Baltic Dry Index. 1395 -117
LIR Gold Target in 2019: $30,000. Revised due to QE programs.
“How
can you govern a country which has 246 varieties of cheese?”
Charles
de Gaulle.
Today we
open with France, the second largest economy in the German Eurozone. Later
today President Hollande gets to deliver his keynote address on the French economy
and how he intends his government will revive the failing economy. Right now
France seems to be descending into a socialist version of hell and chaos. Unfortunately
for Germany and the rest of the Eurozone, France is too big to bail or fail.
Unless the French economy is turned around and soon, France will collapse the
European Monetary Union. President Hollande has picked one hell of a time to
switch mistresses.
“I have come to the conclusion that politics are too serious a
matter to be left to the politicians.”
Charles
de Gaulle.
Paris Cabbies Slash Tires, Smash Windshields in Protest Against Uber
The rivalry
between Paris cabbies and Uber turned violent today, as striking taxi
drivers began attacking cars booked through Uber and another private-hire
service.
“Smashed windows, tires, vandalized vehicle, and bleeding hands,” passenger Kat Borlongan said on her Twitter feed, describing what happened after an Uber car picked her up at Charles de Gaulle Airport (aka Roissy Airport). “Attackers tried to get in the car, but our brave Uber driver maneuvered us to safety, changed the tire on the freeway, and got us home,” she said.
Two other cars, booked through the local Chauffeur Privé service, were targeted in similar attacks near Orly Airport and the Montparnasse train station. “Eggs and stones were thrown, and there were violent blows that broke the cars’ windows and rear-view mirrors,” Chauffeur Privé said in a statement.
The violence erupted during a strike by cabdrivers who are protesting increased competition from private car services. “We strongly condemn this severe violence,” Uber’s local spokesperson said in a statement.
“Today’s incident will certainly not tempt Parisians into choosing a taxi for their next ride.”
News of the attacks spread swiftly through Twitter posts posted by Borlongan, a founder of U.K. open-data firm Five by Five, and fellow passenger Renaud Visage, chief technology officer of online-ticketing company Eventbrite in San Francisco. “No more taxis for me, just Uber,” Visage said, adding that he was “shaken up” but unharmed.
More
France attacks 'ailing' NHS and claims it has better roads and rail
Britain embroiled in diplomatic row with France after embassy says NHS is 'ailing' and its roads, rail and tax system is better
France has said it is better than
Britain because the NHS is "ailing" and its health service, roads,
rail and tax system are all superior.
In a riposte to criticism from
British commentators, the French Embassy in London has drawn up a list of 10
reasons why it is not a "failed socialist experiment" which is at
risk of "turning into a tragedy".
In highly undiplomatic language,
the embassy dismissed claims that its government oversees "absurd levels
of inefficient public spending".
It compares France's health
service, which it claims is the best in the world, to the "ailing"
NHS which has suffered from years of underinvestment.
It says: "France's public
spending is based on a different tradition of public services.
----The embassy goes on to criticise Britain's infrastructure. "Similar success exists in infrastructure, from high-speed rail to energy," it says.
"France has always sought to
achieve greater efficiency and will continue to do so in spite of future budget
cuts. Clearly, when you live in France – from health to infrastructure and
energy costs to transport – you get more bang for your euro."
Dominic Raab, a Conservative MP,
said: "The histrionic reaction of the French Ambassador only magnifies the
increasing sense of Gallic insecurity commentators talk about.
"There's a reason London is
now the sixth largest French city, and that's because an increasing number of
French workers recognise their socialist experiment has failed. "
More
Francois Hollande 'spent nights with actress without security'
Security would leave him alone at Julie Gayet's house
By Rory Mulholland, Paris 8:45PM
GMT 13 Jan 2014
President Francois Hollande spent
nights with his alleged actress lover without any security detail watching out
for him outside the apartment rented by a woman linked to the Corsican mafia,
says the photographer who took the photos that revealed the affair.
“From the moment he was in the
apartment his security detail left,” Sébastien Valiela told RTL radio, adding
that if he had been ill-intentioned it would have been easy to try and attack
the president as he left or entered the building near the Elysee palace.
Mr Valiela was the photographer
who took the first photos published of the late president François Mitterrand
and his daughter Mazarine, from a mistress, 20 years ago.
He said that a bodyguard would
come to do a quick check just before Mr Hollande arrived at or left the
building by scooter, but then the security officers would leave him alone as he
allegedly spent the night with film star Julie Gayet.
The photographer would sit in a
car on the street to take his pictures.
More
How will François Hollande handle his nightmare week?
François Hollande prepares to meet the world's press at huge press conference at the Elysée Palace on Tuesday, as the world asks what he intends to do with the French economy and the women in his life
François Hollande is facing the toughest week of his presidency, in which he faces a Herculean task convincing France that he is not a fraud on a political and personal level.The embattled Socialist leader is said to have been working feverishly in recent days on outlining a credible plan to wrest the eurozone's second-largest economy out of decline with business-friendly reforms.
But his reformist PR drive now risks being totally overshadowed by allegations about a secret love affair with Julie Gayet, a 41-year old actress. With the opposition Right now baying for blood over the president's "unbearable lightness of being", all eyes are on how he handles both issues when he faces media for up to two hours in the traditional start-of-year news conference on Tuesday.
As he takes to the stage, Valerie Trierweiler, his partner and France's first lady, will probably still be in hospital, where she was rushed on Friday when news of the president's affair broke. On Monday her chief of staff, Patrice Biancone, said she could be hospitalized for another six or eight days.
She will remain hospitalized for several more days to recover from the shock of a tabloid report that President Francois Hollande is having a secret affair with an actress.
More
But in the EUSSR, France is not
alone in a never ending train wreck. Yesterday it was Spain fessing up to a
little more reality.
“Treaties you see
are like girls and roses; they last while they last.”
Charles
de Gaulle.
Spain Says CAM Savings Bank Rescue Cost May Reach $21 Billion
Jan 13, 2014 11:00 PM GMT
Spain’s 2011 bailout of savings bank Caja de Ahorros del Mediterraneo (CAM) may
cost as much as 15 billion euros ($21 billion) because its assets performed
worse than expected, Economy Minister Luis de Guindos said. Banco Sabadell SA (SAB) bought the failed savings bank known as CAM for 1 euro after Spain’s deposit-guarantee fund, financed by the nation’s banks, injected 5.25 billion euros into the lender and offered guarantees against certain assets souring, shielding the national budget from losses.
De Guindos said yesterday the assets included in the so-called asset-protection plan had performed worse than predicted, and the total cost of the cleanup may amount to as much as 15 billion euros. By comparison, Bankia SA, the lender whose nationalization in 2012 pushed Spain to seek a European banking bailout, took 18 billion euros of European rescue funds and transferred about 22 billion euros of real estate-linked assets to the nation’s so-called bad bank.
More
But France is not alone in facing
rising anarchy. Stay long physical precious metals. A great wind of anarchic change
seems to be seeping planet earth.
“Since a politician never believes what
he says, he is surprised when others believe him.”
Charles
de Gaulle.
Thai Protesters Extend Blockade After Rejecting Poll Talks
Jan 14,
2014 6:31 AM GMT
Thai anti-government protesters pledged to maintain a blockade of central
Bangkok until Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra agrees to quit, rejecting an
offer to discuss a postponement of elections scheduled for Feb. 2. “We will not compromise on our demand for Yingluck to get out before the election,” Suthep Thaugsuban, a former member of the opposition Democrat Party, who is leading the protest, told supporters in Bangkok yesterday. “There are only two ways. We win and remove Yingluck, or we lose and go to jail.”
Yingluck has faced more than two months of street rallies led by Suthep, who says electoral democracy should be suspended until a council of “good people” can remove what he says is the corrupting influence of her brother, Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted as premier in a 2006 coup. Suthep faces murder charges for ordering a deadly crackdown on pro-Thaksin demonstrators in 2010, when the Democrats were in power.
“There is no win-win situation,” said Suthep, who also has an outstanding arrest warrant on insurrection charges for leading the protest. “One side has to win and one side will lose. There is no compromising. We need to get rid of the Thaksin system and reform the country.”
More
Rise of 'Common Man' in India Threatens Stability of Government Coalition
Jan 14,
2014
The sudden popularity of India’s anti-graft Aam Aadmi Party is prompting concern at
companies such as Maruti Suzuki India (MSIL) Ltd. that this
year’s general election will fail to create a stable government. Arvind Kejriwal’s one-year-old Aam Aadmi plans to contest as many as 300 seats after taking power in the national capital last month, according to senior party leader Yogendra Yadav. That threatens to reduce the chances of the ruling Congress Party or main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party emerging with a majority in the election, which is due by May.
“There is a worry that the AAP might split the vote,” R.C. Bhargava, chairman of New Delhi-based Maruti Suzuki India, the nation’s largest carmaker, said in a Jan. 9 interview. “We’ll have to see what sort of coalitions are formed.”
More
All this uncertainty, plus the
prospect of a US taper has suddenly introduced a small dose of reality back
into planet earth’s disconnected stock markets. QE Forever better had be
forever, or our “one way street” bubble stock markets will rapidly slam into
their pin.
“The more I get to know men, the more I
love dogs.”
Charles
de Gaulle.
Asian Stocks Fall Most in Three Months, Pacing U.S. Rout
Jan 14, 2014 5:20 AM GMT
Asian stocks fell, with the regional benchmark index on course for
its biggest loss in more than three months, as it paced the largest drop in
U.S. stocks since November amid concern over valuations. Great Wall Motor Co., China’s No. 1 maker of sport utility vehicles, plunged 12 percent in Hong Kong after delaying the introduction of its Haval H8 model for three months to address technical deficiencies. Honda Motor Co. (7267), a Japanese carmaker that gets 47 percent of its sales in North America, lost 3.7 percent. Dainippon Sumitomo Pharma Co. fell 7.6 percent in Tokyo after the head of its New York-based partner Intercept Pharmaceuticals Inc. said he may need the help of a larger drugmaker to bring a liver-disease treatment to market.
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index lost 1.4 percent to 138.77 as of 2:18 p.m. in Tokyo, heading for the biggest loss sine Sept. 30. All 10 industry groups on the gauge fell, with more than three stocks dropping for each that rose.
More
S&P 500 Falls Most Since November Amid Valuation Concern
Jan 13, 2014 9:50 PM GMT
U.S. stocks fell, sending the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index to
its biggest loss in two months, amid concern over valuations after benchmark
indexes rallied to all-time highs in 2013. Companies from Microsoft Corp. to Nike Inc. and Walt Disney Co. dropped more than 2 percent, with all 10 main industries in the S&P 500 (SPX) declining. Lululemon Athletica Inc. slumped 17 percent after the sportswear maker lowered its profit and sales forecast. Intercept Pharmaceuticals Inc. plunged 18 percent after the stock soared sixfold last week. Beam Inc. jumped 25 percent after Suntory Holdings Ltd. said it will acquire the spirits maker in a $16 billion deal.
The S&P 500 fell 1.3 percent to 1,819.20, the lowest level since Dec. 20, at 4 p.m. in New York. Some 464 companies in the S&P 500 declined today, the most since Aug. 27, data compiled by Bloomberg show.
More
Japan Current-Account Gap Widens to Record on Weaker Yen
Jan 14, 2014 3:06 AM GMT
Japan’s current-account
deficit widened to a record in November as imports climbed, underscoring
challenges for Prime MinisterShinzo Abe as he tries to drive a sustained
economic rebound. The 592.8 billion yen ($5.7 billion) shortfall in the widest measure of trade, reported by the Ministry of Finance in Tokyo today, was larger than the median forecast of 368.9 billion yen in a Bloomberg News survey of 24 economists. The deficit is the biggest in comparable data back to 1985.
Weakness in the yen and extra demand for energy because of nuclear-plant shutdowns are driving up Japan’s import bill, highlighting drags on the recovery that will also include a sales-tax increase in April. A longer-term risk for the nation is any shift to a sustained deficit that would undermine investor confidence in Japanese government debt.
More
And so we await the great man’s
speech later today in Paris. Who’s in and who’s out will likely dominate the
popular media, rather than how he intends to get the French economy growing
again. But without reform and growth in the economy, France will collapse the
great Bilderberger United States of Europe project. But can a man juggling two
mistresses really deliver Anglo-American style reform in the French economy? Stay
long physical gold and silver and only take euros bearing a German “X”.
The graveyards are full of indispensable
men.
Charles de Gaulle
At the Comex
silver depositories Monday
final figures were: Registered 48.56 Moz, Eligible 127.56 Moz, Total 176.12 Moz.
Crooks and Scoundrels Corner
The bent, the seriously bent, and the totally
doubled over.
Yes
it’s the banksters again. They just can’t stop doing “God’s work” everywhere.
Goldman,
in a statement to MarketWatch, says: “We believe this lawsuit is without merit
and we intend to defend ourselves.” Well they would say that wouldn’t they, to
use a famous quote from a 1960s English sex scandal. Sadly for the rest of us,
the banksters are optimistic for 2014.
“Call
it the Goldman Sachs test. If this is something Goldman would do to its
clients, don't do it."
Felix
Salmon.
Jan. 13, 2014, 8:30 a.m. EST
Optimism seen ahead of J.P. Morgan, Wells Fargo results
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — There’s optimism in the air as J.P.
Morgan Chase and Wells
Fargo get ready to kick off banking earnings season.
After J.P.
Morgan JPM
-0.19%
and
Wells Fargo WFC
-0.36%
results
on Tuesday, Bank of America
Corp.
BAC
-0.48%
is
set to announce on Wednesday. Goldman Sachs
Group
Inc. GS
-0.59%
and
Citigroup Inc. C
-0.64%
will report on Thursday and Morgan Stanley MS
-0.16%
rounds out the big six on Friday.
“I think banks
will be relatively optimistic on 2014,” said Brad Hintz, analyst at Bernstein.
“They are getting an idea where the regulators are pushing them, they know what
they have to do.”
More
Jan. 13, 2014, 7:33 a.m. EST
Dinner with Goldman Sachs cost him $34 million
A tycoon accuses the banking giant of sweet-talking him into a losing currency trade
What’s the most money a dinner has ever cost you? Two hundred
bucks? Five hundred? A thousand?
Self-made Asian
tycoon Peter Oei may take the award for the all-time record. He reckons he’s
out about $34 million. And that doesn’t even include the cost of the food and
the wine.
The dinner
wasn’t even in a fancy restaurant. It was at his house in Singapore.
So how did the
dinner end up costing him $34 million? In a nutshell: It was dinner with
Goldman Sachs GS
-0.72%
.
And it led to a dispute between Oei and the bank that is now at the center of a
lawsuit in federal court in New York.
Oei’s full name
is Oei Hong Leong, but he is known as Peter Oei (pronounced “We”).
He alleges that
Goldman’s bankers lied to him, suckered him, and then scammed him out of
millions. He accuses Goldman of using him as a patsy in order to bet against
him and clean up in the foreign-exchange markets.
Goldman is
defending itself against the suit and says it is without merit. But it will be
fascinating if this thing goes to trial. The Oei suit casts a light on the
largely hidden world of high-hat investment banking and its super-rich clients.
The details are like something
out of “Liar’s Poker,” Michael Lewis’s celebrated inside look at Wall Street.
That book was published more than 20 years ago. But how much have things
changed?
To get the skinny, I spoke with
Oei’s lawyer, Peter McNulty, of the McNulty Law Firm in Los Angeles. He says
that Oei, who made his fortune from privatized industries in China during the
decades when the economy liberalized, traded “hundreds of millions of dollars”
in various transactions through Goldman for several years, but broke off his
relationship with the bank after disputing the wind-up fees he was charged on a
losing trade.
But successful bankers will go to
great lengths to harpoon a whale. In April 2012, Gary Cohn, the chief operating
officer of Goldman Sachs and the heir-apparent to CEO Lloyd Blankfein, came to
a dinner at Oei’s home along with several other of Goldman’s top brass in Asia.
----In April 2013, Oei says,
Goldman Sachs bankers in Asia persuaded him to enter into a trade betting that
the Brazilian real would rise against the Japanese yen.
Oei says the bank misled him
about the trade, failed to disclose the full terms or seek confirmation before
making it, and gave him the worst possible price. When he sought to unwind it
on the next trading day, they tried to hit him with an $8 million wind-up
charge. And as the dispute dragged on for several weeks, the losses spiraled to
$34 million.
He believes that Goldman was
secretly betting against him in the trade by going long on the real and
shorting the yen. That kind of behavior has been associated with Goldman
already, in the case of former trader “Fabulous” Fabrice Tourre, who helped the
bank make money betting against its clients during the financial crisis.
----Without prejudging the suit,
it is possible to draw a couple of simple conclusions from Oei’s story.
Banking and finance are
“zero-sum” activities. One person’s winnings mean someone else’s losses. A chef
turns raw food into a sumptuous meal. William Shakespeare turned ink and
parchment into Hamlet. The people at Ford turn rubber, metal and so on into a
car. Software writers create valuable programs out of ones and zeroes. But
bankers and financiers create nothing. So the more they make, the more you
lose.
If a banker were
ever to come to my house to persuade me to trade, I would understand that the
cost of his time and his bonus would have to come out of my winnings (if any).
If a banker sat down with me and assured me that the Brazilian real was
guaranteed to rise against the Japanese yen, I would ask him why he wasn’t
simply buying reals, and shorting yen, with his own money. Why would he even be
wasting time talking to me if it was such a good deal?
More
I've got news for you... If the financial system goes down, our
business is going down and, trust me, yours and everyone else's is going down,
too."
Lloyd Blankfein. CEO Goldman Sachs, The Times of London.
November 8 2009
The monthly Coppock Indicators finished December and 2013.
DJIA: +204 Up. NASDAQ: +311 Up. SP500: +247 Up.
The new Fed bubble continues, but for how much longer?
No comments:
Post a Comment