Iceland’s Economic Revolution
by F. William Engdahl
Posted May 4, 2015

When the dust settled, relative to the size of its economy, Iceland’s systemic banking collapse ranked as the largest experienced by any country in economic history. By the October 2008 the country’s three major banks–Glitnir bank, Landsbanki and Iceland’s largest bank, Kaupþing were placed into state receivership, nationalized. That was the same time US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, bailed out AIG, Goldman Sachs and his old buddies on Wall Street with “socialized” losses dumped on American taxpayers.

Unlike Greece or Ireland or other EU countries or the USA, the Iceland Parliament and government refused to give unlimited state guarantee to save the private banks.Iceland decided to go it alone and focus on rebuilding her devastated real economy.

The results are quite opposite the results in the EU where the brutal IMF and ECB and EU austerity policies have turned a banking crisis into a major economic crisis across the EU. More…

Fast track to corporate hegemony
By Mike Krauss
Posted May 2, 2015

Thirty years ago I had my first experience of marketing for a corporation. I learned that the most often used word in marketing and advertising is “free.” I recall this lesson as I follow the debate on the “Trans Pacific Partnership” (TPP), which is being sold as a “free” trade agreement. “Free” sells.

What exactly is being sold in the TPP ? To answer that question, you need to read the fine print. But you can’t. TPP has been negotiated in almost total secrecy by a team of about 600 lawyers, working for the major trans-national corporations.

The text of the treaty has been classified as “Secret” by U.S. negotiators. Even members of Congress are not permitted access. The deal will be presented to Congress on a “fast track” — no opportunity for Congress to modify the details. One vote, yes or no on the entire treaty as presented — a done deal. More…

Our Financial Future: Infinite Greed Meets a Funny Thing Called Karma
by Charles Hugh Smith
Posted May 1, 2015

Somewhere along the line, we lost the ability to distinguish between earning a profit and maximizing private gain by any means, i.e. Infinite Greed. If you insist on making this distinction now, you anger a lot of people, as it blows the capitalist cover of Infinite Greed.

The distinction between earning a profit and maximizing private gain by any means angers not just the few benefiting from the useful delusion that Infinite Greed is simply profit on overdrive; it seems to anger everyone who believes the Status Quo of burning mountains of coal to power towel warmers, sitting in traffic burning petrol two hours a day and central banks enriching the already wealthy is not just sustainable but gol-darned good. More…

The Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP). Promoting Global Tyranny Run By Corporations
By Washington’s Blog
Posted April 27, 2015

The powers-that-be are pushing this week to fast track a horrible treaty which would destroy America. The treaty is called the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP).

The U.S. Trade Representative – the federal agency responsible for negotiating trade treaties – has said that the details of the TPP are classified due to “national security”.

Parts of the TPP won’t be declassified for four years … even if it’s passed. Why’s the deal being kept secret? Because it would be impossible to pass if the public knew what was really in it. Ron Kirk, until recently Mr. Obama’s top trade official, was remarkably candid about why he opposed making the text public: doing so, he suggested to Reuters, would raise such opposition that it could make the deal impossible to sign. But it’s not only being hidden from the American people … it’s being hidden even from most U.S.Congress members. More…

How Wall St Has Quietly Bilked Billions from Cities Across the US
By Ed Walker
Posted April 23, 2015

The impact of these transactions on cities is horrifying. For example, the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department (DWSD) paid $547 million in termination fees to banks on its interest rate swaps in FY 2012. It has been estimated that more than 40 percent of Detroiters’ water bills now go toward paying down these termination fees. Fn. omitted.

In fiscal year 2013, Los Angeles paid $290 million in publicly-disclosed financial fees, while it cut services, including road repairs, by 19%. Other cities have similar horror stories.

The Obama Administration has completely ignored the plight of the citizens of these towns. From the outset Obama decided to help banks and creditors, the people who caused the Great Crash, and to ignore the staggering problems facing debtors. This became certain when the administration refused to support bankruptcy cramdown, one of the few steps that would have actually helped debtors, while inflicting losses on the lenders who made bad loans. More…

Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP): Job Loss, Lower Wages and Higher Drug Prices
by Public Citizen
Posted April 22, 2015

Have you heard? The TPP is a massive, controversial “free trade” agreement currently being pushed by big corporations and negotiated behind closed doors by officials from the United States and 11 other countries – Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam. Although it is called a “free trade” agreement, the TPP is not mainly about trade. Of TPP’s 29 draft chapters, only five deal with traditional trade issues. One chapter would provide incentives to offshore jobs to low-wage countries. Many would impose limits on government policies that we rely on in our daily lives for safe food, a clean environment, and more. Our domestic federal, state and local policies would be required to comply with TPP rules.

The TPP would even elevate individual foreign firms to equal status with sovereign nations, empowering them to privately enforce new rights and privileges, provided by the pact, by dragging governments to foreign tribunals to challenge public interest policies that they claim frustrate their expectations. The tribunals would be authorized to order taxpayer compensation to the foreign corporations for the “expected future profits” they surmise would be inhibited by the challenged policies. More…

This deal has been called “NAFTA On Steroids“. If you thought corporate personhood was bad, just wait until we have corporate nationhood.

One Last Look At The Real Economy Before It Implodes – Part 5
by Brandon Smith
Posted April 19, 2015

At the level of international banking and monetary policy, there is absolutely NO indication of any legitimate conflict between the East and the West. Again, such battles are only theater for the masses. But what purpose does this theater serve?

The fake economic war between East and West provides cover and rationale for the true goal of the internationalists: the destruction of the dollar as the world reserve currency and the ascendency of the Special Drawinf Rights (SDR) global monetary system. The endgame of the bankers is, of course, global government. It has been the longtime dream of the Fabian socialists permeating the central banking universe. A global currency system and centralized economic management are first-step psychological weapons against the public. If the world operates on a singular currency mechanism and a singular economic authority, why not have a singular governmental system as well?

The elites are preparing for this event, and they are not content only to trigger it then sit back and watch it happen. They also hope to construct a new image for themselves as the prophets who tried to warn the world — the financial “sages” who would be our rescuers. More…

Wall Street’s Wealth Transfer System Is Imperiling the U.S. Economy
By Pam Martens
Posted April 18, 2015

For nine years now we have written about Wall Street’s institutionalized system of transferring wealth from decent, hardworking Americans to the denizens of Wall Street and those it selectively chooses to favor in the one percent class. The methods of wealth transfer are as diverse as they are diabolical, thus even well intentioned members of Congress cannot stem the havoc on the financial well being of the average American and the overall economy.

One facet that all of these wealth transfer systems have in common is that they all masquerade under a benign sounding name. The 401(k) plan is viewed by most Americans as a way to save for retirement. That’s a good thing – right? It is not a good thing when two-thirds of your savings over a working lifetime end up in Wall Street’s pocket, as carefully demonstrated by Frontline and math-checked by us. More…

How Wall Street Used Swaps to Get Rich at the Expense of Cities
by Ed Walker
Posted April 16, 2015

The Detroit Water and Sewerage Department (DWSD) paid $547 million in termination fees to banks on its interest rate swaps in FY 2012. It has been estimated that more than 40 percent of Detroiters’ water bills now go toward paying down these termination fees.

In fiscal year 2013, Los Angeles paid $290 million in publicly-disclosed financial fees, while it cut services, including road repairs, by 19%. Other cities have similar horror stories.

The Obama Administration has completely ignored the plight of the citizens of these towns. From the outset Obama decided to help banks and creditors, the people who caused the Great Crash, and to ignore the staggering problems facing debtors. This became certain when the administration refused to support bankruptcy cramdown, one of the few steps that would have actually helped debtors, while inflicting losses on the lenders who made bad loans. More…

The Six Too Big to Fail Banks in the U.S. Have 278 Trillion Dollars of Exposure to Derivatives
By Michael Snyder
Posted April 15, 2015

The very same people that caused the last economic crisis have created a 278 TRILLION dollar derivatives time bomb that could go off at any moment. When this absolutely colossal bubble does implode, we are going to be faced with the worst economic crash in the history of the United States. During the last financial crisis, our politicians promised us that they would make sure that “too big to fail” would never be a problem again. Instead, as you will see below, those banks have actually gotten far larger since then. So now we really can’t afford for them to fail.

The six banks that I am talking about are JPMorgan Chase, Citibank, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo. When you add up all of their exposure to derivatives, it comes to a grand total of more than 278 trillion dollars. But when you add up all of the assets of all six banks combined, it only comes to a grand total of about 9.8 trillion dollars. In other words, these “too big to fail” banks have exposure to derivatives that is more than 28 times greater than their total assets. This is complete and utter insanity, and yet nobody seems too alarmed about it. For the moment, those banks are still making lots of money and funding the campaigns of our most prominent politicians. Right now there is no incentive for them to stop their incredibly reckless gambling so they are just going to keep on doing it. More…

To wrap your mind around the figure of $278 Trillion, it is the same thing as 278 Million Billion dollars. The GDP of the entire planet is $70 Trillion.