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The ECB is Preparing for the end of the Eurozone

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A break-up of the eurozone is not a science-fiction scenario anymore, thanks to the European Central Bank and its Public Sector Purchase Programme (PSPP). The more government bonds the ECB buys, the smaller becomes the problem of a country’s insolvency and debt conversion into French francs or Greek drachmas. Eventually, who cares if all the bonds are kept by the institution that cannot go bankrupt and that is out of the financial market?

Let us recall: the exclusion of Greece from the Euro Area was impossible in 2012 due to a large amount of Greek debt held by foreign banks, which were rescued by the ECB, the European Union and the International Monetary Fund. These institutions, called Troika, saved banks and private creditors, not the Greeks: 95% of the bailout money went to banks, as a study of the European School of Management and Technology proved. Continue reading →

Euro Area Crisis: We are Back in 2012 and Even Worse

Euro currency in the thunderstorm

The efficiency of a monetary policy is disputable in recent times, especially in the Euro Area. But it is not a monetary policy to blame because it works in sovereign countries with their own fiscal policy. It is the design of the Eurozone itself that makes the European Central Bank’s actions ineffective, whatever they are.

The unending crisis in the European banking system is clear proof. In a sovereign country, adjusted monetary policy in combination with so called fiscal policy is enough to manage a banking sector during liquidity problems. It means that if banks stop trusting each other and do not lend money to each other any more, a national central bank wades in and provides temporarily some cheap money to stave off a threat and give the government (fiscal authorities) time to solve the underlying solvency problems. The Euro Area does not have this incredibly important mechanism. Continue reading →

Shell’s 6.5% Dividend Is Monetised by The European Central Bank.

Oil companies and their beneficiaries that suffer from low oil prices are being rescued by the current ECB monetary policies. Negative interest rates and the ECB cooperate bond purchase program is turning corporate finances upside down and makes dividend payments rational even if revenue does not justify it. While the oil price is still low, there is no reason to believe that oil prices will stay at this level. There is a lack of investment in new production and world demand is increasing. Energy Information Administration (EIA) expects demand to outpace supply in 2017. The exact moment of a sharp price increase is hard to predict, but it will be somewhere between now and 2020. Oil companies and oil-producing countries have to weather the storm to survive. Continue reading →

TARGET2; European Banking Crisis is Escalating Again

European currency collage

Problems of Deutsche Bank, Commerzbank, Monte dei Paschi and other German, Italian and Spanish banks are not the only concern of the European Banking System. Trouble is much deeper than it is thought because there is a systemic imbalance that has been increasing for almost ten years. Politicians do not want to tell us the truth, but soon we will experience the same crisis in the Monetary Union as we did in 2012.

The extent of the problems in the European Banking System is TARGET2 and its balances of the National Central Banks of the Eurosystem. These balances, or rather imbalances, reflect the direction of the capital flight. And there is only one way: from Southern Europe into Germany. After Mario Draghi’s famous words “I do whatever it takes to save the euro”, things seemed to improve; however, since January 2015 problems have been escalating again. Continue reading →

QE in Europe is an Embarrassment: 18 QE euros generate a growth of 1 euro

Euro sign at European Central Bank headquarters

After almost two years of the quantitative easing program in the Euro Area, economic figures have remained very weak. Inflation is still fluctuating near zero, while GDP growth in the region has started to slow down instead of accelerating. According to the European Central Bank data, to generate 1.0 euro of GDP growth, 18.5 euros had to be printed in the QE, which means that €80 billion have thus been wasted almost every month!

This year, the ECB printed nearly €600 billion within the frame of asset purchase programme (QE). At the same time, GDP has increased by… €31 billion; even if up to the end of 2015 the ECB issued €650 billion during its QE program. Needless to say that the Greek debt is “only” €360 billion and there has been no chance of a relief, so far. Continue reading →

Grexit has never been from the table

TsiprasIn Gefira #0 we wrote that the Greek crisis was never solved. Greece is disconnected from the European banking system TARGET2, and capital control is still in place. Now Brussels is sealing off the border between Greece and Europe to stem the flow of refugees to the European heartland, severing Greece from the Schengen Area. It is not the question if the country will leave the euro but rather when it will start issuing the drachma. Tensions between Brussels, IMF, and Greece are increasing, implying a Grexit has become a contingency that one has to reckon with very seriously. A Grexit will strengthen the euro and increase its value against other currencies, as the euro bloc without Greece will become much stronger. That said, in the long run the euro has become a project that is crippling European economies. Continue reading →

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Der Kampf gegen Bargeld geht weiter

People spend the night in front of ATMs with the hope that money will be brought there and they will finally be able to withdraw it after standing in line for many hours. Sometimes the fights break out, even among those waiting in front of the banks. Tensions reach their peak. Branches are set on fire and people all over the country take to the streets….

Scenes from Cyprus 2013? No. Nigeria, Laos, April this year. Old banknotes were invalidated in February and since then no new ones have been printed, only the old ones collected from the market by the central bank and destroyed. At the same time, they introduced central bank digital currency (CBDC), which was not accepted by the people at all. Over 200 million people were deprived of their money overnight. Almost no one wanted to pay or transact with the new e-currency (called eNaira). Thousands of businesses went bankrupt in a short period of time. A paradoxical situation arose in which gasoline could no longer be bought at gas stations in the country, which is one of the largest oil producers in the world.

Nigeria, with its 22o million people, has long since overtaken South Africa and is the largest economy on the Dark Continent. It is a country with huge raw material resources and a development potential that African mentality and corruption, which is present everywhere, wreck. It can be said that it is a rich country of poor people because almost all the capital is in the hands of politicians. One of them, the head of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefile, said in Davos that his country would soon be cashless and – lo and behold – that might end with blood in the streets. It is hard to believe that in a country where 32% of the people are illiterate, where most people do not have access to electricity, the idea of digital currency comes from below; that the shamans had whispered it in the ears of ordinary people. No, it comes from above and from outside. Third World countries have always been a training ground for Western elites, the grassroots movement of the new authoritarian world without cash. This time they are testing how far and how fast they are able to implement their ideas.

Finally, it should be remembered that the complete transition to cash, would make citizens transparent. Central banks could regulate digital money, depending on how they would like a citizen. It could also be that the validity of the money would be limited in time and could only be spent for certain purposes. Electronically, that’s easy to organize. How embarrassing that would be for the Germans, 58% of whom pay in cash! Nigeria has also been called the “cash king” in Africa.

The virtual world threatens the physical world. More on this in Gefira 73.

by The Board

The battle against cash goes on

People spend the night in front of ATMs with the hope that money will be brought there and they will finally be able to withdraw it after standing in line for many hours. Sometimes the fights break out, even among those waiting in front of the banks. Tensions reach their peak. Branches are set on fire and people all over the country take to the streets….

Scenes from Cyprus 2013? No. Nigeria, Laos, April this year. Old banknotes were invalidated in February and since then no new ones have been printed, only the old ones collected from the market by the central bank and destroyed. At the same time, they introduced central bank digital currency (CBDC), which was not accepted by the people at all. Over 200 million people were deprived of their money overnight. Almost no one wanted to pay or transact with the new e-currency (called eNaira). Thousands of businesses went bankrupt in a short period of time. A paradoxical situation arose in which gasoline could no longer be bought at gas stations in the country, which is one of the largest oil producers in the world.

Nigeria, with its 22o million people, has long since overtaken South Africa and is the largest economy on the Dark Continent. It is a country with huge raw material resources and a development potential that African mentality and corruption, which is present everywhere, wreck. It can be said that it is a rich country of poor people because almost all the capital is in the hands of politicians. One of them, the head of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefile, said in Davos that his country would soon be cashless and – lo and behold – that might end with blood in the streets. It is hard to believe that in a country where 32% of the people are illiterate, where most people do not have access to electricity, the idea of digital currency comes from below; that the shamans had whispered it in the ears of ordinary people. No, it comes from above and from outside. Third World countries have always been a training ground for Western elites, the grassroots movement of the new authoritarian world without cash. This time they are testing how far and how fast they are able to implement their ideas.

Finally, it should be remembered that the complete transition to cash, would make citizens transparent. Central banks could regulate digital money, depending on how they would like a citizen. It could also be that the validity of the money would be limited in time and could only be spent for certain purposes. Electronically, that’s easy to organize. How embarrassing that would be for the Germans, 58% of whom pay in cash! Nigeria has also been called the “cash king” in Africa.

The virtual world threatens the physical world. More on this in Gefira 73.

by The Board





France, Germany Reportedly Against New Sanctions on Russia Over Kerch Strait Row

Austria has mulled over the possibility of new sanctions against Russia due to the detention of three Ukrainian Navy vessels that sailed toward the Kerch Strait in what Moscow has described as an unequivocal provocation committed in violation of international law. At a secret meeting of the Political and Security Committee in Brussels on Tuesday, French and German diplomats spoke out against stepping up existing EU sanctions against Russia in light of the growing rift between Moscow and Kiev over the Kerch Strait incident. Source: Sputnik

by The Board






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Japan’s economy has a $5 trillion problem

An epic bond-buying spree by Japan’s central bank means it’s now sitting on assets worth more than the country’s entire economy. Data released by the Bank of Japan on Tuesday show that its total holdings stand at 553.6 trillion yen ($4.9 trillion) following years of money printing aimed at jump starting the country’s stagnant economy. That’s bigger than Japan’s annual gross domestic product at the end of the second quarter — and more than five times the size of Apple’s (APPL) market value. Source: CNN

by The Board

Euro-Area Economy Grows Least in Four Years as Germany Drags

Euro-area growth slowed in the third quarter, held back by a contraction in Germany, its biggest economy. Gross domestic product grew 0.2 percent, matching an initial estimate, but half the pace recorded in the previous period, Eurostat said Wednesday. Industrial production declined 0.3 percent in September, the second decline in three months, with the biggest falls coming in energy and non-durable consumer goods. Source: Bloomberg

by The Board











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