Comments on: Are German banks in worse shape than the French?

By: Golem XIV - Thoughts

Golem XIV - Thoughts — Mon, 23 May 2011 10:46:00 +0000

Ken,

I know how you feel. I think we all do.

By: Ken

Ken — Mon, 23 May 2011 09:57:18 +0000

@Golum, @Pat @wirplit I swear, you guys! I dunno, I think I threw up my breakfast, I dunno, I was blaming the dog I don't have, my son woke me up on the couch, holy crap, what a way to start a day. Its two days later, I'm back at the scene of the crime and wirplit posts that link. I'm done, I'm finding sand for my head.

By: Golem XIV - Thoughts

Golem XIV - Thoughts — Sun, 22 May 2011 16:21:11 +0000

Mark,

I laughed and then I cried and then I laughed again before having to go and lie down for a while. I would say thanks for making clear just how..how...how I can't even find the word... but I'm not sure that 'thanks' is right either.

By: Mark Wadsworth

Mark Wadsworth — Sun, 22 May 2011 13:47:47 +0000

Interestingly, "muni" is a word used in Switzerland for "bull" (the animal).

What Pat highlights above is the same the world over.

Labour came up with these PFI scheme because they said the private sector was cheaper or more efficient (which it probably is). The problem is the private sector is also better at negotiating than the government and so the taxpayer ended up overpaying enormously for the same old crap.

Of course, these PFI deals ended up being highly leveraged, so after the credit crunch, they didn't make profits for the lucky winners of contracts. So Mandelson said (in all seriousness) the government should offer the PFI providers taxpayer subsidised low interest loans as well just to keep the Ponzi scheme going.

FFS, if the PFI people can only provide things more cheaply if they are given subsidies, then the whole thing is a joke.

By: wirplit

wirplit — Sun, 22 May 2011 10:32:44 +0000

The Germans seems to have the idea ( although its hard to tell from here) that they are somehow more virtuous than the rest of Europe especially those pesky southerners. Your brilliant uncovering work undermines that jolly lederhosen viewpoint. I hope Angela is reading it.
By the way Have you seen this? A rundown on likely events What happens when Greece defaults

By: allcoppedout

allcoppedout — Sun, 22 May 2011 00:04:16 +0000

In all this, it has become hugely expensive to do simple things, as we have to pay 'professionals' for almost non-existent services like conveyancing and estate agency – let alone £200K a year to not deal very effectively with 'nuisance families'. It's like playing Monopoly with a banker who's brought in secret stash of Monopoly money in his back pocket, whilst betting real money on the outcome.

By: Golem XIV - Thoughts

Golem XIV - Thoughts — Sat, 21 May 2011 17:27:12 +0000

Pat,

Good grief Pat! What a sordid example.

By: bill

bill — Sat, 21 May 2011 14:20:25 +0000

As ever Golem your understatement amuses me. The point is that all the formerly AAA rated Greek junk has been used as collatoral for God knows how many more loans and is, of course, on these banks' books marked to model.

Greece is a minnow in world terms, a tadpole in a large pond. Yet the domino effect of such a small player failing is palpable. I have to ask is it a race between the US and EU to crash their currency first.

The whole financial world seems to be a competion measured in high farce.

bill40

By: myopia

myopia — Sat, 21 May 2011 09:30:46 +0000

I guess however it will be politically more acceptable for the Germans to bail out their own banks than to bail out Greece's crony state.

By: Pat Flannery

Pat Flannery — Sat, 21 May 2011 05:52:49 +0000

Golem,

A personal experience I had in the San Diego City Council Chamber a few years ago would tend to confirm your suspicions. I was giving public testimony against a $102m "lease-lease" bond the City was proposing to issue.

Lease-lease is where a city creates "revenue" to support a phony revenue bond by leasing something back to itself. In that particular case the City of San Diego was leasing back a number of its municipal water pumping stations to itself and servicing the bond debt through increased water rates. The $102m was just one of many. It had already "leased" its police stations, bridges, you name it.

I approached the bond counsel who had just testified before City Council that this was perfectly legal and that every city in America was doing it. I asked him how in the world the bond markets would buy such junk. He smilingly told me that the money came from the Fed through foreign banks. In other words financial insiders like himself knew that there were fortunes to be made peddling these phony municipal bonds to foreign banks who were borrowing the money from the United States Federal Reserve.

Since then these insiders have funded the Presidential campaign of an apparent black reformer, who is really their Harvard and Yale trained puppet, who then appointed another trained puppet, Tim Geightner, as Treasury Secretary. In other words a financial coup d'état.

Now the dollar is strengthening and the euro weakening as the same market insiders pick the winners - Wall Street of course. They now control the full economic power of the American Government plus its military. These guys play to win. And the Euro is not in trouble?