Printable View
Yeah, they're gradually being normalised to where they should be, which historically is just above the prevailing rate of inflation. Even with last week's raise it's below where it should be. Of course, years of negative real interest rates (AKA artificially cheap credit) and QE is why stock markets, housing, land, fine art, etc, are so massively overpriced, and is why they have so much further to fall.
The Federal Reserve, which isn't federal - but private whose shareholders are unknown - and has never been fully audited since its inception in 1913 caused the Great Depression by using the same playbook that's being repeated today. By making cheap money available everyone piled into assets during the 1920s, then when they had corralled enough of the something-for-nothing chumps they contracted the money supply following years of expanding it. All the weak hands sold their shares, ditto for those who defaulted on their inflated homes so that the banksters swooped to collect their assets for peanuts.
I hadn't realised Asian markets traded on Christmas Day. The smash in Japan was bigger than in Yank land. So big in fact that it's the top story at the BBC's site.
Japan's Nikkei index slides amid US uncertainty
Japan's main stock market index has plunged, reflecting traders' worries following a slide on Wall Street.
The Nikkei closed down 5% on Tuesday, its worst finish since April 2017. Indexes in Shanghai, Bangkok and Taiwan also fell.
Investors have been concerned about President Trump's dispute with the US central bank chief and another government shutdown.
US stocks had their worst Christmas Eve on record.
The Dow Jones index of 30 leading companies fell more than 650 points on Monday, and is on track for its worst December since 1931, during the Great Depression.
More: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-46679094
Thankfully the real world is a million miles away from this doom and gloom , as we wallow in its riches.
People were far, far tougher in the 1920s and 30s. Very few soft and coddled fatties were around as the welfare state was in its infancy. The thrift and make do and mend mentality is beyond most people's living memory. The mindless throwaway consumerist society and Mammon has been the norm for most of us. I've stated before, but for one - Housing Benefit - of the dozens available there'd be more homeless today than in Victorian times. If and when the state becomes bankrupt then those who are most dependent upon it for income, including those six million public sector workers, 12 million State Pensioners, etc, etc, will endure the most hardship.
Returning to financial markets, we can only guess at what the action portends. Should a capitulation event occur, say for argument's sake stock markets bomb 20%-30% in a single day, then it'll be time to panic.
Brandon Smith, whose latest article I posted on this page, is convinced it's the beginning of a deliberate collapse designed to inflict so much suffering that people will beg for a new system.
An extremely thinly-veiled plea from Donald Trump today for investors to buy stocks tomorrow.
Trump Urges Buying the Dip After Stocks Sink on D.C. Dysfunction
President Donald Trump suggested that a recent swoon in U.S. stock markets is a buying opportunity for investors, even though many analysts blame his policies and Washington gridlock for the plunge.
“We have companies -- the greatest in the world, and they’re doing really well,” Trump told reporters at the White House on Tuesday. “They have record kinds of numbers. So I think it’s a tremendous opportunity to buy. Really a great opportunity to buy.”
More: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump...160858067.html
"Several months worth of cash"? Chance'd be a fine thing.Quote:
Originally Posted by Organ Morgan.
That's the secret world of capitalism kicking in , TOBW. ( some anti establishment folk got money (most of them live in North London, their foot soldiers are in the suburbs starving )Quote:
Originally Posted by the other bob wilson
Loved his Bug Wendal role in Gridiron Gang and he certainly excelled withQuote:
Originally Posted by Organ Morgan.
" Party Up" for Starstruck
Donald Trump's remarks certainly made an impact; U.S. stock markets are up today by 2.8% and crude oil is plus a whopping 8.5%!
I can only foresee sunshine and roses ahead for the global economy during 2019.
If you can see sunshine and roses the psilocybin psilocin are kicking inQuote:
Originally Posted by Organ Morgan.
Back to debt. With every country in the world indebted I've asked twice in this thread who's owed these vast sums and no-one has had a stab at answering it.
Britain's national debt, which is approaching eighteen hundred billion quid, isn't what it seems because around one-third of that is owed to itself.
Wait? What? Then it's not owed then, is it? No, it isn't. Well, why is it included then? Good question, one which you might wish to ask the government for an answer. That third is the approximate six hundred billion quid created by a few mouse clicks since 2008 via QE (quantitative easing). Quantitative easing is essentially a term for money which hasn't been borrowed; it's just created from nothing. Down the years somebody at the UK Treasury rang the Bank of England to rustle-up all those billions, which the BoE did to lend to the UK with interest attached. But, but, but, hold on, the UK government owns the Bank of England, why pay it interest? Another great question which is for the government to answer. It does pay the BoE interest, but the BoE returns that interest to the government.
Now I'm really confused. Why go through the convoluted process of having one branch of government, the BoE, create that funny money at interest when the interest doesn't apply? Why doesn't some bloke sat at a Treasury computer terminal magic the dough rather than have all this palava of going through the BoE? And while I'm at it, rather than pay the thirty six billion quid in interest payments during 2018 to those who lent the UK the other twelve hundred billion quid it owes as national debt, why instead doesn't the same bloke at the Treasury return to his computer to create that amount to then use it to pay off all of the national debt? That way Blighty will become debt free and won't have to pay anyone so much as a penny in interest.
We're getting closer to solving how it is every country is in debt that amounts to a combined one hundred and eighty four trillion dollars globally according to the IMF.
Your a ringer for Dominic CummingsQuote:
Originally Posted by Organ Morgan.