"I love Paris in the fall..."

[Entendance]

"I think under any circumstance we are going to see a significantly lower euro. I think we are going to see slower growth in Europe over several years, and I think there is a serious risk that the eurozone will implode unless there is a sea-change in the way fiscal and monetary policies are conducted."
VIDEO http://tinyurl.com/yadq2pm

The Greek debt tragedy currently unfolding -- the country's on-balance-sheet debt is 13 times its gross domestic product -- may be just the tip of the iceberg.
More troubling, according to a report out last week, is the off-balance-sheet debt owed by the country, and its fellow, over-indebted nations Portugal, Italy, Ireland and Spain, the so-called PIIGS, representing the five-nation acronym.
The next 12 months could be very dramatic for the Eurozone," said Robert Chapman, publisher of "The International Forecaster."
" I am seeing many sovereign defaults for the PIIGS as well as in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet satellite countries running into 2011," Chapman added...
http://tinyurl.com/ybd48r3

Oh, The Off-Balance Sheet Lies Are International?
http://tinyurl.com/ybuktrd




Iceland's voters took the first step toward the right thing:
Ninety-three percent voted against the so-called Icesave bill, according to preliminary results on national broadcaster RUV. Final results will be published today.
May this vote be the start of an international citizen revolt - peaceful revolt - against the brigand-style fraud rained down upon the word by the pinstripe-wearing scam-meisters known as "banksters."
http://tinyurl.com/yd3jznm


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_H2DePAZe2gA/S ... social.PNG

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[Entendance]

...the next country to fall after Greece will be not Spain, but Italy - the reason: massive governmental corruption.
And here is what is the real problem - someone please notify Papandreou.
"This is just a case of shoot the messenger. I think we need to focus on the unsustainable situation that Greece has gotten itself into, with the highest consumption to GDP ration in Europe, one of the lowest labor force participation rates in Europe, one of the highest government social protection rates in Europe, and deficits that have been outsized for several years during the boom, and the of course the fraudulent accounting. I should also note that within the Eurozone, Greece has the worst corruption score according to Transparency International which is a problem because it is telling you is that the institutional quality of the Greek government for reforming itself is very low."
Not surprisingly the next casualty of the rolling crisis (because, to quote Dubya, make no mistake, the crisis will be back very soon) will be not Spain or Portugal, but Italy - another nation using swap gimmickry to enter the Eurozone back in the day.

"The real concern right now should be on Italy. Italy is the country that is most like Greece in this current situation. Highest Debt to GDP ratio, not as high deficits so with smaller changes they can stop the problem. They also, however are very corrupt. They are second to Greece in the level of corruption within the Eurozone."
As a reminder, Italy CDS trade in the low 90s. Evil, hideous speculators - dig in.
Full clip after the jump:
http://tinyurl.com/yddzv3k

The idiocy coming from the EU reeks of desperation
http://tinyurl.com/ybhn6ub

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[defio70]

The Mannheim-based Center for European Economic Research, known as ZEW, said Tuesday its economic sentiment indicator fell to 44.5 from 45.1 in January. Economists had forecast a drop to 43.0. ZEW dropped for a sixth consecutive month in March.

Best wishes to Iceland!
VIDEO
http://tinyurl.com/yenz7os

[Entendance]

Harvard University Professor Martin Feldstein, who warned almost two decades ago that the euro would prove an “economic liability,” said Greece’s austerity plan will fail and the country may quit the single currency to fix its fiscal crisis.
http://tinyurl.com/yc8bs78

Bernanke is trying to get me to borrow money to buy things to help pull the economy out of this depression. It will not work. I do not need to borrow money to buy things. http://tinyurl.com/yea322b

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[defio70]

The proposed EU Greek bail-out cannot simply bypass German law
http://tinyurl.com/ycmtwjo

The European Union on Wednesday warned Germany, France, Spain, Italy and the Netherlands that they are relying too much on a strong economic recovery to meet debt reduction targets.
European Commission reports say that the five largest nations that use the euro have "rather optimistic" growth forecasts in their programs to cut budget deficits to the EU limit of 3 percent of gross domestic product.
It said budget figures could be worse than they expect if growth remains slow.
Germany's "budgetary strategy is not sufficient to bring the debt ratio back on a downward path," the EU executive warned.
Berlin needs to reconcile possible tax cuts -- promoted by Chancellor Angela Merkel's Free Democrat coalition partner -- with the need to reduce budget spending, it said. It also warns that Berlin hasn't spelled out what cuts it would make after this year.
Europe's largest economy isn't facing rocketing debt and deficit levels but still needs to act because debt is mounting and the rising cost of pensions and social security could make it hard to fund public finances in the longer-term.
France's budget plans don't leave "any safety margin if economic developments turn out worse than projected" by the government's "markedly favorable" growth assumptions, the EU said.
It calls on France to specify spending cuts and show exactly how it will bring down its deficit and its debt -- which will keep increasing until 2012 as France takes out a "grand loan" of euro35 billion ($48 billion) to fund a stimulus program.
Spain may need to draft extra measures to reduce its huge deficit -- estimated at 11.4 percent this year -- by 2013 because it may be too optimistic about growth after this year, the EU report said.
It also cautioned Madrid to make pension reforms to reduce spending. The Spanish government faced protests when it tried to do that by hiking the retirement age from 65 to 67.
The EU told Italy that its debt and deficit could be higher than targeted because the government's growth outlook is likewise too high, it hasn't described how it plans to make reductions and it could spend more than it assumes.
It also says Italy needs "a swift and durable recovery in productivity growth" to get the country's economy growing again. That implies developing more lucrative industries that could generate higher profits from exports.
The EU told the Dutch government to lay out more details on how it will reduce its deficit and debt by 2013.

[GSIMMERLE]

Merkel wants option of excluding members from eurozone
http://tinyurl.com/yd954gr

It will be difficult to explain to German taxpayers why they should bail out indebted Greece, which allows its citizens to retire at the age of 61, German Economics Minister Rainer Bruederle said Wednesday.
Generally speaking, "one shouldn&apos;t finance the bad behavior of others," he said at the 13th World Business Dialogue here. By comparison, Germans will need to wait until they are 67 to be eligible for retirement benefits.
The remarks highlight the German government&apos;s reluctance to prepare a detailed financial rescue package for Greece, which faces a budget deficit above 12% of gross domestic product.

http://www.youtube.com/user/looselips67 ... We1ZULxK2U

[sowhat]

viewtopic.php?f=7&t=748&p=9915#p9915

[Entendance]

...will Italy be the next to face a crisis?
http://tinyurl.com/yzpyqkg

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[sowhat]

- "the EU is in dire position", on the precipice of shattering into default and civil unrest;
- the sovereign debt crisis materializing across Europe will soon reach US shores;
- the CFTC will curtail currency speculation by slashing leverage from 100:1 to 10:1, which "can cause a liquidity crisis that backfires, magnifying everything."

" Western society is falling apart .... If we do not act, civil unrest will explode. The current choice is DEFAULT or HIGHER TAXES & CIVIL UNREST .... Someone has to step forward to save us or we may be doomed. It's time to wake up for this is the future of our children and their children at stake. "

http://tinyurl.com/yggfcc3

[Entendance]

The reality is that the eurozone, as it works today, is not a monetary union but a souped-up fixed exchange rate system.

So after weeks of Euro-bluff it looks ever more like an IMF rescue for Greece after all, and hence for any other eurozone nation driven to ruin by the wrong monetary policy.
http://tinyurl.com/yz4r9e2

Global political consensus unravels threatening economic recovery
http://tinyurl.com/ykamuox

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