Statistisch toverorganistatie Centraal Plan Bureau (CPB) voorspelt een economische krimp van 3,5% in den Hollandse over het jaar 2009 en daarom kunnen Bos en Balkenende in maart hun versie van “the shock doctrine” op Nederland loslaten (“taboes zijn er niet”). Maar hey, we leven hier-en-nu en nu gebeuren er dingen waar de Haagse muppetshow pas ergens zomer 2009 over zal praten. Zo pompte een onbekende partij, mogelijk uit Azië, even de dollar omhoog. Gevolg: massale gedwongen verkopen over de gehele linie in Azië en Europa. Dat kwam niet echt lekker aan bij onze buurtjes in Oost Europa, die sowieso al aan het infuus liggen. Moskou gooide haar beurs maar weer dicht. Weer een gevalletje “financieel terrorisme”?
Omdat West Europese banken miljarden en miljarden aan leningen in Oost Europa hebben uitstaan, en het er niet naar uitziet dat de oostblokkers aan hun verplichtingen kunnen voldoen, komt de volgende golf aan schrotleningen op ons af. Swell…het IMF heeft ook geen geld meer. Dat terwijl een aantal Eurolanden op het punt staan ook wanbetaler te worden (leuke grafieken--->hier). Door de fantastische Euro zou het kunnen gebeuren dat we met zijn allen moeten lappen voor Ierland, Spanje en Griekenland. Whoops, daar zakt de Euro weer..
Eastern Europe is about to blow. If it does, it could take much of the EU with it. It's an emergency situation but there are no easy solutions. The IMF doesn't have the resources for a bailout of this size and the recession is spreading faster than relief efforts can be organized. Finance ministers and central bankers are running in circles trying to put out one fire after another. Its only a matter of time before they are overtaken by events. If one country is allowed to default, the dominoes could begin to tumble through the whole region. This could trigger dramatic changes in the political landscape. The rise of fascism is no longer out of the question.
The maestro was wrong.
Eight months after he predicted the worst was over and the threat of recession receding, former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan said the current global recession will "surely be the longest and deepest" since the 1930s.
Although the 82-year-old may be worried about his government's credit line, he hasn't lost all his faith in free markets: “We need not rush to reform," he said. "Private markets are imposing far greater restraint at the moment than would any of the current sets of new regulatory proposals.”
Omdat West Europese banken miljarden en miljarden aan leningen in Oost Europa hebben uitstaan, en het er niet naar uitziet dat de oostblokkers aan hun verplichtingen kunnen voldoen, komt de volgende golf aan schrotleningen op ons af.
In the case of Austrian banks, the country faces a rerun of the 1931 Vienna Creditanstalt crisis which in chain-reaction spread to the German banks and brought Continental Europe into the economic crisis of 1931-33. At the recent EU Finance Ministers’ meeting in Brussels, Austrian Finance Minister Josef Pröll reportedly pleaded with his colleagues to come up with a €150 billion rescue package for the banks in eastern Europe. Austrian banks alone have lent €230 billion there, equivalent to 70% of Austria’s GDP. Austria’s largest bank, Bank Austria, which in turn is owned by Italy’s Unicredito along with the German HypoVereinsbank, faces what the Vienna press calls a ‘monetary Stalingrad’ over its loan exposure in the east. In a botter historic irony, Bank Austria bought the Vienna Creditanstalt in recent years in its wave of mergers.
According to estimates published in the Vienna financial press, were only 10% of the Austrian loans in the east to default in coming months, it ‘would lead to the collapse of the Austrian financial system.’ The EU’s European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) in London estimates that bad debts in the east will exceed 10% and ‘may reach 20%.’
This crisis, for European banks comes atop their losses in US real estate securities. In is the next wave of the crisis that is about to hit. Almost all East bloc debts are owed to West Europe, especially Austrian, Swedish, Greek, Italian, and Belgian banks. Europeans account for an astonishing 74% of the entire $4.9 trillion portfolio of loans to emerging markets. They are five times more exposed to this latest crisis than American or Japanese banks, and they are 50pc more leveraged according to the IMF.
The recent IMF $16bn rescue of Ukraine has unravelled. The country – facing a 12pc contraction in GDP after the collapse of steel prices – is going towards default, leaving Unicredit, Raffeisen and ING facing disaster. Latvia's central bank governor has declared his economy "clinically dead" after it shrank 10.5pc in the fourth quarter. Protesters have smashed the treasury and stormed parliament.
Perhaps most alarming is that the EU institutions don't have any framework for dealing with this. The day they decide not to save one of these one countries will be the trigger for a massive crisis with contagion spreading into the EU.
Clear at present is that for small-minded political reasons, Berlin is not going to rescue Ireland, Spain, Greece and Portugal as the collapse of their credit bubbles leads to rising defaults, or rescue Italy by accepting plans for EU ‘union bonds’ should the debt markets boycott Italy's exploding public debt, hitting 112% of GDP next year, just revised up from 101%.
De hersengarage van Zapruder Inc.
Het ESM-paard staat binnen
George W. & Co. veroordeeld
De massavernietigingsonderbroek
Hoe Italië, Griekenland en België de Euro binnen werden gerommeld