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Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
Are you prepared to be taxed into the next life? There is no escape moving from broken state to broken state
QE must go to infinity or the Fed will be history.
Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
It is happening everywhere. There is no way out that supports political expedience other than "QE to infinity." If the Fed doesn’t play ball they are history.
The shot caller is political expediency.
Top Bell aide says Toledo likely to face ‘fiscal emergency’
Potential strategy to secure labor concessions disputed
By IGNAZIO MESSINA
Unless there is a fundamental change in the way Toledo’s government operates, the city will likely be unable to pay its employees before the year is through, a top official in the Bell administration warned.
That looming financial disaster leads people such as Mayor Mike Bell and Councilman D. Michael Collins to throw out words like "bankruptcy" or "receivership," two feared terms but ones that are not likely to become reality.
The truth is that receivership or bankruptcy is probably not an option for the city anytime soon. But being slapped by the state as a "fiscal emergency" municipality is a real threat – a label some dislike but others advise Toledo to embrace given its $48 million deficit.
"If you cannot make payroll for 30 days, you are there. You are in fiscal emergency," said Deputy Mayor of Operations Steve Herwat, Mr. Bell’s right-hand man.
"If we don’t get this budget balanced, and the imbalance is enough, and yes it is, we are at risk," he said.
Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
It is a US epidemic that will guarantee the jobless part of the illusionary recovery.
Cash-strapped LA County courts to begin layoffs
Updated: 03/08/2010 01:23:03 PM PST
LOS ANGELES—The Los Angeles County Superior Court is laying off 329 staff members next month and officials say more than 1,000 others may go in the next two years because of budget cuts.
A memo from Court Executive Officer John Clarke to employees says the first layoffs will begin on April 1.
Clarke says an additional 500 layoffs are planned for September followed by 530 in fall 2011. The court currently has 5,400 employees.
Clarke says civil rather than criminal cases will be hardest hit.
Clark says the court system’s budget deficit is expected to reach $140 million by the 2011-12 fiscal year that begins in July.
Presiding Judge Charles McCoy has said he’s looking at plans to close up to 180 courtrooms and lay off about a third of the staff.
Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
States, counties, municipalities, cities, villages and hamlets are all broke or going to be soon.
The Fed either produces QE to infinity of the Fed is history.
Counties face more cutting as state income tax payments fall
By Larry Carson
March 9, 2010
The latest state income tax payments to local governments fell $61.8 million year over year, piling new fiscal woes atop budgets already reeling from state cuts, high snow removal costs and earlier revenue declines.
The declines in payments from the state to county governments at the end of February put an added $29.4 million burden on Montgomery County, which was already facing a projected $761.5 million shortfall by June 30, according to the Maryland comptroller’s office.
Prince George’s and Charles counties were alone among Maryland’s 24 jurisdictions to receive more in the fourth quarter of 2009 than in 2008.
Leaders of Anne Arundel and Carroll counties said they were prepared for the bad news and it won’t affect their budgets. Others said the declines will hurt.
"It’s very serious, but there’s been a lot of bad news this year," said Jennifer Barrett, Montgomery County’s finance director. "It makes the gap worse."
Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
Clearly the EU knows what the weapon used by the Financial Reich to break currencies is.
What can be done when Wall Street owns Washington is debatable. We bailed out an industry so it can break the world.
EU, Merkel Urge Swap Regulation as Greece Takes Plea to U.S.
By Rainer Buergin and Ben Moshinsky
March 9 (Bloomberg) — The European Union’s top regulatory official said the bloc will consider banning “purely speculative” credit-default swaps as German Chancellor Angela Merkel called for a crackdown on derivatives trading to prevent a rerun of the Greek financial crisis.
European Commission President Jose Barroso said today the 27-nation region will “examine closely the relevance of banning purely speculative naked sales on credit-default swaps.” Merkel, speaking before Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou meets PresidentBarack Obama in Washington today, said the EU must take the lead in curbing derivatives.
“We’re of the opinion that a quick implementation of actions in the area of CDS has to happen,” Merkel told reporters in Luxembourg. Citing “ongoing speculation against euro-region countries,” she called for the “fastest possible” implementation of new rules.
European leaders are ratcheting up the pressure for global regulation of derivatives amid the Greek fiscal crisis. The commission, the EU’s executive arm, will also propose creating a lender of last resort to aid cash-strapped members such as Greece, a proposal that has divided the region’s leaders.
Papandreou said in a speech in Washington yesterday that “unprincipled speculators” threatened a new global financial crisis and said he’d press Obama to support EU efforts to target speculation.
Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
Things are all good in this MOPE induced illusionary oxymoron of a Jobless Recovery. This is certainly true if you are glib and follow the mob with your future.
Nothing has been done to fix the major problem, which is OTC derivatives. In fact they have grown in size if you understand the computer cartoon called value to maturity which assumes everything will mature.
The Swaps That Swallowed Your Town
By GRETCHEN MORGENSON
Published: March 5, 2010
(Excerpt from article)
AS more details surface about how derivatives helped Greece and perhaps other countries mask their debt loads, let’s not forget that the wonders of these complex products aren’t on display only overseas. Across our very own country, municipalities, school districts, sewer systems and other tax-exempt debt issuers are ensnared in the derivatives mess.
Jim Sinclair’s Commentary
Do what the Chinese do. Do not do what Reuters tells you they will do.
The best book on negotiations in China is "When Yes means No."
China says committed to U.S. debt, wary on gold
(Reuters) – China, the world’s biggest holder of foreign exchange reserves, renewed its commitment to the U.S. Treasury market on Tuesday but said it would be wary of substantially boosting its gold holdings.
China
The country’s chief currency regulator said China would attract more capital inflows this year, partly reflecting expectations of a stronger yuan, but he left the market none the wiser as to when Beijing might let the currency resume its rise.
"The U.S. Treasury market is the world’s largest government bond market. Our foreign exchange reserves are huge, so you can imagine that the U.S. Treasury market is an important one to us," Yi Gang, head of the State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE), told a news conference.
The exact composition of China’s $2.4 trillion of reserves, the world’s largest, is a state secret and the subject of intense scrutiny by global investors aware that, with such large sums at stake, even marginal portfolio shifts have the potential to move markets. Global investors are equally attuned to any clues about the yuan, given its role in China’s trade with the rest of the world and the potential spill-over effect a stronger yuan would have on other currencies in Asia.
Speaking during the annual session of parliament, Yi expressed the hope that China’s presence in the U.S. Treasury market would not become a political football. China, he stressed, was not in the game of short-term currency speculation.
