Tag Archives: ECB

May 15, 2019 · 14:43

The political winds

It all started nice and slow this morning. I had one task that is due in 4 hours and 34.3 minutes (roughly), so the unnatural act (for me) of sleeping in commenced and it was nice. So there I was morning ritual all shot to smithereens and it was 2 hours until zero hour. My ritual of checking breaking news gives me the BBC and the Saudi Tankers, an interesting part, but the intelligence on the events are missing, even in open source intelligence it is too much on ‘decent confidence’ and ‘statistical probability of certain parties’. One source gives an implied presence of Hezbollah in Shinas (Oman), yet there is zero reliability as well as the fact that any attack would have required different tools as well as location does not add up, as it is at that point that Israel Hayom gives me ‘Saudi Arabia retaliates hours after Houthis attack oil facilities‘, the fact that we see “Houthi rebels in Yemen, who are backed by Saudi Arabia’s arch-rival Iran, claim attack on Saudi oil pipelines“, this is indeed a different status and I will dig into this when i get more data, this event could escalate matters fast. As such the defence needs of Saudi Arabia will explode (pardon the pun) soon enough.

Yet this is about UK politics and the issues will relate soon enough. The Independent (at https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/jeremy-hunt-conservative-party-wall-street-journal-london-a8914171.html) gives us ‘Jeremy Hunt appears to struggle for an answer when asked why people should vote Tory‘, you see as a conservative (yes, I am a Tory) I struggle too. There is no shame in this, we need to walk a tightrope and keeping balance is actually a lot harder than you might imagine. So when we see Jeremy Hunt give us: “Because we are not going to solve this problem by retreating to populist extremes” he has a point, it is clear and he is correct, yet the problem is that we are looking at the wrong extreme. Nigel Farage is not the populist extreme, the European Central Bank is the populist extreme, just not a populist extreme for the people, they are the populist solution for the IMF, Wall Street and American commerce, three that they were never supposed to cater for and the European ignorance is just amazing. Also, the view that the media remains silent on many issues involving the ECB, Mario Draghi and their acts of non-accountability have become too staggering. And as the media is in denial in one side and then bashes Nigel Farage at every opportunity gives additional light to the fact that the media botched plenty of issues.

The people have been misled to a much larger degree and now they are willing to try Farage and the Brexit party, not because they like him, but because they largely mistrust all other parties including my own conservative party. That is the realistic stage, so why vote Tory?

The problem is not easy but the biggest issue is the debt, both sides (mainly the Labor party) have pushed again and again and left the British nation with 2 trillion pounds of debt. Even in the most optimal stage it will take well over a generation, it is passed in two parts. The first is no less than £20 billion in interest payment and an optimal £20-£50 billion in annual debt decline; if this is not done soon it will be too late for everyone. The benefit is that the UK without the Euro can steer shallow and deep waters, all having their own risk (and rewards), all having options, but the drag of the Euro 27 nations and their bad choices as well as the ECB and their unacceptable acts will no longer be part of it. It will be the first clear stage of resolving the issues that politicians are too hard to solve. Still, it will take a generation, perhaps two to resolve it and when there is momentum in the first 5 years that will signal economic improvements as well as economic opportunities.

Immigration

If that was not the case, do you think that the refugees would be racing and running to make it to the UK as fast as they possibly can? No, the people in the lower tier are actually seeing the lack of progress for the people all over Europe, and for now the UK is in a similar stage, but it could improve, the UK is in a stage where it could improve faster and better than anywhere else in Europe. Do you think I would sit on billions of IP if any official in the EU27 could be trusted? The EU27 and America are all in the stage to fill their pockets as much as possible before it is too late, I would rather make all my IP public domain and watch them all fight each other on claims that they were first and not giving actual evidence. That is why Google, Huawei and optional Saudi Arabia are seemingly the few parties worth talking to at present.

Google and Huawei have shown to be pushing innovation, not iteration. In addition, the acts we see in Saudi Arabia on renewal and Neom City are showing a push for larger changes, changes that the US and the European Economic Union is no longer able to make, they are stuck with a mountain of debt making everything a discussion, and no resolutions. The fact that for the most tax laws have NEVER been properly been adjusted so that the large corporations (FAANG group) make proper payment has never been addressed, it is a failing on both sides of the Isle, both Tories and Labour have fault at that. the BBC news in March 2018 gave us ‘Google’s tax bill rises to £50m‘, and we get two parts in addition: “The technology giant’s annual accounts show that the company will pay corporation taxes of £49.3m on UK profits of £202.4m” and “The total value of Google’s sales in the UK is about £5.7bn a year“, now I have nothing against google, as a matter of fact, I love Google (platonically mind you). Yet the numbers do not add up. When we consider that google is making 202 million out of 5,700 million, it amounts to a profit margin of 3.54%, considering that the Google Pixel 3 is well over £700 makes me wonder. Yet let’s not forget that Google is not alone here, Microsoft, IBM, Oracle, SAP, Facebook, Amazon all have profits that go into the billions (well the FAANG group players at least). So the tax image is wrong and the people get to pay for the cost of commerce, not exactly fair, is it?

This is the realisation that has been sweeping through the lower tiers of the population and they have had enough, and I get it. We see all these utter BS approaches on what we can sell to the government of Saudi Arabia and we cannot even sort out proper taxation to big business? Small businesses have been driven out of shops through large corporations working from abroad, the Britons have been dealt a raw deal and it bites, the Tories did way too little to deal with it (opposing the Labour party who did nothing at all when they were in charge). So the people have gotten to the point where they will try anything, especially give Nigel Farage and his Brexit party a chance.

Yes, how would I vote? Well, I am all for Brexit, yet I remain a Conservative. The issue is not Brexit, it will happen (read: it should), the issue will be about what happens after that, it will be a mess for close to two years and issues need to be resolved and it will take time and it will take serious discussions, Nigel Farage has charisma, he has knowledge yet what about his team? The players like David Coburn, Julia Reid, Nathan Gill, or Raymond Finch? I am not sure any of those people can hold proper seats like Home office, Foreign office, Defence, or Treasury. That is the problem the UK faces. Getting a proper government in place, Labor was never trustworthy and even as Tony Blair did a lot of good, he bungled plenty too. In that regard whatever came after Harold Wilson (1976) was pretty bollocks by the view of some (a view I only partially support).

These parts matter, the failings form the past are now part of the current battlefield and the failings are important to consider with a debt of 2 trillion, that is why the Brexit party is likely to be the biggest player, yet I remain a conservative, the mess needs to be cleaned up and whilst labour will indiscriminately spend money that they do not have, the Nigel Farage side lacks the true experience that the people need to clean the overall mess up, Brexit is an essential first, but the Brexit party is in my humble opinion not ready to properly deal with the 20 steps that follow.

Was there not a Saudi side?

Yup and we are getting to that now. You see the economy is only one side. Military hardware is only one part of optional commerce, the national growth of 5G will benefit the UK, yet these parts can also be sold to Saudi Arabia, there is more than Huawei and even as the UK needs to catch up, and catch up fast, the sorted problem is not merely military hardware, that part needs services and whilst the UK can be a push forward there, they are up against American Giants and it is a fight worth fighting. The infrastructure for Neom City and even beyond that all the way to Riyadh represents an initial £350 billion, with more on the horizon. When I set the stage for my £2,000,000,000 IP, one part was that I did look beyond one side and since then found four more avenues where people merely accepted certain solutions and never looked at what else was possible. From Marketing, Awareness creation, communication, applied applications on the setting of streaming (yes, that was a pun and a puzzle all at once). And the biggest parts are not big business, it is a small business approach with global ramifications, and the nice part is that Huawei was nice enough to implement part of it in their 5G prospective and not look further, so happy, happy me (for now that is).

This is not merely one part, all the players (and the FAANG group) all want access to Saudi Arabia, so who do you think they will hand options too? These hypocrites who decided to suddenly revoke export to Saudi Arabia whilst ignoring the activities of Hezbollah and Iran, or those who stood by Saudi Arabia and their right for defence? Let’s not forget that the aid of Saudi Arabia was called on by the legitimate government of Yemen, a part most seem to ignore again and again.

Saudi Arabia is trailing in technology on several ides and they are trying to address this and those who facilitate for the progress of that will find themselves with the sweetest deals. More importantly, the UK will need proper trade partners to a larger degree. The US is all about export and the fact that export needs to exceed import, several nations are in that stage. The list that place true value to import to goods and services is small, so having the proper foreign office in place is going to be essential in the next 5 years, the Brexit party cannot deliver on that and that will make matters much worse down the Brexit trail. The Conservative need is easily shown when you look a few degrees beyond the current point of exposure. It is when you look towards the applied stage of the long game, that is where you see that the bulk of all politicians fall short. They will merely tell you: ‘We will solve it when we get there‘, or ‘We have a plan and we will present it at the proper time‘ and it is way too late to take that approach, it is well over a decade too late for that.

If they cannot clearly show you a plan, they are extremely unlikely to have one, which is not a stage the UK (and many other nations) can survive on at present. As such the political winds are blowing, top some degree those who we are willing to trust lack the power and know-how to make it work long term, most of the others are no longer trusted to the degree that they need to. I remain conservative inclined, yet they too need to realise that not only is the party over, facilitating in that direction is no longer an option, making that heard loud and clear is essential.

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Tagged as Amazon, BBC, Brexit Party, Conservatives, David Coburn, ECB, European Central Bank, Facebook, google, Harold Wilson, Hexbollah, Houthi, Huawei, IBM, IMF, Iran, Israel Hayom, Jeremy Hunt, Julia Reid, Labor party, Mario Draghi, Microsoft, Nathan Gill, Neom city, Nigel Farage, Oracle, Raymond Finch, Riyadh, SAP, Saudi Arabia, Tony Blair, Tory, UK, Wall Street, Yemen

May 13, 2019 · 11:47

Is it really Russia?

The independent was making us aware a mere 11 hours ago that ‘Russia and far right spreading disinformation ahead of EU elections, investigators say‘ (at https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/eu-elections-latest-russia-far-right-interference-fake-news-meddling-a8910311.html), now it might be that Russia is trying to make waves, yet the reality is that politicians and their allegiance to big business are already spreading enough misinformation (read: one sided information) to make the people distrust these politicians. I partially discussed this yesterday in ‘The Mental delay‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2019/05/12/the-mental-delay/). So when I see: “It is to constantly divide, increase distrust and undermine our faith in institutions and democracy itself“, my response would be: “Do not worry, Tony Blair is already achieving that, he does not need the Russians to achieve that goal.” So, when we consider that, what is my angle? It is a fair and important question. The matter involving the Brexit party and Nigel Farage have escalated because of inaction and attempts to sway against a referendum that had already been decided. The Business Insider (at https://www.businessinsider.com.au/remain-wars-britain-anti-brexit-parties-tearing-each-other-apart-change-uk-liberal-democrats-2019-5) is giving us: “the prospects for remaining in the EU appear on the surface to be better than ever before, bickering between the country’s anti-Brexit parties now risks throwing that advantage away“, which is odd as the referendum for Brexit was won, so it seems that the voice of the people is openly ignored, and it angers half the nation, so they are willing to let Nigel Farage sort it out for them. Yet the Business Insider also shows another side. With “Change UK instead decided to go its own way, writing off the Lib Dems as spent force and calling on its members to quit and jump ship to Change UK, with the mission of quickly becoming the premier anti-Brexit party“, we see different groups, all wanting to be the captain, so that they can reap the rewards from large corporations, I’ll admit that the last part is my own speculation. You see big business is never about rewarding the group, merely the one keeping them all in check, that is what big business needs and it makes the Bremainers infighters, all wanting a taste of that sweet pie of victory, as well as a taste of the gravy train, the two elements why most people inside and outside the EU want the EU to stop. It cannot keep proper checks and balances and the less said about that monumental failure currently called the ECB the better.

So is Russia Innocent?

I do not think so (better stated, I do not know), and if we are to believe former FBI analyst Daniel Jones (there is currently no evidence that he is not to be believed) we see the act “Senate investigator whose non-profit group, Advance Democracy, recently flagged a number of suspicious websites and social media accounts to law enforcement authorities” is not to be ignored, yet as I see the group that I would personally label ‘stupid political people‘ are doing a fine job by themselves, there is enough distrust to go around for decades at present. Yet there is another part in this. The quote “It is nearly impossible to quantify the scale and resonance of the misinformation. Researchers say millions of people see the material.” the problem is not that it is merely them; the media itself is the problem. The media who is setting the stage by offering one sided stories whilst the bulk of all the people know that there is another side, they are adding fuel to the fire and that is not recognised in the entire data setup at present. The Yemeni war is the clearest example. The bulk of all papers handing blame to Saudi Arabia, whilst they openly ignored the actions from Iran and Hezbollah attacking Saudi Arabia via Yemen, as well as arming the Houthis in all this. Not once, not twice, but consistently, in addition in several events the actions of Turkey was set aside because it was inconvenient towards Turkish talks, that alone should wake you up regarding the one sided exposure and therefor handing out more distrust. So at present I had to giggle regarding Russian Prime Minister, Dmitry Medvedev, as he stated roughly two months ago “Suspecting someone of an event that has not yet happened is a bunch of paranoid nonsense“. He is of course correct, but that does not make him innocent does it? A man is innocent of hoping to screw the prima ballerina of the Bolshoi, and walking around with a condom does not make him guilty, neither is his desire to get lucky, but we can call him out on having the condom on him as he enters the restaurant meeting Svetlana Zakharova for dinner, we can call him out through envy (she is truly amazingly gorgeous), we can call him out on desire (making us wrathful on missing out on the opportunity to be him) the list goes on, yet he is right nothing happened at present. In the end the best thing we have after the event might be the evidence of intent, yet intent after the fact towards something that might never be proven in court is still a huge miss.

And when we make the tally, we can to some degree clearly see that the current politicians made us more distrustful than any Russian action at present, and the media aided in this, they all have their own political agenda side, the media has not been neutral for the longest of times.

Then I notice something that does impact. When I see: “Distinguishing Russian interference from clickbait or sincere political outrage is difficult, even for intelligence services“, that is not entirely true. The analysts are (often) looking in the wrong direction. You see, the stage is not the news; it is the line of forwarding. I noticed that over the last three weeks there were ladies wanting to connect to me, and it came with ‘tit shots‘ and ‘prominent ass poses‘, so they were either cheap ladies hoping to strike an hourly bargain, or they were honey traps (they tend to be the second), so there is piece number one (pun intended), the forwarding started from that point forward and more important, the presence of that account is also a data point to consider. The forwarding news has an origin and Facebook has that original post as well as the originator, so there we see two pieces ready for mining. Even as troll farms have a larger set of systems, they still start at a limited amount of routers, an element ignored. There are not too much masking options in mass spreading, even if it changes per message pushed, the list is decently exhaustive and it is the analysing of the hop path that shows the fake router, and as such we see that a path is now optionally established. That did not take long did it? I did my CCNA 8 years ago, yet that point is there. It is how I designed the cloud intrusion stage. It is a Router_n + 1 approach; it is not the originating router, the two routers after those optionally downscale paths towards the point of origin.

You see, even as we are given: “The digital trail often winds up in one of the internet’s anonymised dead ends“, we see no anonymity in the normal spreading of social media or even sharing of posts, the anonymity gives us the initial red flag; the router path can give us a lot more. The simplest of all solutions has been ignored by the lot of them. When I share news (usually because it is funny, or a nice indecent or Monday morning pun (example added). In all this a clear path can be established, so why is all the other not flagged and optionally removed? There is a right of expression from your own account, should hidden shares not all be auto removed? Was that example perhaps a little too simple for them?

We are all so intent on blaming Facebook for being too big, blaming them for not policing what was never supposed to be policed, it is also time to hold a light to those abusing the options available, in all this there is a lack of truly investigating not social media, but the usage of digital media and digital advertising. And that is where the problem starts, the moment that voice goes to town suddenly we see politicians starting to shout on the infringement of the people, the politicians are part of the problem and seeing that is the first step in recognising that the problem is a lot larger. When we start investigating election fraud versus voter fraud, we see a stage where it is not unlikely that the true mountain is not the voter fraud. And that is not all, when is it voter fraud, when is it logistical error and incompetence? You merely have to Google ‘election fraud‘ you will find issues in Texas and South Africa, but what was exactly the case and when was action taken? What actions were taken and was it in time? All that and when we focus on the European election and the ‘instigations’ by the Russians, I wonder how much an impact they are having, or basically the EU elections has bigger problems to sort out and the media is one of those problems to a much larger degree than anyone is willing to admit to.

This is a clear case where the premise of Oliver Hazard Perry, an American naval commander: ‘We have met the enemy and they are ours‘ (1812), which was freely translated into ‘We have met the enemy and they are us‘, as we agree that we tend to be our own worst enemy, did anyone consider that social media could emphasize this no less than tenfold?

So is it really Russia, or do we need to take a look at what we enable ourselves and facilitate for? Acknowledging that we have a social media usage problem will be the first step in scaling the dangers down.

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Tagged as Bolshoi, Brexit, Business Insider, Change UK, clickbait, Daniel Jones, Dmitry Medvedev, ECB, election fraud, Elections, Farage, FBI analyst, Hezbollah, Houthi, Independent, Iran, Nigel Farage, Oliver Hazard Perry, Prime Minister, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Senate Investigator, South Africa, Svetlana Zakharova, Texas, Tony Blair, Turkey, UK, UKIP, Yemen

May 12, 2019 · 14:17

The mental delay

There is a mental delay; we all have it, the moment between the realisation that things are wrong and the rest of the media finally willing to confess to the wrongful parts after they had been milked to the maximum. This is where I believe the UK is when I see: ‘Poll surge for Farage sparks panic among Tories and Labour‘ (at https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/may/11/poll-surge-for-farage-panic-conservatives-and-labour). The situation is given through “Support for the Conservatives at the European elections slumps to 11%, less than a third of what the Brexit party is polling“. From my point of view, it is not really a surprise. The people have had enough of the ECB and their lack of control and accountability. The people in Europe are down 3 trillion euro through ill-conceived plans, it gets to be even worse when we consider the march news from the Financial Times ‘ECB unveils fresh bank stimulus amid rising Eurozone gloom‘, a setting that is not unlike irresponsible children using a credit card for which they do not have to pay the bill, the people have had enough. It is emphasized by other media giving us quotes like “Even if we stipulate that Greece’s government is, in fact, as creditworthy as the U.S. government, why would investors accept a lower yield on the Greek bond? And why are they willing to accept the even lower yields on the bonds of other Eurozone governments?“, as well as “Despite the low Eurozone bond yields, investors may expect eventually to boost their returns by selling the expensive euros and buying cheaper dollars and other currencies. Indeed, there is some basis for such a strategy. As of late April, the consensus among analysts was that the euro will appreciate significantly over the next couple of years, and more modestly thereafter; forward markets (where buyers and sellers settle the price of a future transaction in advance) support this consensus view.” Source: MarketWatch.

My issue is that the writing has been on the wall for a while and whilst we are given “The poll suggests the Brexit party, launched only last month, is now on course for a thumping victory that Farage will, MPs fear, use to back his argument that the UK must leave the EU immediately without a deal“, it was a risk that had been 3 years in the making and now that the time is over, we see panic on a few levels. The need for Status Quo as well as the continued Gravy train is now at a stage that the UK and others have had enough, a stage where the large four are pulling a cart where 20 others have not been doing their bit, not even to the smallest degree. From my personal view, the biggest loser is Tony Blair when we consider: “Writing for the Observer online, the former prime minister Tony Blair says it is vital that Labour supporters go to the polls, even if they choose a party more clearly in favour of Remain than Labour“, in a stage where the ECB does as it pleases, the people have largely lost faith, with the economic anchors Greece and Italy still firmly in place things will not get better, not in a Bremain stage of mind. Even as we accept that things will get worse, there is enough indication that it will be relatively short term, without the anchors, the 15 smallest EU nations will unite against the UK, only to find that the setback will increase, a voice without money is worth the value of the empty wallet at best. The IMF report makes it merely worse, the stage where the three largest EU economies are Germany, France and Italy and their prospects are in the basement for this year, led by Italy with a forecast that is somewhere between 10% and 25 % of last year, and as I took the UK out of this, we will see that as the others slide faster, the UK will suddenly become the place to be, a nation in repair. Then MarketWatch gives us a part that I have been claiming for over 2 years: “Policy makers also underplay the financial risks. They emphasize the decline in government debt ratios and banks’ nonperforming loans from their peaks reached during the euro-area crisis. They fail to note, however, that these vulnerabilities are at present distinctly higher than they were in mid-2007 for virtually all Eurozone countries“, whatever options they thought they had was squandered away by the ECB stimulus plans that did not work twice around and now they are giving us an attempt at option three, with no evidence that the third time has any chance of being a charm.

So when I see “‘northern’ Eurozone governments worry that the ECB may be left holding debt that may never be repaid“, which is nice, but I told that the people close to two years ago. It is nice for others to catch up this late. All this is before we give consideration to ‘Italy budget deficit forecast to smash EU fiscal rules‘ (at https://www.ft.com/content/e3b662d2-70ac-11e9-bf5c-6eeb837566c5) all thanks (in part) to an ECB that cannot restrain itself or its members, the UK is much better out and the sooner they do this, the better it is for all. The problem is not merely the deficit, the economy downturn will hit jobs soon thereafter, so before the end of the year. As such the unemployment rate that was merely a stitch below 11% in February 2019 could hit 14% by October, and with one out of three Italian youths without a job, that situation will worsen. It is already worse than Spain, but it will worsen still, that is merely one of the 4 large economies, whilst the ECB was too worried on the next bonus spreadsheet, we will now end up having spreadsheets where the dominant colour is red, on pretty much every page.

Even as we accept the Financial Times words “The forecasts play down the risks of a no-deal Brexit, saying that it “would dampen economic growth, particularly in the UK but also in the EU27, though to a minor extent”“, the part that I see missing is that the UK economy will recover, the remaining EU27 players a lot less so, which is also why we have seen the fuelled anti-Brexit sentiment all over Europe, not because they lose what they call an ‘economic ally‘, but because their own mess becomes centre stage for everyone to watch soon thereafter.

The other part is that the Northern economies are seemingly slowing down, the Local Sweden gives us: “The Swedish economic boom has reached its peak and the economy is approaching a slowdown, the country’s Fiscal Policy Council wrote in its annual report“, I do not believe that to be correct, you see Ericsson is one of a few having a decent 5G solution, together with Nokia they are the only ones who have a decently advanced 5G solution, they are the only ones who are considered in several nations because those nations are narrow-minded and loudly anti Huawei, so these two profit to a larger degrees. When 3G was starting Nokia broke all records, these two will in similar drive 5G, even if there is a slowdown, it is likely to be a very short one, unless the US stops its Huawei smear policy, these two will propel the Nordic economies to a much larger degree.

So when I see Justine Greening, Sam Gyimah, Alistair Burt, all conservatives, all pushing for a Bremain, a second referendum, or some ill-conceived idea that Brexit needs to be acknowledged, the voters have all realised that it is too late, the EU wanted to keep on playing games and leaving the game at whatever point is to be preferred over more and more unacceptable spending.

Yet the one part that is not pushed for is that the Brexit Party and Ukip are approaching a majority, if they can strike a deal with the greens and the Liberal Democrats (they tend to be great followers), we see a new government with the Labor party and conservatives sitting next to one another in the opposition. A historic first, the entire House of Commons for too long in indecision and the people have had enough, I cannot blame them. So when they want to play the blame game, a lot of politicians merely need to look into a mirror to see the guilty party.

I personally belief that the people are seeing the dangers of non-decisions as well as the added media pressures with non-stop incriminations and a total lack of explanation; It is driving the ‘better out than in‘ mood that seems to be exploding all over the UK. The fact that sources are claiming that Brexit might not happen, or that there is a 20%-30% that it will not happen has the people riled, in the end there was a referendum and the complacent and lazy Bremainers were all in a stage ‘it will never happen’, just like that popular claim ‘too big to fail’, so as that went the wrong way the people have been hit with media after media going wild in allegations and all kinds of managed bad news reports like ‘we could lose everything‘, or ‘you’ll get nationally evicted‘, exponential levels of fear mongering for too long, the people are fed up and the Brexit party is gaining more and more momentum. In France far right Marine Le Pen is again in the lead, the Dutch ‘Forum for Democracy (FvD) party’ is equally pushing forward, is that the Europe that the UK wants to be part of? The extreme right parties are gaining momentum more and more and I personally believe that not having a handle on the ECB was a first step, then we still have Mario Draghi being a member of an elite banking group and the fact that no one was holding him to account is still a factor that the few are disregarding, whilst the 3 trillion of bad conceived spending was never up for debate.

There has been a mental delay with the voters, but the facts are out in the open for too much and the facts are too visible, it has angered the people, so as the news thought it was fun to give the readers the news through “The Hinduja brothers, Gopichand and Srichand, have reclaimed their crown as the UK’s wealthiest people, according to the annual Rich List survey. The Indian-born, London-based industrialists are estimated to be worth £22bn, up £1.35bn on last year’s list“, so yes that was a nice part, as the people cannot pay their bills, have to deal with unaffordable living, someone made an additional £1,335 million pounds extra, all that whilst we get “The list reveals that retailer Sir Philip Green has lost his billionaire status; his fortune is believed to have halved in a year because of a pension black hole in his Arcadia empire. The Sunday Times Rich List has Green’s total wealth free-falling £1.05bn in a year to £950m“, when I lose 50% of my wealth, I go from £1,500 to £750, so where is the ‘half’ and the mere decline of10% illustrating going from £1,05B to £950M? It seems to me that he wealthy people are taxed differently on fortunes having to be halved.

Are you still wondering whilst millions of Britons are in anger and are you wondering why the Brexit party is gaining momentum? Farage has the charisma to exploit the silly news items that are seemingly fun to read for some, but in light of all that has happened, it is infuriating a lot more people in the UK than the media should be happy about. And as we saw Tony Blair, yesterday in his opinion piece ‘Farage cannot be allowed to dictate Britain’s future. He must be thwarted‘ (at https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/may/11/farage-cannot-be-allowed-to-dictate-britains-future-he-must-be-thwarted) we are given “This is not a vote to choose a prime minister or a government. It is a vote for the Farage Brexit – or against it“. There I respectfully disagree; it has gone way beyond that. It has been about the unacceptable acts of the ECB and the overpaid EU gravy train riders for a much longer time and if Tony Blair had done something about when he was in charge from 1997 to 2007, or perhaps Gordon Brown in the three years that followed, the mess would not be there, in that same light the Conservatives after that did not achieve any significant push to make the ECB come to its senses, and now the people have had enough; they are willing to let Nigel Farage try. Tony should have done a few more things a decade ago and that was never the case. That is why the Brexit party is growing to the degree it is. The lack of kept promises, and the Italian government is merely throwing petrol on that fire, as such the Dutch are finding a person like Thierry Baudet more acceptable than ever before. A status quo play was the worst one to have, but the non-elected officials needed status quo for their wealth and now the gig is up in more than one way.

Tony Blair needs to realise that the Brexit party is not the downfall for either the Labor party or the Conservatives, facilitating to big business was and that is an important elements that none are touching on, the bulk of the politicians are tainted, tainted to the degree that they will stand out in every limelight and their denial in that is just staggering.

The mental delay has passed and now the people are in a phase where they are considering every other solution, except the ones that labour and conservatives offer. It is interesting that no one went on those tracks, the signals and indicators are clearly pushing in that direction.

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Tagged as BBC, Brexit Party, Conservatives, ECB, Ericsson, Financial Times, Forum for Democracy, France, FvD, Germany, Gopichand, Gordon Brown, Greece, Hinduja, Huawei, IMF, Independent, Italy, Labor party, Liberal Democrats, Marine Le Pen, Mario Draghi, MarketWatch, Nigel Farage, Nokia, Sir Philip Green, Srichand, the local Sweden, theGuardian, Tony Blair, UKIP, US

April 27, 2019 · 11:56

Then the hard

As we all are looking at the accusations towards Saudi Arabia, the political presented power plays (not real ones) against Iran on ‘no more sanctions waivers‘, all issues we knew were coming upfront of all the other issues, most people forgot to look at France. Or perhaps others were able to pull attention away from France.

Some give us ‘France’s Macron Promises Tax Cuts, Reforms in Response to Yellow Vests‘, others give us ‘Unsatisfied in France: Muted response to Macron sales pitch‘, the short and sweet of the matter is that tax cuts are almost out of the question. The French national debt has risen to over €2,446,051,000,000, France is approaching the €2.5 trillion mark and France is presently dangerously close to the next recession, they only passed it last quarter by nothing short of a miracle, it had nothing to do with President Macron or anyone else, for the most it was merely sheer luck that they avoided the recession stamp, Q2 might not be that lucky a moment. At that point, all the claims of ‘tax cuts via less spending‘ will fall flat soon thereafter, less spending will be the massive agenda point of Q3, and France will have no other way of dealing with it. It is even less good when we consider yesterday’s Financial Times (at https://www.ft.com/content/f9920a26-6750-11e9-9adc-98bf1d35a056) where we are treated to ‘French employees face challenge to short-hours culture‘. When the French system starts applauding the casual work staff solution, France will be heading to a much deeper pit than they imagine, President Macron played the game wrong and even as most would applaud a mental change to the workers environment and how things were done, the system is too rigid to accept changes and as that system went into shutdown mode for too often, the larger impact was ignored, President Macron was too stubborn and now there is a much large impact to be seen.

The FT opens up with the best statement ever: “French workers pride themselves on being more productive than their peers in other countries, despite the fact that they work fewer hours — but that advantage is waning“, it is the ‘waning‘ part that matters. The world had adjusted for the longest of times and their advantage is no longer there, so we have a protective system (which is fair enough) and whilst it was an advantage no change was going to happen, but now that the advantage is gone change is still not an option and now these labour laws become a noose, new investors and new companies are trying to find ulterior solutions (apart from growing outside of France), now we see that the need for longer hours is essential, or we see that these people are in a stage of becoming casual workers and being complemented (read: replaced) with other casual workers and the hours will go to the best performing people, making this solution more than a slippery slope. The Financial Times is giving us numbers where we see that French production is already surpassed by the Netherlands and Germany and that is also where we see that a growth system of part timers made that happen. You see in the end two people working 20 hours part time will perform better and get more done than one doing 40 hours and that is the shift that some France exploiters seem to be looking at, it partially improves tax revenue, but it also does something else. In the stage of cost of living these people will often work two jobs, so doing 2 times 20 hours and merely ending up working 20% harder for the same pay. When France gets there it will hit the French workforce really hard.

Now we get to the part where the €2.5 trillion mark matters, as the ECB is trying to find new ways to convince others that the continued provision of stimulus to the economy matters, that against all the odds and against all the previous parts, we see that the ECB policies will hit France harder, the debt makes it so and whilst the ECB is not an elected official, it is draining the options away from the European nations, all whilst so far it has been proven that there was no actual benefit to the economy twice over. So after three trillion in unacceptable spending the ECB still believed it can work, all whilst we see the data different.

It comes down to the old premise from Albert Einstein no less: “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results” and this now gives us the optional premise whether ECB rate-setter Olli Rehn should be committed under section 20 of the Mental Health Act (the involuntary committing of a patient).

It hits several nations, yet in all what is happening these issues will hit France and Italy the hardest I reckon. That part is seen when we consider “In France only 71 per cent of the population was in employment last year, compared with 79 per cent of the UK and 80 per cent in Germany“, in this the case for casual workers is often easily made, yet in France the impact gives a larger rise, lets consider that it reduces 10% of the unemployed force, which would be great, if not for the fact that these 10% now employed imply that the same amount of employed people will see a 30% reduction to their quality of life as they now share the one job with another person. It will not increase tax revenue ad that is easily shown.

At present in France the first two tax brackets are: €9,964–€27,519: 14% & €27,519–€73,779: 30%

Example one: A person makes a full income of €35,000. This gets the treasury €4702, we now get two part-timers, giving each €19,000, giving the treasury two times €1265, making it €2530, a treasury loss of €2172.

Why? The zero bracket will now apply to both employees, and even they will not see it in their second job, we see a larger shift that will occur, so in their time of great debt the treasury will fail itself twice over and even in more ways than one thinks. When you consider that the average income in France is €26,700, the part timers will dent the treasury a lot further than you think, and consider that the second job is fully taxed, how long until the French will not go that way? How much will the treasury miss out on, that is beside the next wave of badly designed stimulus ideas, a game that only sees banks and members of the ECB winners, the rest gets an added debt, how was that ever fair, just or even beneficial to any economy? Yes, France too will face their endgame, yet whether this Endgame involves President Macron (Thanos) and the Avengers (the yellow coats) to come to blows is not a given, it is an expected must soon enough.

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Tagged as Albert Einstein, ECB, France, laboour laws, national debt, Olli Rehn, President Macron, Yellow Vests

April 7, 2019 · 15:27

When the joke is on us all

We all have moments where we imagine that the dice is cast, yet we play roulette, we think we have the numbers down, yet did you know that the roulette number sequence is different in Europe compared to America? These are all elements in a play of high stake gambling. That same setting returns when we look at the Guardian article ‘Campaigners head to court to stop arms sales to Saudi Arabia’. The article (at https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/06/campaigners-court-bid-to-stop-uk-arms-sales-to-saudi-arabia) holds two sides (apart from it being partially a joke in my eyes). You see, I have no issue with people who have the principle of being against weapons. That is their prerogative. What does bug me is that these same people will suddenly blame the government for all kinds of issues and they will scream that they want higher taxes for the rich, ignoring the fact that they are the cause of several issues that are the consequence of some faulty misdirected version of ideology.

So even as I am happy to step in and take over the arms trade to Saudi Arabia, mainly because I do not have the luxury of walking away from a multi-billion pound deal, you see the rent is due next week and I would like a nice mince pie after I pay my rent, the £3,576,229,000 will enable me to get both. OK that amount would not all be mine, but 20% could be and that is still £715,245,800.

My entire pension issue solved overnight. The article takes us a step further. With: “The UK court case comes amid the continued fallout from the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was tortured and assassinated by Saudi agents“, I am fine with that step for the mere reason that there are too many question marks in that case. The evidence on several levels is missing proper scrutiny, the fact that Turkey has other agenda’s in play is ignored, and the involvement of Iran in all this is ignored on several levels. I am not stating that things did not happen, there is clearly a massive lack of proper scrutiny and people like the Campaign against Arms Trade are fuelling my opportunity and I am fine with that, if stupid people enable me to become wealthy, why would I oppose?

How Come?

Well, we are decently certain that something happened to Jamal Khashoggi, yet to what degree can government actions be proven? That is the issue, there is no evidence and as such can you, or should you stop dealing with a sovereign nation with a lack of evidence? In addition, in the other direction, we have seen a massive indecisive move towards Iran whilst Iran fuelled activities go on in Europe, October 2018, January 2019, covering Denmark, France, Netherlands, and the UK. Yet over at that point, we see an utter lack of actual actions (merely considerations).

Does it matter?

Well that is in part the question, we can accept that Campaign against Arms Trade wants it all to stop, but what is ignored is that merchants have markets and the UK cannot evolve next level defences if they cannot be sold. So whilst places like Saudi Arabia are still opening their internal market to have quality defence gear, places like the UK, Russia and America are looking to sell defence solutions to places that can afford them (Saudi Arabia, Egypt, UAE, Taiwan, South Korea and a few more players), yet the well is drying up, more and more countries have their own solutions and the size of the cake is getting smaller.

The next part is seen where we get Andrew Smith of Campaign against Arms Trade giving us: “This case could set a vital precedent and end UK complicity in the worst humanitarian catastrophe in the world.” In that I respectfully disagree, the catastrophe was that too many people sat on their hands for too long, the fact that Yemen is not just the Saudi-led coalition, the other side, the terrorist side is more than Houthi fighters, it includes Hezbollah as well as Iranian forces, by leaving that out, we see an unbalanced stage and in all this we see a deterioration of events, so even as we accept (to some degree) “civilian targets in Yemen have regularly been hit“, in addition we need to accept the Human Rights Watch who gives us clearly: “Houthi forces have repeatedly fired artillery indiscriminately into Yemeni cities and launched indiscriminate ballistic missiles into Saudi Arabia. Some of these attacks may amount to war crimes. Houthi attacks have struck populated neighbourhoods in Yemen, having a particularly devastating impact on Taizz, Yemen’s third largest city.” There is more than one player, yet these focus groups have merely looked at the Saudi side and that needs to stop, not because of what they are trying to achieve, but because the actions are much larger then they proclaim and there are two sides. In addition to what was given we need to consider the fact that Houthi forces have been staging some of the events. Al Jazeera gave us more than once: “The war has been at a stalemate for years, with the coalition and Yemeni forces unable to dislodge the Houthis from the capital, Sanaa, and other urban centres.” This indicates that the Houthi forces are in-between the population, with 16 million on the verge of death by starvation, is inaction even a problem?

Yet, from one point of view, I do not mind. If I get the option, I will sell it to the Saudi government and I will send Andrew Smith an authentic Fortnum and Mason hamper, just so that he knows I appreciate him enabling me to write a multi-billion pound invoice. Of course, the optional impact that the UK faces if the profitability of Britain’s largest defence company, BAE Systems is set to zero. I feel certain that Andrew Smith can explain it to the thousands of workers out of a job if I am given the assurance that I can get a much better margin by selling the Saudi government 47 Mikoyan MiG-35, complete with training and proper service level agreements. That puppy is a direct superior option against the Typhoon, the Super Hornet and a few others; my upside is that if I get Saudi Arabia on board, I am likely to get additional requests from Pakistan and at least three other governments.

So at that point, how exactly did Campaign against Arms Trade achieve anything (other than making me filthy rich and I will thank them in person for that). In this day and age where the markets and economies cannot take these hits, it is the ability of Andrew Smith that Europe fears, you see commerce is at the heart of the matter, and at this point, any nations bringing in bad news will stop being an asset, that is the Wall Street premise we all signed up for in 2005 when things started to get bad, we never corrected for any of it.

Distasteful like a Vegan

We can all consider where our ethical boundary is, yet in all this, we seem to forget that any sovereign nation has the right to self-govern, Europeans with their gravy train, ECB and shallow morals seem to have forgotten that. In all this having commerce allows diplomats to find a path that steers some nations away for certain practices and that path will be denied to them soon thereafter. Consider that I am all about profit and the Campaign against Arms Trade allowed for that change, how did they achieve anything? Because the UK misses out on have a dozen billions a year less? How many projects and funding issues will dry up the year after that starts? We have settings and measurements, most do not deal with terrorists, most do not sell to individuals, and the Campaign against Arms Trade is starting to allow for the return of those markets.

Sidestepping into art

Consider John Wyndham’s 1951 novel The Day of the Triffids. Some saw the movie, some read the book. Yet what happens when the sequel is a direct horror story? What happens when the sequel gives us the stage where the Triffids land on a planet ruled by vegans and vegetarians? How scared will they be (the Triffids that is)? This relates to the setting we have, you see, we seem to push towards everyone becoming a vegan and vegetarian (non-weaponised), because that is what their norm states, yet what are we going to do about the hunters (lion), the carrion eaters (Hyena) and other non-vegetarians? What do we do when people have certain norms and will not be told by anyone how to act? Is that such a weird issue?

You merely have to look at football hooligan UK to see that part of the equation, and there is no end in sight. It is a shallow connection, I agree, yet that is the ball game, someone wants to pressure towards an ideology whilst the other players are not interested. Now that does not invalidate the ideology, yet the fact that the reasoning is one sided, whilst the entire economic premise requires selling to other governments is a factor that cannot be ignored.

Who are we to dictate rules and manners? I get it, by denying the Saudi government one’s own screwed up values is all good, yet when the act does the opposite of what they are trying to achieve, can we agree that the action is not that bright? I am not comparing the Saudi people with either the Lion or the Hyena. I am merely stating that there is more than one option and that is fine for all concerned. How can any nation, most of them either dealing with their own levels of corruption, or facilitating to massive corporate tax evasion, as these elements also impact whatever was to be part of a government budget, do we have any business impeding the other paths that were available? Consider that we were treated only a month ago to ‘HMRC’s first probes into corporate tax evasion facilitation‘, the stage where we are seeing “HMRC has confirmed that it has opened its first investigations into the corporate criminal offence of failure to prevent the facilitation of UK tax evasion, using new powers to tackle corporate fraud contained in the Criminal Finances Act, introduced in the wake of the Panama Papers leaks“, an event that is close to 15 years late. How can we see the actions of a group stopping billions the UK government desperately needs? Don’t worry, in the end I might be ecstatically happy regarding their act, I am not so certain the British people will love the impact of what Campaign against Arms Trade invoked to happen. We can see that there is a lot that needs fixing, I am not sure that international arms trade to other governments no less is a first problem to solve, not with the competition and not with much larger issues in play.

And it is here where we see the delusional part of Andrew Smith, with “BAE’s solution will always be the same: it wants to sell more weapons, regardless of the atrocities they are enabling. Wherever there is war and conflict, there will always be companies like BAE trying to profiteer from it“, we get to see just how whacked his view is. Well, to be honest, he is allowed to have that view, it just does not add up. You see, the actual premise is: “BAE’s solutions are designed to keep Britain safe. Yet the development will cost 155 billion, to assure the top state of defence for the UK, who will only buy for up to 100 billion requires additional sales to global governments who could need that solution, even as the US buys a lot, it is not enough to fill the gap and that is where other nations come in. There is the Netherlands, Germany, Norway, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Thailand, South Korea, Taiwan and a few others.“ In addition Andrew Smith seems to forget (or he does not care)that others like the US, France, Italy and Russia all have solutions to sell, so we need to ensure our survival for the need of growing British defence and keeping it as high as possible. This part is extremely important, because whoever has the best deals with places like Saudi Arabia is also in the best position to aid and guide international development in places like that. As Saudi Arabia is about to become a 5G powerhouse, that path is more and more important for everyone. Consider the impact if Campaign against Arms Trade is successful. Do you think that British Telecom has a chance in hell to grow the 5G options to the degree they could if their portfolio is auto rejected in several Middle Eastern nations, or only accepted at a mere 2% margin? Commerce is so intertwined in so many ways on a global level that the entire premise Campaign against Arms Trade is to regarded as too ideological, whilst ignoring common sense; it would be nice if this was a setting where there was only the US and the UK, yet there is a strong defence field that includes Russia and China, whatever the UK loses, China and optionally Russia will gain and in that regard, how did that help the British people?

The fact that we see a one-sided part against Saudi Arabia, whilst there is a large and utter denial (or silencing) on the acts from Hezbollah and Houthis firing Iranian missiles into the Saudi population is not mentioned. The article (at https://www.caat.org.uk/campaigns/stop-arming-saudi) gives more, yet leaves the atrocities of the Houthi and Hezbollah terrorists out of that equation, that part alone should be cause for concern. The small fact that at present there is no evidence, evidence that could stand up in court giving us a clear path that the Saudi government murdered Jamal Khashoggi, is also part of concern. As I stated earlier in other articles, I am not stating that they are innocent, I am stating that the evidence has gaps, large ones and the conviction through some political hacks came via a CIA report stating ‘high confidence‘, which is not the same. When did we allow the courts to decide on ‘confidence‘? The fact that the acts in all this (Yemen and Jamal Khashoggi) from both Iran and Turkey is largely ignored is making the entire stage even more appalling.

Yet, I will thank Andrew Smith in person when I get to deliver the goods making me rich, I do however expect him to be not so appreciative of it all in the end, even less so when others with no scruples at all (like myself) start delivering goods instead of BAE Systems, and deleting the job security of 83,200 employees? Well, it is ideology, is it not? They will just have to find another job.

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Tagged as Al Jazeera, Andrew Smith, BAE, Campaign Against Arms Trade, China, Denmark, ECB, Egypt, Eu, Europe, Fortnum and Mason, France, Human Rights watch, Iran, Jamal Khashoggi, MIG-35, Netherlands, Russia, Sanaa, Saudi Arabia, Taizz, the Guardian, Turkey, Typhoon, UAE, UK, Yemen

March 25, 2019 · 11:54

A political Chucky

I love cricket, I played it and loved it. That is as long as I was not bowling. There is no point in handing 10 overs to the opposition when Chucky (me) is bowling and I am happy that I am not considered outside of the field or batting. Some things should not happen, so, what do you do when your own party (the conservatives) considers chucking as a valid tactic in a game where it has been an illegal action?

That is what the Guardian (at https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/mar/24/tory-islamophobia-row-15-suspended-councillors-quietly-reinstated) informs us on in ‘Tory Islamophobia row: 15 suspended councillors quietly reinstated‘, and the fact that it is openly and ‘quietly’ done implies that my own party does not seem to grasp the educational need of the matter. We have all made ‘questionable’ considerations. I have on occasion noticed a lady who had an amazing * (assterix). I did not state that out loud, but optionally whispered it as softly ass possible (pun intended). It gets us to the old situation ‘If you are alone in a forest and no woman can hear you, are you still wrong?‘

So, when we see: “More than a dozen Conservative councillors who were suspended over posting Islamophobic or racist content online – with some describing Saudis as “sand peasants” and sharing material comparing Asian people to dogs“, when we see this, this is not whispering. This is loudly proclaiming, shouting even as it happened online. This is stupidity of a whole new level and there needs to be an investigation. It is not merely for the norm of the PC of it all. This has business impact. We can consider that the Middle East will be funding hundreds of billions in business decisions and the UK would want as much of it as possible. And in that is Mohammed Amin wrong? When we see the chairman of the Conservative Muslim Forum for the publication of set of formal disciplinary processes that far off? When discrimination is condoned to the degree that it is, should we not expect a much larger impact? When we see Islamophobia and anti-Semitic issues, we need to remember that there is a larger impact. If parties are rejected from consideration, it shows that political players are dismissing optional best solutions from the political arena because they are wearing filtering glasses, implying that the cost of doing business is optionally increased due to unacceptable practices and as the article implies that it has transpired 15 times, we see a systemic failure of a political engine that besides doing things wrong is optionally transgressing into the field of criminal acts. So even as James Cleverly claims that that swift investigations was made, the stage of quietly adding them back to the party gives light of more than Islamophobia, it gives light to the acceptance of racism within the party and that is not a good thing.

There is no doubt that there is a lot of emotion regarding the Middle East, yet anti-Semitism and Islamophobia will never solve it, it merely polarises issues beyond repair. I wonder what happens when Huawei and Saudi Arabia complete their initial setting and Saudi Arabia becomes a 5G powerbroker? Some analysts made the claim that there will be 30 million subscriptions in the Middle East by 2024. I believe that to be wrong, Huawei is not the only player and Ericsson is showing to be almost as capable as Huawei (driving competition and innovation), giving Saudi Arabia an option to drive partnerships to nations including the UAE, Oman and Egypt. OK, we admit that Egypt is Africa, yet the light that Saudi Arabia could grow subscriptions towards 60 million upwards when they get to include Egypt, and set the stage for Telecom growth a lot wider than that. A speculative step is seen in the Arab News on March 4^th. When I looked at the complete language regarding Saudi Arabia’s Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Adel Al-Jubeir, I noticed that the statements were precise (read: too precise). So when I saw: “ruled out restoring diplomatic relations with Syria or reinstating Damascus to the Arab League without progress on a political process to end the eight-year-old war“, as well as: “Riyadh will also not take part in any reconstruction efforts until stability is restored in Syria“. Yet in this, 5G and creating options for communication is not reconstruction, or political progress. Yet it facilitates for both when the innovative players are allowed for a push towards global 5G considerations and it is my believe that Adel Al-Jubeir could use it to set an increasingly larger stage for the KSA. I admit that my speculation is based on text (and interpretation) that is super thin, you could not skate on it, but you might lie down on it and cautiously create forward momentum. In light of the optional growth all over the Middle East and Africa, Saudi Arabia (read: Huawei business partners) are all gaining an advantage that allows for multiple conversations on a much larger board. The direct impact being that the setback for American corporations will increase larger and faster.

The 5G push would also allow options towards Jordan and now we see that Saudi Arabia (via Huawei and Ericsson) has created a much larger bond for future options for all these players. Now we see an optional line through Saudi Arabia to Oman, Egypt, Jordan, the UAE and optionally Yemen to follow. A big chunk of the Arab league, basically the big 5 all connected in 5G together making one voice more and more powerful. And with every victory there, the US gets pushed into becoming less and less relevant in 5G in that same wave. In that stage, when we see these steps unfold, do you really think that keeping racist and Islamophobic politicians is serving anyone’s purpose other than fear mongering and extremism?

So when we see the Guardian quote: “When CCHQ has been made aware of the small number of such cases we have acted swiftly, suspending members and launching immediate investigations, in sharp contrast to other parties” my issue here is that it is the exact party line that James Cleverly gave us. It sounds like a Microsoft sound byte, a claim made when they cannot solve a problem and they need it to be put into a drawer for well over a full upgrade. The fact that the Guardian treats us to: ‘quietly reinstated‘ gives rise to a systemic failure, one that can cost the UK many opportunities down the line and should we allow for that?

The Middle East is currently actively investing funds in excess of £1.4 trillion (not billion) on numerous projects in constructions, ICT, telecommunications and infrastructure, do you think that the UK has a chance of scoring any jobs when these contractors ask for a clarification on the application of ‘sand peasants‘? I also wonder what we will find when we read the transcripts and investigation papers regarding the 15 members that had been ‘quietly reinstated‘. How loud are we allowed to be when we look into this? The UK has enough worries with new Brexit fear mongering and a non-accountable ECB as Europe is about to get several trillions deeper in debt (because they found a miracle formula that explains it all. source: Bloomberg), digging our own graves by not acting against racism and discriminating phobias seems to be a problem we can avoid from the start.

When one of these Middle Easters investors asks feedback from Miqdaad Versi of the Muslim Council of Britain, what would these people hear? Quietly allowing chuckies to be set up as bowlers whilst we know that they will (through inadequacy, insensitivity and lack of professionalism) optionally knowingly instigate an illegal play is not common sense at all.

Any cricket captain should know better than to allow any chucky to bowl, but that is exactly what is seemingly happening right now.

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Tagged as 5G, Adel al-Jubeir, Arab League, Brexit, CCHQ, Conservative Muslim Forum, Conservatives, discrimination, ECB, Egypt, Ericsson, Huawei, James Cleverly, Jordan, KSA, Miqdaad Versi, Mohammed Amin, Muslim Council of Britain, Oman, racism, Saudi Arabia, Syria, the Guardian, Tory, UAE, UK, US, Yemen

March 9, 2019 · 14:39

Electing Stupid People?

It was the first thought that I had when I got confronted with ‘ECB Injects More Stimulus as Draghi Reveals Slashed Forecasts‘, trillion upon trillion added in debt and none of it worked, the Europeans merely added 3 trillion in debt and they have nothing to show for it. The ECB has become a clear and present danger to the quality of life of Europeans. At present every European should consider that they have an added €5,859 of debt that they have to pay, so in a family of 4 that amounts to €23,437 with the optional €156 of interest every month. A setting where we see that close to 53% cannot make that payment, so that is merely the interest with no chance of ever paying the actual debt. A debt that was a bad idea and has been a bad idea for over 4 years and still the ECB does whatever makes themselves and their friends rich. No accountability for their actions, no transparency and no way to undo the damage they push unto others. Still people ask me why I am a Brexit person. The acts of the ECB are a clear indication that the EU has failed its people to the largest extent.

So as Bloomberg gives us “But bank stocks dropped as the new loans will have less favorable terms than the ECB’s previous operation. There may also be concern about the ECB’s gloomy prognosis for the economy and the limited ammunition it has left if things worsen“, I merely see that what I mentioned in my blog for over 2 years is becoming a reality. the article (at https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-07/draghi-slashes-ecb-outlook-as-officials-inject-more-stimulus) also gives us “The ECB is reverting to more monetary support just three months after policy makers decided to end their bond-buying program and hoped to start weaning the euro-area economy off its crisis-era stimulus. The export-dependent European economy buckled under the weight of trade tensions, a slowdown in China and the uncertainties around Brexit.” This is making matters worse. You see the stage of ‘the uncertainties around Brexit‘ is one that the ECB gunned for trying desperately to keep the UK in and the actions of the ECB are pushing the UK away. Yes I agree that matters will become worse, yet only for the short term, the UK will over time rise faster and faster whilst the economies of France and Germany will become more and more stagnant towards facilitating to the other 23 players, as they are merely there to get an unrealistic economy and the loans that go with it. When I speculate, I come to the conclusion that Austria will get an expected debt that equals their GDP of 83% by 2021, Belgium is racing towards 108%, optionally by November 2020, Italy is likely to be at 135% by then, Spain is actually doing well, but it will not continue, if they are really lucky they will remain steady at 97%, France will climb to 99.2% and those nations are adding trillions more debt, because the ECB is not kept in check. that is the Europe that Europe is steering to and no one is asking the serious questions on how retirements will falter before 2028, the cost of living no longer realistic and there is no way to keep any economy in check because tee was never any real stage to keep it in check, with merely the impossibility to cast members out. Greece has a chain around its neck that will soon surpass the current debt level of 179% of GDP. So whilst ABC News over sells it with “Provisional data released Thursday show the economy grew 1.9 percent in 2018, down from a 2.1 percent estimate by the government, but closer to the European Commission forecast of 2 percent“, all whilst Greek Industrial news gives us: ‘Greek Economy Loses Steam in Q4, Recovery on Course‘, which might be really true as summer is coming for Greece so from that we accept that the Greek economy numbers will fluctuate positively. And those travelling to Greece tend to see a Greek alternative location, not an alternative country which is great for Greece but the overall numbers are merely positive, not overly positive. The weather has been part of that. There has been a tendency for people in Europe to select less foreign destinations for their vacations, especially the Netherlands and Belgium. This part is not the most important art, yet it still matters. If one nation is off by 0.1% we see an impact, however it is Germany where the economic slowdown is the most visible, and from the past people in Germany get cautious really fast, the 2013 smash down taught them that the hard way. It would impact Spanish tourism by a fair bit. For France we see a similar impact but less in tourism, for them the game changes in other ways and it impacts the EU as well. French RFI reported that the OECD gave “Italy is likely to go into recession. France comes out well, relatively speaking, with 1.3 percent, exactly half the likely growth rate for the US economy“. I personally have some serious doubts on those numbers. If France ends up with 1.1% they would be lucky, as we already have a debate on 0.2%, nation after nations have ‘recovery’ idea’s and not one is staged in any rock solid situation, it is all fluid and most of them hide behind ‘Brexit uncertainty‘ whilst they are all desperate to see Brexit fail before it becomes a reality, their economies will all take a massive hit, even the UK however, the UK once out will be able to push forward momentum just for the UK not for the dozen members hanging on the coattails of the UK. That was the truth that the ECB and the EU commissions are so desperate to hide. The UK residents get fear mongering story, one after another. How there will be no toilet rolls, how things collapse and how values are soon gone. Yet the direct impact is ignored. Once out the UK can determine for the UK again, not have an usurper player setting policy.

For clarity: a usurper is a person who takes a position of power or importance illegally or by force. It does not seem to apply to the ECB, yet how are they setting policy that is pushing the Europeans into debt by trillions, even after the second stage where it did not impact the economy in a positive way? The moment it was switched off, the EU economy is showing to buckle, so how is such a stimulus ever going to be a solution?

When we see “offering banks cheap loans to try to help revive the economy“, well from my point of view, a plan to revive that has been going on for four years is not a plan to revive, it is a vegetation form of life that is being kept alive artificially, as it would have been dead for some time under any other condition. It is merely facilitating for large invoices on a cadaver that no longer has the ability to self-determine its life. And in this case the ECB is really ready to facilitate large invoices, the question becomes who gets that cash, the people of the EU merely get to pay the bill and there are questions that are not getting answered by anyone, giving us a much larger problem. Are people this stupid allowed to be elected into such powerful positions?

You tell me, because from my point of view it does not make sense, and it never did, not past 2015 anyway. It is one part that is wrong; we see even more when we give regards to the issues shown by the Guardian (at https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/mar/07/ecb-to-keep-interest-rates-low-recession-fears-eurozone-banks). With: “The central bank for the 19 euro nations said it would launch a series of targeted, long-term refinancing operations (TLTROs) in September. These are to run until March 2021 to help banks roll over €720bn (£617bn) of ECB loans and to ward off a credit squeeze that could deepen the economic slowdown” we see a situation that could optionally be interpreted as: “we predict that we cannot pay the outstanding loan of €720 billion, so we are creating a new loan to pay the old loan. We will not mention that as our economic position is not as good, so the fact that this will come at a higher interest is something we will have to accept“, a danger I saw coming a mile away well before 2017. Greece was the most visible one, but not the only one, Italy is in a similar position with its 131% of GDP debt and it will go from bad to worse. With a current predicted debt of €2,526,450,000,000 its interest responsibility is beyond horrendous and that too is swept under the carpet. When we see these acts of stupidity and irresponsibility the Europeans do not have a clear prospect, they basically have seemingly no prospect at all. At present every EU nation will denounce my view, yet what will they say in 2024 when I am proven correct? What happens to the people born between 1956 and 1960 when they look at their pensions and see that they really cannot afford being alive having to pay their bills on what is left? What excuses will their governments and the ECB give them when these people get to hear: ‘OOPS!‘ The chaos that comes with it will be one we get to remember for generations. It will be the moment where all over Europe the life of a Ministry of Pensions official will have a speculated shorter lifespan than that of a crack addict overdosing.

It is all merely part of a larger issue, even as Reuters gives us less than 24 hours ago ‘German industrial orders post strongest drop in seven months‘, we forget that this also impacts shipping numbers, the Dutch harbour revenues, in addition the “Contracts for goods ‘Made in Germany’ were down by 2.6 percent on the month, Economy Ministry data showed on Friday, marking their steepest fall since June 2018 and confounding forecasts for a 0.5 percent increase” gives rise to questions. We accept that we cannot predict increases and decreases to some degree, yet the stage of +0.5% against a 2.6% drop is quite another matter. I also had an issue with: “The Federal Statistics Office put the revision down to large orders for December being reported late“. I am not stating that they were misreporting to us, yet the question on the validity and quality of their forecasting pipeline shows to be more than a mere glitch, it shows that elements are either ignored or not properly doused in awareness. I am not sure which of the two is more dangerous, as the faltering positivity could also give rise to an increased risk of negated negativity through managed unawareness. I do not believe that either form exists by itself. I have accused some of orchestrated reporting through delayed bad news. I personally believe that this is a much larger problem in the EU, and it needs to be addressed really soon and to a much larger degree than it ever was. For that we need to make one final jump. It was last year September when Forbes gave us (at https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelfoster/2018/09/29/bernankes-2020-prediction-is-dead-wrong/#3132f00c4df5) “Something strange is happening in the investment-bank and hedge-fund world: a growing sense that the next recession (which, by the way, Wall Street has long been wrongly predicting for years) finally has a due date: 2020“. By itself it is not really an issue in any way shape or form. We have all seen these predictions, all based on actual numbers before. I made a similar prediction before Forbes got there (yay me), yet when we see: “the likelihood of a 2020 recession has risen due to, among other things, a tight labour market and higher borrowing costs“, as well as “former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is getting in on the act, saying a boom “is going to hit the economy in a big way this year and next year. Then in 2020, Wile E. Coyote is going to go off the cliff“, we see a lot of it coming to fruition at present and still the ECB pushes forward? We understand that this should be about actual data and not predictions, yet the numbers have been towards the negative for some time now and pushing for more stimuli whilst there is enough data to see it as folly to become reality is another matter entirely. There is a play handed out to players, whilst whomever owns the bank is seeing exactly which player has which card and the players are kept in the dark that the banks have camera’s looking over the shoulder of every player, which indicates that the banks can decide at any moment to sell short the play made by any player. It is great to be told that you can bluff, whilst the bank gets to see the cards all the players have. So the bank decides to set a stimulus play whilst they know that all players have losing hands, how does that go over with the players in the room?

And we allow these banks to be elected to set the stage as such in the first place?

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Tagged as Austria, Ben Bernanke, bloomberg, Brexit, Draghi, ECB, Eu, European debt, Federal Reserve Chairman, Federal Statistics Office, Forbes, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Ministry of Pensions, Netherlands, OECD, reuters, RFI, Spain, stimulus, targeted long-term refinancing operations, the Guardian, TLTRO, UK

February 13, 2019 · 12:58

Life without pension

Yes, that is one of the elements that are now in play, life without pension, work until death. Did you consider this danger when you woke up this morning? It does not matter whether you are 55+ and awaiting your first months on a pension, or perhaps you are a decade younger and you are setting the stage for your house, your family and your future to be decently secure. Perhaps you are young and you do not care yet on how you celebrate your golden years. Yet what happens when you are becoming aware that this will never be the life you can embrace?

For me it is not really a concern, I have always been a workaholic.

Yet the picture I am painting is slowly becoming a reality. I made mention somewhere in 2018 that there would be noise on renewing, or not cancelling the entire stimulus program. I was initially pleasantly surprised that this was exactly what happened. It did not take long, a mere 8 weeks later we see: ‘Dutch central banker calls on ECB to pause plan to ditch stimulus‘ (at https://www.ft.com/content/d42d5c12-2def-11e9-8744-e7016697f225). Here we see: “The European Central Bank should pause plans to ditch its crisis-era stimulus, the governor of the Dutch central bank has said, in a sign that concerns over disappointing economic growth have spread to the eurozone’s most hawkish circles“, In addition we see: “the central bank needed to gauge how badly the economy was faring before pressing ahead with plans to normalise monetary policy“. This is merely one part where we see that the economy is a jester and we are all playing the same card whilst the protected few get the entire deck, an economy that requires $3 trillion and counting to run through invested support is not running, plain and simple and that debt is with us, the tax payers. The idea to runt that bill up higher should outrage us all, no matter what excuses we get to hear. So when we see “he has moved into line with Mr Draghi and the majority on the ECB governing council. It shows the steep deterioration in eurozone sentiment“, I merely see that not only was Brexit the better idea, we need to get out as quick as we can, with exit deal or not.

What do you think will happen when this blows up in their faces? It will; I personally believe that there is close to zero doubt on this. The Wall Street Journal gave us two days ago: “the ECB could raise interest rates this year. If it doesn’t, the bank might turn to new stimulus measures. It has few tools left“, I will go one step further, it has no moves left other than to tap unused resources for short term gains and that is when someone will give the audience assurances with some small ‘extremely unlikely‘ or some ‘failure is too small a factor to see it as any threat‘ mention and soon thereafter that one thing happens and the pensions will be gone. The Dutch Telegraaf reported on that less than 10 hours ago where the reader gets: “De EU-landen willen volgende maand de knoop doorhakken. De PEPP moet het makkelijker maken geld opzij te zetten voor de oude dag door een einde te maken aan de lappendeken van regels in de Unie“, which translates to: “The EU countries want to make a decision next month. The PEPP should make it easier to set aside money for the old age by putting an end to the patchwork of rules in the Union“. Critical viewers see the danger as the mandatory part comes into question. So not only do we see places like Carillion (UK) with their “pension fund deficit of £800 million” a mere week ago. So what happens when this ends up being the impact on a European scale? What happens when the Dutch and Swedish systems (which are among the safest and most secure pensions) collapse? That is not fictive, that is not academic, that is a realistic danger of the PEPP, when those schemes start banking on the wrong bonds and investments there will be no pension left. Good luck getting by with that March Hare menu. The fact that this is getting pushed by more and more marketing, complete with ‘How a US firm pushed for EU €2.1 trn pension fund‘. It makes me extremely cautious. In the age where we see new stimulus replace another, whist there is no economic good to be found, we see more and more debt, the moment the ECB gets there fingers on that PEPP option the fences move and the entire herd of economic protection levels gets squashed, like grapes in a wine barrel, to be diminished to the status of vinegar. So there goes your pension that was initially a decent chardonnay at $15 per 700ml, and is now no more than $2 per gallon, so how does that go over with your planned pension outlook?

The rapid growth of all these international advisors all claiming that the Pan European Personal Pension products (Pepp) are a good idea is making me even less trusting. Having seen the eager needs of hedge funds managers over the decades and their renowned need for greed is making me worried that this will blow up and whilst they walk away with multimillion bonuses, we all end up without a pension. It does not get any better soon. That part is seen through the paper by Paul Cox, Lecturer at the Birmingham Business School (at https://www.birmingham.ac.uk/Documents/college-social-sciences/social-policy/CHASM/briefing-papers/2018/BP1-2018-Pan-European-Personal-Pension-Paul-Cox.pdf), and the first thing that should worry you is: “Currently there is no specific EU legal framework on the design, provision and distribution of PPs“, so not only is this an international product limited by national law, there is every indication that once outside of the borders a lot of national legislation loses its impact and power, giving rise to all kinds of dangers. Even as we are given: “The PEPP takes the form of a Regulation. A Regulation is directly applicable in each Member State and does not need to be passed in Parliament as a Directive does.” This comes with the added danger that these regulations can be altered at any time, giving the rise to ambiguity as well as adaption to fit the need of the ECB, that same entity that callously handed over $3 trillion in stimulus with nothing to show for it. How does that fit your retirement scheme?

Even as we see: “Transfers into a PEPP from any national Member State PP is allowed but a transfer from a PEPP to a national Member State PP is not allowed” and are given the reasoning of “The aim is to prevent possible tax relief arbitrage where the PEPP tax relief is not as generous as national Member State tax relief.“, the indirect danger will be that the PEPP could face additional taxation (on top of the normal national one).

Yet the bigger danger is in the unspoken part of: “An obligation to provide a financial guarantee might lead to investment in low risk and low returning assets, such as government bonds and money markets, which would go against the CMU’s aim of fostering investment in equity and increasing private sector economic growth. A financial guarantee may also create a significant barrier to entry as only some providers would be able to offer such guarantees“, so not only the loss of optional guarantee, yet the bigger part is the danger of much higher risk investments, apart from the partially visible danger of investing in ECB bonds fuelling more non profitable stimulus, the danger of big risk as people experienced in 2004 and 2008, at that point your pension is gone.

That is a direct danger at present and there is almost zero chance that these dangers will not hit you at some point. The problem is that the closer you are to retirement, the larger the impact will be. Some of my friends were hit with their low risk investments in 2008, resulting in an added 10 year shift to their retirement, so retiring at 75, do you think you will be that lucky?

From my personal point of view, it is not the large players that are the danger, there will always be another Carillion, the danger are the dozen small players where we see people diving into a pool they do not comprehend and set aside the essential protections required, all with the view to strike rich fast. In that view, consider the “the fallout of a $235 billion dirty-money scandal that has engulfed the local branch of Copenhagen-based Danske Bank A/S“, then take “the ABLV, Latvia’s third-largest bank, accused of laundering Russian money and starved it of American dollars, forcing it to close“, add “the closure of Malta’s Pilatus Bank and a 775 million euro fine imposed on Dutch lender ING” and the clear message, given via Reuters by committee chairman Petr Jezek: “The Financial Intelligence Units of many EU member states are ‘clearly not up to the task’“, that is the PEPP picture you could face, all getting in and out quick and ransack EU pensions overnight (and all falling over at the same time). There is too much danger and as we might have some faith in the uber wealthy Larry Fink and his need to grow his $6 trillion empire, the danger of small bank barracuda’s pretending to be great white’s or their version of an all devouring Megaladon (thanks Jason Statham) is too great, there is a lack of protection in place and with pensions that is just too great a risk to face. To translate that in other terms. It is not the one player losing $1oo billion that is the danger, it is the setting that 100 players all lose $1 billion at the same time, the systems are often not ready to deal with such a situation.

I fear that the fraud and pocket filling impact by greed driven persons the next time around will be a lot higher, a lot more devastating. I always figured that I will be working should I pass the 77 mark and still be alive, that is the one benefit of a workaholic, is that the view you are having for your retirement at 40+?

BP1-2018-Pan-European-Personal-Pension-Paul-Cox

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Tagged as ABLV, Birmingham Business School, Carillion, Danske Bank A/S, ECB, European Central Bank, Financial Times, ING, Interserve, Mario Draghi, Netherlands, Pan European Personal Pension products, Paul Cox, PEPP, Petr Jezek, Pilatus Bank, reuters, Sweden, Telegraaf, Wall Street Journal

February 1, 2019 · 12:43

Updates

First of all

So whilst Microsoft is trying to rephrase their weak position through: ‘We are continuing to look at engagement as our key metric for success and are no longer reporting on total console sales‘, yes try to sell that whilst you have been all aggro on boasting boosted numbers for decades. Now that Xbox is about to become the number THREE system, they are running scared. The Nintendo Switch is now at 32 million, which surpasses the previous total number of Xbox One consoles sold, but they are currently allegedly at 41 million consoles sold, which means that there is only a 9 million gap until the most powerful console in the world degrades to the bronze position. Nintendo sold 14 million consoles in the last quarter alone, so that gives light that this is the last quarter with Xbox in the number two position, optionally the last month. Yet, I admit, my expectation of passing Microsoft by January 31^st was not met, I was wrong. Yet the total number of consoles sold in the last quarter is still an amazing feat by Nintendo and it also shows that even as I was not correct in the end, my view was a lot better than all the market analysts.

The writing is on the wall.

I personally believe that some analysts have been setting the stage for shorting the stock of Nintendo. The question becomes what the law states. You see, when we look at the definition of shorting stock, the most generic version is: “he or she borrows shares of a company from an existing owner through his brokerage, sells those borrowed shares at the current market price, and pockets the cash“, yet in this case, the premise is not entirely that clear, with ‘he or she borrows‘ we need to consider that shorting the stock was done as a service for a third party, giving rise to the sale at tremendous profits. At present I seem to be wrong, there is no evidence of a setting to allow for a short sell. Yet the predictions that were made last year were so wrong, in so many ways that the overall findings would lead me to this path (there are others too). So is it just me? I would actually agree with this, was it not for the fact that the level of wrongness regarding Nintendo was so profound.

The state last year (Oct 2018) was given with ‘Nintendo Delivers Record Quarter, But Misses Estimates‘, so the stock tumbled a little less than 2%, in all this, whilst within a year the total lifetime sales of the Microsoft Xbox One were completely by 67% at that time, in addition, the software sales were almost globally ruling software top ten lists all over the place. We can argue that the ‘missed estimates’ were so ludicrously unrealistic that the entire matter had to be looked at, now we see the last quarter alone delivered 14 million consoles, which is almost 50% of what Microsoft achieved in sales between 2012 and 2016, four years versus three months, so how were estimations missed?

The puzzlement is supported even further with: “That’s Nintendo’s most profitable Q2 in eight years and a solid increase from the $211 million it booked last year.” It is in that light that I had an issue with the predictions in the last year. From my point of view Nintendo smashed almost every record, yet the stock is not reflecting that, giving rise to a few issues, but as a non-trader and a non-economy educated person, I cannot give the weight to that thought, yet the thought remains.

And now that we are treated to: ‘Nintendo cuts Switch sales forecast despite strong holiday season‘ the matter should be set, yet I am not convinced. Even as we see 14.5 million consoles up to now the last two months are unlikely to give them the 5.5 million consoles they need, they expect to get 2.5 million consoles and that seems achievable. I am not convinced that the 5.5 million consoles cannot be met, merely because Microsoft is on the ropes and there is no marketing, no advertising to reflect that. In this aggressive expansion universe it seems odd that Nintendo is not taking up the gauntlet to that degree.

They drastically improved visibility, especially compared to the WiiU. They have the titles that have a large appeal across the board and the people who do play the Switch love the interactions. In addition the shock news of Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3 and the fact is that it is exclusively to Nintendo Switch is not merely news, it is equally a shocker to Sony as well, as this was the kind of stuff that Sony needed to prevent from happening. The fans (including me) loved the first one on Xbox 360 and as we see the foundation of the original Gauntlet added to the DC and Marvel Universe, we get a game any comic book fan would love to play and nearly everyone that was one did and loved it. So to get this exclusively to Switch is a dealmaker as well as a record breaker. I doubt that this game will be out in time to get the next quarter sales up to the degree it needs to be upped, but it will soar sales of Nintendo yet again (optionally not in time to make the 20 million marker).

So did Nintendo do it wrong? I am not convinced, they made huge mistakes in the WiiU era and seemingly repaired all those flaws in the Nintendo Switch stage, no matter what estimates were not met, we now see that Nintendo Switch has gotten to 45% mark of the PlayStation 4 lifetime sales in under 2 years which is quite the feat as Microsoft got nowhere near that result, ever!

In second place

This is given to us by the Guardian (at https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jan/31/italy-slips-into-recession-for-third-time-in-a-decade-economy) it is in the setting of the same wall with more writing. It was to be expected as Italy has a whole range of economic anchors and downfalls. Yet I had hoped that Italy would have been able to stagnate their economy; alas they do not get to be that lucky and recession is the result. The problem is that this could also adversely affect France at present. It is (according to the Business Insider) yet at present the recession there is most likely, yet not a certainty. No matter how it wields, the French President will have to make a few committing jumps on several levels and as the stage between the US and the EU is polarising France will be on the side of the French needs, which by the way is not on par with American needs, so the Europeans have that to look forward to in the next 5 weeks. It is also the Italian part where we see failings, the Guardian gives us: “The deputy prime minister Luigi Di Maio, the head of the Five Star Movement, said the recession was proof that Europe’s budget rules should be relaxed to allow Italy to stimulate its economy back to growth“, which is the larger mistake. That approach did not work for the ECB and now the EU nations have a 3 trillion Euro anchor around their necks, adding debt will not have any true influence on the economy. the entire spending spree is now to be the anchor that drowns the 27 EU nations sooner rather than later and that is the overbearing part why Brexit was essential, the moment the UK is cut form that, the entire mess evolves too fast for anyone to correct for. The entire mess on four economies, where the one (UK) leaves and two (France and Italy) have merely a recession to offer, which means no options at all leaving it all to Germany who has enough for the ace of spades to be handed to them again and again. Germany avoided recession as it grew by 0.1%, which means that they only defeated the recession on the academic principle. It still means that the German economy is stagnating and that is not a good feeling when you are a German. So whilst we now see a whole parade of blaming the UK on making matters worse through a chaotic Brexit, I merely state that these idiots only have themselves to thank. If they had done something about the lack of transparency at the ECB as well as muzzle Mario Draghi from spending 3 trillion euro’s, money they never had, the situation would not be this dire (as I personally see it). The fact that the Business Insider also reported: (at https://www.businessinsider.com.au/europe-economic-gdp-growth-data-heading-to-recession-2019-1) “Junk bonds went through the roof. Total issuance of junk bonds from non-financial companies (rated BBB) went parabolic, according to Bank of America Merrill Lynch, as more highly rated bonds declined“, it is directly linked to the problem, that market went up by €100,000,000,000 in the last year alone, so this time if there is another meltdown (like 2008) and it happens, Europe will not see the fallout as it happened in Wall Street. No, this time around Europe will be the cause of it all to a much larger extent, so the impact on Europe will be beyond disastrous. Whatever quality of life there is, the Europeans can kiss it goodbye for decades. They could quite likely desire the time of harsh austerity, how is that on forecasting quality of life?

In combination

The EU is in a bad place and it has been reflecting all over the place. You see, last November we were treated to: ‘CPPIB is shorting $750 million worth of EU stock, making it one of the most active short-sellers in Europe, data show‘, more important, it gets an added “Unusual in that Canada’s biggest pension plan also tends to hold ‘rather long-term’ positions“. It seems a perfectly valid place to be in, especially when we see that so far that pattern seems valid. We see the additional “the CPPIB has nearly doubled the number of its disclosed short positions since last year, to 23 from 14. That places CPPIB 14th on the list of the most active short sellers in Europe“, as stated before, I can see the presence, and in this case I cannot explain it (merely because I am not knowledgeable enough to do so). Now, as we see the recession hitting Italy, followed by France soon enough, we might see the reflection on how the gains for the CPPIB could be one of the most profitable ones they have ever had. Even as there is still a little doubt, the firm holding ‘$356.3 billion in assets’, might soon be growing to a half a trillion wealth management colossal. With the positions becoming winners as Talend SA, Wirecard and PostNL falling like a brick in free flight, we see that the CPPIB is lunging forwards through growth (for now).

When we see the impact markets where the fun of wealth comes through the investing towards the gloom of failure, there we see profits soar, profits for those selling short that is. This is not the end or the beginning of the end. As France is setting the stage to move directly into a recession we will see more and more short selling profiteers and as France stumbles, the eyes of all will focus on Greece. Even as we are given ‘Greece moves towards ending austerity with rise in minimum wage‘, it is hard to predict the outcome. It makes perfect sense to do this and when you realise it is significantly less than half of what an Australian would get over that same period. It makes us wonder how the Greeks had been able to keep themselves alive. I personally hope that the view of Alexis Tsipras works out the way he thinks it will, the case is viable, and will it work? Only time will tell at present. Yet it is also a dangerous place. That is seen with: “A glimmer of light emerged on Monday as borrowing costs on 10-year bonds dropped to a four–month low and Tsipras announced that the government would imminently be issuing a five-year bond“, we get the logic of essentially needing to borrow, but Greece is in a much too dangerous place and those bonds could backfire in a terrible way, I believe that the bond issuing was done too early, in a time when there is still too much to lose. In that I actually hope that I am wrong, yet my track record towards predicting these events have been too often on the nose and that worries me to no end.

In this Bloomberg view supports mine (at https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-01-07/all-the-risks-besieging-europe-bonds-are-spilling-over-into-2019), the headline ‘All the Risks Besieging Europe Bonds Are Spilling Over Into 2019‘ gives that. Even as the view does not include Greece, the overall risk will be hitting all EU nations (as well as the UK). There are two parts to this, the first opposing me is the view “The risk of spillover from Italy is in our view overestimated,” by Arne Lohmann Rasmussen, head of fixed-income research at Danske Bank A/S. Both that as well as the positivity that he thinks that Spain brings is set on realism, the man is a professional, let’s not forget that. Yet on my side we see: “What happens in Italy is still likely to be felt in its Mediterranean peer, albeit not to the extent of the euro-area debt crisis earlier this decade” this is the Goldman view and I believe t is more accurate, more important the doubt and worrying nature of these investors will make them sketchy and shift happy on a few levels, so when Italy is hit, France will get a beating as will Greece and it will affect Spain too, depending on their economy optionally a lot less and there we get back to the academic non recession of Germany, that 0.1% in the plus, when that gets hit negatively it will escalate the Mediterranean issues by a lot more hitting Spain for certain and hitting the others harder. It is merely my view, yet I believe it to be the correct one. For how much is unknown, I have no idea and I am not willing to guess. We will see a lot more by the end of March. It is at that point where we see what the actual impact will be, at the point the people will decide to either enjoy a little sunshine or make sure that they can avoid the winter of their bank accounts, in Europe these options have become mutually exclusive, an impact that will hit tourism in Greece and Spain in more ways than one. At least the Greek prediction that their tourism will level off in 2019 is decently realistic, which opposes the view: ““2019 will be Greece’s year,” according to DER Touristik, the largest travel company in German-speaking countries” one that is wishful thinking at best.

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January 24, 2019 · 14:26

A case of Molasses

We have seen the news, we see the new news and we are all wondering what the impact will be. I am of course talking about Mario Draghi and his ECB minions. MarketWatch is the most recent one with ‘All eyes on Mario Draghi as investors look for ECB to acknowledge risks to Eurozone economy‘ (at https://www.marketwatch.com/story/all-eyes-on-mario-draghi-as-investors-look-for-ecb-to-acknowledge-risks-to-eurozone-economy-2019-01-23). There are more sources and the total amount of sources is likely to increase over the next 10 hours. We have all heard it before, all the dangers and the gloominess, so when we see “it’s time for European Central Bank President Mario Draghi to acknowledge growing risks to the Eurozone economic outlook” people might ignore it all, which is not a good thing this time around. You see, at this point the ECB is at minus €3 trillion, France is at minus €2.2 trillion, Germany is at minus €2 trillion, Italy is at minus €2.3 trillion, Spain is at minus €1.2 trillion and the UK is at minus £2.1 trillion. All that debt, most governments have no further degrees of freedom to work with. And the media is not properly informing the people, for them it is all business as usual and it is not.

These are merely the larger players and I am hoping that the UK can get out of the EU before this collapses, because the moment it does the EU member states are in a world of hurt and will remain to be in that stage for close to 5 generations. That is the impact of debt and most players are all in denial as they need to gravy train to provide for them a little longer. When we consider surplus and deficit of GDP the message does not get any better. When considering the larger economies, the Netherlands, Sweden and Germany are in a surplus, the Netherlands merely at 0.42%, yet the rest are all in deficit as bad as -4.54% (Spain), France, Italy and the UK are at minus 2.44% or worse, the image is that bad and the UK has options to turn it around as it leaves the EU, it will still take a lot of work and optionally 2 generations, which is still better than 5 generations, but it will be a hard fight, anyone in denial of that element is merely utterly stupid.

Even in the surplus, the Netherlands and Sweden who are in a good place will need to be extra careful and tighten every belt possible, because one bad event will turn surplus to deficit quite quickly. In addition, the Netherlands is relying on the Rotterdam harbours to keep on working as good as they have been and thanks to Germany being at +0.76% they end up having options for now, but the difference between +0.76% and minus 0.56% is merely two strikes away and there German trade union Ver.di. is not too much useful for now, and it is not merely them, the mess is growing in Germany. It is as I personally see it the impact of long term Austerity. So as we see: “Workers are seeking a minimum hourly wage of €20“, which is close to 36% better than in Australia (in general), we are treated to the impact of the cost of living and even as a lot think that their bosses have it way too good (not entirely a wrong thought), what was positive could turn into a long term negative part too easily and the national and ECB debts will take a massive toll to the quality of life soon enough. Oh, and when the German situation worsens, which is likely to happen by Q3 2019, there will be the impact on the Netherlands too. Even the minimal impact of 0.3% would move the Dutch economy to a nil point; at that point they are one move away from recession and the monster that feeds it.

That has been the clear danger for the longest of time and the entire disaster called the bond buying scheme by Mario Draghi will impact Europeans for a very long time. You see, the bonds that do mature in 2020 will be a non-deniable impact and when the ECB and those connected to it fail to push forward those bonds and payment is due, the entire mess will really look like ‘a shit on the front door’. Good luck trying to get anything done at that point. This is the biggest part in my view of the UK getting out of the EU as fast as possible and France is no longer limited to Marine Le Pen going for Frexit, now we get the Gilets Jaunes’ manifesto where Frexit is the top demand, they are all catching on that the EU is the limiting factor in all this and so far we have seen and in most cases proven that only large corporations truly benefit from the EU in all this, the rest is merely window dressing and people in general and to a much larger degree have had enough.

The issues I warned about in 2015 are not merely coming true; the overbearing danger of the UK delaying Brexit could still bite to a much larger degree, so it was always clear that the break needed to be fast and even a no-deal Brexit was better than delay. This is seen in a few ways, when the others follow (France, Italy and optionally Germany) these larger players will unite in trade deals really fast making them the growing players soon thereafter, the rest will suddenly feel the pinch of all the smaller players filling their pockets and now realising that debt has to be paid for, at that point we will see an infrastructure collapse on a scale so large that it will cause nightmares to a large part of the populations in the 27 member states. Do you think that banks and wealthy people will sit still? No, they will run to EVERY profit shore possible, even if that means collapsing on their national grounds. If you think that this will not happen, think again, I merely listed the larger players, but they are all financially stretched and when the EU starts breaking down, we will all learn that the ECB is a paper tiger and the debt will get shoved into whatever nation is still part of it, collapsing the financial infrastructures tout suit.

As Germany is in a positive state, their departure is not to be expected, but that feeling changes when the UK is gone and that will trigger the French financial revolution (aka Frexit) soon thereafter. So when these two are gone, the entire mess of comparison to a barge, I made that comparison in May 2013 when I stated: “Consider a large (really large) barge, that barge was kept in place by 4 strong anchors, namely UK, France, Germany and Italy. Yes, we to do know that most are in shabby state, yet, overall these nations are large, stable and democratic (that matters). They keep the Barge EU afloat in a stable place on the whimsy stormy sea called economy. If the UK walks away, then we have a new situation. None of the other nations have the size and strength of the anchor required and the EU now becomes a less stable place where the barge shifts. This will have consequences, but at present, the actual damage cannot be easily foreseen“, now that same barge is at risk of losing two if not more anchors, how much stability will remain? I can tell you right now that the impact will be huge and as the economies will take hit after hit; the wrong people will get to enrich themselves through the hardship of others, that is the consequence of a Wall Street state of mind too.

so when we see the entire political machine delaying and moving like molasses towards the undoing of infrastructure through inaction, we need to consider the damage that they are inflicting on the people and when they need to explain themselves on the news, how much consideration will you give the politician stating: ‘We thought that we were acting on the best interest of the people‘ as your quality of life goes into the basement for the next decade?

And still the people are getting lied to. From my personal point of view even the UN is involved at this point. That part is seen (at https://news.un.org/en/story/2019/01/1030902) where we are treated to ‘Global economy to see ‘steady’ growth of three per cent in 2019 despite risks, says UN’, the entire delusional statement, whilst we see the slowing in both Germany and France to a larger degree, Spain and Italy are already in the decline and whatever is gained is set against the debt of the largest four economies, that too impacts the economic growth as none of the nations has any financial options to create growth or set the stage for an increased infrastructure for years to come. So the 3% marker is what I personally would consider the delusional thought of a fictive inclined mind, even if whatever pressure would be applied to stop Brexit that predictive number is not realistic.

So when we see: “Among these looming dangers, accelerating trade tensions are already “having an impact” on global trade and employment, Mr. Harris told UN News. In addition, rising national debt is also crippling many countries’ ability to provide basic services, but this and other risks – such as those from climate change and waning support for international cooperation – could be avoided or minimized if countries worked together to do so, the UN’s top economist insisted. With mounting pressures in the areas of international trade, international development finance and tackling climate change, the report underscores that strengthening global cooperation is central to advancing sustainable development.”

We see the delusion of United Nations Chief Economist Elliott Harris and his dangers of ‘accelerating trade tensions’, ‘rising national debt’ and ‘waning support for international cooperation’ are all set against ‘strengthening global cooperation’. So how is a person allowed to sit in the place he is? How can the additions and denial of massive factors are negated by the mere idea of ‘strengthening global cooperation’? The fact that the bulk of the EU nations cannot get their tax laws in order giving rise to properly tax the FAANG group and a few other players is evidence that the system is broken beyond believe and the entire mess of some magical +3% economy where the numbers deny the realistic notion of overwhelming nil status or actual recession makes the entire mess larger and I believe it is time to hold such reports up to scrutiny for prosecution of these elected officials who make more than 90% of the rest of a nation, there should be prosecution for those giving reports that are debatable to the largest of degrees. That will never happen of course, but in all this the media will give the fake positivism of 3% and in the end not hold these people to account after the fact.

The system is rigged to not leave the larger population with anything and that is soon becoming the actual driver to break the entire EU asunder. When that happens remember those who stated that the EU would become a better place and call them out in public, they will love that.

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