This post originally appeared at Credit Writedowns.
The news about Greece’s bailout has me thinking a lot about Creditanstalt, the Austrian bank which collapsed in 1931. This account bears remembering because we should see the 1929-1933 descent as a two-part episode, with the second part starting in the Spring of 1931 with Creditanstalt.
It should be noted that there were a lot of positive economic signs before the Creditanstalt ruined this. The key difference to today is the monetary liquidity and fiscal stimulus, which has buoyed both asset markets and the real economy. But, the situation in Greece makes me think a lot about Creditanstalt.
The similarities and the differences for the US economy were brought home for me by two data points I want to share.
News from 1931
First, there is the blog site News from 1930 which provides verbatim news from the Wall Street Journal exactly 79 years ago because the September 2008 Lehman bankruptcy roughly corresponds to the October 1929 crash. They have an entry from yesterday with a lot of good data points. The ones I want to highlight are bulleted below. By and large, they are very bullish. Everything is upbeat.
- Thomas E. Dewey, Chief Asst. US Attorney, announces Amer. Bond & Mortgage is being investigated by Justice Dept. Company issued about $90M of mortgage bonds in past few years, most of which are now in default. Company owns and operates the Mayflower Hotel in Wash. and several NY hotels.
- H. Bancroft, Wall St. Journal publisher, says unclear if business has definitely passed low point of depression, but “whether or not business has passed the extreme low point, it is very close to it.” Cites rapid US increase in savings and paying down of debt.
- Pres. Hoover receives reports from editors of business papers covering seven major industries on "What Is Holding Back Industry." List by industry: Automotive – tariff and "hand-to-mouth buying." Construction – lack of standardization and banks’ hesitancy in making loans. Food – waste in distribution and failure of big baking cos. to lower bread prices. Chemical – lack of price stability, taxes, inadequate statistics, and bad trade practices. S. Dennis, chair. of nat’l conf. of business paper editors, proposes committee of outstanding business leaders headed by Owen Young to help business plan national economic policy and restore prosperity. Attacks "individualistic trend based upon the philosophy of ‘devil take the hindmost.’" Labor Sec. Doak warned editors it would be dangerous to reduce wages as percentage of nat’l income. Dr. J. Klein, Asst. Commerce Sec., pointed to some positive news including recent steadying in prices and European markets.
- US seen likely to ease credit further if large export of gold from France threatens to follow recent $3.5M shipment; objective is to divert gold to where it’s needed.
- A number of economists believe business is scraping bottom; they don’t expect quick improvement, since summer is usually dull for business, but believe a further sharp decline is unlikely.
- W. Atterbury, Pennsylvania RR pres., notes business decline has lasted almost two years; precedent certainly indicates we’re scraping bottom and trend should turn upward before long. Wrong to single out rail difficulties in the depression; rails have been affected similarly to other industries, should recover similarly.
- Last week’s bank statements contained some encouraging signs: loans and investments reversed downtrend, increasing $206M to $23.051M, though bulk of the increase went into buying securities; demand deposits increased, possibly due to veterans’ bonus money; purchases of non-govt. securities continued.
- Harvard Economic Society says gains in seasonal spring recovery this year have been far less widespread than a year ago, but, since they started from a much lower base, should be longer lasting. "We anticipate that they will continue and spread and that an upturn of general business is in early prospect."
- B. Hutchinson, Chrysler VP: "Automobile production and sales are steadily progressing toward what we regard as normal volume and may reach that point this summer." Expects more sustained production for remainder of the year than in previous years; inventories in very satisfactory shape.
- C. Mitchell, Bank of US chairman, admitted under defense cross-examination that he attended the directors’ meeting at which large loans to affiliates were approved; Mitchell previously contended he had little to do with those loans.
- Refineries ran at 68.2% in week ended Apr. 18; stocks of gasoline declined 383,000 barrels to 46.384M. Crude oil production in week was 2.422M barrels/day, up 113,750 from prev. week but down 138,900 from a year ago.
There is a lot more from this entry. Notice the bullet on Mitchell; they had their scandals too. And they were just then surfacing, much as they are today.
But that last bullet is important. Refineries were operating at only 68% of capacity. That is much worse than today. Utilization rates are depressed but they are well above 80%. To me, this speaks to the robustness of the 2010 real economy as compared to the 1931 real economy.
Nevertheless, the bullets showing extreme levels of rebound confidence (in what we now realize was the middle of a terrific slide into Depression) are frightening to say the least.
The Greek disaster
Then you have Peter Boone and Simon Johnson writing on Greece, The IMF, And What Comes Next.
These two are pretty bearish on a positive outcome for Greece and the Eurozone. Earlier this month, I wrote a post "Greece And The Potential Upside In An IMF Rescue" as a sort of optimistic spin on their depressing "Greece And The Fatal Flaw In An IMF Rescue." But, I was just brainstorming potential exit strategies. The reality for Greece is very much as Boone and Johnson present it: dire.
Here’s what they say in their latest post. This is what had me thinking Creditanstalt:
The latest developments from Europe – including Greece appealing for an IMF program today – may well be a watershed, but if so, it is not a good one. The key event yesterday was that the yield on all the debt of weak eurozone governments widened while German yields fell. The spreads show all you need to know: a very clear and large contagion risk.
The five year Portuguese yields rose from 3.84% to 4.26%. The five year Spanish bonds rose from 2.89% to 3.03%, and the five year Irish bonds rose from 3.74% to 3.97%. These are not minor moves for investment grade sovereign bond funds. This kind of change means, for example (and roughly), you lose 0.5% on the value of a bond in one day. These are bonds that just pay 3% per year – and one such day may be enough to cause “investment grade investors” to decide not to stay involved and not to come back for a long while…
These higher government bond yields are also hitting banks. No doubt there is a bank run on in Greece to some extent at the wholesale level. This will spread to other banks in the region. Since their marginal funding costs are tied to the creditworthiness of the sovereign, and since the collateral for these banks’ portfolios is tied to local property values and assets, these changes in sovereign yields will have a negative impact on banks’ balance sheets.
Irrespective of the next move – which lies this weekend with the International Monetary Fund and the ministers of finance meeting in Washington for the Fund’s spring meetings – this looks like the moment when the Greek problems really start to generate contagion across the eurozone region. We’ll see rates on government debt trending higher, asset prices (such as real estate) falling even more, and renewed concern about banks on the European “periphery”.
It is that contagion and bank run part that I find worrying. I wrote a post about 1931 in March of last year, quoting from Charles Kindelberger (read it here). What essentially happened was that an innocuous notice from a Dutch bank that it was raising the lending rate for a fairly insignificant Austrian bank created a panic run on that bank, Creditanstalt. This bank was bailed out. But rather than calm things down, the bailout created a rout on the entire country. Eventually, Austria’s collapse reverberated around the world through bank interconnectedness and Depression ensued.
As Spring 1931 corresponds to right now, I see parallels to what is occurring in Greece and what occurred in 1931 Austria. This as a critical juncture in the Euro experiment, not just for Greece, but globally. Boone and Johnson suggest that a bailout of Greece is now perceived as a collective backstop of Portugal, Spain, Ireland and Italy too.
And this is simply not credible. So, the sovereign bond contagion is already with us. However, if a Greek bank run ensues, I am pretty sure Swiss, German or Austrian bank exposure to these banks would be a serious problem. the question is what can the Eurozone due about this? Is the US involved in any way? Yes it is.
Johnson and Boone say:
Yesterday was also a wake-up call for the United States. It is no longer reasonable or responsible to say: “US banks have no exposure to Greece”. US banks are heavily exposed to Europe, and this is turning into a serious Europe-wide problem. The US badly needs to make sure this does not spread beyond Greece and Portugal/Ireland.
To restore confidence in buying Spanish and other major European nation bonds, it would surely help to have clear signals that President Obama himself, and the Federal Reserve, are taking an active stance now on making sure this does not spread to become another threat to global financial stability. A broader wall of preventive financing must now be put in place – after all, this is exactly why (in principle) the IMF was recapitalized this time last year.
Such a push by the US would be awkward, to be sure, as the French and Germans (and British) are not keen to have more US involvement in their affairs. But the Europeans have handled matters so badly in the past few months, it is time for a much more scaled-up US role.
So, that’s what has me thinking about Creditanstalt today.
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“Refineries were operating at only 68% of capacity. That is much worse than today. Utilization rates are depressed but they are well above 80%. To me, this speaks to the robustness of the 2010 real economy as compared to the 1931 real economy.”
First thing that came to my mind was — I wonder how off shore floating storage, as well as on shore storage facilities, compare between these periods … I bet there is a significant difference between now and then, making comparisons of refinery operations somewhat useless.
And the rise of Saudi oil was on the horizon as opposed to running out of oil.
Yeah, and big difference in consumption levels even when reduced today. The number of cars on the road in 1931 was a fraction of now.
“Refineries were operating at only 68% of capacity. That is much worse than today. Utilization rates are depressed but they are well above 80%. To me, this speaks to the robustness of the 2010 real economy as compared to the 1931 real economy.”
I believe, although I don’t have data to back it up, that this just shows higher dependence on oil. I imagine that most oil was used by business back then because ordinary people just did not have cars unless they had plenty of money.
Yeah, absolutely. There was no plastics industry using petrochemicals to speak of in the early 1930s, no Interstate highways and no huge trucking industry. Trains were pulled by steam engines that ran on coal. Trolleys hadn’t been replaced by buses. People weren’t spread out to suburbs and commuting by car and driving kids all over town every day. So the impact a recession or depression might have on oil demand was a completely different thing.
Let me destroy the refinery statistic. Refineries in this country have been closing since the early 1980’s. Many of these refineries dated back to predepression days. With the removal of Entitlements Program under Reagan, refineries which had less than 100,000 barrels (what were called “Teapot Refineries”) a day through-put became basically economical. Very few small refineries still exist in the US. Accordingly, if you added all the refinery capability that has closed in the last 20 years you would have refinery capability operating at a much lower level that it currently is.
CreditAnstalt is the single most important lesson from the 1930’s. It is what turned everything in a Great Depression – and it happened almost 2 years after Oct 1929 !
I’ve been harping on this for almost 2 years.
There is only one good book on the subject (out of print) – but worth finding if you can
Which book?
Maybe it’s this book? It’s the only one that pops up in the Amazon advanced search that seem to fit the bill.
http://www.amazon.com/Credit-Anstalt-Crisis-Studies-Macroeconomic-History/dp/0521030293/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1272049925&sr=8-1-spell#noop
a limited preview of this book is available on Google books
http://books.google.com/books?id=rwT_olVjH7oC&dq=credit-anstalt+crisis+1931&printsec=frontcover&source=bn&hl=en&ei=pvLRS_iyM4nSsgP66uzECQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CBsQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q&f=false
When a recovery or an economy is particularly shaky, it does not take much to push them over.
Such as it was in 1931. The failure of Creditanstalt was not inconsequential at all, but more symptomatic than causal.
What Jesse said. If it hadn’t been Creditanstalt, it would have been someone else.
Which is exactly why Johnson and Boone’s logic is so silly. The losses are real and already exist, they’re not something that is conjured into existence by some vaguely-defined contagion. If Greek bondholders don’t take the hit then someone else does, and you solve exactly nothing in the process. The Johnson/Boone para is lame, “oh if only we hadn’t let Lehman fail the Dow would be back at 14,000” thinking.
Complete agreement. The pain is already in the system, it just hasn’t been recognized yet. As always, the question is: will the pain be allowed to rest where it originated, perhaps then causing cascading knock-on effects, or shoveled off onto the rest of society upfront?
I’d prefer the latter, but I expect the former.
Market at the top today April 23, 2010 according to source below. Same source nailed the bottom of March 06, 2009. So pay attention guys. Prediction of today as a top was made April 15, 2010.
http://financialtraders.blogspot.com/2010/04/sp500-dow-nasdaq-100-stock-market.html
Sure. It would make sense that the day John Paulson comes out as bullish on housing, and just about every housing stock hits a 52 week high on heavy volume, that THE TOP gets put in.
Here’s a good wrap-up by Marc Faber. Greece is mentioned at the end:
http://www.kitco.com/reports/KitcoNews20100412J.html
Vinny
So now we have the financial equivalent of the disintegration of Yugoslavia on our hands and the EU leadership is structurally and temperamentally fully as prepared for this as they were to deal with Milosovich.
Maybe the IMF can call in air strikes to end the folly.
I think we better call in NATO right away…:)
Vinny
Note that at the time of Credit Anstalt the US was having a wave of bank failures (see Lords of Finance) Late 1930 it was the Bank of the United States in NYC, then moving to bank chains in Chicago in May 1931 after the collapse of real estate bubble there, and ever bank in Toledo but one failed in Toledo. Prices were falling at 20% per annum. The Fed had decided not to bail out these banks, because it thought most were insolvent. So there are differences in the situation. The biggest one is FDIC insurance for bank deposits. If we can get the living wills for large banks defined so that they can be wrapped up with debt holders taking a haircut on debts to the bank holding companies its a good next step.
So there are differences in the situation. The biggest one is FDIC insurance for bank deposits.
Yes, this has encouraged depositors to keep a much greater share of their deposits at much worse institutions than was the case heading into the 1930s wave of bank failures.
Bank bondholders should watch their investments go to zero before one thin dime of public money is used to bail out remaining liabilities to depositors and counterparties.
Comparing 80% of refinery capacity 2010 versus 68% in 1931 and inferring that this implies robustness in the real economy is quite a logical leap! This would assume the same rate of automobile use (not the case the case by any means!) the same use of fertilizers and synthetic products of various types–not much polyester back then or plastic bags or plastic siding. Rates of energy use? The news in 1930 is instructive from a political economy perspective but drawing direct comparisons and drawing inferences is misplaced and well just wrong. In fact, people make too many comparisons and they may have a certain narrative appeal but you are comparing essentially two very different worlds.
I recommend checking this artice by Marshall Auerback
http://www.counterpunch.org/auerback04212010.html
really informative
This is non-sense:
“This as a critical juncture in the Euro experiment, not just for Greece, but globally. Boone and Johnson suggest that a bailout of Greece is now perceived as a collective backstop of Portugal, Spain, Ireland and Italy too.”
Portuguese arent crazy. In fact, some voices are discussing a new austerity plan, if that one inst enouph to cut the fiscal deficit. mr. Fernando Ulrich, a important portuguese banker, sugested today a new austerity plan as back up, if the actual austerity plan doesnt work as we think. Even yesterday, portuguese government took new measures to cut spending, as puting tolls in highways and stop funding them with public money, for example.
In my opinion, Peter Boone and Simon Johnson are ignorant or are trying to give a fictious picture about Portugal. I dont believe that these men are sold to some speculators but I will not be surprised if someone in Portugal suits this kind of misinformation. Of course free speech is a gift but not showing these biased opinions against some people, who feels the pain of these bizarre opinions that cant be acepted. Are the analysts disclaiming their personal interests? They even dont know what are the real figures about Portugal and the measures that portuguese authorities are doing to cut spending and increase revenues. These ignorant opinions costs millions to portuguese companies, to portuguese state and to portuguese people, who are feeling rising interest rates.
In Portugal we like to ear strong opinions about ours mistakes. Is the best way to learning. But when these opinions are lies or with a lot of flaws and errors maybe these authors should pay attention what they say. Can be used in court of law. These atacks to Euro and to Portugals interests is costing millions and is a gift to some kind of speculators, as we saw today the GS memo to atack Iberian banks and interests. That costs millions. Someone must to pay. Someone who looses millions maybe starts thinking suiting some analists with their publicized analisys. These errors costs millions, inst true?
In Portugal the opinions are splited. Some people say these kind of flaws are normal when the market is in fire and as we made mistakes, that isnt understood. But others feel that these opinions are deliberated lies against portuguese interests, with some opinions biased to give millions in gains to some kind of speculators.
Almost everybody knows that we will have troubles. Were seeing the first signs of these atacks in Portugal, as some hedgefunds noticed our SEC that they took short positions in a listed bank. But everybody is calm and waiting for these atacks. We are seeing that these atacks come from anglo-saxon world. And we feel these atacks are a deliberated against the €uro.
Now its time for a kind of an economic war. We portuguese realise that were in a special war. An economic war. Someone will see that we arent easy to defeat. We will see who wins these war. Were waiting and ready to fight. Will al ours means and in the law court if is needed.
Portugal will not give up to be member of the euro and will not default as a lot of economic and political interests wish. Portugal will fight and show that were are ready to the war.
Some lies was spread concerning Portugals accounts. One lie was very hard to swallow. When someone say that Portugal lives in a Ponzi Scheme because even we cant pay our interest rates of the debt, this is very serious. A lot of bad risk perception could trigger bad movments of the market.
But these lies are really bad, not because every analist hasnt information available to study the figures, but because these lies maybe are deliberated atacks to others credibility and some kind of racism.
In Portugal, state accounts are public. You can check the figures, that are reported monthly:
http://www.dgo.pt/
And you can check if is true some facts wrote by some opinions makers. Before were hit by credit cruch, these are the figures:
http://www.dgo.pt/Boletim/1208-bol.pdf
At page 15 you can check if is true that even we live in Ponzi Scheme.
But if you dont believe in these reported figures, you can check the portuguese figures reported by Eurostat, who is the European Institution who controls the countries figures:
http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cache/ITY_PUBLIC/2-22042010-BP/EN/2-22042010-BP-EN.PDF
So, when some analist are spreading lies that costs millions to some countries, companies or even private households, is better to the analist to check his figures in his opinions with the real facts. If the analist doesnt believe in oficial figures is better that the analist show how his figures come from. Otherwise is poor analisys and maybe deliberated misinformation. These misinformations costs millions and afect others. These others can use court laws to repair their credibility destroyed by some lies and misinformation spread by poor analists.
Of course you can have a lot of opinons. We live in the free world but is better when do some analisys and give some opinions to check yours figures and to ckeck the true facts before damaging others interests. This isnt wild wild west as the lack of supervison sugests in others places of the world. The supervision exists in some regions of the world as the court of laws to fight some gunmen who uses their opinions to atack others. And maybe profits with these kind of misbehaviour.
Even if in Nakedcapitalism someone needs real figures he can ask for them. The portuguese laws gives the right to everyone, especially international investors to demand figures. The portuguese authorities allways gives the figures. The portuguese authorities never denied or complained against rating agencies or others institutions that study portuguese economy. On the opposit, is the best way to check our errors and to have others views on ours problems.
All good opinions are welcomed in Portugal. But these good opinions are good because are studies that uses real figures and facts and not lies.
Disclaimer: Im not a member of government, oficial adviser, or oficial government consultant. Im only a portuguese guy living outside my cowntry who even doesnt vote in portuguese internal elections. I dont have political party biased opinions. Maybe the only biased opinions that I could have is because I am portuguese citizen and I love my cowntry and my people.
If someone in Nakedcapitalism wants figures and facts about portuguese economy, he can allways demand information to traditional international institutions, like MFI, OECD, ECB, EC, credit agencies (even with problems concerning the recent suspections about their behaviour in some cases, they are the best source of international analisys to Portugal figures and facts) and others.
However in Portugal the law gives the right to everyone demand information about government figures. In Portugal we have a special institution that audits portuguese public accounts. This institution is the Tribunal de Contas, who studies and audits public spending and revenues. Is a kind of Court, where his members are judges, independent of politicians and can deliberate advices to avoid normal mistakes by politicians who uses peoples money. That special Court can investigate the behaviour of public servents and politicians and if believes that corruption exists, can demand to the public attorney a criminal investigation about some facts found in their audited reports.
You can check the information, reportings and deliberations here in http://www.tcontas.pt/en/english.shtm.
This institution, now, is one of the best supervision institutions in Portugal. Is independent and recently the changes in the law gave them more powers and resources to audit public affaires and peoples money.
Other institution is the Central Bank, Banco de Portugal. You can acess here in http://www.bportugal.pt/en-US/Pages/inicio.aspx .
This institution is, perhaps, the best economic research in Portugal. Monthly reports central bank activities and his economic research and economic activity. You can check the true economic activity monthly and what drives economic growth and more information about portuguese economy.
Other institution is the portuguese statistics agency. Isnt completely independent of governement but isnt bad as in anothers places. In fact, sometimes they are very hostile agaisnt politicians, because their own regulation, that are dependent of politicians wishes. You can acess here in http://www.ine.pt/xportal/xmain?xpid=INE&xpgid=ine_main .
Everyone in Nakedcapitalism can acess to the data and demand data to portuguese public institutions. And everyone is welcome to do economic analisys to portuguese figures. Everyone can criticize portugals figures, economic choices and portuguese strategy to rule our cowntry. Every good opinion is welcomed especially outside our cowntry because is a good way to check our reality with others eyes and way of thinking. Is the best way to learn with others.
However if someone use lies and misinformation about Portugal, of course inst welcomed and can be hostilized. If someone uses good faith criticizing Portugal is allways welcome even if his analisys is bad. But if someone uses misinformation, lies and suspection of badfaith against Portuguese interests, that one will not be welcomed and will be hostilized. Its normal and is a way to evoid some kind of bad behaviour from our enemies or competitors.
Everyone in Nakedcapitalism could do their analisys. The portuguese institutions are very open to foreigners opinions. In fact, in Portugal we like to adopt new opinions from outside and we tend to be early trend followers. We tend to look for others opinions as a way to improve our economy and our standard of living. Today, Portugal has one of lowest child mortalitily rate in the world because we learned with others. We achieved this important indicator in thirty years thanks to others opinions and foreigner advisers. It wasnt easy and only with outside studies and opinions Portugal could improve this important indicator of good quality of life. So every good opinion is welcome in Portugal. Not gunmen.
Nobody outside our cowntry cant complain agaisnt the lack of information about Portugal. In fact I live outside my cowntry and I can do the same analisys as if I live inside the cowntry. A lot of information is available to study and ckeck our figures. If someone is lying about portuguese economic situation is because they dont study the figures and information. Is because they dont do their homework or theyre trying to misinform theirs readers.
Fuss the links and discover our figures and facts. Dont believe in every fancy analisys that are spread in the internet. Compare their figures with the public information available. You can judge by yourself the reality about Portugals figures and facts.
oh! I forgot to leave some interesting links.
In stead banking runs, were waiting for the shortsellers. We learned a lot with the “Volkswagen affaire”. ;)
http://web3.cmvm.pt/sdi2004/emitentes/docs/IDR28083.pdf
http://web3.cmvm.pt/sdi2004/emitentes/docs/IDR28080.pdf
http://web3.cmvm.pt/sdi2004/emitentes/docs/IDR28085.pdf
We dont mind having shortsellers as they arent naked and illegal, we appreciate them. :)
Good luck!
PJM I hate to tell you this but you must be channeling Dick Fuld when he said he was going to screw the shorts, but with a little stronger language. Hate to tell you this a few weeks later, Lehman which Fuld was the CEO laid in a heap of dung.
Most PIIGS countries have gotten themselves into a situation where either they destroy their standard of living, default or exit the Euro. Take your pick but none of them are good for the Euro. Mathamatics are against you and all the talk and bluster will not save you.
Party on Garth!
Dear Ishmael, its the opposite.
I think legal shorts are needed to good markets and good corrections. And are allways welcomed.
What is nasty is the ilegal shorts and naked short. These kind of crime schemes are very bad for all of us.
But portuguese authorities are looking for that kind of shorts. As the portuguese stockmarket capitalization is lower via-a-vis others markets, is better to control some kind of ciminal activities. And to impose some laws to squeeze these ilegal activities. Do you see, the portuguese minister of finances (treasury) is a former cop of the markets. We was leader of our SEC before he took the position in the government.
The insiders are using the shorts to buy more stocks. No big deal, its the normal market. But the ilegal activities will be watched closely.
As I said, short sellers are welcomed. Criminal activities arent and should be fighted with all means.
What is an “illegal short?”
Do you really think that Johnson & Kwak or Nakedcapitalism are so influential that their words can influence the market?
Otherwise, how do you propose to sue any of them? On what grounds? In what court? Do they owe anyone a duty of care, especially if they do not have a position in any Portuguese government debt?
Even if all of the above commentators can be shown to be completely wrong and the Portuguese government is in the pink of financial health, does this mean that business commentators writing to the general public may not make any innocent mistakes?
Even if you had a case (and you don’t) how would do you propose to calculate damages? Who would pay?
Come on, Holmes, think some of this through before you spout off.
Few days ago about the agreed plan Mr Van Rompuy said “We hope that it will not have to be activated”.
I noted at
http://mgiannini.blogspot.com/2010/03/naked-gun-smell-of-fear.html that the fact that they hope not to activate it, it might mean that it would be a mess should it be activated.
The loan plan was a naked gun put on the table to buy time but smelling the fer of default. It’s now clear that Greek bondholders should take a haircut and let Greece orderly default stopping the money creation for nothing of European banks.
http://mgiannini.blogspot.com/2010/03/money-creation-for-nothing-or-let.html
I’ve been wondering for awhile if Lehman Bros. was just the overture to a financial Gotterdamerung. We may know in a few months if Greece defaults and starts another contagion. We would be too weakened, economically and politically, to fight a new financial disease off, I fear. And life could quickly become “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.”
My children need to bail out Greece? Eat shit and die!
You forgot Portugal.
By definition, we don’t have any way of knowing where the Black Swan will come from. I can just about guarantee that with everyone looking at the PIIGS, it won’t be from there, though.
I am in a mode of thinking it might be a weather event. That would complete the circle with the 1930s’ Dust Bowl. The weather geeks tell me, though, that the Icelandic volcano eruptions are too far north to behave like a second Tambora.
Maybe we should now be looking for a white swan with swan flu.
It is not much of a Black Swan in that a couple of years ago everyone was worried by various Eastern European governments going into the tank. Which countries are causing the problem does seem a little unexpected. It is the Euro angle that is adding the extra flavor here.
Dennis Morehouse,
It seems your wish will come true! It is foreign banks that own 82% of Greek debt! Be prepared for a bail out not of Greece but of your banks by your government! Good luck!