A&G's AIG Moment Approaching: Moody's Downgrades Generali, Cuts Megainsurer Allianz Outlook To Negative
For a while now we have said that the very weakest link in Europe is not the banks, not the ECB, not triggered CDS, and not even the shadow banking system (well, infinitely rehypothecated Greek bonds within a daisychain of broker-dealers, which ultimately ends up at the ECB at a negligible repo discount, that could well be the weakest link - we will have more to say about this over the weekend) but two very specific insurers: Italy's mega insurer Assecurazioni Generali, which at last check had more Greek bonds as a % of TSF than anyone else, and Europe's biggest insurer and Pimco parent, Allianz, which is filled to the gills with pretty much everything (for more on Generali, or as we like to call it by its CDS ticker ASSGEN read here, here, here, and here). Well, Moody's just gave them, and the entire European space, the evil eye, and soon the layering of margin calls upon margin calls, especially if and when Greece defaults and a third of ASSGEN's balance sheet is found to be insolvent, will make anyone who still is long CDS those two names rich. Assuming of course the Fed steps in and bails out the counterparty the CDS was purchased from.
from The Economic Collapse Blog:
You
might not want to read this article if you have a weak stomach. Most
Americans have absolutely no idea what is going on in the dark corners
of America, and when people find out the truth it can come as quite a
shock. Many of you will not believe some of the things Americans are
doing just to survive. Some families are living in sewers and drain
tunnels, some families are living in tents, some families are living in
their cars, some families will make ketchup soup for dinner tonight and
some families are even eating rats. Some homeless shelters in America
are so overloaded that they are actually sending people out to live in
the woods. As you read this, there are close to 50 million Americans
that are living below the poverty line, and that number rises a little
bit more every single day. America was once known as the greatest
nation on earth, but now there is decay and economic despair almost
everywhere you look. Yes, money certainly cannot buy happiness, but the
lack of it sure can bring a lot of pain. As the economy continues to
decline, the suffering that we see all around us is going to get a lot
worse, and that is a very frightening thing to think about.
Read More @ TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
You
might not want to read this article if you have a weak stomach. Most
Americans have absolutely no idea what is going on in the dark corners
of America, and when people find out the truth it can come as quite a
shock. Many of you will not believe some of the things Americans are
doing just to survive. Some families are living in sewers and drain
tunnels, some families are living in tents, some families are living in
their cars, some families will make ketchup soup for dinner tonight and
some families are even eating rats. Some homeless shelters in America
are so overloaded that they are actually sending people out to live in
the woods. As you read this, there are close to 50 million Americans
that are living below the poverty line, and that number rises a little
bit more every single day. America was once known as the greatest
nation on earth, but now there is decay and economic despair almost
everywhere you look. Yes, money certainly cannot buy happiness, but the
lack of it sure can bring a lot of pain. As the economy continues to
decline, the suffering that we see all around us is going to get a lot
worse, and that is a very frightening thing to think about.Read More @ TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
Doug Casey: Is A US-Iran War Inevitable?
Previously we presented some alternative thoughts to the mainstream misperception of the Iranian "isolation" by some of its biggest oil trading partners. Unlike others, we simply believe that the gulf nation, together with the new axis of anti-USD (as confirmed once again earlier today) is simply preparing itself for a barter based economy, or alternatively, one with commoditized intermediates. However, this ignores the likelihood of geopolitical instability caused by intervening US and Israeli interest in the region. Below are some thoughts from Doug Casey of Casey Research on the likelihood of another full blown shooting war erupting in the Persian Gulf, as well as his thoughts on how one may prepare for such a contingency.PIMCO,Texas Teacher Reitrement Fund &Soros buys into GLD/Greek bailout no further ahead as potential delay in implementation/ Portugal
Harvey Organ at Harvey Organ's - The Daily Gold and Silver Report - 1 hour ago
Good
evening Ladies and Gentlemen:
Gold closed up today by $10.70 to $1726.60 by comex closing time.
Silver was ambushed by our bankers after being up considerably during
the early part of the comex session. Silver's final comex resting price
was $33.39 up only 7 cents. It was close to $34.00 at the second London
fix. As I pointed out to you on previous commentaries the bankers do
not like
SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - "It's All Upside From Here"
Volume Soars As Rally Ends
As
AAPL dominates the headlines for its dramatic 5% reversal intraday and
biggest drop in over two months, perhaps it is worth pointing out that
the lacking volumes have returned with a flourish. ES (the e-mini S&P futures contract) saw its heaviest volume since this mid-December rally began (30% above average)
as our recent pontification on the messages from the credit market
(along with the rhythmic periodicity of the rally's size and length) may
be starting to wear on investors' risk appetites. After European
credit markets accelerated to the downside today, US investment grade and high-yield credit was not buying any of the overnight rally in stock futures
and moved wide of yesterday's pre-Samaras rally out of the gate. Stocks
surged upwards, tracking uber-stock AAPL but as chatter of a NASDAQ
rebalance sent game-theorists scrambling to migrate, AAPL's slump
dragged everything down (sadly) with ES stalling at the pre-China rumor
level before falling to pre-Samaras levels from yesterday's lows. A
lack of rumors and no QE mention from FOMC minutes along with
lackluster news from the Eurogroup did nothing to rescue the situation
as EURUSD ended on its lows (-1% on the week now) and USD Strength saw carry trades dragging stocks down. Interestingly, post-FOMC
Treasuries came off their best levels in the afternoon (even as stocks
were tanking) but we saw Gold rallying (in the face of a stronger USD)
- does make one wonder on where the safety trade is now. WTI
closed near its highs of the day (over $102) and as we noted earlier
Brent in EUR closed at record highs as Copper is -1.3% on the week and
Silver is tracking USD -0.75% or so on the week.Greek President (And Nazi Resistance Fighter) Lashes Out At "German Boot" For Pushing Country To The Brink
The following extract from a Bloomberg article suggests that the German mission of getting Greece to file for bankruptcy on its own, thus removing the perception that Europe has given up on the first (of many) terminal patient, own has almost succeeded. "Greek President Karolos Papoulias slammed Germany’s finance minister for recent comments about his country as stalled bailout talks stoked tensions between Greece and the northern European countries funding its rescue. “I don’t accept insults to my country by Mr. Schaeuble,” Papoulias, who fought in the resistance against the Nazis during World War II, said in a speech today. “I don’t accept it as a Greek. Who is Mr. Schaeuble to ridicule Greece? Who are the Dutch? Who are the Finns? We always had the pride to defend not just our own freedom, not just our own country, but the freedom of all of Europe."What is better than a one-front European war on insolvency? Why two-fronts of course. But not before many "soothing" words are uttered (no really). From Reuters: "Portugal's international lenders arrived in Lisbon on Wednesday to review the country's bailout, with soothing words of support likely to dominate as Europe gropes for success stories to counteract its interminable Greek headache. As the euro zone's second weakest link, Portugal's ability to ride out its debt crisis will be key to Europe's claim that Greece is a unique case. Despite a groundswell of concerns that Portugal - like Greece - may eventually have to restructure its aid programme, the third inspection of Lisbon's economic performance in the context of its ongoing 78-billion-euro rescue should make that contention clear. "The review will be all about peace and harmony," said Filipe Garcia, head of Informacao de Mercados Financeiros consultants. "The important thing for Europe is to isolate Portugal from Greece, to put it out of Greece's way in case of a default or even an exit from the euro." That makes sense - after all even Venizelos just told Greece that the country is not Italy. And if that fails, the Don of bailouts, Dr Strangeschauble will just give the country will blessing to use a few billion in cash. Oh but wait. It can't. Because as as we pointed out in late January, and as the market has so conveniently chosen to forget, Portugal, unlike Greece, has simple, clean and efficient negative pledge language in its non-local law bonds. Which means "no can do" to any additional bailouts under its current capitalization. Which may very well mean that Portugal is stuck with its existing balance sheet unless the country succeeds in doing an exchange offer which takes out all UK- and other strong-protection bonds. All of them. And as Greece has shown, that is just not going to happen.
Brent Priced In EUR At Record Highs
Presented with little comment except to note that the fact that the price of Brent Crude in its local Euro currency has broken all-time highs from July 2008 - which we are sure won't impact the already recessionary environment facing many European nations.Who Says Government Can't Create Jobs?
As
the NFP print from two weeks ago proved (), the US is
gaining jobs rapidly. Of course the argument that government cannot
create jobs remains (just ask the 100,000s of Wall Streeters looking for
blogs to write for thanks to Dodd-Frank perhaps?). Bloomberg's
outstanding Chart of the Day sums it all up nicely as the incredible
rise in Financial Regulators continues. Since 2004, the number of federal employees at financial regulators will have almost doubled to 20,805 in 2013 -
with the FDIC dominating the gains. What is also interesting is
DoubleLine's Gundlach's recent observation (via Cato) that Federal
employees earn almost twice what private employees do on average. Well
done government.Dear daily readers....you know better...
by Mac Slavo, SHTFPlan.com:
President
Obama defends his deficit spending and handling of the economic crisis
in an interview with WAGA-TV, arguing that everybody – experts,
economists, analysts and advisers – all underestimated the severity of
the downturn:
CNBC’s Rick Santelli discusses President Obama seeking higher taxes on big business and why this is wrong for the economy.
President
Obama defends his deficit spending and handling of the economic crisis
in an interview with WAGA-TV, arguing that everybody – experts,
economists, analysts and advisers – all underestimated the severity of
the downturn:
“Well we’re not there because this recession turned out to be a lot deeper than any of us realized.”
“Everybody who is out there back in 2009,
if you look back what their estimates were in terms of how many jobs
had been lost, how bad the economy had contracted when I took office, everybody underestimated it.
People thought that the economy contracted 3%. It turns it retracted
close to 9%. We lost 8 million jobs just in a year’s span, about half a
year before I took office and half a year after I took office,” Obama
said.
“So, the die had been cast, but a lot of us didn’t understand at that point how bad it was going to get.
That increases the deficit because less tax revenues come in, and it
means that more people are getting unemployment insurance, we’re helping
states more so they don’t layoff teachers, etc. The key though is we’re
setting ourselves on a path where we can get our debt under control.”
Read More @ SHTFPlan.comCNBC’s Rick Santelli discusses President Obama seeking higher taxes on big business and why this is wrong for the economy.
from The Daily Bell:
Egypt’s cold shoulder … A sudden new wave of anti-Americanism is thriving in Cairo … As 16 U.S. citizens await trial in Egypt for accepting foreign financing to promote democracy, for the first time in more than 30 years there is a serious debate in Washington about whether to end the $1.3-billion annual military assistance to Cairo. There’s no debate in Egypt, however. More than 70% of Egyptians, according to a recent Gallup poll, no longer want U.S. funding. Facing extreme challenges at home and in need of distractions, anti-Americanism has become Cairo’s preferred populist recourse. Although a solution might be found for this particular controversy — with or without U.S. foreign assistance — this bilateral dynamic assures that the next crisis is not far off. – Los Angeles Times
Dominant Social Theme: The Muslim Brotherhood is a bad and radical organization. Now they’ve emerged from nowhere to challenge the United States and the larger West. Bad luck, eh? Who could have known?
Free-Market Analysis: In a series of groundbreaking articles (beep, beep, alert: self-promotion ahead!) we have tried established (with some success in our view) that the Anglosphere power elite has been using the State Department and the US military to overthrow secular Middle Eastern and African regimes.
Read More @ TheDailyBell.com
Egypt’s cold shoulder … A sudden new wave of anti-Americanism is thriving in Cairo … As 16 U.S. citizens await trial in Egypt for accepting foreign financing to promote democracy, for the first time in more than 30 years there is a serious debate in Washington about whether to end the $1.3-billion annual military assistance to Cairo. There’s no debate in Egypt, however. More than 70% of Egyptians, according to a recent Gallup poll, no longer want U.S. funding. Facing extreme challenges at home and in need of distractions, anti-Americanism has become Cairo’s preferred populist recourse. Although a solution might be found for this particular controversy — with or without U.S. foreign assistance — this bilateral dynamic assures that the next crisis is not far off. – Los Angeles Times
Dominant Social Theme: The Muslim Brotherhood is a bad and radical organization. Now they’ve emerged from nowhere to challenge the United States and the larger West. Bad luck, eh? Who could have known?
Free-Market Analysis: In a series of groundbreaking articles (beep, beep, alert: self-promotion ahead!) we have tried established (with some success in our view) that the Anglosphere power elite has been using the State Department and the US military to overthrow secular Middle Eastern and African regimes.
Read More @ TheDailyBell.com
by Graham Summers, GainsPainsCapital.com:
[...] As noted in Monday’s essay, the Federal Reserve and world Central Banks, by loosening monetary policy and spending money in order to combat their dreaded debt deflation, have unleashed inflation upon the financial system.
This is happening both blatantly in the form of prices being raised:
[...] As noted in Monday’s essay, the Federal Reserve and world Central Banks, by loosening monetary policy and spending money in order to combat their dreaded debt deflation, have unleashed inflation upon the financial system.
This is happening both blatantly in the form of prices being raised:
Food prices hit record highs in 2011
The price of basic
foodstuffs hit a record high in 2011, with the cost of cereals surging
by more than a third over the last 12 months, the UN’s Food and
Agriculture Organisation said on Thursday.
The FAO said that its
monthly Food Price Index averaged 228 points in 2011, the highest level
since records began in 1990, although prices did slide by some 2.4
percent in December. The previous high was in 2008 at 200 points.
Read More @ GainsPainsCapital.com
by Jeff Nielson, Bullion Bulls Canada:
It
has become increasingly difficult to engage in credible economic
analysis, especially with respect to the U.S. economy. The problem: ever
more limited sources of uncorrupted data, while the farcical “official
statistics” have long since been totally divorced from the real world.
Fortunately we have been presented with some raw, uncorrupted data which demonstrates in conclusive terms that the U.S. economy is literally shriveling before our eyes: a 21st century economy with plummeting energy consumption, and even a declining use of electricity.
As I was sifting through all of Bloomberg’s propaganda on the latest U.S. trade numbers (and trying to latch onto a few facts), I came across one very peculiar passage:
Read More @ BullionBullsCanada.com
It
has become increasingly difficult to engage in credible economic
analysis, especially with respect to the U.S. economy. The problem: ever
more limited sources of uncorrupted data, while the farcical “official
statistics” have long since been totally divorced from the real world.Fortunately we have been presented with some raw, uncorrupted data which demonstrates in conclusive terms that the U.S. economy is literally shriveling before our eyes: a 21st century economy with plummeting energy consumption, and even a declining use of electricity.
As I was sifting through all of Bloomberg’s propaganda on the latest U.S. trade numbers (and trying to latch onto a few facts), I came across one very peculiar passage:
Read More @ BullionBullsCanada.com
by Pete Papaherakles, AmericanFreePress.net:
Could
gaining control of the Central Bank of the Islamic Republic of Iran
(CBI) be one of the main reasons that Iran is being targeted by Western
and Israeli powers? As tensions are building up for an unthinkable war
with Iran, it is worth exploring Iran’s banking system compared to its
U.S., British and Israeli counterparts.
Some researchers are pointing out that Iran is one of only three countries left in the world whose central bank is not under Rothschild control. Before 9-11 there were reportedly seven: Afghanistan, Iraq, Sudan, Libya, Cuba, North Korea and Iran. By 2003, however, Afghanistan and Iraq were swallowed up by the Rothschild octopus, and by 2011 Sudan and Libya were also gone. In Libya, a Rothschild bank was established in Benghazi while the country was still at war.
Read More @ AmericanFreePress.net
Could
gaining control of the Central Bank of the Islamic Republic of Iran
(CBI) be one of the main reasons that Iran is being targeted by Western
and Israeli powers? As tensions are building up for an unthinkable war
with Iran, it is worth exploring Iran’s banking system compared to its
U.S., British and Israeli counterparts.Some researchers are pointing out that Iran is one of only three countries left in the world whose central bank is not under Rothschild control. Before 9-11 there were reportedly seven: Afghanistan, Iraq, Sudan, Libya, Cuba, North Korea and Iran. By 2003, however, Afghanistan and Iraq were swallowed up by the Rothschild octopus, and by 2011 Sudan and Libya were also gone. In Libya, a Rothschild bank was established in Benghazi while the country was still at war.
Read More @ AmericanFreePress.net
by Lesley Wroughton, Reuters:
(Reuters)
– World Bank President Robert Zoellick said on Wednesday he will step
down in June, raising questions as to whether the United States will for
the first time throw open the job it has always claimed as its own.
“I’m honored to have led such a world class institution with so many talented and exceptional people,” Zoellick said in a statement announcing his plans. Earlier, he had met with the World Bank’s 25-member board to inform them of his decision.
Speculation has been rife in recent months over who might take the job when Zoellick departs. Possible U.S. candidates include Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and former White House economic adviser Larry Summers.
Zoellick, a Republican, would potentially be a strong candidate for a senior position if a Republican takes the White House in presidential elections in November.
Read More @ Reuters.com
“I’m honored to have led such a world class institution with so many talented and exceptional people,” Zoellick said in a statement announcing his plans. Earlier, he had met with the World Bank’s 25-member board to inform them of his decision.
Speculation has been rife in recent months over who might take the job when Zoellick departs. Possible U.S. candidates include Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and former White House economic adviser Larry Summers.
Zoellick, a Republican, would potentially be a strong candidate for a senior position if a Republican takes the White House in presidential elections in November.
Read More @ Reuters.com
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