The modern day banking holiday in Cyprus....

Levy Link

Given central bank lending at interest in smaller economies, perhaps this is a forecast of mathematical inevitabilities for larger brethren?

Time to hide your money? No interest vs. negative interest

More fruit from the tree of liberalism.

Pretty accurate assessment, I'd say.

Of course you would.

Tell us how safe tobacco use is again.

lol

You can be a dumfk Dan. I never once said it was safe. I presented medical practices as evidence that the whole smear was overblown. I also stated that I wasn't promoting smoking.

so just gfy ............ twice

Awww.

You mad bro?

A person can be wrong about one thing and right about another.

LOL..... There ya have it.

Puppet speaks.

Anyone stupid enough to downplay the dangers of tobacco use is too fuckin' stupid to believe anything from.

Tell you what Jerry - next time you need the straight dope, ask slabby. He's demonstrated his intelligence on many occasions - what with the tobacco danger and punching telephone poles and all. He's obviously right up there with Einstein and Illyrian.

And I thought it were the Irish that were pissed....

I remember when Slaby wrote about the telephone poles, and I always thought that if you had been around at that time things might have been different.

Nah, not with steel spikes wrapped around my knuckles. I mean, we are talking about 50 years ago. Li'l Danny wasn't even around then.....of course if he had been, it wouldn't have been for long.

Huh? slab was punching teiephone poles?? Why were you doing that slab?

BU was/is the last-picked "go long" guy that nobody wanted on their team.

things ain't changed much.......

testing brass knuckles SD

actually was a ww1 knife with steel knuckle ridges

was practicing (not really)

Well?

lol

The phone pole was still there when he was done, so I guess he failed to dispatch his enemy.

Aside from the nonsense following Hank's post, I will add that the idea of the Government seizing ten percent of your current bank account is a sobering thought. Logistically it seems daunting- do they have bank account numbers? Is it just a percentage of a banks holdings? Was there a warrant demanding the bank deliver the info or were the details already known?

Obviously I have only read a few of the articles from web based news but it seems fascinating to me. Is this a history lesson? Should these people have seen it coming? Should WE see it coming?

I would love to see this thread get back to topic.

I guess the phone pole is a secret.

Nevermind...I missed this post.

There has been quite a bit of talk of starting a value added tax, or a national sales tax in this country. The effect on people who have managed to save money would be very similar to what has been proposed in Cypress.


I just hate it when the rules are changed in the middle of the game.

So the people that saved and went without some things get punished and those that spent all without saving get off scott free? That's one way to level the playing field.

Or you could do it this way.

Washington Lawmakers' Pensions: The Envy of a Nation

While extending the payroll tax cut through the end of last year, members of Congress last fall took what many feel was a long overdue whack at the cost of their retirement plan. They bumped up the rate at which federal employees contribute to their pension plan, saving an estimated $15 billion over the next 11 years.

They also made sure that none of the increase applied to themselves.

http://www.dailyfinance.com/2013/03/14/washington-lawmakers-pensions-the-envy-of-a-nation/

Fishy

I thought I read that they backed off the idea now. Wise move, I would say.

The Botching of the Cyprus Bailout: Worse Than Lehman Brothers

Everyone now agrees that Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson badly botched the Lehman Brothers crisis of 2009. But at least he had an excuse. Panicked by the speed of Lehman’s meltdown, he had no time for second thoughts. By comparison the German-led group of EU officials who engineered this weekend’s Cyprus bank bailout don’t have a leg to stand on.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/eamonnfingle...ehman-brothers/

Fishy

Seems a levy being actual bank robbery is gaining international attention....

Putin is Pissed

Maybe 'cause Russian business of the legit and not so legit kind run funds through Cypriot banks, and there are significant cracks in the internat'l banking system. Next stop Italy?

This could get Fast & Furious....

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeub...ed the bailout.

The gun to the head solution....

What will Russia and the BRIC's do in response? Currency wars getting interesting....

I've not been one to run away nor hide from things when the sht hits the fan, but this stuff scares me. Not just the Cypris crisis, because I don't view it as an isolated problem.

Are we really immune? Why don't I see our government putting the brakes on? Have we not reached the time when stopping the debt from growing is a primary concern? Why not?

Somebody will have to pay up at sometime.

The EU systemic cracks are growing rather quickly....



Cyprus is roughly 0.2% of EU GDP. What will happen when this piker inevitably defaults on its EUCB bond holders? What recourse will the well-heeled depositors (with total accounts that likely dwarf the Cypriot GDP) have against this pip squeak country?

It will be interesting to see what the Cypriot government can work out since the parliment voted against the EU proposal.

It won't be a collapse, but a slow crumble, with this incident being just one crumb.

Sad, but spot on.

So much for *trust*....

In Case you Missed Bernanke's response to this question today:

Journalist: I was wondering if you can tell me how if a run on the banks happens in Cyprus, how that might affect U.S. markets. And also is it possible for the U.S. to levy a tax on regular deposits here? Or why not?


Bernanke: As someone mentioned Cyprus is a tiny economy. I don’t think these issues as worrisome as they are and as concerned as we would be for the Cyprus people, I don’t think that they have a direct implications for the U.S. economy.
The only way that they would create a problem would be if the runs became contagious in some sense, if depositors in other countries lost confidence. But to this point I’m not aware of any evidence that that is in fact the case.
The argument the Europeans are making is that Cyprus is a unique situation, very different situation, and indeed, it is quite unusual to have a banking sector as large as they have relative to their economy.
In terms of the United States, the FDIC was founded in 1934, and we have insured deposits and they are very proud of the fact that no one has ever lost a dime in insured deposits.
And during the crisis the response of the government was in fact to increase the level of deposit or account sizes that were insured. So I consider that to be extremely unlikely in the United States.

My Observation:
I was aghast that Bernanke did not make a definitive statement against the ECB and IMF theft. Not surprised especially, but amazed that he did not say something more equivocating. He condoned it, he knows it is an ace up his sleeve (should he need it) and believes that deferring the question with euphemisms will keep the U.S. and Europe cash in deposits intact. An incredible failure due to hubris.

His condoning and equivocation is an UNMISTAKABLE SIGNAL THAT HE VIEWS THIS THEFT AS AN ACCEPTABLE POLICY TOOL.

Period.

Trust me, if anyone in the world pays extra special attention to every syllable that exits his mouth, and what it means or could be interpreted as meaning, It's Bernanke.

Just wait, until it hits the fan.

A trillion dollar coin will fix everything.

Edited.

One could read too much into Bernanke's statement of "the FDIC was founded in 1934, and we have insured deposits and they are very proud of the fact that no one has ever lost a dime in insured deposits."

With the end of the Transaction Account Guarantee program (TAG) deposit insurance on business checking accounts has gone from unlimited to $250,000. Anything over that is not FDIC insured. My bank, and others, have joined up in a system that participates deposits in excess of $250,000 to other member banks to essentially give our clients unlimited FDIC insurance, up to roughly $20 million. While we don't have many participants at this time, that list is growing.

This has been a concern of a number of our clients over the past 6 years of so when the first rumblings of this turmoil started to be felt.

What goes up....

Just my $0.02....

Cyprus invested too heavily in Greek government bonds, much like american banks losing money with the decline of securities based on the failed subprime mortgages bundled in said securities. The Jerrys offered up the levy idea because they are in an election cycle and don't want european investors thinking the Jerrys support bailing out the commies, who are the heavy investors in Cyprus. I say "Fvck 'em."


The real question is, why has no one ever been held accountable in any country for making such poor investments?

So what's the FDIC/TAG insurance coverage on a Cypriot-style levy?

4th amendment, 2nd amendment, and 200+ million firearms.

They have about 3-4 million, not 300 million.

How is gun ownership going to prevent or solve a banking crisis? I'm having a hard time seeing how citizens with guns will take on the corporate police state in the event of run on the banks. Please enlighten me.

With apologies to Socrates, what if just like the depositors in Cyprus, most are lacking both the standing and capacity to make any claim much less one under the Bill of Rights?

“None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.” - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Have you ever heard of Vietnam, or asymmetric warfare? Don't get me wrong I'm not suggesting insurrection, as I believe our path to salvation is the path to the ballot box. I just wanted to point out that history is replete with examples of world powers being defeated through attrition by inferior forces.

I had never heard of the Battle of Athens, thanks for that.

FP,
I really don't think it's quite as depressing as you make it out to be, but yes our situation is depressing.
Our federal government's job is to govern and protect, not to provide food, housing, schooling, etc.
The problem we face is that all government, under both party's leadership has grown too large and powerful, and now it needs to be governed. Also a great deal of the voting public has become accustomed to being provided for, and they are more than willing to make a deal with the "Devil", who is their provider.

I think that I'm going to watch that dog video again; it makes me feel good.

This sums it up for every person....

The finance ministers accepted the plan reached in 10 hours of negotiations in Brussels between Cypriot officials and the so-called troika of creditors: the International Monetary Fund, the European Commission and the European Central Bank.

"We believe that this will form a lasting, durable and fully financed solution," said IMF chief Christine Lagarde.

Under the plan, Cyprus' second-largest bank, Laiki, will be restructured and holders of bank deposits of more than 100,000 euros will have to take losses, Dijsselbloem said, adding that it was not yet clear how severe the losses would be.

"This will have to be worked out in the coming weeks," he added, noting that it is expected to yield 4.2 billion euros overall. Analysts have estimated investors might lose up to 40 percent of their money.


Guess we'll see how big of an EU bank run occurs in the next few days....

So four pages later, we are back to hiding money under the mattress?



I can't see there not being a civil war in Cyprus. There will be alot of people pushed over the edge if they lose 40 percent of their savings.

First it was banks small enough to fail.

Then it was banks too big to fail.

And now it's countries small enough to fail.

Next.......

Anyone ever play the game of Risk? Basically the strategy is to get all of your opponents to fight over every little thing while you sat back and watched and ultimately just cleaned up the pieces. If this was a game of Risk I'd pick China to win

this is what is next Brood:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-03-25/guest-post-say-goodbye-purchasing-power-dollar

...pay very close attention to the time intervals in the first chart.

Looks like the Fed is helping the 1%'rs

I would also like to know how it is that the Fed can finance the gov through the monthly purchase of gov bonds?

"Just like the government itself is a hybrid between a legitimate top level social order institution and an organized crime syndicate."

Your analogy would be funnier if it weren't so true. Fiat currency. When a critical mass believes we are using Monopoly money is when we get to the WTSHTF or also called TEOTWAWKI. When that happens, it's time to garner all weapons, food, and fuel and take refuge in Dogfish's bunker.