Bernanke’s Remedy: Pump More Blood Into a Corpse

By Mike WhitneyInformation Clearing House” — Credit is everything. Without credit expansion there’s no recovery because there’s no pick-up in overall demand. But credit growth is going backwards. The banks have tightened lending standards and the pool of credit-worthy applicants has vanished. Bank lending is off 14 per cent since October 2008. Private credit is presently decreasing at a 10.5 per cent annual rate. The situation is getting worse, not better.

October 05, 2009 “

From the UK Telegraph:

“Both bank credit and the M3 money supply in the United States have been contracting at rates comparable to the onset of the Great Depression since early summer, raising fears of a double-dip recession in 2010 and a slide into debt-deflation…

“Similar concerns have been raised by David Rosenberg, chief strategist at Gluskin Sheff, who said that over the four weeks up to August 24, bank credit shrank at an ‘epic’ 9pc annual pace, the M2 money supply shrank at 12.2pc and M1 shrank at 6.5pc.

“’For the first time in the post-Second World War era, we have deflation in credit, wages and rents and, from our lens, this is a toxic brew,’he said. (Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, “US credit shrinks at Great Depression rate prompting fears of double-dip recession”, UK Telegraph)

Foreclosures, delinquencies and defaults are all up. Foreclosure activity is currently at 300,000-plus per month and rising. A huge shadow inventory is being kept off-market to maintain prices. The drip, drip, drip-effect of excess inventory dumped onto the market will keep housing in the doldrums for a decade. Homeowners are unable to borrow on underwater homes. Everything points to a long-term slump in spending.

Corporations are finding it harder to roll over their debt, bank loans are defaulting at a historic pace, and commercial real estate is imploding. Credit destruction is unprecedented, massive and ongoing. The capital hole is bigger than the Fed and bigger than the Treasury. It can’t be plugged with liquidity alone.

For now, the government can fiddle GDP with $800 billion infusion of stimulus, but what happens when the political will for more deficit spending dissipates? What happens when foreign investors demand the Fed stop writing checks on an overdrawn account?

The Fed has fixed nothing. The banks are still underwater, output is at record lows, and unemployment is climbing towards 10 per cent. Fed chair Ben Bernanke’s multi-trillion dollar rescue programs have kept a wobbly system upright, but nothing more. The economy’s underlying problems are still the same. The Fed’s quantitative easing (monetization) program has sent stocks surging, but done nothing to stimulate the economy. That’s because equities bubbles have negligible impact on aggregate demand; there’s no knock-on effect. The real economy is still flatlining while Wall Street parties on. Bernanke’s plan has been a total wash.

The government cannot deficit spend forever. Eventually, GDP will have to depend on wage growth and credit expansion. Given the political and institutional bias against labor, (and opposition to wages that rise with productivity) the only way to fuel the economy is through credit growth. And there’s the rub. Households have lost nearly $14 trillion in wealth since the crisis began and are in no position to resume borrowing at pre-crisis levels. Consumers are cutting back on spending and paying down debt. They have no other choice.

This is from Bloomberg News:

“Americans plan to refrain from boosting their spending even after the biggest drop in consumption since 1980, signaling concern about the direction of the economy over the next six months.

“Only 8 per cent of U.S. adults plan to increase household spending, almost one-third will spend less, and 58 per cent expect to ‘stay the course,’ a Bloomberg News poll showed. More than 3 in 4 said they reduced spending in the past year.

“Underscoring consumers’ austere attitudes, 77 per cent of respondents said they have cut back on spending during the past year, 59 percent said they have made a bigger effort to pay off debts and 48 percent have put more money aside as savings.” (Bloomberg News)

Savings are up and spending is down. The economy is headed into a long-term funk; the “new normal”. The Fed’s sleight-of-hand programs and Obama’s stimulus elixir haven’t changed the prevailing downward trend. If anything, they have made matters worse. Consider this from Janet Tavakoli, author of “Dear Mr. Buffett” in an interview with Max Keiser:

“Regarding the outlook, my analysis is grim. I am not a doomsayer, I follow the cash, and so far, I’ve been correct, and the government has been wrong. Here’s the situation. We are at greater risk of a total meltdown due to a deflationary collapse than we were in 2007. After the greatest Ponzi scheme in the history of the capital markets, we’ve seen history’s greatest fiscal and monetary expansion, but it hasn’t worked. Debt levels of consumers and business exceed the capacity to repay.” (Janet Tavakoli On The Edge With Max Keiser)

The Fed has done nothing to restructure the financial system so the same problems which killed Lehman and thrust the global economy into a tailspin, persist today. When the stimulus runs out and the Fed ends its $1.25 trillion purchase of (Fannie and Freddie) mortgage-backed securities and $300 billion in US Treasuries, interest rates will rise, housing prices will tumble, and the economy will nosedive. Bernanke will be forced back to the printing presses, the only hope for reversing the deflationary spiral. This will trigger the next crisis, a run on the dollar.

This is from an article by Alice Schroeder of Bloomberg News:

“In all the talk of inflation because the Treasury is printing so much money versus deflation because it may not print enough, there is one type of inflation that is rarely discussed. This is the mega-inflation caused by a sudden currency devaluation. Currency is like any financial innovation, an obligation secured by assets. When the obligation is perceived to have increased far beyond the level justifiable by the assets, which in this case make up a country’s economy, a bubble has formed……Right now, the American economy is worth less than the value implied by the market value of its obligations.” (Gold Tells You U.S. Bubble Hasn’t Popped Yet: Alice Schroeder, Bloomberg)

The system crashed because it was built on the false assumption that an unregulated shadow banking system could generate an infinite amount of credit without sufficient capital. This proved to be wrong. Capitalism requires capital. The trillions of dollars in loans, complex debt-instruments, off-balance sheet operations and derivatives contracts were all stacked atop a tiny scrap of capital which eventually collapsed beneath the weight of the debt. This system (securitization) which created the mess, cannot be restored. It required a strong currency, artificially low interest rates, and credulous investors who were unaware of the inherent risks of illiquid assets. Those conditions no longer exist, nor have they for more than two years. Even so, the Fed continues to pump blood into a corpse hoping for some fleeting sign of life. This is why an even bigger crisis cannot be too far off.

Link to Article

The Economy Is A Lie, Too

By Paul Craig Roberts

September 21, 2009 — Americans cannot get any truth out of their government about anything, the economy included. Americans are being driven into the ground economically, with one million school children now homeless, while Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke announces that the recession is over.

The spin that masquerades as news is becoming more delusional. Consumer spending is 70% of the US economy. It is the driving force, and it has been shut down. Except for the super rich, there has been no growth in consumer incomes in the 21st century. Statistician John Williams of shadowstats.com reports that real household income has never recovered its pre-2001 peak.

The US economy has been kept going by substituting growth in consumer debt for growth in consumer income. Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan encouraged consumer debt with low interest rates. The low interest rates pushed up home prices, enabling Americans to refinance their homes and spend the equity. Credit cards were maxed out in expectations of rising real estate and equity values to pay the accumulated debt. The binge was halted when the real estate and equity bubbles burst.

As consumers no longer can expand their indebtedness and their incomes are not rising, there is no basis for a growing consumer economy. Indeed, statistics indicate that consumers are paying down debt in their efforts to survive financially. In an economy in which the consumer is the driving force, that is bad news.

The banks, now investment banks thanks to greed-driven deregulation that repealed the learned lessons of the past, were even more reckless than consumers and took speculative leverage to new heights. At the urging of Larry Summers and Goldman Sachs’ CEO Henry Paulson, the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Bush administration went along with removing restrictions on debt leverage.

When the bubble burst, the extraordinary leverage threatened the financial system with collapse. The US Treasury and the Federal Reserve stepped forward with no one knows how many trillions of dollars to “save the financial system,” which, of course, meant to save the greed-driven financial institutions that had caused the economic crisis that dispossessed ordinary Americans of half of their life savings.

The consumer has been chastened, but not the banks. Refreshed with the TARP $700 billion and the Federal Reserve’s expanded balance sheet, banks are again behaving like hedge funds. Leveraged speculation is producing another bubble with the current stock market rally, which is not a sign of economic recovery but is the final savaging of Americans’ wealth by a few investment banks and their Washington friends. Goldman Sachs, rolling in profits, announced six figure bonuses to employees.

The rest of America is suffering terribly.

The unemployment rate, as reported, is a fiction and has been since the Clinton administration. The unemployment rate does not include jobless Americans who have been unemployed for more than a year and have given up on finding work. The reported 10% unemployment rate is understated by the millions of Americans who are suffering long-term unemployment and are no longer counted as unemployed. As each month passes, unemployed Americans drop off the unemployment role due to nothing except the passing of time.

The inflation rate, especially “core inflation,” is another fiction. “Core inflation” does not include food and energy, two of Americans’ biggest budget items. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) assumes, ever since the Boskin Commission during the Clinton administration, that if prices of items go up consumers substitute cheaper items. This is certainly the case, but this way of measuring inflation means that the CPI is no longer comparable to past years, because the basket of goods in the index is variable.

The Boskin Commission’s CPI, by lowering the measured rate of inflation, raises the real GDP growth rate. The result of the statistical manipulation is an understated inflation rate, thus eroding the real value of Social Security income, and an overstated growth rate. Statistical manipulation cloaks a declining standard of living.

In bygone days of American prosperity, American incomes rose with productivity. It was the real growth in American incomes that propelled the US economy.

In today’s America, the only incomes that rise are in the financial sector that risks the country’s future on excessive leverage and in the corporate world that substitutes foreign for American labor. Under the compensation rules and emphasis on shareholder earnings that hold sway in the US today, corporate executives maximize earnings and their compensation by minimizing the employment of Americans.

Try to find some acknowledgement of this in the “mainstream media,” or among economists, who suck up to the offshoring corporations for grants.

The worst part of the decline is yet to come. Bank failures and home foreclosures are yet to peak. The commercial real estate bust is yet to hit. The dollar crisis is building.
When it hits, interest rates will rise dramatically as the US struggles to finance its massive budget and trade deficits while the rest of the world tries to escape a depreciating dollar.

Since the spring of this year, the value of the US dollar has collapsed against every currency except those pegged to it. The Swiss franc has risen 14% against the dollar. Every hard currency from the Canadian dollar to the Euro and UK pound has risen at least 13 % against the US dollar since April 2009. The Japanese yen is not far behind, and the Brazilian real has risen 25% against the almighty US dollar. Even the Russian ruble has risen 13% against the US dollar.

What sort of recovery is it when the safest investment is to bet against the US dollar?

The American household of my day, in which the husband worked and the wife provided household services and raised the children, scarcely exists today. Most, if not all, members of a household have to work in order to pay the bills. However, the jobs are disappearing, even the part-time ones.

If measured according to the methodology used when I was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, the unemployment rate today in the US is above 20%. Moreover, there is no obvious way of reducing it. There are no factories, with work forces temporarily laid off by high interest rates, waiting for a lower interest rate policy to call their workforces back into production.

The work has been moved abroad. In the bygone days of American prosperity, CEOs were inculcated with the view that they had equal responsibilities to customers, employees, and shareholders. This view has been exterminated. Pushed by Wall Street and the threat of takeovers promising “enhanced shareholder value,” and incentivized by “performance pay,” CEOs use every means to substitute cheaper foreign employees for Americans .
Despite 20% unemployment and cum laude engineering graduates who cannot find jobs or even job interviews, Congress continues to support 65,000 annual H-1B work visas for foreigners.

In the midst of the highest unemployment since the Great Depression what kind of a fool do you need to be to think that there is a shortage of qualified US workers?

Where Has all the Money Gone? … This is a Recovery?

By Mike Whitney

The slight rebound in housing looks a lot different when one considers how much the Fed is meddling in the market. Fed chair Ben Bernanke has purchased $240 billion in US Treasuries to keep long-term interest rates artificially low while–at the same time–buying $740 billion in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac mortgage-backed securities (MBS) to provide the financing for new home buyers. It’s the double-whammy; and that’s not all. Bernanke plans to continue buying agency MBS (monetization) until he reaches $1.45 trillion, which will make Uncle Sam the biggest player in the housing market by far. How’s that for central planning?

Ironically, the funds for Bernanke’s housing market rescue plan were never approved by Congress, which means that the Fed committed nearly-$2 trillion with “no down” payment. That makes the Fed’s Treasury buyback program the biggest subprime loan of all time. 

   The fact is, all the recent gains in home sales are all the result of direct government intervention. If interest rates were allowed to rise (as the would naturally) or if  Congress withdrew its $8,000 first-time home-buyer subsidy, or if FHA tightened its loosey-goosey financing (which requires just 3.5% down payment and low FICO scores, the same as subprime!) home prices and sales would continue to drop at a 10 to 15 percent year-over-year rate. Housing has stopped plummeting for one reason alone; the Fed bought the market.

  The same rule applies to the stock market, where the Fed’s quantitative easing (QE) and liquidity injections have sparked a 6-month bear market rally sending equities to the moon. It’s all Fed intervention. A recent report by Egan-Jones Ratings And Analytics traces the Fed’s lavish liquidity handouts pointing out the precise sectors of the market that have been most effected:

  “Massive monetary stimulus is good for asset prices (stocks, bonds, houses, commodities) in a weak pricing environment and soft economy. The Federal Reserve has doubled its balance sheet from $1 Trillion to $2 Trillion effectively adding $1 Trillion to our economy. In addition, the Fed has through an alphabet soup of facilities i.e. Term Auction credit, Asset Backed Commercial Paper Money Market Mutual Fund Liquidity Facility, Term Asset Backed Securities Loan Facility, Primary Dealer and other Broker Dealer Credit, Other Credit Extensions, Term Facility, Maiden Lane LLC one, two and three, Money Market Investor Facility, added approximately $3 Trillion in loans and over $5.5 Trillion in guarantees of private investments. While these latter funds are technically loans, they get renewed regularly.

So where has all the money gone? The chart below shows the rise in the stock market causing the valuation to be somewhat extended in our view – some liquidity found a home here. Large rises in just the last month in small cap stocks, plus 17%; most shorted stocks, plus 17%; stocks with the lowest analyst rating out performing those with the highest rating by 380 basis points, all suggest some speculation……
Commodities have had a nice rebound from their lows with copper hitting new highs. High yield bonds have out performed investment rated bonds as investors are willing to bet on a faster recovery and start to reach for yield.
These are indications of excess liquidity finding outlets.” ( “Fundamentally…Disconnected”  Egan-Jones Ratings And Analytics, hat tip zero hedge.com)

Let’s summarize: The Fed is goosing the stock market and subsidizing the housing market. Bernanke has slashed interest rates to zero percent, underwritten the entire financial system with $12.8 trillion in loans and guarantees, and flooded the financial system with liquidity. The Fed has  also doubled its balance sheet to $2.08 trillion which is the equivalent of dropping the Fed Funds rate to -1 percent.  As Mark Gongloff of the Wall Street Journal opines, “The Fed is essentially paying people to borrow money.”

Indeed, the Fed has done its level-best to keep the market from correcting, but isn’t it a bit of a stretch to call it a “recovery”?

In truth,  Bernanke is in a pitch-battle with deflation and the outcome is still uncertain. Deflation has spread to every sector of the economy; retail, travel, luxury items, autos, building supplies, home furnishings, electronics. No business has been spared. The C.P.I. inflation-gauge has slipped into negative territory and is now at -2.1 percent. Prices are headed down and spending is falling fast. Unemployment is soaring, wages are dropping, and the average work-week has been sliced to just 33 hrs. And, as we noted, housing prices have flattened out, but only because of unprecedented government intervention into the market. Otherwise, real estate would still be stretched out on a marble slab.

  Most people think it should be easy to beat deflation. They think all the Fed has to do is flip a switch and print more money. But there’s more to it than that, especially when trillions of dollars in credit suddenly vanishes in a poof of smoke. That’s what happened last September when Lehman Bros imploded and reduced the financial system to rubble. Global stock markets crashed, interbank lending collapsed, capital flows stopped, and payrolls and inventories were slashed. The gigantic credit-purge thrust the economy into deflation, a condition which persists to this day.

 Economist Irving Fisher tackled the problem of deflation 76 years ago  in his masterpiece “Debt-Deflation Theory of the Great Depression”. Fisher showed how over-indebtedness eventually triggers a chain of events beginning with debt liquidation and ending in distress selling, huge capital losses, and violent economic contraction; the same challenge that Bernanke faces today.

Irving Fisher:

“Unless some counteracting cause comes along to prevent the fall in the price level, such a depression as that of 1929-33 tends to continue, going deeper, in a vicious spiral, for many years. There is then no tendency of the boat to stop tipping until it has capsized….

On the other hand, it is always economically possible to stop or prevent such a depression simply by reflating the price level up to the average level at which outstanding debts were contracted by existing debtors and assumed by existing creditors, and then maintaining that level unchanged.” (Irving Fisher)

Clearly,  Bernanke is following Fisher’s advice and doing everything in his power  to reflate asset prices and avoid a bigger crash. But it’s still too soon to tell whether his strategy will work. We’re still in the early innings of a humongous system wide credit-implosion event.  
 
 The term “deflation” relates to a drop in the general price level, something not seen in the United States since the Great Depression. As economist John Bellamy Foster points out,  deflation squeezes corporate profits even if costs and productivity remain the same.  When profits fall, heavy layoffs and wage reductions ensue.  

John Bellamy Foster:  “But the real fear of deflation has to do with the enormously bloated financial structure and the huge debt load of the economy…  In a deflationary economy,  debt has to be paid back with bigger dollars (worth more over time).  This then creates a debt-deflation spiral, enormously accelerating financial meltdown.  As Fisher put it, “deflation caused by the debt reacts on the debt.  Each dollar of debt still unpaid becomes a bigger dollar, and if the over-indebtedness with which we started was great enough, the liquidation of debt cannot keep up with the fall of prices which it causes.”  Stated differently, quoting from The Great Financial Crisis (p. 116), “prices fall as debtors sell assets to pay their debts, and as prices fall the remaining debts must be repaid in dollars more valuable than the ones borrowed, causing more defaults, leading to yet lower prices, and thus a deflationary spiral.” (Interview of John Bellamy Foster on the Great Financial Crisis, Monthly Review) http://www.monthlyreview.org/mrzine/foster270209.html

It is this “deflationary spiral” that Bernanke is trying to avoid at all cost, even if he destroys the currency in the process. (Which he appears to be doing) Despite the Fed chairman’s steely resolve, the economy has continued its historic nosedive. Consumer spending is falling and households are limiting themselves to the bare essentials. (US households lost $14 trillion in wealth in the last year alone.) Families everywhere are paring back their credit, paying down their debts and rebuilding their nest eggs with what’s left from their skimpy paychecks. Unfortunately, what’s good for the family balance sheet is poison for the economy.

From Bloomberg News: “U.S. consumer credit plunged more than five times as much as forecast in July as banks maintained more restrictive lending terms and job losses made households reluctant to borrow.

Consumer credit fell by a record $21.6 billion, or 10 percent at an annual rate, to $2.5 trillion, according to a Federal Reserve report released today in Washington. Credit dropped by $15.5 billion in June, more than previously estimated. Credit fell for a sixth month, the longest series of declines since 1991. (Bloomberg)

US households and consumers have never been as strapped as they are today. They’re dealing with recession the only way they can, by pulling back and hunkering down. That will make it even harder for Bernanke to resuscitate the economy. There’s simply no way to force people to borrow when they’re not interested.  

Bernanke’s deflation-fighting strategy needs to be revamped. The country doesn’t need another credit bubble. The surge in delinquencies, defaults and personal bankruptcies all suggest that the era of easy money and lax lending standards is over. Why not “hang it up” for good. The Fed should be focused on rebuilding the economy from the ground up, paying particular attention to aggregate demand. Demand is what keeps the mighty GDP-flywheel in motion. Wall Street likes to stimulate demand through credit expansion and bubblenomics so they can skim fat bonuses on the front end and then bail out before stocks crash. But this perennial “boom and bust” cycle get’s old for ordinary working people, who just want a little stability and a paycheck that keeps pace with inflation. The best way to avoid “demand shock”–which is at the heart of every recession–is through wage growth and full employment. It’s that simple. When workers get better pay, they buy more more stuff and the economy thrives. Everybody wins!

What risk of Deflation?

Neville Bennett

The price level in the UK was the same in 1815 and 1914. This did not mean that prices were stable throughout that 100 year period: they fluctuated in long waves, with periods of inflation followed by deflation. More recently, there was a decade of deflation at the time of the Great Depression, and in Japan prices fell by an average of 0.5% p.a. from 1999-2005.

Deflation may again affect the US and UK, and perhaps spread further through the world economy. Consumer prices slipped by 2.1% in the year to July in the US, and 0.7% in the EU. In the UK the CPI is expected to be 1.8%, despite the Bank of England and Government desperately trying to keep it at above 2% by cutting interest rates to their lowest level in 300 years and pouring ₤150 billion into financial markets, a sum more than 12% of GDP.

The UK’s CPI does not contain housing costs, the Retail Price Index is more inclusive and it indicates that the UK had a -1.6% fall in prices for the July year: its first fall since 1960. I believe deflation is already strong in the UK as goods have declines in price since about 1995, but services have lifted the CPI.

There is widespread fear that the massive pump-priming by Governments globally will be over-inflationary, but I question that because it will result in higher interest rates, higher government spending on debt service and lower spending on welfare, increased taxes and higher costs to business for credit. Japan has tried for 19 years to create inflation but has failed. Moreover, there is a huge ‘output gap” putting pressure on all producers.

I do not intend, however, to gaze into the crystal ball so much as to discuss deflation and explain some its properties.

What is it?

Deflation is simply a fall in prices, and is regarded negatively because it is associated with depressions and with very low interest rates. The UK has not had a full year of deflation since the 1930’s. Indeed, inflation has been the norm, averaging 7%, since 1945.

Conventionally, deflation has virtues: consumers enjoy falling prices creating increases in real wages (the Great Depression was good for people in work). Moreover, it causes low interest rates, yet it is good for savings as their real value increases annually.

Deflation is not so good, therefore, for people in debt. The value of real debt increases each year, which affects people on mortgages as their house or farm may also decrease in value each year. It also discourages spending because the prices will be cheaper next year. Wages fall creating a downward spiral. It damages banks because they end up with a lot of surrendered property. The BNZ was the biggest landowner in New Zealand in the early 1890’s.

Recent Research

A recent Bank of England study by Groth and Westaway [Groth} discusses deflation’s costs in detail. Price adjustments for firms are costly, both for reprinting price lists but more in setting optimal prices in an environment of changing prices. Zero inflation is preferable. Deflation has an effect on taxation. In most cases, tax systems are not inflation indexed, so taxes rise with inflation.

The argument that consumers will defer consumption in periods of deflation is challenged by Groth and Westaway. They argue that in most cases low interest rates weaken the case for postponement.

Wages

Groth also discusses the difficulty of business in reducing money wages when this is justified by economic conditions such as the distressed situation of a firm or when all prices are falling. Workers may have a “money illusion”: they might focus on nominal wages rather than real wages. It they have a money illusion; they will resist a wage cut because they think they can buy fewer goods.

Many workers may resist pay cuts, not because they have a money illusion, but because they want to be rewarded for increasing productivity. British workers have raised productivity by about 2% a year over the last 30 years, so even if prices fall, there would not generally be a necessity (in the short-term) to cut in nominal wages. But in some industries, especially those particularly hard-hit, there would be a stronger case for wage cuts. If these are resisted, it can increase unemployment.

What evidence is there for downward rigidity in wages? Certainly there are more raises than cuts. But I believe many employees are prepared to accept cuts when there is a strong case. Most economists believe there is strong resistance, but this is exaggerated by the actions of a few trade unions. Employers find ways of cutting labour costs, moreover, by slashing non-wage benefits and bonuses, avoid customary raises for merit or seniority, or employing new workers at lower wages than those paid to existing workers.

In the UK there are a growing number of wage freezes, while wage cuts are relatively few. But British Chambers of commerce data indicates that about 10% of companies plan nominal cuts in 2009. Workers may be more flexible than they have been in the previous inflationary periods because they perceive growing unemployment: a lower-paid job is better than the dole.

Debt Deflation

Deflation increases the debt burden and recessions are deeper for countries carrying the most debt. The key element is a transfer of wealth from debtors to creditors caused by an unexpected fall in inflation. Many mortgage holders expected benevolent inflation. About 40% of Britons entered fixed-rate contracts and are now suffering from a real rise in interest rates. This effect is magnified by falling employment and a fall in asset values. Defaults will rise and impact on financial institutions.

The authors say many writers have demonized deflation but it is important not to confuse the effects of the credit- crunch shock with the effects of deflation itself. Goth says British workers are flexible about wages. She believes that with a massive monetary policy response, the deflationary episode should be short-lived. My knowledge of the Japanese economy makes me skeptical of that conclusion.

Question for Bernanke: “Do You Have The Cojones To Raise Rates?”

By Mike Whitney August 12, 2009 “Information Clearing House” — Booyah. It’s morning in America. The jobless numbers are stabilizing, the stock market is sizzling, quarterly earnings came in better than expected, traders have turned bullish, housing is showing signs of life, and clunker-swaps have given Detroit a well-needed boost of adrenalin. Even Cassandra economists –like Paul Krugman and Nouriel Roubini–have been uncharacteristically optimistic. Is is true; did we avoid a Second Great Depression? Is the worst really behind us? Maybe. But there is only one way to find out for sure. Raise rates. Bernanke should welcome the opportunity to show everyone how he’s pulled the world’s biggest economy back from the brink of disaster. All he needs to do is stop giving away free money, shut down a few of his so-called lending facilities, and stop manipulating interest rates by purchasing mortgage-backed securities (MBS) from Fannie and Freddie. How hard is that? The S&P 500 has skyrocketed 48 percent since March 9. What’s Bernanke waiting for; a 75 percent increase; a 100 percent increase??? How high do stocks have to go to convince Bernanke that the economy can stand on its own two feet without the torrent of cheap liquidity issuing from the Fed? Bernanke can prove to his critics that the US economy doesn’t need the Fed’s monetization programs and price fixing; that it doesn’t need the liquidity injections and the buying up of junk mortgages. ($80 billion last month alone) After all, as Bernanke opines, “The fundamentals of our economy are strong!” Right. Now prove it. All Bernanke has to do is boost rates by a point or two and demonstrate that he’s willing to mop up some of the $13 trillion he’s pumped into the financial markets. With just one announcement, the Fed chair could show our biggest creditor–China–that he’s serious about defending the dollar and the trillion dollars of US Treasuries China purchased believing that the US was a responsible trading partner who would never write checks on an account that was overdrawn by $12 trillion. (The National Debt) So, go ahead, Ben. Raise rates, shut down the printing presses, roll up the corporate welfare programs. Be a He-man. Make your critics eat their words. This is from Bloomberg News 8-12-09: “The Fed’s policy-setting Open Market Committee will today keep the target rate at zero to 0.25 percent and retain plans to buy as much as $1.45 trillion of housing debt by year-end to help secure a recovery, analysts said. The FOMC’s statement is expected at about 2:15 p.m. in Washington.” Hmmmmmm. So all the “green shoots” happy talk is pure gibberish, right? There is no recovery. Bernanke plans to continue flooding the financial system with cheap liquidity. It’s all a fraud. Things aren’t better; they’re worse. Look at the facts. There were 1.9 million foreclosures in 2009 in the first six months, and there will be another 1.5 before the end of the year. Is that better? According to Bloomberg: “A glut of unsold homes is also pushing down prices. The 3.8 million homes for sale in June would take 9.4 months to sell at the current pace of transactions, according to the National Association of Realtors. The inventory turnover rate averaged 4.5 months in the six years from 2000 to 2005…..More than 18.7 million homes, including foreclosures, residences for sale and vacation homes, stood vacant in the U.S. during the second quarter. That compared with 18.6 million a year earlier, the U.S. Census Bureau said July 24 Total home sales fell 23.7 percent in June versus a year earlier.” Bloomberg) Massive supply, falling prices, record foreclosures, flagging demand–and according to Deutsche Bank–48 percent of all mortgages will be underwater by 2011. It’s all bad. Here’s another clip from Bloomberg today 8-12-09: “Home price declines in the U.S. ACCELERATED in the second quarter, dropping by a record 15.6 percent from a year earlier, as foreclosures weighed on values. The median price of an existing single-family home dropped to $174,100, THE MOST IN RECORDS dating to 1979, the National Association of Realtors said today. “I don’t think we’re at a bottom yet in home prices,” said Scott Anderson, a senior economist at Wells Fargo & Co. in Minneapolis. “There’s also a pretty big shadow supply of houses. People are kind of waiting for the bottom but there’s a pent up supply out there.”…Home prices are tumbling even as mortgage rates remain near all-time lows. The average U.S. rate for a 30-year fixed home loan was to 5.22 percent last week, down from 5.25 percent the prior week.” (Bloomberg) The decline in housing prices is ACCELERATING, not slowing down. The historic collapse in real estate is ongoing and it is wiping out trillions in homeowner equity making it increasingly difficult for consumers to borrow on the diminishing value of their collateral. This is why foreclosures, defaults and personal bankruptcies are soaring. (According to the American Bankruptcy Institute: consumer bankruptcy filings reached 126,434 in July, a 34.3% increase year over year, and a 8.7% increase sequentially (116,365 in June). July’s number is the highest monthly total since the October 2005 bankruptcy reform aka the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act.) This is why households and consumers can no longer spend as much as they had before the crisis. Credit lines are being pared back; personal savings are rising, and GDP (excluding fiscal stimulus) is shrinking. Every one of the 3.5 million foreclosures represents hundreds of thousands of dollars the banks will never recoup. NEVER. That’s why the rate of bank failures will be much greater than current estimates. The banks are facing a triple-whammy; soaring foreclosures, plummeting asset prices, and a meltdown in commercial real estate. The combo has created a gigantic capital-hole which is forcing the banks to slow lending even to applicants with flawless credit. The Fed has built up excess bank reserves by $800 billion, but it hasn’t made a bit of difference. They banks are still not able to lend. The uptick in housing last month reflects seasonal changes and a shifting of pain from the low end of the market to higher priced homes; nothing more. Homes that are priced over $1 million are now sitting on the market for 20 months; a lifetime in real estate parlance. High-end neighborhoods have turned into leper colonies. Zero interest; zero traffic. Expect a crash this year. Now take a look at this from CNBC’s Diana Olick: “The number of homes listed officially on the market, while still at historically high levels, might be only the tip of the iceberg,” said Stan Humphries, chief economist at real estate website Zillow.com in Seattle, Washington. According to Zillow’s latest Homeowner Confidence Survey, 12 percent of homeowners said they would be “very likely” to put their home on the market in the next 12 months if they saw signs of a real estate market turnaround, 8 percent said “likely,” while 12 percent said “somewhat likely.” Survey results could translate into around 20 million homeowners trying to sell their homes, a startling number given that the Census bureau indicates there are 93 million U.S. houses, condos and co-ops, Humphries said. According to the National Association of Realtors, the market is currently on track to sell 4.89 million homes annually. “At this pace, it would take about four years to run through this amount of backlogged inventory,” he said. “Shadow inventory has the potential to give us another leg down on home prices during the second half of the year,” said Steven Wood, chief economist at Insight Economics in Danville, California. (Diana Olick, “Shadow inventory lurks over US housing recovery” CNBC) The banks are using all types of accounting tricks to hide the real losses or the true value of downgraded assets. The only difference between a common crook and a commercial banker is a well-paid accountant. The banking system is broken and its only going to get worse as the hammer comes down on the commercial real estate market. The Fed and Treasury are already working out the details for another stealth bailout that they’ll initiate without Congress’s approval. It’s all very “hush-hush”. The plan will involve more mega-leveraging of government liabilities. Bernanke has appointed himself the de facto Czar of Hedge Fund Nation, Clunkerville USA. An article in this week’s Financial Times further illustrates how the Fed has transformed the economy into a riverboat casino: “The Federal Reserve Bank of New York is aggressively hiring traders as its seeks to manage its burgeoning securities holdings, making the central bank one of Wall Street’s most active recruiters of financial talent. The New York Fed – the arm of the US central bank that implements its monetary policy – plans to increase the staff in its markets group to 400 by the end of the year – up from 240 at the end of 2007. The Fed, which says that most of its new recruits come from private sector financial firms, is hiring employees as many banks, rating agencies, hedge funds and private equity groups shed staff. New York city officials recently estimated that the sector’s woes would lead to a loss of up to 140,000 jobs. The Fed’s need for more traders is a direct consequence of the central bank’s efforts to keep credit flowing through the US economy. The Fed has been buying fixed-income securities at such a rate that its assets have more than doubled to $2,000bn in the past year, leading the central bank to conclude that it needs more people to monitor the markets and to manage its credit risks.” (Financial Times, “NY Fed in hiring spree as assets soar”, Aline van Duyn) Nice, eh? So now the Fed needs to enlist a gaggle of professional speculators just to keep all the balls in the air. What a joke. This isn’t a rebound; it’s just more hype. Here’s Warren Buffett summing it up on CNBC: “I get figures on 70-odd businesses, a lot of them daily. Everything that I see about the economy is that we’ve had no bounce. The financial system was really where the crisis was last September and October, and that’s been surmounted and that’s enormously important. But in terms of the economy coming back, it takes a while…. I said the economy would be in a shambles this year and probably well beyond. I’m afraid that’s true.” “The economy is in a shambles”. That’s from the horse’s mouth. Inventories are down 11 percent year-over-year, durable goods are down 10.4 percent y-o-y, industrial capacity is at record lows, manufacturing is still contracting, housing is in the tank, shipping and rail freight are scraping the bottom, retail is in a long-term funk, and–according to Krugman–the slight dip in unemployment was a statistical anomaly. Here’s Bob Herbert’s great summary of the unemployment data: “Some 247,000 jobs were lost in July, a number that under ordinary circumstances would send a shudder through the country. It was the smallest monthly loss of jobs since last summer. And for that reason, it was seen as a hopeful sign. The official monthly unemployment rate ticked down from 9.5 percent to 9.4 percent….The country has lost a crippling 6.7 million jobs since the Great Recession began in December 2007… The percentage of young American men who are actually working is the lowest it has been in the 61 years of record-keeping, according to the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston. Only 65 of every 100 men aged 20 through 24 years old were working on any given day in the first six months of this year. In the age group 25 through 34 years old, traditionally a prime age range for getting married and starting a family, just 81 of 100 men were employed…. The numbers are beyond scary; they’re catastrophic. This should be the biggest story in the United States. When joblessness reaches these kinds of extremes, it doesn’t just damage individual families; it corrodes entire communities, fosters a sense of hopelessness and leads to disorder…. A truer picture of the employment crisis emerges when you combine the number of people who are officially counted as jobless with those who are working part time because they can’t find full-time work and those in the so-called labor market reserve — people who are not actively looking for work (because they have become discouraged, for example) but would take a job if one became available. The tally from those three categories is a mind-boggling 30 million Americans — 19 percent of the overall work force. This is, by far, the nation’s biggest problem and should be its No. 1 priority.(“A Scary Reality” Bob Herbert, New York Times) Sorry, Bob, the media has no time for unemployment news. It tends to undermine the positive vibes from green shoots stories. The stock market rally has made it harder for people to see the truth. But the facts haven’t changed. Deflation is setting in across all sectors and the economy has reset at a lower rate of economic activity. Housing prices are falling, consumer spending is slowing, layoffs are rising, and demand is getting weaker. That means growth will be sub-par for the foreseeable future. Here’s an excerpt from a speech given by San Francisco Fed Janet Yellen drawing the same conclusion: “I don’t like taking the wind out of the sails of our economic expansion, but a few cautionary points should be considered… a massive shift in consumer behavior is under way.. American households entered this recession stretched to the limit with mortgage and other debt. The personal saving rate fell from around 8 percent of disposable income two decades ago to almost zero. Households financed their lifestyles by drawing on increasing stock market and housing wealth, and taking on higher levels of debt. But falling house and stock prices have destroyed trillions of dollars in wealth, cutting off those ready sources of cash. What’s more, the stark realities of this recession have scared many households straight, convincing them that they need to save larger fractions of their incomes…. a rediscovery of thrift means fewer sales at the mall, and fewer jobs on assembly lines and store counters…. This very weak economy is, if anything, putting downward pressure on wages and prices. We have already seen a noticeable slowdown in wage growth and reports of wage cuts have become increasingly prevalent—a sign of the sacrifices that some workers are making to keep their employers afloat and preserve their jobs. Businesses are also cutting prices and profit margins to boost sales….. With unemployment already substantial and likely to rise further, the downward pressure on wages and prices should continue and could intensify…. If the economy fails to recover soon, it is conceivable that this very low inflation could turn into outright deflation. Worse still, if deflation were to intensify, we could find ourselves in a devastating spiral in which prices fall at an ever-faster pace and economic activity sinks more and more.” “Falling prices.” “Deflation.” “Devastating spiral.” That’s not the kind of honesty that one expects from a Fed chief. Yellen must not be drinking the lemonade. And don’t forget the banking system is still broken. Not a dime from the $700 billion TARP bailout was used to purchase toxic assets. The banks are still drowning in red ink. . Bernanke has known since last September when Lehman Bros. defaulted, that the bad assets would have to be removed before the economy could recover. An underwater banking system is a constant drain on public resources and a drag on growth. Bernanke knows this, but rather than remove the assets by nationalizing the banks or restructuring their debt (as he should have done) he expanded the Fed’s balance sheet by $1.2 trillion which provided the liquidity that financial institutions pumped into the stock market. “Bernanke’s Rally” has generated the capital the banks needed to keep them from writing-down their debts or filing for Chapter 11, but the problems still persist right below the surface. Just this week, Elizabeth Warren’s Congressional Oversight Panel released a damning report which stressed the need to address the issue of toxic assets. According to the COP’s report: “Financial stability remains at risk if the underlying problem of toxic assets remains unresolved…. If the economy worsens, especially if unemployment remains elevated or if the commercial real estate market collapses, then defaults will rise and the troubled assets will continue to deteriorate in value. Banks will incur further losses on their troubled assets. The financial system will remain vulnerable to the crisis conditions that TARP was meant to fix…. Changing accounting standards helped the banks temporarily by allowing them greater leeway in describing their assets, but it did not change the underlying problem. In order to advance a full recovery in the economy, there must be greater transparency, accountability, and clarity, from both the government and banks, about the scope of the troubled asset problem. The problem of troubled assets is especially serious for the balance sheets of small banks. Small banks‘ troubled assets are generally whole loans, but Treasury‘s main program for removing troubled assets from banks‘ balance sheets, the PPIP will at present address only troubled mortgage securities and not whole loans. Given the ongoing uncertainty, vigilance is essential. If conditions exceed those in the worst case scenario of the recent stress tests, then stress-testing of the nation‘s largest banks should be repeated to evaluate what would happen if troubled assets suffered additional losses.” To sum up: There will be NO real recovery until the toxic assets problem is resolved. Unfortunately, the Treasury and Fed have shown that they intend to sweep this issue under the rug for as long as possible. Toxic assets, falling home prices, widespread malaise in the credit markets are just part of the problem. The deeper issue is the dismal condition of the US consumer who has seen his home equity dissipate, his retirement funds sawed in half,his access to credit curtailed, and his job put at risk. Ordinary working class Americans now face what David Rosenberg calls, “the era of consumer frugality—new paradigm of savings, asset liquidation and debt repayment .” Life styles will have to be toned-down and living standards lowered to meet the new deflationary reality. More and more people will be forced to jettison their credit cards and live within their means. It’s not the end of the world, but it does foreshadow a protracted period of negative growth, social unrest and persistent high unemployment. Here’s how the Wall Street journal sums it up: “A surprisingly large number of money managers and economists are warning that, despite the hopeful signs, the economy is still deep in the woods, not strong enough to support a long-running stock and bond recovery….Even after the recession ends, economists expect the gradual reduction of the nation’s massive consumer debt to take years. The debt data are striking. According to the Federal Reserve, total household indebtedness peaked at the end of 2007 at 132% of disposable income. That was by far the highest level since at least the end of World War II, nearly quadruple the 36% of 1952. By the end of March, with families boosting savings, repaying debt and defaulting, the ratio had fallen to 124%, a tad lower but still miles from the level of, say, 69% in the middle of 1985. Consumer spending today accounts for two-thirds or more of economic output. But as they boost savings and cut borrowing, consumers can’t be the drivers of economic growth that they were at the end of other recent recessions. Consumer borrowing fell in June for the fifth consecutive month…. “Consumers are under significant financial pressure,” Goldman notes in its report. “The weakness in household income — partly resulting from the sharp slowdown in hourly wage growth — will make it harder to raise saving without significant constraints on consumption.” As for home building and capital spending, two other possible growth motors, “we do not expect a ‘traditional’ rebound in these sectors, largely because the overhang of unused capacity in both the housing and business sectors remains enormous,” Goldman said.” (“Debt Burden to Weigh on Stocks”, E.S. Browning and Annelena Lobb, Wall Street Journal) Stock market euphoria can last a long time, but the laws of gravity still apply. The economy is in deep, deep trouble and Bernanke knows it or he’d be raising rates right now. The patient is still hemorrhaging my friends, and no amount of happy talk is going to stop the bleeding.

The Expiring Economy

Note from Al Walsh:  While I don’t agree with everything said in this article, it raises some interesting and valid questions about the economy.

The Expiring Economy

By Paul Craig Roberts

August 07, 2009 “Information Clearing House” — Tent cities springing up all over America are filling with the homeless unemployed from the worst economy since the 1930s. While Americans live in tents, the Obama government has embarked on a $1 billion crash program to build a mega-embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan, to rival the one the Bush government build in Baghdad, Iraq.

Hard times have now afflicted Americans for so long that even the extension of unemployment benefits from 6 months to 18 months for 24 high unemployment states, and to 46 – 72 weeks in other states, is beginning to run out. By Christmas 1.5 million Americans will have exhausted unemployment benefits while unemployment rolls continue to rise.

Amidst this worsening economic crisis, the House of Representatives just passed a $636 billion “defense” bill.

Who is the United States defending against? Americans have no enemies except those that the US government goes out of its way to create by bombing and invading countries that comprise no threat whatsoever to the US and by encircling others–Russia for example–with threatening military bases.

America’s wars are contrived affairs to serve the money laundering machine: from the taxpayers and money borrowed from foreign creditors to the armaments industry to the political contributions that ensure $636 billion “defense” bills.

President George W. Bush gave us wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that are entirely based on lies and misrepresentations. But Obama has done Bush one better. Obama has started a war in Pakistan with no explanation whatsoever.

If the armaments industry and the neoconservative brownshirts have their way, the US will also be at war with Iran, Russia, Sudan and North Korea.

Meanwhile, America continues to be overrun, as it has been for decades, not by armed foreign enemies but by illegal immigrants across America’s porous and undefended borders.

It is more proof of the Orwellian time in which we live that $636 billion appropriated for wars of aggression is called a “defense bill.”

Who is going to pay for all of this? When foreign countries have spent their trade surpluses and have no more dollars to recycle into the purchase of Treasury bonds, when US banks have used up their “bailout” money by purchasing Treasury bonds, and when the Federal Reserve cannot print any more money to keep the government going without pushing up inflation and interest rates, the taxpayer will be all that is left. Already Obama’s two top economic advisors, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and director of the National Economic Council Larry Summers, are floating the prospect of a middle class tax increase. Will Obama be maneuvered away from his promise just as Bush Sr. was?

Will Americans see the disconnect between their interests and the interests of “their” government? In the small town of Vassalboro, Maine, a few topless waitress jobs in a coffee house drew 150 applicants. Women in this small town are so desperate for jobs that they are reduced to undressing for their neighbors’ amusement.

Meanwhile, the Obama government is going to straighten out Afghanistan and Pakistan and build marble palaces to awe the locals half way around the world.

The US government keeps hyping “recovery” the way Bush hyped “terrorist threat” and “weapons of mass destruction.” The recovery is no more real than the threats. Indeed, it is possible that the economic collapse has hardly begun. Let’s look at what might await us here at home while the US government pursues hegemony abroad.

The real estate crisis is not over. More home foreclosures await as unemployment rises and unemployment benefits are exhausted. The commercial real estate crisis is yet to hit. More bailouts are coming, and they will have to be financed by more debt or money creation. If there are not sufficient purchasers for the Treasury bonds, the Federal Reserve will have to purchase them by creating checking accounts for the Treasury, that is, by debt monetization or the printing of money.

More debt and money creation will put more pressure on the US dollar’s exchange value. At some point import prices, which include offshored goods and services of US corporations, will rise, adding to the inflation fueled by domestic money creation. The Federal Reserve will be unable to hold down interest rates by buying bonds.

No part of US economic policy addresses the systemic crisis in American incomes. For most Americans real income ceased to grow some years ago. Americans have substituted second jobs and debt accumulation for the missing growth in real wages. With most households maxed out on debt and jobs disappearing, these substitutes for real income growth no longer exist.

The Bush-Obama economic policy actually worsens the systemic crisis that the US dollar faces as reserve currency. The fact that there might be no alternative to the dollar as reserve currency does not guarantee that the dollar will continue in this role. Countries might find it less risky to settle trade transactions in their own currencies.

How does an economy based heavily on consumer spending recover when so many high-value-added jobs, and the GDP and payroll tax revenues associated with them, have been moved offshore and when consumers have no more assets to leverage in order to increase their spending?

How does the US pay for its imports if the dollar is no longer used as reserve currency?

These are the unanswered questions.

Fort Knox, Fort Hocks or Fort Shocks: Three United States Gold Scenarios

Fort Knox, Fort Hocks or Fort Shocks: Three United States Gold Scenarios

By Stewart Dougherty

For 72 years, the building at the intersection of Bullion Boulevard and Gold Vault Road in Fort Knox, Kentucky has symbolized the financial strength of the United States of America. The United States Bullion Depository, better known as Fort Knox, is said to contain 147.3 million troy ounces of gold, over half the nation’s total reported gold bullion holdings of 261.5 million troy ounces. The remaining 114 million ounces are said to be stored at the Denver and Philadelphia Mints, the West Point Bullion Depository, and the San Francisco Assay Office. Assuming a price of $1,000 / ounce, the nation’s gold is worth $261.5 billion. If the metal is actually there, it represents the largest sovereign stockpile of gold bullion in the world.

However, the gold holdings of the U.S. have not been audited in more than 50 years. One reason given for the lack of an audit is that it would be “too expensive” to conduct one. An audit would cost a few million dollars, at most, so using cost as a reason for not performing it strains belief when placed in the context of the country’s Fiscal Year 2009 deficit of $2,000,000,000,000.00+, and federal debt of $11,600,000,000,000.00+. It is curious that one of the few places within the government where costs appear to be of concern relates to an audit of the one, true monetary asset possessed by the American people.

Even the Treasury Department’s clandestine $50 billion Exchange Stabilization Fund (ESF), which is only one-fifth the value of America’s reported gold holdings, undergoes an annual audit. For fiscal year 2008, this audit was conducted by KPMG, a well-known, independent CPA firm. KPMG’s 2008 ESF audit uncovered “significant deficiencies,” “material weaknesses,” a “weak control environment,” and “several control deficiencies.” If a Treasury organization subject to annual audits could fail its recent exam as broadly as that, what are we to assume about the safety and security of the people’s gold supply, which, like the national money geyser, the Federal Reserve Bank is never audited? And if the ESF is audited each year, what legitimate rationale can there be for not auditing the nation’s gold supply? Something isn’t adding up. In such a situation, inferential analysis can provide value, which you will see as this article progresses.

The financial events of the past year demonstrate beyond any reasonable doubt that the United States government is now of Wall Street, by Wall Street and for Wall Street, in general, and of, by and for Goldman Sachs, in particular. This inversion of power and privilege was partly brought about by an explosion in government debt. The government relies on Wall Street to roll over existing and sell new debt issues. Debt is now hitting the market like a tidal wave, given the country’s record-shattering deficits and costly Wall Street bailouts. If the paper cannot be sold at expected interest rates, then the debt-addicted system will go into seizure.

The radical empowerment and enrichment of Wall Street has transformed our democracy into an aristocracy, making the debt dealers the nation’s new royalty, the government its feudal barons, and the citizens mere serfs who endlessly sweat and toil in fields of debt weeds that grow so fast they can never, ever be harvested.

Predictably, in such an aristocracy, an iron curtain of secrecy and non-transparency has descended across the land, separating Wall Street and government on one side, and the people on the other. While the people are deluged with generally useless government data that numbs their minds (as an example, a recent search of the Federal Reserve web site for “United States government 2008 financial statement” produced an unmanageable avalanche of 520,817 entries), simple, truly important information, such as audited gold reserve statistics, accurate monetary aggregates like M3, the names of taxpayer-funded TARP, TALF and other bailout recipients, and audited Federal Reserve Bank financials, is kept a state secret, using the hackneyed excuse that “it’s for the people’s good.” Autocracies have always tried to convince the masses that ignorance is freedom, and that knowledge is enslavement.

The colossal conflict of interest that has developed between government -Wall Street axis, which hides behind the iron curtain of secrecy, and the citizens who stand in front of it now requires the people to-second guess everything they are told, for their own protection. The financial interests of a government controlled by avaricious, bonus-focused financiers are directly opposed to those of the people, since government revenues come directly from the people. What the government gains, the people lose, in the zero sum game of government finance. Which brings us to a more detailed examination of the people’s gold.

For the past 28.5 years, from 1980 through June, 2009, the United States government’s gold holdings have been reported as being essentially constant, at around 262 million ounces. Gold hit a nominal price high of $850.00 per ounce in January, 1980, when a severe recession was developing. (Compared to today, 1980 looks like the bubbliest part of the Roaring 1920s.) Inflation-adjusted (using government CPI figures, which are hotly debated), that price would now exceed $2,400 per ounce, whereas the current market price is only $950.00 per ounce. As GATA (www.gata.org) has demonstrated beyond any doubt, U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve officials actively monitor and seek to suppress the gold price, because a rising price can signal fiscal, economic and/or fiat currency distress, things that are bad for markets and embarrassing for governments. (GATA’s work in this area has been nothing short of heroic, and is well worth examining in detail.) For gold to be selling today at only 40% of its 1980 inflation-adjusted price, in the midst of the worst financial crisis in the nation’s history, is curious.

While the United State s gold supply is said to be constant, the holdings of many other nations, with the general exception of export-rich Asian countries, has declined, oftentimes radically. According to the World Gold Council, Canada’s gold reserves are down 99.5% from 1980 to today; Australia’s are down 68%; Austria’s are down 57%; Belgium’s are down 79%; The Netherlands’ are down 55%; Portugal’s are down 45%; Spain’s are down 38%; Norway’s are down 100%; Sweden’s are down 30%; the United Kingdom’s are down 47%; South Africa’s are down 67%; Argentina’s are down 60%; Mexico’s are down 92%; Brazil’s are down 41%; and the European Central Bank’s are down 33% (since 1999, its first reporting year). Even Switzerland, a country with a long-term affinity for gold, has slashed its reserves by 60%. Official world gold holdings (held by all nations plus international financial organizations such as the BIS, the IMF and the ECB) are down 17%, despite large gold reserve increases by countries such as China, Taiwan, India and Russia that moderated the larger percentage declines in the many nations noted above.

However, the United States’ gold holdings are said to be down a mere 1% during this 28.5 year period, even though the country’s debt has surged from $712 billion to $11.6 trillion and its unfunded contingent liabilities have exploded to more than $90,000,000,000,000.00. So while other countries with far less debt and far better balance sheets slashed their gold holdings to raise money for various government purposes, the United States, with its surging debt and staggering deficits did not. Inconsistencies like this are worth exploring; sometimes they represent golden opportunities.

If the United States were a corporation or an individual, it would be considered completely non-credit worthy given its disastrous finances. The U.S.A. would not qualify for an Exxon credit card, let alone for the trillions of dollars it is borrowing in the global bond market. One way those in financial distress can obtain credit is to post bona fide collateral. Some consider a country’s future tax receipts to be a form of collateral, but in the case of the United States, this is not so, because according to the Congressional Budget Office, the country will run multi-hundred billion dollar annual deficits for the next 70 years and beyond. So according to the CBO, the nation’s future tax revenues are already spent. Hypothetically, the nation could sell its national parks, or its mineral and/or energy rights, but this would be a radical, last ditch solution that has not even been publicly debated. For all practical purposes, the country’s only true collateral is the gold in Fort Knox and related depositories.

Those who are lending the United States money, by buying its Treasuries and other debt instruments, must be competent capitalists. If they have billions to lend, they obviously know how to earn and manage money. These lenders simply cannot be oblivious to America’s financial situation, and must certainly understand the concept of collateral.

As of July 17, 2009, the nation’s top few bullion banks were short 19.5 million ounces of gold on the futures exchanges. This highly concentrated short position was reportedly held by 4 or fewer major money-center banks. At a gold price that day of roughly $940.00 / ounce, the dollar value of this short position was $1,833,000,000.00, or $1.83 billion. A mere $10.00 / ounce decline in the price of gold would give the banks a profit of $195,000,000.00. A price increase of the same amount would produce a loss of $195,000,000.00, in other words, serious money in either direction. Given the financial crisis and the myriad problems affecting the banks, such as toxic derivatives and non-performing loans, why they would risk $1.8 billion on naked gold shorts in the world’s most volatile financial casino, the commodities and precious metals futures market, is difficult to understand, unless they know things or have other advantages that the rest of the marketplace does not.

In inferential analysis, we look at what might appear to be unrelated facts to see if, in reality, there might be connecting strands among them. These connections help explain situations that otherwise defy logic. Even though isolated facts might be mute and uninteresting, they often tell an important story when combined. Sometimes, conjoined facts sing like canaries. We believe events in the gold market are trying to tell a tale, and we posit three general scenarios relating to the nation’s gold reserves: Fort Knox, Fort Hocks and Fort Shocks.

FORT KNOX. In this scenario, the citizens of the United States own the exact amount of gold that is reported by the Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve: 261.5 million ounces. The gold supply is owned free and clear by the United States and its citizens. It is not swapped, hypothecated, pledged, exchanged, leased, sold, claimed, conditionally offered or in any other way compromised with respect to ownership. A full audit of the gold would prove that it exists strictly in bullion form (with no “paper bullion” or third party warehouse receipts) in the stated depositories. Based on recent fiscal, financial, monetary and economic developments, we view this scenario as possible, but extremely unlikely.

FORT HOCKS: In this scenario, an audit will show that a significant portion of the citizens’ gold has been mobilized by the Treasury and / or the Federal Reserve; in other words, that it has been hocked at the global financial system’s pawn shop. There are many possible means by which this could have happened; we list only a few.

1. The gold backstops favored bullion banks’ trading activities: In this scenario, the government has contracted with a small number of favored bullion banks to have them manipulate the gold price so it remains within federal targets. They would achieve this by large-scale shorting and related market-intervention techniques. This helps explain why a small number of major NYC money center banks are currently short 19.5 million ounces of gold, which would otherwise be a reckless, irresponsible gamble with shareholder assets, and a possible violation of the banks’ fiduciary duty, particularly in the current financial crisis. The banks have been guaranteed that if an exogenous event increases the gold price, their short positions will be “backstopped” by U.S. gold reserves. In other words, if a major bank failure, terrorist event, natural catastrophe, war or other major domestic or international event drives the gold price higher, exposing the banks to trading losses on their shorts, then the government will supply them with the bullion needed to close out their positions and cancel their losses. This is entirely consistent with the recent bailouts, where the government has purchased the banks’ toxic assets with taxpayer money, sterilizing their losses at citizen expense.

   This scenario creates a money machine for the bullion banks. They can short gold with a government guarantee against losses, and can cover at lower prices, after they have driven the longs out of their positions. Operating like this, they can profit on up and down price moves, since they will create them. As noted above, the profits generated from these types of “bear raids” and subsequent “bull covers” can be enormous. ($195,000,000.00 for every $10.00 price decline given the bullion banks’ current short position.) The banks can launch these raids repeatedly at virtually no risk, since dumping large amounts of gold onto the futures market creates predictable price declines. However, if the government needs to backstop the banks (due to trades gone wrong that are backstopped and insured), then the gold must come from the United States’ gold reserve. There have been hundreds of $10.00 and dozens of $50 – 100.00+ price declines during the current bull market, indicating that the bullion banks have potentially made tens of billions of dollars’ worth of profits, given that they have consistently been short the gold market during these price episodes. If they have not been profiting from these short positions, why would they have continued to hold them for years, and continue to hold them today? One further point: since futures represent a zero-sum game, where every profit means an identical loss for another party, any bank gains have come at the direct expense of other investors who have been losing in a rigged, corrupt casino that is riddled with fraud.

2. Leasing for profit: In this scenario, the government has leased all or a portion of the nation’s gold to earn interest on its value, or simply to mobilize the gold as a way for bullion banks to keep the price within targets. However, in this case there is no government “backstop” or guarantee if the bullion banks’ shorts go bad; the banks are responsible for their own trades. In this case, the government assumes counterparty risk, because if the bullion banks’ naked shorting operations produce losses, then the banks may be unable to return the borrowed gold to the government. This is a Las Vegas gamble on the part of the bullion banks and the government. However, if the government is willing to lend large quantities of gold to the bullion banks, this will give the banks enormous leverage in the marketplace, and the ability to drive down the price of gold, thereby generating significant profits at the longs’ expense. The banks are fully exposed to the risk that exogenous events could increase the price of gold, creating losses on their short positions. However, if the gold price does increase, the banks might be able to “double down” by borrowing additional bullion from the government, in an ongoing effort to crush the price. With potentially tens of millions ounces at their disposal from the United States, plus additional gold possibly available from other central banks, producers and operators of the new Exchange Traded Funds, the shorts could cause serious price damage, though they would have to take risks to win. As in scenario #1 above, the profits from such trading operations are potentially huge. Leasing has existed in the market for years, with gold supplied by central banks and miners. Much of this hedging activity has been curtailed with respect to miners, but due to the culture of secrecy and non-transparency at central banks, their exact activities are an unreported state secret and a mystery. Recent government rhetoric about transparency has clearly been disingenuous.
3. The government is actively trading gold. In this scenario, the government is trading gold on the futures exchanges, for profit and to control the price, either directly (under a secret trading name) or indirectly (using proxies), and either on-shore or offshore. This activity could be conducted by the Working Group on Financial Markets or some other government-funded financial entity. Any trading losses could be settled by delivering to the exchange(s) gold from the United States’ official reserve.

FORT SHOCKS: In this general scenario, and audit would reveal that America’s gold is gone, either in whole, or in part. It might have been sold outright, pledged to counterparties, or otherwise distributed. The belief that there are millions of ounces of gold in Ft. Knox would therefore be a great American delusion. America’s gold could have been sold or exchanged in several ways. Here are a few:

1. Foreign purchasers of U.S. Treasury and/or Agency debt simultaneously demanded the right to purchase U.S. gold, to offset currency and other risks associated with the debt. In this scenario, China, Japan and/or other governments demanded and won the right to purchase “x” ounces of United States gold for every “y” dollars of United States debt. This would compensate the debt purchasers for likely dollar devaluation given current fiscal deficits and fast-growing national indebtedness. This would also provide debt purchasers with some insurance against default, since default would most likely result in a rising gold price. Since the U.S. economy is now completely debt-based, maintaining an orderly debt market is the nation’s top fiscal and financial priority. Selling national gold to keep the debt market functioning smoothly would be considered by authorities a small price to pay.
2. Backstopping guarantees were invoked. In this scenario, recent rallies in the gold market caught the bullion banks short, and enabled them to receive gold from the government as part of the backstopping guarantees they negotiated. This gold was used by the banks to settle their short positions and cover losses. This gold would be sold into the open market, and never returned to the official U.S. reserve.
3. Government sold gold to raise cash. Over the 50 year non-audit period, government needed money and did not want to issue additional debt at the time. Therefore, it sold gold into the market to raise funds, just as numerous other central banks have done in recent years.
4. Gold leases with a “cash settlement” option. In this case, the government leased gold to third parties, such as bullion banks, with a “cash settlement” option, as opposed to demanding that the gold be returned at the termination of the leases. For whatever reasons, the bullion banks exercised the cash settlement option, and did not return the borrowed gold. In this scenario, the gold would never be returned to the official U.S. reserve.
5. A portion of the gold supply has been stolen, or has otherwise disappeared. The Royal Mint of Canada announced in June, 2009 that 17,500 ounces of Mint gold had been lost or stolen. This disappearance was confirmed during an audit of the Mint by Deloitte & Touche, CPAs, under the direction of the Auditor General of Canada. (If Canada audits its gold, why doesn’t the United States?) Regarding security, the Mint’s web site states: “The rigour of our production standards is equalled by the stringency of our security protocols. The refinery is a restricted environment controlled by security personnel supported by state-of-the-art surveillance technology.” If it could happen there, could it not happen here, particularly over a period of 50 years? This is exactly why you conduct audits.
6. All or a portion of the gold simply cannot be accounted for. In this scenario, the paper trail for the nation’s gold fails, with errors, gaps and inconsistencies, and no one even begins to know how to re-create it. If gold is missing, no one knows when it went so or how to find it, since there are so many years (50) to account for. This would be similar to the $50+ billion in cash that is missing in Iraq. That money was stolen recently, and even so, no one can account for or find it.

Implications. If the Fort Knox scenario prevails, it is a non-event. Since there is no change in the nation’s gold supply, the status quo is maintained.

If the Fort Hocks scenario prevails, then the government has orchestrated a market manipulation scandal that is equivalent in nature to Enron, Worldcom, Madoff and all the other frauds in the sordid panoply, but that dwarfs them in dollar value and sheer, outright dishonesty. The revelation that a first world government had deliberately engineered such a market manipulation, resulting in tens of billions of losses to honest investors, while simultaneously producing epic, illicit profits for favored inside traders would be a shock to all markets and investors. An insider trading scandal of such alarming, unprecedented proportions would constitute an inexcusable abuse of power, and represent fraud and corruption on a third world scale. It would not just damage the reputations of America’s monetary institutions, it would destroy them.

If the Fort Shocks scenario prevails, it would have severe implications for the dollar, because it would demonstrate that the United States’ financials are deliberately distorted for monetary and political reasons. Even though the dollar amount of this scandal ($262 billion) would be miniscule in comparison with the government’s 2009 deficit ($2 trillion), debt ($11.6 trillion) and combined debt and unfunded contingent liabilities ($90 trillion), it might serve as a tipping point, where faith in America’s finances and confidence in its government are lost. If America’s gold reserve position is a lie, then what else has been distorted, and where, if anywhere, is the truth?

Keep in mind that the fiscal year, 2009 deficit is currently running at $5,479,000,000.00 per DAY. So even if the Fort Knox scenario prevails and the 261.5 million ounces of citizen gold are safe and accounted for, their dollar value is completely destroyed by only 47 days’ worth of deficits. America’s gold cannot protect it from the national wealth wipeout that intensifies each and every day.

The United States could put these concerns to rest simply by auditing the gold and publicly reporting the findings. And yet, despite repeated attempts by such organizations as GATA to get them to do that, they refuse. Why? Is it because Treasury and Federal Reserve officials know that the results would be explosive, and similar to what has been outlined in the Fort Hocks and Fort Shocks scenarios above?

If it becomes known that the United States has surreptitiously hocked or sold its citizens’ gold, the price per ounce would most likely explode. Conceivably, gold would have its first $500 up day as people threw in the towel on other forms of “money” they could no longer understand or trust.

While inferential analysis is not used to prove a hypothesis (there are other forms of analysis that can offer proofs, when the facts exist to create them), it can be extremely useful in pointing to the truth when important facts about a situation are not available or revealed. Even though this report does not prove the hypothesis that the United States’ gold position is compromised, perhaps radically, the risk/reward dynamics of this situation are so interesting that we believe it is worth paying attention to the opportunity they provide.

Government Debt – Analysis of Developed & Emerging Countries

Government Debt

Neville Bennett

This “Greater Depression” is a profound turning point in history. Recently, I analyzed how it had tipped the balance in global GDP away from the West to the emerging world (NBR June19). That change arises partly from differential economic growth rates. Obviously more is involved, and my focus now is on public debt and demography.

In essence, ever since the Asian Crisis, emerging countries have cleaned up their balance sheets and now have significant savings. But the developed world is encumbered with an ageing population, and unsustainable commitments in health and pensions. These prevent the paying down of public debt, which has been overblown by the need to bailout banks and fund costly stimulus packages. Japan and the UK are illustrative cases, but there may be lessons for New Zealand in this issue, as credit ratings come under pressure.

Global Public Debt

Governments have possibly stabilized the financial sector but there must be doubt about the remedy: massive public debt. According to the IMF, by next year, the gross public debt of the 10 richest countries will have risen from 78% of GDP in 2007, to 106%. It is an increase of $9 trillion in three years. New Zealand has made a modest contribution to this. Its public debt in May 2007 was NZ$28.8 bn, rising by a quarter to NZ$36.6 bn in May 2009.

There is worse to come. Weak economic growth and revenue, plus increased expenditure point to large budget deficits. The IMF believes public debt will be 111% of this groups GDP in 2014, but in a worst case scenario it may reach 150%. (See chart.)

This is the highest peacetime borrowing on record. The world economy will struggle for a decade at least with the weight of this albatross around its neck. It is the result of the paradox that crash caused by too much debt has been remedied by government bailouts to keep economies completely falling off the cliff. Most economists agree with this pump-priming in principle, but they may thereafter disagree on some aspects (for example: too much to banks) and the timing the necessary return to sounder fiscal management.

To be sure, governments have been ably to service this debt quite cheaply. Their reserve banks have driven down rates in order to stimulate the economy, and markets rates have been low as investors have flocked to find safety in government-backed securities. Nevertheless, yields are rising in response to new issuances and the cost of debt servicing is increasing net debt appreciably.

Will governments try to pay off the debt at the cost of lower economic growth? Or will try to inflate the debt away? Inflation can reduce the real cost of debt, and is attractive to governments as it is more politically acceptable than tax increases. But the cost is much higher than many politicians think.

The cost of high inflation is horrendous. Investors will buy debt only if they can make a real return. This requires an interest rate well above the CPI. If inflation is running at 10% p.a., medium term interest rates have to be higher, say 12%-16%. In the process, unless a lot of debt is paid off, the remainder will grow in line with interest rates. It is like a dog chasing its tail. The debt reduces when the dog is exhausted and can chew its tail. Meanwhile, high interest rates have slayed the economy. Only hyper-inflation destroys debt but it also destroys the middle class.

Recent History

Public debt always rises after recessions because Keynes’s policy of pump-priming is universally accepted. Some countries default. But the richer countries rely on fast growth. More recently some very fiscally responsible states like Canada, Sweden, Ireland and New Zealand have restrained public debt.

Although New Zealand will triple its bond issuance from about NZ$5 bn p.a. in 2008-9, to NZ$ 15 bn. in 2013-15,

It will keep public debt at a reasonable proportion of GDP. It is forecasting gross public debt as a proportion of GDP at 41.1% this year, rising the 45% in 2012-13 and 49% in 2014-15.

This is clearly responsible, but it does rest on projections on increases in GDP which may be optimistic. I am apprehensive that interest rates may rise to attract foreign investors, and that will be a drag on economic growth. Moreover, if NZ yields are attractive, the NZ dollar is likely to soar above fair value, hurting exports and our important tourist and student markets.

Rebound?

A rebound is difficult. Exports may be sluggish, particularly as households are rebuilding their balance sheets, with a marked reluctance to buy big-ticket items. The richer countries may follow a version of Japan’s past, where it is very difficult to stimulate the domestic economy when asset prices are falling. The Japanese Government has pump-primed until it is gasping. The country is still in deflation, but its gross debt-ratio has tripled from 65% of GDP in 1990 to 170% now.

Other Fiscal costs

The problem of repaying the cost of the bailout is dwarfed by the cost of an ageing population. According to the IMF, the present cost of the bailouts is only one tenth of the financial cost of ageing. If this problem is not addressed, demographic pressures will send the debt of the big rich economies to around 200% of GDP by 2030.

The world has regarded emerging country debt as the most in risk of default. This is an anachronism. The emerging members of G20 had a debt-GDP ratio of 38% in 2007 and it is falling to perhaps 35% this year.

The rich countries need to be careful to avoid tightening policy too soon for fear of snuffing out economic growth. But they may need to take other action to free up fiscal elbow-room. Pensions are an obvious problem, and raising the retirement age seems imperative as many superannuation schemes are unfunded. S&P have made it clear that the UK either raises taxes or cuts pensions and health spending if it is to avoid a credit downgrade. This is problematic as funding civil service pensions alone can amount to 85% of GDP.

Spending/Debt Up, Tax Revenues Down – What Does It Mean?

“The Deficits’ Red Glare…”
By David Galland, Managing Editor, The Casey Report

While everyone else has been focused on the banks’ stress tests and how much the government is spending to bail out troubled “too big to fails,” a disturbing trend on the other side of the ledger is now emerging: how much (or rather, how little) the U.S. government is receiving in tax revenues.

After combing through the past 25 editions of the “Monthly Treasury Statement of Receipts and Outlays of the United States Government,” which is compiled and published by the Treasury Department’s Financial Management Service, we’ve uncovered a disturbing trend.

Here’s what’s going on:

• In 2007 and 2008, government tax revenues averaged about $633.15 billion per quarter. For the first quarter of 2009, however, the numbers just in tell us that tax receipts totaled only about $442.39 billion — a decline of 30%.

• Looking to confirm the trend, we compared the data for April – the big kahuna of tax collection months – to the 2007-2008 average, and found that individual income taxes this year were down more than 40%. The situation is even worse for corporate income taxes, which were down a stunning 67%!

• When you add in all revenue from all sources (including Social Security revenue, government fees, etc.), the fiscal year-to-date – October through April – revenue shortfall comes to 19%, vs. the 14.6% projected in Obama’s budget. If, however, the accelerating shortfall apparent year-to-date, and in April in particular, continues, the spread between projected and actual tax receipts will widen considerably.

Tellingly, for the first time since 1983, the U.S. government posted a deficit in April. That’s a big swing in the wrong direction, as the bump in personal tax collections in April historically results in a big surplus — on average about $68 billion.

What are the implications of this tanking tax revenue?

For starters, it means the federal government deficit is going be as bad, or worse, than the $2.5 trillion Bud Conrad, chief economist of Casey Research, projected it to be last year.

If the shortfall in individual and corporate tax revenue persists — and we expect it will — then the deep hole the government is already digging for itself will be that much deeper.

Using the government’s own expense projections, the revenue shortfall, even if it doesn’t worsen further, would push the fiscal 2009 budget deficit up to about $1.958 trillion. Those expense projections are likely to be significantly understated.

Case in point, in January the government projected a $1.2 trillion deficit for fiscal year 2009… in March, just three months later, they upped the projection to $1.8 trillion. That $600 billion “adjustment” alone totaled more than any full-year budget deficit in the nation’s history.

Yet, the real fly in the ointment is that the actual borrowing by the Treasury is likely to be at least half a trillion dollars more than the deficit.

That’s because the Treasury is buying toxic paper (mortgage, credit card loans, etc.) and putting it on the books with a higher value than the market is willing to assign. While that makes the budget deficit appear smaller, it doesn’t negate the fact that the government still must borrow the money needed to buy the toxic paper in the first place. The additional revenue shortfall means the government has to raise that much more money. Based on the struggle it had pushing the $14 billion in long-term notes at the latest auction, it becomes increasingly apparent that when push comes to shove, the only way the government is going to come up with the money needed to meet its aggressive spending is to print it up.

In other words, events are rolling out almost exactly as we have been anticipating. We are not prophets, just students of history. Last month, in an article, entitled “Widening Deficits,” my colleague, Olivier Garret, observed:

“In the midst of the Great Depression, the 1931 federal tax revenues had fallen by 52% from their 1929 highs. While we do not expect anything that dramatic in 2009, it would not be unrealistic to see a 20% to 25% reduction in cash flow from tax collections this tax season. Such a drop would pose significant challenges, given that spending commitments are off the charts and climbing.”

“In the absence of sizeable increases in tax revenues,” Olivier continued, “it is quite clear that the lion’s share of the planned sales of Treasuries in 2009 cannot be met by demand from the market. Either the Treasury will have to raise interest rates significantly [to attract demand], or the Fed will need to step in very aggressively to support the planned auctions. Our expectation is that both will happen. Auctions will fail and the Fed will step in. The market will react…by demanding higher interest rates. Once the cycle starts, it will be very hard to pull interest rates back.

“We continue to stand by our December forecast,” Olivier concluded, “that the 2009 budget deficit is more likely to widen to levels between $2.5 and $3 trillion rather than the CBO’s $1.8 trillion forecast. We also believe that inflation could start setting in as early as Q3 of 2009 and will accelerate sharply by 2010. Treasury Rates will start climbing and the era of cheap money will end, making it harder for overleveraged consumers, businesses, and governments to service their debt.”

Olivier’s forecast of failed auctions and rising interest rates on Treasuries proved more prophetic, as a May 7th story from Bloomberg reported:

“Treasury 30-year bonds fell the most in four months, as investors demanded higher-than-forecasted yields at today’s auction of $14 billion of the securities with the U.S. slated to sell a record amount of debt this year.”

“This is a problem,” moaned Chris Ahrens, head interest-rate strategist at UBS AG in Stamford, Connecticut, one of 16 primary dealers required to bid in Treasury auctions. “The market required a fairly significant discount to buy the bonds.”

30-year bonds have produced a loss of more than 20% year-to-date, as the Treasury increases securities sales to help fund a swelling budget deficit. Last December, 30-year Treasury yields dipped to nearly 2.50%. But rates have soared since then, pushing the 30-year yield all the way up to 4.15%.

So, what does all this mean?

The rock-and-the-hard-place scenario we have been predicting is unfolding before our eyes. At this point, other than sharply changing course and letting the free market cope with the crisis through a brutal “survival of the fittest” scenario, the government is left with no other option than to accelerate its buying up of its own debt.

Which is to say, the government must push even harder on the levers of its printing presses, further setting the stage for the massive period of inflation we consider inevitable… and for the stunning rise in interest rates that we also consider inevitable.

The Economy – Political Dreamland

On to Moscow!
By Bill Bonner

Last week, the European Central Bank squared its shoulders and joined ranks of the damned. The Times of London reported that in joining up with the US Federal Reserve Bank and the Bank of England, the European Central Bank “pulled out all the stops” in their drive to revive their economies. The ECB announced that it will cut its key lending rate to its lowest level ever and begin a form of “quantitative easing,” in which it will buy corporate debt in order to reduce commercial interest rates. Details to follow, it said. “Stops” are to central bankers what safety fuses are to electricians. You may take them out when you really want to get the juice flowing; but your house might burn down.

But thus did the European troops pull out the stops and get under- way. Reluctant allies, they set off to join the battle against capitalism…with no reliable maps…with insufficient supplies and a strategy elaborated by incompetents. Of course, the gods must have laughed at Napoleon too. His armies had been cut off and destroyed in Egypt. Then, his Peninsular Campaign was a disaster. But the plan to attack Russia topped them all; even the draft horses must have snickered.

It doesn’t seem to bother the Europeans that their American commander is the same fellow who failed to spot the biggest bubble in history until it blew up in his face. Nor that their field marshal has no idea of the lay of the land; nor that anyone on either side of the Atlantic seems to know where they are going; nor that, wherever it is, it will cost more to get there than they’ve got.

This week the Obama government revealed its new budget deficit. If nothing goes wrong, it will reach $1.84 trillion this year – nearly 400% of the record set last year. In 2009, the US government will borrow 50 cents for every dollar it spends. Accumulated deficits to 2019 will reach $7.1 trillion, says the forecast. Moody’s was so alarmed it warned that the US may lose its Triple-A bond rating, which it has had since 1917.

But even as bad as it looks, Obama’s budget map is still fanciful – its mountains are made of whipped cream and its rivers run with Scotch. It imagines a loss of only 1.2% of GDP in the current downturn…and a quick return to growth, with a 3% increase in 2010. Yet, the last report showed the US economy contracting at a 6% annual rate. As for growth in 2010…where would it come from? Consumer credit is falling at its fastest pace in 18 years. Consumer incomes are falling too – down 1.2% in the last 12 months. If there were any lasting consequences of this downturn, opines the New York Times, it is likely to be the “shift to savings” by the US consumer.

Meanwhile, businesses aren’t exactly hankering to spend either. Even if they had the money, businesses wouldn’t expand; they don’t have to. Spiders build their webs on America’s remaining assembly lines with little risk of being disturbed; one out of every three factories is quiet. Until existing capacity is put to work, businesses will have no power to raise prices and no need to add to their facilities.

And yet, Napoleon Bernanke is upbeat. The troops will be home “before Christmas,” he says. But the central banks’ calendars are no better than their maps. In 2004, Mr. Bernanke credited improved monetary policy with having created what he called “the Great Moderation” – the period of strong growth and low-inflation since the mid-’80s. Specifically, he was referring to the Fed’s policy of ‘inflation targeting,’ which presumes that the inflation numbers carry all the information the Fed needs to guide an economy.

This was the map the Fed was using seven years ago. Then, a tiny recession took GDP down to all of 0.2% over an 8-month period. The Fed panicked. Its emergency policy pushed the fed funds rate well below the rate of consumer price inflation and left it there for two years. This was not merely a slight miscalculation. It was a fatal strategic error, say professors Carr and Beese of the University of Akron. Not only did the Fed’s map fail to warn them; it actually sent the economy over a cliff:

The low interest rates signaled…that credit was inexpensive and readily available…[then] the Federal Reserve moved from a low accommodative interest rate policy to one of a steady and consistent increasing of interest rates between 2004 and 2007…and became a prime cause of the financial services mortgage crisis of 2008.

Today, central banks use the same computers, same theories, and same maps they had seven years ago. With these feeble instruments, they set out to go where no central bank has ever gone before – borrowing, inflating, and intervening on a scale that would have been unimaginable a few years ago. Where will they end up?

We will take a guess: this grande armee sets off on the road to recovery with the wind at its back; it will end up in Moscow with snow on its face.