After several drinks at a Greek restaurant on Manhattan’s Third Avenue in the summer of 2006, two computer programmers at Bernard Madoff’s investment firm asked their supervisor whether the boss’s business was a scam.
Chief Financial Officer Frank DiPascali laughed off the question, telling George Perez and Jerome O’Hara that Madoff was honest. DiPascali would later tell the FBI he wondered why they took so long to ask. Continue reading
With Greece experiencing political instability & embarking on a slow banking run, attention must be paid to other — more important — countries.
While the exit of Greece from the Euro may be of great importance to the Greeks, it won’t make much difference to the rest of Europe. However, what does become critical is preventing “follow on” — breaking the chain of dominoes, before failure ricochets across Europe.
Spain’s banking sector is in trouble, and with it likely next after Greece, action is needed now. The future of the Euro, may well play out in front of us over the next 2 months…
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The European Central Bank has stopped providing liquidity to some Greek banks as they have not been successfully recapitalized, the ECB said on Wednesday.
Greek banks have been experiencing strong withdrawls of euro (800 million per day), as citizens prepare against possible exit from the euro & devaluation of their deposits. Continue reading
Many moderates, and Republicans, are concerned about the current (and growing) US debt. As America finds itself post- financial crisis, winding down two wars, debts exceeding $14 trillion dollars — let’s ask where this came from? Continue reading
Since the financial crisis broke in 2008, there has been economic confusion as to what policies, if any, will help US and European economies recover.
Spending cuts, or ‘austerity’, have been strongly advocated; by Republicans in the US, by Britain’s Conservatives, and by Germany. This school of thought believes that ‘confidence’ must be restored, for growth to resume.
Yet historical experience shows a different picture. Continue reading
Friday brought two numbers that should have everyone in Washington saying, “My God, what have we done?”
One of these numbers was zero — the number of jobs created in August. The other was two — the interest rate on 10-year U.S. bonds, almost as low as this rate has ever gone. Taken together, these numbers almost scream that the inside-the-Beltway crowd has been worrying about the wrong things, and inflicting grievous harm as a result. Continue reading