Bankers Refuse To Create Central Market For Derivative Swaps

September 16, 2008

Elaine Meinel Supkis

On Sunday, the Treasury and Federal Reserve asked the Derivatives Beast's handlers to come to Manhattan and open trading of credit default swaps. No one showed up and nothing was traded! So today, the bankers who fear this beast, are talking in a desultory way about opening a market for their hideous monster. Japan was caught in the latest wringers as they lent lots of loot to both AIG and Lehman Brothers. And god knows, everyone else in this stupid mess. China's markets are also falling but the Chinese government wanted this back in 2005. So now, everyone is following China's lead. No surprise. They are in the driver's seat now.

Lehman Collapse Spurs Call for Credit Derivatives Clearinghouse

(Bloomberg) -- Banks may accelerate efforts to move trading in the $62 trillion credit-default swaps market through a central clearinghouse or to an exchange after the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and the credit downgrade of American International Group Inc.

Lehman, the first major market-maker to go bankrupt in the decade-long history of the privately negotiated, unregulated business, may leave behind billions of dollars in potential losses for trading partners, according to Barclays Plc of London. No one knows exactly how much because there's no central exchange or system for recording trades.

``The fact that I can't tell you the notional value of derivatives contracts Lehman has written the day after a bankruptcy is a scary thing,'' Brian Yelvington, a strategist at New York-based bond research firm CreditSights Inc., said yesterday.

All these years, I have detailed how our stock market and banking systems are full of holes. This is due to the fact that the main way to get rich quick is to evade controls, evade definitive book keeping records, avoid fixing messes. Glitches ARE money! The worse the glitch, the more money that can be made! This is the logic of funny money creation: the worse the system functions, the better it is to loot. So instead of noticing these glitches and problems and fixing them, the reverse happens: everyone wants to EXPLOIT these problems for their own profits. Once everyone does the same stupid things that allows them to take advantage of messes, the messes take over all systems and destroys them!

It is like having an ATM machine that is broken so that anyone can come up to it and ask for money and it spits it out and nothing is taken out of the proper accounts. So crowds form as everyone rushes to the machine to get this free money and soon there is a riot. Once everyone in the neighborhood knows the machine is broken and is trying to get money from it, the machine ceases to spit out dollars and the bank goes bankrupt! And everyone who TRUSTED the bank to protect their savings is screwed.

This is why it is imperative for the top people in control of our government and economy MUST always be VIGILANT about messes being exploited! The instant this comes into view, it must be crushed or fixed. And anyone exploiting obvious problems, arrested and forced to turn over their ill-gotten gains! Instead, the people who exploit flaws are paying the guardians of the US economic systems to go to sleep and let them quietly raid the broken parts of our economic infrastructure.

This extends to the G7 universe. Japan's banking system is a fraud. It has created an open ATM machine which is the Japanese carry trade. Everyone figured out how to use this flawed system to enrich themselves and a flood of ridiculous lending has created global inflation which is now unwinding in a very ugly fashion. Has the Japanese system been reformed?

NO! Nor has the broken US system been reformed. All the reform talk is about enabling the US to borrow more money, not fix the open faucet which is our own government overspending. The bankers never bothered to create a proper central market for the Derivatives Beast because they didn't want anyone to figure out how big this monster was, what it was really worth or how it really functioned in real-time, honest and open trading! They KNEW from DAY ONE, this would be impossible. They created this creature in order to evade paying a realistic interest rate on risks. They wanted cheap lending. And they got it, in spades.

Now, they have to open the doors and let the Derivatives Beast into the market place. I warned everyone all the last year, then a major investment bank would go under, this would turn the invisible Derivatives Beast into a very real and quite visible monster which would then stomp on the entire global banking system and annihilate it. Note how unhappy the bankers are, tackling this business. All their genius is focused on finding and exploiting even microscopic flaws, not fixing them.

This is why we have regular banking collapses that come like clockwork.

AIG Sparks Bond Risk Surge on $441 Billion Counterparty Concern

(Bloomberg) -- American International Group Inc. triggered a surge in the cost of protecting corporate bonds from default on investor concern the company may face demands for more cash to back $441 billion of credit derivatives it sold.

Credit-default swaps on the Markit iTraxx Europe index of 125 companies with investment-grade ratings jumped 15 basis points to 139, the highest in six months, according to JPMorgan Chase & Co. prices at 10 a.m. in London. The index surged by a record yesterday after Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. filed for bankruptcy.

AIG, which raised $20.3 billion in May by selling debt and equity, may face calls for as much as $17 billion in new collateral after Standard & Poor's and Moody's Investors Service cut the company's credit ratings yesterday, UBS AG analysts said today. The downgrade came as the biggest U.S. insurer by assets sought $70 billion to $75 billion in loans arranged by Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. to replenish capital, according to two people familiar with the situation.

``If AIG spirals in the same way as Lehman, the ramifications will be much more substantial,'' said Jim Reid, head of fundamental credit strategy at Deutsche Bank AG in London. ``The rating downgrades have accelerated the need for an imminent response.''

This is all so pathetic. AIG knew before this that the model they were based on was totally ridiculous. But the anxiety to produce huge numbers via fake interest rate estimations was too great a temptation. Throughout the systems, the desire for EASY CREDIT ruled the roost. At every level, from top to bottom, the desire has been for money to flow freely, they even call this 'liquidity'. To keep up the fiction that this fake interest activity was sound, they had to insure all these deals. And this was done at rates that were set far too low.

No banking system can run in the red. Governments can run in the red. Bankers have to strive to STOP this from getting out of hand. The Bardis of Lombardy, Italy, started the first modern international banking complex during the late Middle Ages. The King of England needed money for wars. He did poorly and didn't bring home enough loot to pay off the loans and the Bardis went bankrupt. I am a descendant of that family and the ancient lessons are still impressed upon us today!

The fact is, banks DO go bankrupt and entire systems can be wiped out nearly instantly. The Bardi collapse happened over less than one year. And news traveled on sailing ships and horseback! Today, we have modern communications and computers so collapses can happen in an eye blink. Only in this case, the tragedy is unfolding over the course of a year just like in the Great Depression. AIG is, like everyone, caught out on a limb. Since they inaccurately gaged risk, they are now failing. And they can't gage risk if they deliberately lie about risk or pay others to look the other way while they fake it. How much as AIG and its top employees given to politicians this last 10 years?

An ungodly amount, I am guessing. And they encouraged Congress and our rulers to overspend money at every possible turn.

WaMu Rating Lowered to Junk by S&P on Mortgage Losses

(Bloomberg) -- Washington Mutual Inc., the biggest U.S. savings and loan, had its credit rating cut to junk by Standard & Poor's because of the deteriorating housing market.

S&P reduced its rating on Seattle-based WaMu to BB- from BBB-, leaving it three levels below investment grade, the ratings firm said today in a statement.

``Increasing market turmoil and the related impact from managing its concentrated mortgage franchise in this troubled housing and credit cycle led to the downgrade,'' S&P wrote. S&P cut its rating on the subsidiary bank to BBB- from BBB.

BBB- is worthless, of course. This bank should be taken over by regulators who will have to sit down and go through all the books. This definitely includes red penciling all the mortgages held against houses in Galveston and other Gulf communities that were rendered nearly totally uninhabitable after the hurricane season. Washington Mutual holds lots of hyper-overpriced California housing. The inevitable 7.5+ earthquake hasn't happened yet but it is going to come. And not in the distant future, either. Over-valuing housing is very dangerous. This is why obvious housing bubbles due to lying about inflation and interest rates are so dangerous. The aggregate costs of losses in a declining bubble market is astronomical.

The BILLIONS lost this month due to hurricanes are a warning sign! Houses that can't be lived in won't get paid off. Owners will be forced to walk. Especially if the house is worth much less than the mortgage! And there is no hurricane insurance and Uncle Sam is too broke to offer free money to victims.

Stocks: Nikkei Dives Nearly 5% To 3-Yr Low On Lehman Failure

TOKYO (Kyodo)--Tokyo stocks plummeted Tuesday, with the key Nikkei index diving nearly 5 percent to its lowest level in more than three years, as the failure of U.S. securities house Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. stunned investors and discouraged them from buying risky assets such as stocks.
**************************************************

Lehman Japan Unit Fails; 2nd Largest Bankruptcy Ever

TOKYO (Nikkei)--The Japanese arm of Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy protection Tuesday with the Tokyo District Court under the Civil Rehabilitation Law.
**************************************************

Shinsei Has Up To Y38bn Exposure To Lehman

TOKYO (Dow Jones)--Shinsei Bank Ltd. (8303) said Tuesday it has an exposure of about Y38 billion at a maximum to Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. (LEH), which filed for U.S. bankruptcy protection Monday.
*************************************************

Japan Banks Extended $1.67bn Loans To Lehman

TOKYO (Nikkei)--Japanese financial institutions have outstanding loans totaling 1.67 billion dollars (about 170 billion yen) to Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., according to a document the failed U.S. investment bank submitted to a federal bankruptcy court.

Japan is stuck here. They got caught in the gears of the US banking collapse. Japan's banks don't offer anything to savers or investors. They made money by making or doing deals overseas. This flood of wealth and money from Japan has boosted all sorts of systems to unrealistic levels. Now, as wealth is being destroyed by demonic forces, Japan is losing its grip on its own banking system. Which broke after the Japanese housing bubble. But since most of that money was internal, Japan could limp along with virtually no real banking system. But ever since 1998, the system was fixable but Japan refused to fix it. They liked the flaws that allowed them to keep interest rates at near 0%. This made their manufacturing exports boom. So they exploited the flaws rather than fixing them.

Japan, China Join Central Bank Efforts to Calm Market

(Bloomberg) -- The Bank of Japan added a total of 2.5 trillion yen ($24 billion) to the financial system and China cut interest rates as Asian central banks attempted to calm markets after Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. filed for bankruptcy.

The Federal Reserve yesterday added $70 billion in reserves to the banking system, the most since the September 2001 terrorist attacks, and may cut its benchmark lending rate today. China lowered its benchmark rate for the first time in six years late yesterday and may act again.

Japanese bonds jumped, sending the yield on the benchmark 10-year bond to its biggest drop in five years on concern the credit crisis will worsen. Financial institutions worldwide have reported more than $510 billion in losses and writedowns and the credit-market collapse has erased $11 trillion from global stocks in the past year.

Japan and China have the world's biggest FOREX reserves. Three trillion dollars worth. And are the world's biggest joint holders of US debts. So Japan is coughing up some of this loot while China is playing traditional banking in a world filled with fake, fraudulent bankers. They killed their own stock market bubbles last year by raising the reserve ratios and interest rates. Now, they have room to drop them while the rest of us can't.

Japan can't drop rates! It is already nearly 300 basis points below the rate of inflation in Japan! The US is dropping rates in the teeth of obvious inflation. I predict, it will be 1% again in the hopes this will create a stock market bubble and enable easy lending for US homeowners and the Home ATM machine can begin to spit out dollars again. But China is following the older rules and thus will be the top central bank in the future. Already, we are clutching to this dragon, begging it to save us from our own follies.

From Yahoo Finance, the Shanghai Index stock market graph:

Global stock markets can't go up unless there is a sound economic basis for optimism. Right now, with the wrong parties doing the wrong things, there is no optimism. And until the G7 bankers capture, tame and reduce the size of the Derivatives Beast, this market crash will continue.

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Comments

[Buffalo Ken]

Elaine - if I'm not mistaken, I seem to recall an "Executive Order" allowing the seizure of assets. I was against this order from the get go, but now since its out perhaps with a slight amendment or two it can be utilized for the purpose you allude to above.

Peace,
Ken

[Buffalo Ken]

When this Executive Order first came out (I think it was more than a year ago), I said to friend - this could be turned around.

Peace,
Ken

[Blunt Force Trauma]

The insanity continues!!!

25 minutes before the markets open in the US....

Fed injects $50 bln in markets

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5hyGt4CJdplKMgthdKM_oiNo69RcA

[Blunt Force Trauma]

LIBOR overnight doubled! Raises the cost of money being lent from one bank to another.

Europe's banks abandon dollar lending

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/investing-and-markets/article.html?in_article_id=452163&in_page_id=3&position=moretopstories

[RobG]

I get a mental image of a giant hot air baloon deflating (or rather, on fire) and the man in the basket feverishly working a air pump:

Fed pumps $50B into nation's financial system (Tuesday September 16, 8:57 am ET

Fed pumps $50 billion into financial system to ease stresses as markets tumble

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Urgently trying to keep cash flowing amid a Wall Street meltdown, the Federal Reserve on Tuesday pumped $50 billion into the nation's financial system to help ease credit stresses.

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York's action comes in addition to its regular market operations to inject $20 billion into the system slated for the day.

The maneuver takes place as Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and his central bank colleagues prepare to meet to decide their next move on interest rates and conduct a fresh assessment of the country's financial and economic troubles.

Lehman Brothers, the country's fourth-largest investment bank, filed for bankruptcy protection. A weakened Merrill Lynch, deciding it couldn't go it alone anymore, found help in the arms of Bank of America. Now, the insurance giant American International Group is dangerously wobbling. Against this backdrop, Wall Street on Monday plunged 500 points, the most since the September 2001 terror attacks.

To help grease the financial plumbing Monday, the Fed pumped a total of $70 billion into the system through open market operations.

hahaha, yeah 'grease that financial plumbing'; it's more like an oil spill on a highway and cars are now careening everywhere. Weee!

[Buffalo Ken]

The sort-of ironic thing though is if any sort of seizure ever occurred, I suspect there would be little value left. Just a bunch of goofy artwork and such.

Oh, there might also be some gold, and gems, and silver and that sort of thing.

Paper money is rapidly losing value I think.

Peace,
Ken

[Buffalo Ken]

except perhaps in relation to "other" paper money - and perhaps that offer an opportunity.

BUT

There MUST be accountability - don't you think? If not, then we are all just living somebody else's dream. I ain't gonna do that. I won't. I refuse. I've got my integrity you know.

Ken Hausle

[Blunt Force Trauma]

And they're off! DOW is down 104 at the open! Yee-ha!

[Buffalo Ken]

you should see whats happening to silver (I use the Kitco charts) - big dive this morning, but I honestly think it is a head fake. Otherwise, somebody might be trying to "play" with something that they do not understand.

I suppose they are trying to take out all the stops (I also think they know where the stops are and this is blatantly unfair). But even so, I suspect they are the ones who ultimately get "taken out".

Just calling it as I sense it.

I think a small amount of physical coin is desirable. Not too much mind ya because as Elaine has already stated - folks always know where to find the gold.

Just a little stash. I know that that is all I have.

Peace,
Ken

[Buffalo Ken]

If I owned silver I would remove any stops. Silver has value.

[Buffalo Ken]

and I sure as hell would not be "shorting silver" because this might just be fatal.

I could be wrong, but some of these rigged games a fucking annoying.

[Buffalo Ken]

R. are. ahrggggf!

FUCKING annoying.

[Buffalo Ken]

oh yeah, and the above is NOT a poem. OK little ccq or g or whatever you are if you are anything. Hell, I don't know.

[Buffalo Ken]

Hell, I'm thinking about so I might as well also say it. I encourage folks to LEARN about batteries and inverters and simple connections.

I also would like to say that I was once an investor in Fuel Cell Energy (FCEL). I'm not anymore, but I still think their idea has considerable application.

Peace,
Ken

P.S. Sorry ccq or CCQ or whoever you are, but you were talking trash about me for no good reason. Don't pout and don't be a bully. The time of "bullies" is coming to an end - its in the stars are you should know.

[Buffalo Ken]

and for my own selfish personal reasons, this is just one more post....I don't like to leave it at 6. 6 posts that is.

I admit it. I'm a bit "superstitious". What about U?

[RobG]

Over at Mish - if you remember playing the card game OldMaid - you didn't want to get stuck with it:

Fed Sponsored Poker Party Morphs Into "Old Maid"

All weekend long I monitored the ongoing high stakes poker game sponsored by the Fed, the Treasury, and the SEC. Progress of the game appears below for historical reference. A quick summary will follow.

Play By Play Recap

* High Stakes Poker Game In Progress
* High Stakes Poker Update: Barclays Refuses To Go "All In"
* High Stakes Poker Update: Cinderella, Merrill Side Bets
* AIG Struggling To Stay Alive, Begs Fed For Cash
* Another Shotgun Marriage: Bank of America and Merrill Lynch
* AIG wants $40B from Fed; Market Cap is $32B

Game Summary

Fed, the Treasury, and the SEC were acting as the dealers (or carnival barkers if you prefer). Merrill Lynch (MER), J.P. Morgan Chase (JPM), Goldman Sachs (GS), Citigroup (C), Bank of America (BAC), Barclays, and others were all players at the table. Lehman (LEH) was not a player. Lehman was the pot.

The role of the carnival barker was to get the amount bet as high as possible. Dealers hoped to goad Barclays and/or the Bank of America to go "all in". Both refused. Numerous side games developed and a deal was struck between Merrill Lynch and Bank of America. Another side game is still in play with AIG begging the Fed for cash.

At midnight, in the Cinderella Pumpkin Room, the game morphed into The Old Maid.

The Old Maid

Inquiring minds just might be asking "Who is kissing the old maid?" It's a good question too. The answer can be found in Pimco, Vanguard Are Biggest Bond Fund Losers in Lehman Collapse.

Pimco holds Lehman bonds in at least 12 of its funds, including the $134 billion Total Return Fund. Bill Gross, manager of the fund and co-chief investment officer of Pimco, was buying Lehman bonds as recently as June, Bloomberg data show.

[Buffalo Ken]

RogG - now I understand a little better!

[Buffalo Ken]

oh sorry, I meant "RobG". Your post definitely gave me my hearty laugh of the day and damn it feels good to laugh.

Thanks.
Ken

[Anthony]

China will come out the strongest player after this is over. They are poised to position themselves as the biggest economic player.

[RobG]

BK,
It's unbelievable how fast the news is coming now. Imagine someone like Elaine analyzing nuances and digging into closets regarding this mess more than a year ago. And now as it unravels it comes down like an imploded buildings. The disturbing thing is regulators are letting things go by that will kill the normal folks. AIG can borrow $20B from it's subsidiaries, those that do insurance and annuities from insurance policies. Talk about picking the last of the flesh off the company.

[DrKrbyLuv]

Financial markets have become cheap carnivals attracting people to ring toss games and a bunch of other silly gambles that are unregulated and surely fixed. Investors have become "marks" for exploit.

No one has any idea how bad the situation is with Lehman's credit default swaps. We see some are calling for a "clearing house" to be formed in order to nationalize as much bad debt as possible. Maybe a clearing house, or should I say a toilet, like Fannie and Freddie? Put the stuff in and flush it into our nationalized sewer.

We long ago passed the point of possible reform. We need the total collapse of the federal reserve system. Bernanke and the Fed must go, they are parasitic thieves.

Perhaps the most outrageous part of our national distress is that we still have a billion dollars for georgia and we still give around $15,000 a year for every man woman and child in Israel. Don't they get to steal enough of our money through their bankers?

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

Thanks for the links! I just installed a new door that I got out of a dumpster, it is insulated steel with double plate tempered glass! A great find! A great addition to the homestead, most of which I built out of odds and ends other people threw out.

Lots of fun.

And so here we are: the secondary stage of the Melt Down. This corresponds with the Great Depression's time frame. The players are reading the exact same lines and exact same LIES as before. The media is struggling to tell the exact same story as before.

Just like back then, some smart people like Mr. Garrett Garrett who wrote 'Bubble World' get it right from the get-go and just like back then, the Fed Reserve chiefs get everything ass-backwards.

Europe abandoning dollar lending? YIKES ! Will write about that. It also echoes exactly what happened in 1931.

Remember: all confiscations of wealth are SUDDEN and done SECRETLY and then is sprung on everyone. This is why I warned people, hoarding gold is futile if the government goes a-hunting for someone to loot.

[blues]

Hey, Blunt Force Trauma,

We can't use your links if they run off the page! The link to:

"Europe's banks abandon dollar lending"

.... is here:

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/investing-and-markets
/article.html?in_article_id=452163&in_page_id=3&position
=moretopstories

I just paid a visit to the ever-enigmatic Sorcha Faal. She has it that:

|¯ The Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation (FSB) is reporting in the Kremlin today that the Bank of England has received from the United States Federal Reserve Bank a ‘notice’ that President Bush is preparing to declare an ‘Economic Emergency’ during the week of October 5th and will further announce that the American Presidential election due to be held on November 4th will be ‘indefinitely suspended’. _|

Oh boy! Her article quotes the al-Wikipedia:

|¯ [Note: Derivatives are financial instruments whose value changes in response to the changes in underlying variables. The main types of derivatives are futures, forwards, options, and swaps. The main use of derivatives is to reduce risk for one party.] _|

Now, I did look it up in the al-Wikipedia before, but I didn't quite get it. But taken out of context like this, it's... really... THE PERFECT DEFINITION OF GAMBLING!

[RobG]

blues: there is more here: (link)

Including this quote:

Not being explained to the American people is that AIG, the World’s largest player in the $45 Trillion derivatives market, during the past two weeks had bet heavily on the World Markets against the damage from Hurricane Ike exceeding $2 billion in property damage, lost oil and gasoline production, lost wages and payments to companies forced to close, etc., it is obligated to pay, but which the actual damages are now being estimated will exceed $1 Trillion as the damages throughout the United States are finally tallied.

[RobG]

Sorcha Faal (Sucha fool) could be a hoax ...

[Bear of Little Brain]

For anyone who doesn't know, those long URL's can be cut down by using a TinyURL:

http://tinyurl.com/

I have the TinyURL converter in the browser bar, so a quick click does the conversion and copies and pastes it ready for insertion, as explained here:

http://tinyurl.com/#example

The TinyURL always fits in the Preview window.

[Blunt Force Trauma]

Global banks brace for derivative blow-up

"SO here we are on the morning of D Day. The world's major couterparties on the $US455 trillion derivatives market go into technical default and no one is sure what is going to happen."

http://tinyurl.com/5f7tts

[Blunt Force Trauma]

Soory about my long links that didn't fit, guys. Thanks Bear for the lesson.

[Blunt Force Trauma]

Fixed the link from earlier today - made smaller, er, tiny.

LIBOR overnight doubled! Raises the cost of money being lent from one bank to another.

Europe's banks abandon dollar lending

http://tinyurl.com/6b5gpz

[blues]

The Times of India
September 16, 2008
Ukraine's pro-Western ruling coalition collapses
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/World/Ukraines
_pro-Western_ruling_coalition_collapses_/rssarticleshow
/3489500.cms

|¯ KIEV: The governing coalition in Ukraine collapsed on Tuesday in a crisis brought on by Russia's war with Georgia that raises the prospect of the country being knocked off its pro-Western course.

"I officially announce the collapse of the coalition of democratic forces," parliament speaker Arseny Yatsenyuk told lawmakers.

"I would not call this an apocalypse. It is a challenge for democracy, but I hope we will overcome this challenge together," he said.

Less than four years after President Viktor Yushchenko and Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko united in the "Orange Revolution" against a Moscow-backed presidential candidate, their political marriage lies in tatters.

Tensions between the president and prime minister came to a head last month following Russia's war with Georgia, with Yushchenko's allies accusing Tymoshenko of "high treason" for not supporting Georgia enough. _|

I did not expect this at all. The spooks must be putting in a ton of overtime today. This must mean something, and this looks like it's going to be a rough week for Uncle Sammy.

Seems like Ohio got hit as bad as Texas. I guess Ike had quite a long tail, and hit harder at the dollar than at the population. Insurance companies are dying. Maybe FEMA can find trailers for them.

You know, insurance is gambling, too, just like the derivatives. The insurance company is simply gambling that your house won't burn down. Maybe we should declare Wall Street an official Indian reservation, and let the real pros handle it all.

[Blunt Force Trauma]

US FED RATE UNCHANGED @ 2%

[Blunt Force Trauma]

...and after that annoncement, the DOW proceeded south again, currently at 10,907 - and sliding.

[Buffalo Ken]

I purchased my gold directly from the US Mint. If they take it back, then I guess the US Mint doesn't exist anymore does it?

I mean what are they - "indian givers"

(and PLEASE, there is absolutely no derogatory connotation in my mind associated with the word "indian", but I do think those who lived here prior to the European arrival ought to be called what they really are: original inhabitants - you know - I think they do).

This craziness might just blow on over assuming the media gets the scale correctly. Its obvious to me who are the large-scale offenders.

[Buffalo Ken]

Plus, I have 4 Gold Buffalo Coins. That is it. I hoping to give each of my daughters one when they reached a life milestone.

The packaging from the US Mint is very nice. I hope that they get to continue on, but things seem ridiculously crazy just now and it ought not be that way.

Peace,
Ken

[Buffalo Ken]

Oh yeah, I also have 1 and only 1 Platinum Canadian maple. It is incredibly beautiful to me - reminds me of my wonderful spouse, but it pales in comparison to her beauty!

Let me tell ya - or at least it does to me.

I ain't no town clown. This is the real deal - it ain't just me.

Peace,
Ken

[Blunt Force Trauma]

at this hour, AIG is currently trading at $2.99, down $2.12 (41.49%).

"A complex asset swap brokered by New York state officials will give embattled American International Group a $20 billion lifeline, but the insurer's longer term rescue plan will depend on additional funding."

Google this headline from Reuters for full story:

AIG gets NY state help to stave off cash crunch

[Buffalo Ken]

I also have a small amount of food under the house and several other basic supplies.

I was this website once by a fella I think who lived in Russia when "they" came and did their Chicago School Friedman thing....it didn't work (at least it didn't for the Russians) at first, but that was before Russia corrected the situation. I would not ever want to mess with someone from Russia. You get tough when you have to go through a whole bunch of bullshit.

Anyhow, this website talked about planning and set out the steps that transpired there. It questioned whether the US of A could survive something similar. I think we can for sure (there is so much infrastructure already in place here), but I'm hoping that maybe a lesson has been learned and we can avoid all of the unnecessary strife.

There are so many products that can be produced and there is plenty to go around for everyone - be aware hoarders, in my opinion, it is not in anyone's interest to hoard.

Later,
Ken

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

The rats are drowning.

[Blunt Force Trauma]

From Reuters:

Goldman Sachs net plunges 70 percent

Ba, ha, ha, ha, ha!

"Goldman Sachs Group Inc said third-quarter earnings plunged 70 percent as one of the market's worst slumps ever sapped revenue in almost every business while fueling investment and credit losses.

The largest U.S. investment bank reported net income of $845 million, or $1.81 a share, for the quarter ended August 29, down from $2.85 billion, or $6.13 a share, a year earlier. Net revenue fell by half to $6.04 billion from $12.3 billion.

-snip-

The earnings beat analysts' sharply reduced expectations of $1.75 a share, but revenue fell short of the consensus forecast of $6.3 billion, according to Reuters Estimates.

In trading before the bell, Goldman shares fell more than 5 percent to $128.13 a share, their lowest level in two an a half years."

Currently, Gollum Sacks is trading at $127.00, down $8.84 (6.51%). It closed at $140 even yesterday.

[Buffalo Ken]

and remember this calculus is flawed and so are all your stupid ass models that have too (way too) many variables.

You created a whole bunch of "error" because you didn't even understand the tool you were trying to use. Just fess up you mother-feffefs...

[Buffalo Ken]

because as I've said elsewhere this "upside-down, twisted & bound, ponzi-ass scheme pyramid" is gonna be changing its orientation. Ain't it obvious. This has been a long time in coming...wait and see if you disagree.

[Blunt Force Trauma]

Ohh. DOW shot up on news that AIG may get a handout from the Fed. Dow is up at 10,893.

[Buffalo Ken]

I could go on.

1. In the US of A we still have plenty of manufacturing experience. It exists in the brains of many great engineers.

2. Another was is a dead end - for all of us I think.

3. If our military was in out country many folks who lived in Texas might still be alive (I don't know this for sure, but it sure seems this way to me...).

4. We need a Constitutional Convention desperately. It could work.

[Buffalo Ken]

make that "another war" - sometimes I suppose I type too fast. Oh well.

[Buffalo Ken]

just some "pre-emptive" ideas. Is there anything wrong with that even if you disagree? If you think so, then seems to me you ain't learning no more. You might as be gone.

[Buffalo Ken]

might as "well"...

[Buffalo Ken]

lastly, even though it should go without saying...."you reap what you sow" or alternatively "Karma never forgets....

[Buffalo Ken]

oh yeah one more thing

SCALE MATTERS

[Blunt Force Trauma]

Ken said, "I could go on."

Please refrain from that urge.

[Blunt Force Trauma]

If 'scale matters', Ken; please contain or condense your posts into one message. You're killing me.