It's always about "investment" possibilities

 

I remember when they planned the same thing on the heels of George W's invasion of Iraq.  How'd that turn out?

So we just take an entire country and steal their resources.

Yeah.

Still working our way downward

UPDATE 08/04/2023:

However, the market impact has been minimal. There was no significant movement in the price and yield of US Treasuries, the benchmark borrowing mechanism, nor in the value of the US dollar against other currencies – even after the US Treasury announced the following day that it would increase borrowing by $7bn in the next quarter and add another $6bn in its debt auctions in the coming month.

The reality is that there is ample demand for US debt, which plays a vital role not only in the US financial system but across the globe.

Consider the two largest economies below the US: China and Japan. One is a rival, the other an ally. Yet, both are the world’s largest buyers of US Treasuries, which serve not only as the source of US dollar holdings for global reserves but are also the predominant instrument in which international trade is financed.

  alJazeera

We may not have manufactured goods to sell, but boy do we have debt. What a coup.

They can afford to lose the odd yacht here and there

If action against Russia isn’t paired with reforms at home, the battery of sanctions set to come will fall flat, undone by the same Western nations professing to be aghast at this resurgence of empire, and at this return to warfare in Europe.

[...]

If Western policy makers hope to hold Putin’s cronies truly accountable, sanctions will have to be paired with pro-transparency reforms that can disassemble this web of secrecy. Western governments should start by ending anonymity in shell companies and trusts; demanding basic anti-money-laundering checks for lawyers, art gallerists, and auction-house managers; and closing loopholes that allow anonymity in the real-estate, private-equity, and hedge-fund industries. That is, if the sanctions are to retain their bite, the entire counter-kleptocracy playbook needs to be implemented—immediately.

[...]

Rampant financial anonymity in places like the U.S. makes it relatively easy for powerful rich people to evade sanctions. A Russian oligarch may have multimillion-dollar mansions in Washington, D.C.; or multiple steel plants across the Rust Belt; or a controlling stake in a hedge fund in Greenwich, Connecticut; or an entire fleet of private jets in California; or an array of lawyers setting up purchases at art houses around the country. And all of that wealth can be hidden—perfectly legally—behind anonymous shell companies and trusts that are enormously difficult to penetrate.

[...]

With few Americans paying attention, the U.S. transformed over the past few decades into the world’s leading financial-secrecy haven, providing all of the anonymity services kleptocrats in Moscow and around the world needed to continue their transnational money-laundering operations.

States such as Delaware opened anonymous shell companies for whoever came calling, while South Dakota and others invented new financial-secrecy tools that prevented even the federal government from figuring out who’s behind trusts in those states.

[...]

The most conspicuous jurisdiction feasting on ill-gotten Russian gains is the U.K. As illustrated by a recent report from Chatham House (of which I was a co-author), the U.K. has helped launder billions in questionable, illicit, and dirty post-Soviet money, especially out of Russia. In the process, suspect Russian wealth has flowed into British real estate, London’s luxury-goods market, and even the Conservative Party’s coffers.

[...]

So long as the policies that enable dirty money to flow around the globe remain in place, untouched even by those Western politicians now railing against Russia, any sanctions-related response will be less than the sum of its parts.

[...]

In Washington, at last week’s State of the Union, President Joe Biden announced the formation of an interagency “KleptoCapture” task force to target oligarchs. And Johnson’s government in London announced the same day that a long-delayed economic-crime bill—which would create a registry of offshore-owned property—would finally move forward in Parliament. Yet that bill is yet to be passed, let alone implemented, and the announcement came only as protesters gathered in Whitehall to remind legislators that russian money < ukrainian lives. Progress is far from assured.

  The Atlantic

But also,,,

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Ooops

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Good if it works

The Treasury Department on Tuesday proposed rules meant to snuff out money laundering through the use of anonymously owned businesses.

The department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) issued a proposed set of regulations that would force the controlling owners of a wide range of companies to register themselves with the federal government. The rules are meant to prevent individuals from using shell companies and other opaque corporate structures to evade taxes and international finance laws.

[...]

Not all U.S. states and territories require beneficial ownership information when a business is registered, which experts say can help facilitate money laundering and other financial crimes.

Under the proposed rules, certain domestic and foreign companies would be forced to disclose any individual who “exercises substantial control” over the firm, or owns or controls at least 25 percent of the firm’s ownership interests. Beneficial owners would be required to disclose their name, date of birth, a current address and a state identification number.

[...]

The proposal is open for public comment until Feb. 7. FinCEN did not specify when the rules would take effect.

[...]

Publicly traded companies — which are already subject to Securities and Exchange Commission transparency rules — are not covered by the regulations. Businesses based in the U.S. with more than 20 employees, a physical office and at least $5 million gross revenue are also exempted from the regulations, along with a wide range of limited partnerships and trusts.

[...]

The rules are the latest step the Treasury Department has taken to implement the Corporate Transparency Act, which was included in a major defense policy bill signed by former President Trump in 2020.

  The Hill

I'd bet my life he didn't know that was in the bill.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Listen and share

This discussion is a good reminder that government debt and spending bear no relation to individual debt and spending.  Politicians never explain that to us.  I wonder how many of THEM don't understand it.  And how many DO, but use our ignorance to hornswoggle us.

Listen and share.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Panama Papers II: The Pandora Papers

Story at The Guardian

Hopefully, it's not too late

Shareholders are celebrating long-fought climate wins at some of the world’s largest corporations, but a potentially more powerful financial movement is on the verge of exploding as central banks join the fight against greenhouse gas emissions.

The Bank of England this month launched a climate exploratory scenario. The Bank of France recently concluded its first climate stress test pilot. The European Central Bank will begin testing significant banks against climate risk in 2022. The central banks of Australia, Brazil, Canada, Hong Kong and Singapore are planning climate stress tests this year and next.

“The time for voluntary bank action has passed,” said Maximilian Horster, head of ISS ESG, the responsible investment arm of Institutional Shareholder Services. “There is no place to hide.”

The U.S. Federal Reserve has no mandate to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions, nor is it conducting climate analysis. Yet.

[...]

The European Investment Bank issued a “climate awareness bond” in 2007 and the World Bank had a climate-related offering a year later. Both were aimed at “shifting the trillions” — green-speak for deploying capital to projects that can slow global warming or prepare for its impact.

More than a decade later, cumulative green bond issuance has barely exceeded $1 trillion.

Sustainable debt made up only 6 percent of the market for investment-grade bonds in 2020 but is growing rapidly and hit 11 percent in the first three months of 2021, according to data from Deutsche Bank.

  Politico

An under-discussed issue in governmental economics is economics of government

With a Democrat now in charge, fiscal conservatives will be hitting hard on the claim that it's irresponsible to deepen the nation's already-hefty debt. So it's more important than ever for people to understand why some of the more emotionally appealing of those arguments are specious.

  Bloomberg

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

If you're surprised by this, you've been living in a cave

[...]

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

complete thread

ICIJ article

International relations is a zero sum game, and he's the only one who knows how to play it

Rich coming from someone who has failed financially in a spectacular way all his life (with the exception of the years of The Apprentice, and he wasn't in charge of that venture).

He's right about one thing, though:  incompetence is a terrible thing to watch.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

He knows economics better than anyone

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Christ, impeach this asshat already

Says any fascist despot anywhere.







...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Tip: Do not go to CNBC for financial advice

I guess this 25-year-old is going to be wearing the same clothes he or she has had since college for the foreseeable future.

Does he not have a car?  No insurance for that, or for household and personal items.

House cleaner definitely doesn't do windows.

Where is someone living that he can make $100 grand and yet only pay $825 in rent?

Cell phone $40.  Prepaid and he doesn't use it for half the month?  No data plan?  (And the slowest possible internet plan.)

Donations???  $615 ???!!!  Are those donations to the local drug dealer?


...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Bernie Quixote

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on Wednesday is unveiling legislation that would place a hard cap on the size of financial institutions, a proposal that would splinter Wall Street’s biggest firms in an effort to ward off future taxpayer bailouts.

  WaPo

If only.

The measure is dead on arrival with a Republican Congress and President Trump in office. And even if the current Democratic Party were to take control of government, it would face a difficult path to passage, as many of the party’s moderates have opted for answers to the banking crisis that did less to alter the financial system.

Made all the less possible by Bush and Obama's handling of the 2008 financial crisis. Of course there's no political will to rein in the financial institutions. As long as you can bleed the taxpayer. Gee, wasn't going up against those guys a Trump campaign promise? Who in the world thought that would happen?

Sanders’ bill would bar financial institutions from holding assets, derivatives, and other forms of borrowing worth more than 3 percent of the entire U.S. economy, or $584 billion in today’s dollars.

The legislation would force federal regulators to break up six different Wall Street firms — JPMorgan, Bank of America, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley — as well as insurance giants such as Prudential Financial and MetLife. Collectively, the targeted firms hold more than $13 trillion in assets, according to Sanders aides.

Despite its unlikelihood of passing in the near-term, the measure could become a marker for Democrats seeking support from the party’s progressive voters, much like a single-payer, universal health care system has become.

[...]

In response to the 2008 [financial] crisis, Democrats narrowly passed a broad banking law that was meant to ensure that “too big to fail” banks took steps to ward off failure, subjecting the largest firms to more stringent restrictions aimed at limiting their risk.

The law, signed by former president Barack Obama, had 16 separate chapters and ran more than 2,300 pages long. Sanders’s measure runs seven pages, and instead goes after the size of banks, arguing firms of that size pose an inherent risk to the economy.

[...]

“This legislation cuts to the heart of the matter, by putting a size cap on the largest highly leveraged firms. The size cap is simple, straightforward, and transparent,” said Simon Johnson, an economist at MIT who served as chief economist of the International Monetary Fund and supports the bill. “This measure will bring us closer to full and fair competition in the financial system, where a few megabanks currently predominate.”

Four of the six biggest banks are on average 80 percent bigger than they were when they started receiving bailout funding about a decade ago, according to Sanders aides, as many of the largest financial firms acquired distressed banks during the crisis. JP Morgan, which acquired Bear Stearns in 2008 at the urging of the federal government, has grown by about 60 percent to $2.53 trillion, according to the company’s public disclosure forms.

Holy cow.

[ Thomas M. Hoenig, who recently stepped down as vice chair of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation that regulates the banking industry] pointed out that Republicans were joined by more than a dozen Democratic Senators in dismantling parts of Obama’s 2010 Dodd-Frank banking bill, an effort that many Republicans thought did not go far enough.

“Several Democrats just voted to ease capital standards on two of the largest banks,” Hoenig said. “So who is going to pass this law?”

Nobody in this Congress. But, Bernie's giving the progressives coming on something to run with. I think it's a great idea, whether he can get is passed or not.

Sanders had already called for breaking up the biggest Wall Street firms, but this new bill offers a new mechanism for doing so. Previously, Sanders had called for the Financial Stability Oversight Council to identify and break up “too big to fail” institutions in addition to supporting the reinstatement of Glass-Steagall — the 1930s law keeping commercial and investment banking separate. The new approach sets a clean cap on a financial institution’s size.

Start with bringing back Glass-Stegall, and go from there, but shoot for the moon, because they're going to whittle you down. You need extra padding that you can afford to jettison.

Robert Hockett, a professor at Cornell University who specializes in banking issues and helped draft Sanders’ “too big to fail” legislation, said the measure may more easily garner public support and offers a significant improvement on previous banking legislation.

“Like Obamacare, Dodd-Frank is very long, very nuanced, and very difficult to explain to people,” Hockett said. “It’s so much easier to explain Sanders’ bill.”

Which will make it easier to use in campaign ads.

Changeover in the Fed

The Federal Reserve is imposing more penalties on Wells Fargo, freezing the bank’s growth until it can prove it has improved its internal controls. In addition, bank agreed to replace four board members.

It’s the latest blow against the San Francisco bank that has had its reputation tarnished by revelations it opened phony customer accounts and sold auto insurance to customers who did not need it.

The new penalties were announced late Friday on Fed Chair Janet Yellen’s last day at the central bank.

  TPM

Yes, Janet is leaving.

“We cannot tolerate pervasive and persistent misconduct at any bank,” Yellen said in a statement.

Oh, I think the year 2008 disproves that statement.

Anyway. I dread to find out who Trump will put in Yellin's place.

US President Donald Trump has named Jerome Powell, a current Federal Reserve governor and former finance executive, as his choice to replace Janet Yellen as chair of the world's most powerful central bank — ending months of speculation about who would take charge.

[...]

Powell is seen as a relatively safe, Wall Street-friendly choice at a crucial time for the central bank. The Fed has begun the process of raising interest rates from post-recession lows and is unwinding its massive asset-buying program — a response to the financial crisis a decade ago.

[...]

Trump's decision not to grant Yellen a second term as chair is a break with the recent tradition of presidents nominating sitting chairs to a second term, even when they have different political affiliations. Yellen is a Democrat and served in the administration of former US President Bill Clinton. Her term ends in February.

  Business Insider

Oh, God, a democrat!

"He had a very favorable view of her but in the end he thought governor Powell would be the best choice," the senior official when pressed about the reasoning behind the unusual change of guard.

Right. Sure.

Still, Powell does offer continuity of sorts, and in that sense is the best alternative to Yellen among those who were on Trump's shortlist of candidates. Other candidates reportedly considered included White House adviser and ex-Goldman Sachs executive Gary Cohn and Kevin Warsh, a former Fed governor and Morgan Stanley banker.

The selection was a drawn-out affair conducted in Trump's very public style. The president tweeted as he met candidates, and last week posted and an Instagram video previewing the decision.

You can't really say Trump governs. He just conducts TV ratings shows.

The appointment of Powell, who is among the wealthiest members of the Fed, is likely to be well received on Wall Street, which will see him as a friendly face on possible deregulation but also, importantly, as somewhat predictable on interest-rate policy at a key time for the central bank.

[...]

Powell, a 64-year-old Republican, was appointed to the Fed's powerful Washington-based board of governors in 2012 by US President Barack Obama.

I bet Trump doesn't know that.

[Powell] is likely to maintain the Fed's course of gradual but cautious rate increases, with an eye to an inflation rate that continues to undershoot the central bank's 2% goal. This points to economic activity and a labor market still running below their potential, a point highlighted by weak wage growth for most Americans.

Wait, what? Weak wage growth? Surely not. That's not the picture Trump has been painting.

Powell worked in private industry much of his life and was a partner at Carlyle Group from 1997 to 2005.

The Carlyle Group. The Carlye Group. Where have I heard that name before? Oh, yeah.

 ...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Game on at Davos

Or, the Roman Colosseum.

Donald Trump's administration is "a danger to the world" and is attempting to "establish a mafia state", according to a speech by financier and philanthropist George Soros at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

  IB times

Actually, as I mentioned before, Trump's whining about Palestine being disrespectful to the US, does sond like mob talk. You have to wonder how any organization could function with him at the top, though.

Soros told the audience that the US Constitution, other institutions and "a vibrant civil society" are standing in the way of Trump's plans.

[...]

Soros told the audience that the US Constitution, other institutions and "a vibrant civil society" are standing in the way of Trump's plans.

[...]

The billionaire also took aim at monopolistic technology and social media companies, which "while once liberating, are now socially damaging". He said that the power to "shape people's minds" now lies in the hands of a few companies, and that those without freedom of mind can be easily manipulated. In another attack on Trump, Soros pointed to the 2016 presidential elections as an example of this.

The billionaire also took aim at monopolistic technology and social media companies, which "while once liberating, are now socially damaging". He said that the power to "shape people's minds" now lies in the hands of a few companies, and that those without freedom of mind can be easily manipulated. In another attack on Trump, Soros pointed to the 2016 presidential elections as an example of this.

[...]

One solution would be a "multi-track" approach to EU membership, in which member states are free to form coalitions of the willing to pursue particular goals in which they agree.

The EU should also drop the requirement for member states to adopt the euro, Soros said, as "I would like to see Britain remain a member of the EU or eventually rejoin it, and that couldn't happen if it meant adopting the euro".

George Soros knows infinitely more about finance than I do, but I think the idea of the Euro was not such a bad one. The problem was that it was not applied equally to all members. That's one of the things that caused Greece to fall. A euro from a Greek bank was not equivalent in strength and favor as a euro from a German bank. Greece's once finance minister who quit once Greece's president decided to go along with the EU austerity proram, does know as much - and maybe more - about finance than George Soros, and this is what he had to say:

Varoufakis: Well, imagine if in the United States you treated people from Arizona as non-Americans or as people that must fend for themselves and whose banking system is their own problem. Then you wouldn't be having the United States of America.

Brancaccio: And that's the conundrum that Europe is still in. It didn't fix it.

Varoufakis: Indeed, we created the common currency, but did not create everything else which is necessary not to make the common currency a place of shared prosperity.

[...]

Brancaccio: Just so we know a piece of the story, what did the finance minister of Germany want to do but his chancellor wouldn't let them do?

Varoufakis: Wolfgang Schaeuble, decades ago, was a committed federalist, but a combination of Angela Merkel — who usurped him and effectively stole, that's in his view, the prime ministership, the chancellorship from him, as well as the French, did not want a proper federation.

They wanted all the benefits from a common currency, but without the obligations of a federal democratic political system. Schaeuble was against that. But over the years, he became a cynical man, using the finance ministry to do that which he would have wanted to do as the chancellor of Germany.

  Marketplace

It's nice to know at least the bankers are safe

A group of senators on Monday rolled out a rare, bipartisan agreement years in the making that would relax a number of banking regulations enacted after the 2008 financial crisis.

[...]

Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio, the top Democrat on the Banking Committee, said he opposed the proposal because it went too far in rolling back regulations.

But with nine Republicans, eight Democrats and one independent senator signing on, the package had a significant head start on the way to advancing through the Senate, where bipartisan agreement is essential to passing most laws.

[...]

In June, House Republicans passed a bill known as the Financial CHOICE Act that would repeal whole sections of Dodd-Frank and scale back the authority of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau — the kinds of provisions that are absent from the more targeted Senate compromise.

[...]

“Our bill is an example of how if Democrats and Republicans can put partisanship aside and work together, we can reach real compromises that support the country,” Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.) said.

[...]

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said he’s "very, very supportive” of the agreement, which he praised as “a bipartisan proposal, which I think is terrific.”

  Politico

Yes, Heidi and Steve, that's all we've ever wanted - Democrats and Republicans working together. 

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Just Takes Hard Work and the Right Attitude

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Market Response to Muslim Ban

According to the Guardian:

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.