So the ignoble wrangling over the American debt ceiling is over. An agreement is reached and the market reaction was to promptly sell everything. The Dow fell 2.19, the Nasdaq fell 2.75 and the S&P fell 2.56. So that’s what ‘victory’ over the debt ceiling looks like. Both sides were after all claiming a victory and a good deal for America. I’m tempted to ask, whose America?
The markets know this was not any kind of solution. It was the opening salvo in a re-election campaign. The Republicans have merely ensured that the whole crisis can be visited upon the White House again closer to the elections.
And after all what was all the wrangling when one clears away the shameful deceits of party political posturing? Each side, Democrat and Republican with the Tea Party in there to add extra zest and drama, claimed to be fighting for a noble principle and a vision of America’s future. All sides were lying. There was no great principle at stake nor any differing visions. On one side were those who wanted to pile yet more debt on the backs of America’s tax payers – and not in order to support the tax payers particularly, but to pay for more QE for the banks. And on the other side were those who felt the proper use of the American tax payer was to cut all services to them, such as welfare, but still expect them to pay their taxes and for a cherry on the top to cut taxes for the wealthier.
So any way I look at it what I see is two groups broadly agreed on who to help and protect – the bankers and financial class (themselves and their friends) – and agreed on who should pay – the broad base of America’s working and lower middle class, their only disagreement was over how to extract the money and where to place the burden. Should it be via more debt to be paid off or via savage cuts to any social or infrastructure programme. Should we flog the lower classes or drown them? Decisions decisions.
The slight problem is that while the two political teams will fight for the right to be Betrayer in Chief, Wall Street and its rulers do not much care which party is in charge since they will buy the services of whichever gimp is elected.
And so while it makes all kinds of political in-fighting sense to re-run this battle again when even more political capital can be made from it, it makes less sense in Wall Street. Sure there will be opportunities for those with the best inside knowledge to make a killing, but the risks of volatility spilling over and getting out of control are already far too high.
The currency markets internationally are dangerously out of control.
Meanwhile in Europe we are playing our own fanfare of failure.
What was always going to happen is now starting. We were a badly holed ship but instead of closing the bulk heads, flushing the debt out of the flooded compartments of Greek, Irish, Spanish, German, French and Italian banking, and then repairing the holes, our leaders, those living it up on the upper decks, decided that the loss of those valuable compartments would curtail their party and opted instead to pump the ingress of debts from the banks to other larger rooms. The section of the ship from which we pumped seemed to rise fractionally, or at least the water level, it was claimed, was going down, and the ship, we were assured could deal with the extra cargo now being ‘safely’ stored for later disposal in two private rooms marked ECB and EFSF.
Sadly the holes, unfixed, are larger than was admitted, the flood is still coming in, the pumps are at capacity and the new store rooms, the ECB and EFSF, are filling up rapidly. In fact the EFSF is now flooded.
OK enough of the tortured analogy.
The EFSF (European Financial Stability Facility) is in trouble. Double trouble in fact. In an attempt to calm the debt markets by words alone (the European way) the rules of the EFSF were changed recently. The new rule said,
“To improve the effectiveness of the EFSF and address contagion, we agree to increase the flexibility of the EFSF, allowing it to intervene in the secondary markets on the basis of an ECB analysis recognizing the existence of exceptional circumstances and a unanimous decision of the EFSF Member States.”
First the “exceptional circumstances” have been exceptional now for over a year at least and show absolutely no signs of ever returning to ‘normal’. Simply because nothing is being done to address the root cause. The flood of bad debts. Pumping them into larger and larger rooms in the ship was never a solution.
Second their non-solution is a failure even in its own stupid terms. The extra ability to intervene has to be agreed unanimously, and so the markets have quite logically concluded it would never actually happen until the disaster was too overwhelming for it to make a difference anyway. This is why, I think, the cost of insuring Italian and Spanish debt has shot up to record levels in the last week. It seems clear that the markets don’t believe the EFSF will work.
Third you have to look at how the EFSF is funded. These things get created, given names and buildings, their functionaries get titles, plush offices and salaries paid from our taxes, and their words are duly reported as edicts from some new power in the land. But the EFSF has no money nor any power of its own.
The EFSF exists on the basis of promises made by EFSF’s backers and with the amounts of money they have pledged. It is their pledges, promises and their financial strength which gave the EFSF its AAA rating and allow it to act as Europe’s version of the IMF. Here is a list of the EFSF’s backers with the amounts they have pledged.
You’ll note that some of those backers are also the same countries who are bankrupt. Problem number three. I have highlighted those countries already bankrupt and those whom the world knows are one short step away from needing rescuing.
You can see that Ireland and Greece are not major backers and so their relegation form backer to beggar is not erminal for the EFSF. But take out Spain and Italy from the list of backers and have them take money out rather than putting money in and “Berlin, we have a problem.”
This is what is meant when people say the cost of bailing out Europe is going to fall increasingly upon Germany and France. Ireland is not going to stump up more money for the EFSF. Nor is Greece nor Cyprus. And who is going to be so stupid as to think that all is well if Spain and Italy give money with one hand and “stand fully behind” the EFSF while also nipping round the other side of the counter to stand in line in order to take far more money out, with the other hand?
The EFSF has €440 billion. Everyone inside and outside the EFSF has already admitted this is not enough. And that was before Italy joined the general collapse. Who will give the EFSF the hundreds more billions teh banks are saying will be a necessary minimum?
Contagion is not an ‘if’ nor even a ‘when’. It is already a fact. The only questions are who’s already infected, how badly and who is next?
Contagion is the dark twin to ‘We’re all in this together”. Let’s just take one example but a relevant one – UniCredit. I could just as easily use Santander but not today.
UniCredit is in all kinds of trouble. Its vast US subsidiary, Pioneer, is the Marie Celeste. I do not believe it is long for this world as a going and profitable concern. But it is in Europe that the infection is most advanced. UniCredit has had trading in its shares suspended time after time on the Italian Bourse because of massive and unstoppable losses in the last few weeks. In the last few days the other main Italian banks also had trading in their shares suspended. Why now? Because of what I wrote about a few days ago – Support Uplift – the support a bank has from its national government. Italy’s government is in a bad way. There is talk of the head of the Italian Central Bank, Mr Draghi, being asked to head a new government of national unity to steer a perilous course through the present crisis. How this would work with him also becoming the new head of the ECB I have no idea.
UniCredit and the Italian Financial sector will not survive if Italy is perceived as not being able to support them. But if Italy itself has to go with a begging bowl to the EFSF then how much confidence can investors have in the future stability of UniCredit? The answer is there every day on the Italian Bourse – and it is “Not much.”
But if UniCredit were to implode and need rescuing would this be Italy’s problem only?
UniCredit own Austria’s largest bank – Bank Austria. I know that there are already political concerns in the Austrian Parliament that UniCredit’s troubles would hammer Austria. And they’re correct. It would.
It would also hammer Ireland and Bavaria because UniCredit also owns what was HVB (HypoVereins Bank). HVB is big in both Ireland where it has a major part of its operations and in Bavaria where it came from.
Bank Austria is also perhaps the largest player in banking in Eastern and South Eastern Europe. Were UniCredit to collapse it would set off a line of depth charges from Greece , through the Balkans, further East and up the Adriatic as well.
The plan is failing, as it was always going to. It is starting to pick up speed. Can the European powers regain control? How much longer before the German voters rebel? How much more uncertainty and fear will the coming Spanish election create? How much stronger will the Swiss franc become as a ‘safe haven’ alternative to the Euro before no level of Swiss Central bank intervention has any effect and the franc gets so strong it kills countries like Hungary stone dead?
And before I go, transfer what we have said about the EFSF to the IMF. The IMF has been around, hurting people, for so long it almost seems a fixture. It has also recently been given the power to issue its own bonds. Both of which make the IMF seem like a power in this world in its own right. But it is not. The IMF is actually not unlike the EFSF – it is not a country with a tax base of its own – it has to be funded and most of that funding relies on the assurance that behind the IMF lies real power and real financial clout. The IMF’s sugar daddy has always been America. The IMF’s power was that it was seen as a projection and arm of American power.
But America is broke and living off a parabolic rail gun trajectory of increasing debt. At what point in the ruination of America will the IMF be seen for what it is, America’s version of the EFSF?
The IMF is not the lender and disciplinarian of last resort. It is the ideological bully of last resort paid for principally by America. If America itself starts to lose control of its own debts (which I think it already has) then the IMF is just another larger hollow colossus and its guarantees of help will be questioned and discounted exactly as may soon happen to the EFSF.
How unutterably and exceedingly depressing.
Hi Gollum, hope your situation is better. Thanks again for putting in focus my scrambled thoughts. I would hope that the credibility of the bunch of back slapping assholes who recently announced they had it all sorted, might start to be further questioned as the situation unravels further. I have been following the march to Brussels for a rally in October, by the Spanish "Indignant". At the present pace of change, it will be fascinating to see what the situation will be like by the time they get there, & what support they will pick up along the way.
https://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/notes/15m-marcha-bruselas/necesidades-de-la-marcha-gente-que-se-incorpore-y-gentes-de-los-alrededores-de-l/118023624961452
On another point, David Norris has been forced out of the Aras election, am I right in thinking he was someone who took WhistlebowerIRL seriously ?
I thought for a minute that the amounts the backers of the EFSF was in 1000s not billions, I was going to send them a tenner.
I'd like to join steviefinn in wishing you well.
Thanks for keeping up with the blogging during tough times. Still makes for essential reading.
Hello Steviefinn,
Yes, Norris was the onoly one who actually tried to do something about the WhistelblowerIRL situation. Norris was also the ONLY one who tried twice to get the Irish government to discuss who the Bond holders of Anglo Irish Bank actually were. Twice he tried to read out the list of Bond holders and twice was silenced.
Whatever else, he was one of the very few to stand up and fight for the ordinary people of Ireland.
As for that tenner they will need it before long.
Jamie,
thank you.
And thanks Stevie. I should have said so in my response to you.
I am trying to read the US situation. It is not that easy, but I have a sense that there is a major political impasse developing, even larger than the one we have seen over the debt ceiling.
Pressure is building inexorably, although the capacity to absorb pressure in the US is rather prodigious, partly due to the resources
(wealth) it already has, and the resources (and space) and labour flexibility it still enjoys, and the capacity of the population to see their problems as internal, rather than describe them as what they really are, essentially political and economic externalities.
I think the US is quite resilient and has a considerable capacity for re-invention-like a phoenix. And just as important, I think a lot of Americans believe the idea that America is capable of enduring the pains of a 're-birth'.
The TP 'ers are basically saying-"Bring on the death – and re-birth. Provoke an 'end time' and let the truly virtuous (the honest,sturdy, independent minded) emerge from the ashes of the current undoubtedly corrupt system.
Obama has played so directly into this script it is difficult to believe he is not following a pre-determined script. We appear to be in the moments before the crash, when the perception of time slows down.
in some sense the Tea partiers are like the canaries squeaking in the cage about the toxicity of the political environment in the US. That doesn't mean that the canaries have a clue what is really going on.
The interesting thing is that they are very radical, and they have targeted the Republican party and made considerable inroads. A lot of interesting
politics will now happen. How will the debt agreement be seen by them? Will the Tea party continue to pressurise for more right wing tea partiers? i.e more of the same, seeking to overturn the squalor of Washington squalor politics through the electoral system, or will the movement seek other ways to project its influence. I sense that they will be 'disappointed' that their political wing in congress have fudged the deal and will simply regard it as further evidence of the decrepitude of the Washington political show
Analogies are a bit dangerous but I see the Tea Party as Schizophrenic aunt in a family, and as anyone who knows anything about schizophrenia there are few more disruptive conditions than schizophrenia to social order( maybe a wild, binging drunk).
The problem s that the TP enjoys much secret regard for its open contempt for social liberalism.
The Tea Party movement in the US is quite crucial, as I am sure everyone knows. Again it is difficult to pin this down, as the active TP people are not that many, but many Americans basically sympathise with their ideas about liberalism (what is mistakenly called socialism by TP'ers). They are the equivalent of the woman, Gillian Duffy secretly despised by the political elite, and called a bigot by Gordon Brown, the tragedy being that she was his natural supporter.
The anxiety about the speed of change in her social environment was justified, even if it was expressed in a clumsy way.
I know exactly the kind of background that Gordon Brown emerged from, and this empathy failure (or the blatant hypocrisy of his dealings with the woman) revealed the degree of failure of politics and political people.
For Gordon Brown it was much more of a failure than if it hard been done by Champagne Charlie (Mandelson), because, within the Labour party, he represented the very person whose distress and anxiety he dismissed as bigotry, while he thought he was not being heard. He fell very hard and fast from that point, although there were many previous signs of his personal political failure.
I am pretty sure that there are many democrats who are very disillusioned by the moral collapse and failure of politics which the debt ceiling fiasco reveals. In many ways the British situation is an (admittedly distorted) mirror microcosm of US politics.
There is a much more general antipathy to immigration than is revealed by the TP anti-islamism ravings, a symbol ( or scapegoat) of the much more general sense of wanting to find reasons for the rapid change in what seems like abiding economic realities, such as decent career opportunities for young people. (It is very disconcerting to go into a restaurant and be served by young people, graduates, (and even 'masters' level) who are scraping a living on table tips. (What is happening to all the non-graduates who represent 50% of the population).
I think it is very easy to see why there is a growing fury.
The MacPuddoc,
thank you for a very valuable analysis. I'd be interested to hear more of your thoughts on this.
thanks golem
One of the things i can't quite get my head around is Obama.( and i am not alone)
I think he is basically a mediator, or sees himself as the calming oil on troubled waters but i think that approach has failed. His ultimate responsibility as President, never mind the party politics, is to serve the whole nation, but especially to ensure that the least advantaged are not ground into the dust, and to preserve some basic assumptions about the special qualities of American democracy.His mediation has just looked like (and probably been) a caving in to pressure from all sides.
He campaigned on 'change' but he has revealed himself as incapable of standing up to the many vested interests that operate. His mediation has just resulted in him looking weak.
He has now alienated all the meaningful components of American politics apart from the most compliant and complacent.
I doubt if he has even maintained the entire support of African Americans. I am sure he will get votes, but swing states such as Ohio are basically lost to him. I really cannot see how he can win a majority if the republicans remain reasonably 'solid'. That is by no means assured of course. The Tea party is creating real strains within the Republican party but i suspect the TP types will pretend to ally with the long established GOP types to gain power, and then provoke some power struggle, with the aim of purging the Republican party of its 'decadent' tendencies. (somehow-not sure how this will happen ). At some point real lines will have to be drawn, as at that point, i suspect some really serious pain will be imposed, by the mad mullah Taliban TP types.either that or their 'foreign policies' will become entirely detached from reality.
Strangely, the seriousness of the situation has been marked by the conspicuous silence of, and disinterest in, Sarah Palin. I suspect she was some kind of political stalking horse and she has been sidelined, having served her purpose of providing a ' nice face' for much more sinister forces.
But many a slip twixt cup and lip. Who knows what stunts Obama will pull to save his situation.
"In fact, the tensions in bond markets reflect a growing concern among investors about the systemic capacity of the euro area to respond to the evolving crisis," Barroso said in a statement.
But neither he nor European Monetary Affairs Commissioner Olli Rehn offered any immediate steps to stem the crisis….
MacPuddock
These exact issues have also concerned me and so I have been looking out for posts that credibly explain what's really going on.
The first I will offer is from the always excellent Yves Smith of Naked Capitalism. That it cost inordinate amount of money to get elected to any post in the US is well known and this cannot be good for the health of the system. What I had not realised is that there is another layer to it as she outlines.
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/04/our-polarized-and-money-driven-congress-created-over-25-years-by-republicans.html
In the 1980s Gingrich et al introduced a system of "pay to play" into Congress. In brief, they made fundraising for the Party a precondition for appointment to committee posts. In effect they introduced a price list for office holders within Congress.
So, not only did it cost to get elected in the first place, it now cost to climb the slippery pole of political office. And it cost lots.
The inevitable result was that it gave financiers/plutocrats immense additional influence in the halls of power. And moreover this influence was not/is not nearly as visible to the public as the original election.
This approach worked financially for the GOP so it was soon adopted by the Democrats to their eternal shame. So now both parties are totally beholden to the money interest in ways that are not obvious to Joe Citizen. The form of democracy is preserved but the substance has been gutted.
Bear that in mind and think what you would do if your political agenda was to gut social security, Medicare etc. It's not really possible for a Republican President because it's a plan that most oppose and the American Constitution with its checks and balances would make it impossible.
But a Democratic President? People would be off guard, assuming only that he was badly advised etc. And per the money politics and "pay to play" system you could get your candidate elected as a "Democrat" if that's likely to work better.
Now read this from Black Agenda Report. The money quote is.
"The truth is that Barack Obama’s actions are entirely rational, understandable and even predictable if you suppose him to have been a vicious, vacuous and cynical right wing operative from the very beginning."
http://www.blackagendareport.com/obama-fake-debt-ceiling-crisis_smarter-than-you
Is this too paranoid? I hope it is … but I'm not sure.
Michael Hudson has been repeatedly saying much the same thing about Obama. See http://michael-hudson.com/2011/07/obamas-debt-ceiling-doublespeak/ (short); and http://michael-hudson.com/2011/07/the-euthanasia-of-industry/ (longer).
I'd like to think Obama has somehow been got at, but perhaps – as Hudson has argued – it was there to see from the start in the key appointments he made (Geithner & co.).
Meanwhile, a new concept: feral finance.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/03/second-global-financial-crisis .
And I can't resist quoting the dreaded John Redwood in a discussion on stimulating the economy by cutting taxes: "the one thing the coalition has done so far is to keep the markets happy when other countries in Europe and now America have lost the confidence of markets at considerable cost to themselves".
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9552000/9552004.stm 3:37 mins in.
So this is what the role of our "democratically" elected government has come down to – keeping the markets (ie global capital) happy…
@ Steviefinn
Here is the link to one of the Irish Seanad (Senate) debates in which Senator Norris tried to read out the list of Anglo bond holders. What a weird idea?!? trying to discuss the burning issues of the day in our houses of parliament. No wonder the powers that be dug out everything they possible could to ensure he would change his mind about running for presidency (he withdrew yesterday). After all, David Norris single-handedly challenged the Irish State in the European Court of Human Rights in 1988; the last thing our puppet parliament would want now would be a strong-minded man in as the president of country. Good heavens, NO!
http://debates.oireachtas.ie/seanad/2010/11/25/00005.asp
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Norris_(politician)
@Whistleblower
Thanks for the link, I remember reading it now. It must be a bit of a blow to you as I imagine he was a potential ally. I sincerely hope he can come back fighting & cause trouble for the collection of self serving lackeys who constitute the Irish government. There doesn't seem to be any strong individuals with integrity in positions of power anywhere in the the Western world. We need people like David Norris, yourself & probably many others, who are presently being gagged by the powers that be.
Gollums previous article referring to yourself I posted onto various Irish related blogs, the indifference is scary.
The Comments about Obama are really interesting. I have long suspected that Blair was somehow placed by behind the scenes powers possibly under direct influence from across the pond to continue what had been started by Thatcher and continued by Major.
Each time a change of face and apparent approach but a similar set of policies. In this view it is well understood that democracy will eventually demand change and that change must therefore become inevitable, but that this change can be stage managed as one of style rather than reality.
So despite the disaster of the Poll tax and the extraordinary resistance it provoked among ordinary people they managed very adroitly to continue with conservative power under Major who actually carried through the Thatcher privatization programme while appearing to be a complete change of type and never seeming so obviously ideologically determined.
Major was the kind of good boy from the lower ranks who knew how to do what he was told even when he didn't understand why.
When this at last wore out then they had a young opportunistic lawyer carefully groomed who might have equally enjoyed being a rock star all ready to convince a demoralized Labour party that yes they could take power if they only followed his "modernizing" route. Curiously so very like what had gone before ( with even the same media mogul as godfather)
Even Brown was curiously a huge fan of Greenspan who was himself a disciple of Ayn Rand who plays the role to Neo Liberalism that Wagner played for the Nazis…providing the inspiring myth… the mood music of conquest.
I know it sounds paranoid but I suggest it might be considered that once it worked here the idea might have been: why not try it at home…back in the land of the free?
For if now people are trying to grasp where Obama stands it and how his appointments and actual policies fit with the hopes of those that elected him so at odds with what was expected and craved for in those heady days of his inauguration… they are faced with the same bewilderment as so many felt watching Blair gyrate. …
What some observers like Hudson are saying is forget the presentation look at the reality… and a Roosevelt even a Teddy Roosevelt Obama aint so what is he? He certainly knew how to raise money, his backers included many on Wall Street. As Gordon and Neil said above I hope this isn't so but in the end it can only be the facts that create the judgement.
The posts on Obama are interesting in particular with the reference to Blair's groomin. If you want to think again about who or what Obama is, read this.
http://www.infowars.com/bombshell-barack-obama-conclusively-outed-as-cia-creation/
Holy sh1t Golem I am able able to bring you one last update from China before I return home to blighty.WTF is the clusterf++k going on at the moment? FTSE MIB closed, Unicredit suspended, Italy markets may keep closed tomorrow (I think that's what it says, is Unicredit hours from bankrpcy, LIFFE suspended, (LIFFE FFS?) what is going on?
The Chinese professionals in this restaurant are bemused and cannot understand the lack of leadership in the US and EU. The opinion here is that this is a plan to usurp China.
Given the shitstorm that is happening I am suprised. I can't believe what I'm seeing.Is it really that bad?
Bill,
worse.
Bill,
I don't think it's a lack of leadership. It's more that they have gradually, through a series of stupid, short-sighted and cowardly decsions, put themnselves in a position where there is no exit.
They cannot withdraw 'support' or 'extraordinary' policies, but at teh same time they cannot extend them either. There are calls for the EFSF to be made much bigger. But how? Will they borrow they money? Who from? WIll they demand teh German's pay? Merkel does not have the power. Will they print? Most likely panic solution. But will the markets slaughter the euro?
What's wrong with the Euro sliding some might say. Answer – as the Euro slides the Swiss franc rises. As it does it kills the whole Eastern and Balkn end of Europe. I do not think Hungary will last the year (perhaps much less) unless the Swiss franc come down considerably.
They have painted themselves into a room that has no exit.
For those still tempted to give Obama the benefit of he doubt, 'Lifting the Veil' – http://vimeo.com/20355767 – offers a quick juxtaposition of promise v. reality.
i too am on my way back to blighty very soon, it seems to be a ****storm om an epic scale, and a many clustered ****, it seems.
Heelp! Should i stay????
Is there a safe refuge?
For those who want to keep regularly updated with the situation, the Telegraph (not my usual read, I hasten to add) has been running "Debt Crisis: Live" coverage: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/8680820/Debt-crisis-live.html .
And all this while millions in the Horn of Africa face death through lack of food and water.
From the Telegraph Debt Crisis feed:
"21.00 So, on Barack Obama's 50th birthday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average has closed down 512.76 points – 4.31pc – at 11383.68.
20.57 The Dow is suffering its biggest one-day fall since September 1, 2008 – the financial crisis."
MacPuddock,
there is no haven here. But neither is there in the US. It's a matter of who you wnat to be with when things get nasty.
I'd be glad to have you with us.
The Guardian has also been running live coverage. CortinaMkII makes an interesting observation on a Guardian comment list:
"I wonder how all the hyperventilating deficit worriers reconcile all the contradictory information?
On one hand the USA with debt at 100% of GDP has run out of money and is bankrupt, unable to borrow a cent more and financially incapacitated. But…how can it be….shock, horror, surprise……Bond yields going down.
Then Japan with debt at 200% of GDP can find any ammount of money at will to sell Yen, bail out their banks, rebuild after the tsunami etc….. Bond yields close to zero, moderate inflation.
At what point do the dim wits realize a sovereign issuer of currency can always meet its obligations, set its own interest rates and tell the bond markets to sit down and behave.
Oh deary me… How the facts contradict the lies we are told to reduce the deficit or the big bad markets will hold us to ransom and hyperinflation will sink the country…. bah hum bug!" (http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/aug/04/japan-yen-crisis-financial )
Comments?
Very interesting posts on Obama. I've been so bemused and angry at his actions since being elected. He's obviously just another right winger shoe horned in to get the votes and pretend he's all about change.
The thing that is utterly depressing is that there literally is no alternative right now. TINA has won. When we had fascism we also had socialism, and social democracy and other movements. Now there is only neo-liberalism – every where you look. I can't see how this is going to play out. Collapse is the only end game I can envisage really, because there is no other economic paradigm out there to stop the lunacy.
All sorts of scary rumours abounding tonight about Italy and UniCredit. I hope they aren't true, just because it could be such a s*** storm but after reading this blog enough, I know they most likely are!