Monday, October 13, 2008

I love it when a plan comes together

There are a few stock phrases being bandied around by financial commentators which are starting to get to me, either because they're meaningless; offering no explanatory power whatsoever, or simply misleading

My favourite cliches of the moment include...

'The Credit Crunch'

Coined early on in the current crisis and now blandly and repeatedly used as the 'explanation' for everything that is being and will be inflicted on us

'Why have I lost my job?'
'The Credit Crunch'

'Why is my pension worth fuck all?'
'The Credit Crunch'

'Why did my life savings disappear?'
'The Credit Crunch'

etc etc


'Banks are hoarding cash'

Misleading because it gives the impression that great big piles of touchable, sniffable cash actually exist. I've even seen the words '...in their vaults' used a few times. For fuck's sake

Also perplexing because I've yet to hear anyone identify which of the banks actually are the ones hoarding all that cash in those, er, vaults

That would be kind of interesting to know, given that virtually all of the banks are actively pleading poverty and holding their hands out for trillions more. Solely for the Common Good, obviously



'x billion pounds was wiped off the value of shares today'

Misleading because it supports the impression that those shares were ever worth their inflated values

The market value of a company's shares (or market index, or houses, or special collectors edition Beanie Babies) is based solely on the price paid for the last one sold

So, in theory, if one irrational idiot pays way over the odds for a share, or a Beanie Baby, everybody else holding the same share, or Beanie Baby, gets to kid themselves that they'll all fetch the same price

For a while anyway

and vice versa if one irrational idiot sells a share, or Beanie Baby, for way under the odds


'Too big to fail'

Which is a euphemism for 'They've got us by the nuts' or, more accurately, 'I think they've got us by the nuts because I'm not permitted to conceive of any alternative way of doing things'


There Is No Alternative


On the subject of 'too big to fail' here's a clip of Max Keiser talking with Noam Chomsky.

Chomsky does a very passable impression of a total fucking idiot...





I make no bones of the fact that the attraction of Chomsky has always passed me right by. I find his prose turgid and, as far as I can tell, his political reputation is based largely on expressing something very obvious; something that any cab driver, or blogger, would tell you, but in a turgid academic way. Chomsky's pseudo-rational attitude towards 9/11 was just icing on the cake

In the clip, Keiser articulates a thought that quite a few Loons seem to share; that stock market prices are being manipulated to scare the crap out of people. To use fear and panic as a means of manufacturing their consent to hand over 'hoards of cash' to the banks

Chomsky just doesn't seem to get it

He even goes so far as to say that a market crash is harmful to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's interests

/ scratches chin

Hmmmm, is it really


Henry Paulson


And, in the same vein, I suppose George Bush appearing on US television every five minutes crying out 'Don't Panic!! Don't Panic!!' really is the sort of behaviour that's genuinely intended to positively discourage panic




Yes, in exactly the same way that cutting interest rates is a sure-fire way of boosting stock markets

As the chap who left me the link to the following article suggested, I'm also thinking that F. William Engdahl is sniffing along the right lines...




One World Banking - You Know you want it

And even if you don't think you do right now, you will

.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

The credit crunch,,the ultimate "one size fits all" phrase.

Just watched Zeitgeist,all of it,,great documentary.A must for conspiraloon neophytes.The section on religion was excellent.Fascinating stuff.

Anonymous said...

the bank bailouts are is biggest daylight robbery crime in a long time.Taxpayers are to pay billions of pounds to stop the big banks failing,,so we have the absolutely insane situation that the "people" are to "buy" shares(through taxes) so that they may be able to continue putting their hard earned cash into those very same fucked up institutions!!!everyone who has an account with these wankers should close that account withdraw the cash and put it somewhere else.

paul said...

My least favourite:
The real economy
which I think refers to people outside the gilded world of extreme financial decadence. ie just about everybody

Hudson on how their ripping out the copper as they leave the building

Anonymous said...

BBC business headline



Markets SURGE after crisis talks
European and Asian stock markets react positively to efforts by world leaders to stem the financial turmoil.

meanwhile!!

Oct. 13 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Federal Reserve said central banks will offer financial institutions unlimited dollar funds, backing up efforts by governments to restore confidence in markets.

The ECB, the Bank of England and the Swiss central bank will conduct dollar auctions with maturities of seven days, 28 days and 84 days at a fixed interest rate, the Washington-based Fed said on its Web site today. The Bank of Japan will consider introducing ``similar measures.''

Policy makers from the Group of Seven nations pledged at the weekend to take ``all necessary steps'' to stem a market panic after the MSCI World stock index plunged 20 percent last week. Central banks last week cut interest rates in tandem for the first time since 2001, the U.S. plans to buy $700 billion in distressed assets from banks and in Europe, the U.K. is leading a push to keep lenders afloat with taxpayers' money.

Anonymous said...

http://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/press/monetary/20081013a.htm

Anonymous said...

Thom Hartmann talks to the Ruskies.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFnloOG8kr8

Anonymous said...

the pathetic bbc wankers

Markets surge after crisis talks!!!

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/45102000/jpg/_45102411_f0b02fe8-c932-418e-828e-9af77d81f9f6.jpg

Stef said...

Huzzah!!

We're saved

Anonymous said...

anyone wanna buy some $$$$$$$???

European central banks have opened the floodgates with promises of unlimited dollar funding in a coordinated action with the US Federal Reserve.

The European Central Bank, Bank of England and Swiss National Bank said they were ready to inject as much as needed into the markets for dollars funding covering periods of seven days, a month and 84 days.


Banks would “be able to borrow any amount they wish against the appropriate collateral in each jurisdiction,” the central banks said in a statement. In Tokyo, the Bank of Japan said it was considering a similar step.