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Germany takes hot seat as Europe falls into the Abyss
Telegraph ^ | Oct 5, 2008 | Ambrose Evans-Pritchard

Posted on 10/05/2008 6:52:37 PM PDT by Lazamataz

We face extreme danger. Unless there is immediate intervention on every front by all the major powers acting in concert, we risk a disintegration of global finance within days. Nobody will be spared, unless they own gold bars.

Investors will learn today whether the Paulson bail-out - fattened to $850bn (£480bn) by Congress - can begin to halt the death spiral in the credit system. So far, the response looks terrible.

Germany is now in the hot seat. The collapse of a rescue deal for Hypo Real Estate on Saturday threatens a €400bn (£311bn) bankruptcy that nearly matches the Lehman Brothers debacle for sheer scale.

Chancellor Angela Merkel has been forced to pull her head out of the sand, guaranteeing all German savings, a day after she rebuked Ireland for doing much the same thing. Reality intrudes.

During the past week, we have tipped over the edge, into the middle of the abyss. Systemic collapse is in full train. The Netherlands has just rushed through a second, more sweeping nationalisation of Fortis. Ireland and Greece have had to rescue all their banks. Iceland is facing an Argentine denouement.

The US commercial paper market is closed. It shrank $95bn last week, and has lost $208bn in three weeks. The interbank lending market has seized up. There are almost no bids. It is a ghost market. Healthy companies cannot roll over debt. Some will have to sack staff today to stave off default.

As the unflappable Warren Buffett puts it, the credit freeze is “sucking blood” out of the economy. “In my adult lifetime, I don’t think I’ve ever seen people as fearful,” he said. We are fast approaching the point of no return. The only way out of this calamitous descent is “shock and awe” on a global scale, .....

(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Germany
KEYWORDS: globaleconomy; merkel
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Okay, I'm simply not getting something. How does the WHOLE WORLDWIDE STSTEM crumble? I understand that finances are not a zero-sum game but there is money SOMEwhere. Don't the winners buy the losers and life goes on?

Or are we really facing a worldwide Depression?

1 posted on 10/05/2008 6:52:37 PM PDT by Lazamataz
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To: Lazamataz
Money is the debt of a bank.

All it is.

If banks have no credit with the rest of the world, there isn't any money.

2 posted on 10/05/2008 6:54:49 PM PDT by JasonC
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To: Lazamataz

Not in China. They have insulated themselves.


3 posted on 10/05/2008 6:55:56 PM PDT by Shermy
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To: JasonC

There isn’t any money? Money exists as a fundamental indicator of wealth. If money needs to be backed by gold then so be it. But money needs to exist.


4 posted on 10/05/2008 6:56:37 PM PDT by Lazamataz (Secondhand Aztlan Smoke causes drug addiction obesity in global warming cancer immigrant terrorists.)
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To: Lazamataz

The money is still there (except for the FALSE “money” of over-valuations), but it is the FLOW of money that is suspended for the moment.


5 posted on 10/05/2008 6:56:51 PM PDT by steve86 (Acerbic by nature, not nurture™)
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To: Lazamataz

The rest of the world is heavily invested in US. WE were a good money maker, we were safe, we had lots of great places to invest, only problem is again, Fannie and Freddie. The markets are tied up because of bad debt/credit due to F & F defaults on home mortgages. They were, as someone said, a giant pyramid scheme. The pyramid crumbled.

In short, the world financial systems are tanking because of Barack Obama and his Gang of Democrat fools. That’s why Europe and other nations were angry with us.


6 posted on 10/05/2008 6:57:00 PM PDT by madison10 (Republicans don't win polls, they win elections.)
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To: Lazamataz; Candor7; yefragetuwrabrumuy

Ping.


7 posted on 10/05/2008 6:57:07 PM PDT by LucyT
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To: steve86
The money is still there (except for the FALSE “money” of over-valuations), but it is the FLOW of money that is suspended for the moment.

Money sitting does no-one any good, especially the holders, what with inflation about to skyrocket. Something still eludes me.

8 posted on 10/05/2008 6:58:15 PM PDT by Lazamataz (Secondhand Aztlan Smoke causes drug addiction obesity in global warming cancer immigrant terrorists.)
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To: Lazamataz

There was a worldwide (or at least a North American and European) housing bubble.

Many warned about this years ago, and were basically laughed at.

It has popped, and the correction is painful.


9 posted on 10/05/2008 6:58:39 PM PDT by B Knotts (Calvin Coolidge Republican)
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To: madison10

so freddie pwn3d (forgive my hacker-talk) the entire system like some computer virus?


10 posted on 10/05/2008 6:59:25 PM PDT by ari-freedom (Betcha they're good. Why shouldn't they be? Their one mistake was giving up me!)
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To: madison10
The rest of the world is heavily invested in US. WE were a good money maker, we were safe, we had lots of great places to invest, only problem is again, Fannie and Freddie. The markets are tied up because of bad debt/credit due to F & F defaults on home mortgages. They were, as someone said, a giant pyramid scheme. The pyramid crumbled.

So how does this pyramid crumbling take EVERYthing down? When food stops trucking, electricity goes out... how does THAT happen?

11 posted on 10/05/2008 6:59:50 PM PDT by Lazamataz (Secondhand Aztlan Smoke causes drug addiction obesity in global warming cancer immigrant terrorists.)
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To: B Knotts

I probably put to much onus on Fannie and Freddie, but they are still related to the problem.


12 posted on 10/05/2008 7:00:25 PM PDT by madison10 (Republicans don't win polls, they win elections.)
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To: B Knotts

Yes, I can grasp that. Corrections are painful. But completely crippling to the point it seems we are about to see?


13 posted on 10/05/2008 7:00:45 PM PDT by Lazamataz (Secondhand Aztlan Smoke causes drug addiction obesity in global warming cancer immigrant terrorists.)
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To: Lazamataz
Okay, I'm simply not getting something. How does the WHOLE WORLDWIDE STSTEM crumble? I understand that finances are not a zero-sum game but there is money SOMEwhere. Don't the winners buy the losers and life goes on?

Or are we really facing a worldwide Depression?


It crumbles because of leverage. Imaginary money. Imaginary financial products backed by almost nothing in the way of real assets. A whole system built on trust and expectations of perpetual growth.

Yes, we really are facing a worldwide depression of sorts. If it comes it will be different from the one before.


14 posted on 10/05/2008 7:01:16 PM PDT by Arkinsaw
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To: steve86
The money is still there (except for the FALSE “money” of over-valuations), but it is the FLOW of money that is suspended for the moment.

While its not moving, its losing value.
15 posted on 10/05/2008 7:02:06 PM PDT by Arkinsaw
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To: Arkinsaw
Yes, we really are facing a worldwide depression of sorts. If it comes it will be different from the one before.

Yes, but it will end the same: War.

16 posted on 10/05/2008 7:02:17 PM PDT by Lazamataz (Secondhand Aztlan Smoke causes drug addiction obesity in global warming cancer immigrant terrorists.)
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To: Lazamataz

LOL You read too much. I don’t know if it takes everything “down” or if it just slows down.

That too is speculation, right?


17 posted on 10/05/2008 7:02:44 PM PDT by madison10 (Republicans don't win polls, they win elections.)
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To: Lazamataz
Money sitting does no-one any good, especially the holders,

Actually it does. It's called being 'liquid'. Banks would rather hold their money than risk lending it to a possibly insolvent entity. "A bird in the hand..." and all that.

what with inflation about to skyrocket.

But it's not. What we're about to experience is deflation. Housing prices are a leading indicator of that.

If there's no money circulating to buy goods, the price of those goods collapses.

L

18 posted on 10/05/2008 7:03:19 PM PDT by Lurker (She's not a lesbian, she doesn't whine, she doesn't hate her country, and she's not afraid of guns.)
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To: Lazamataz

Is Soros doing this?


19 posted on 10/05/2008 7:03:24 PM PDT by Hattie
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To: Lazamataz
Yes, but it will end the same: War.

Won't argue with you there.
20 posted on 10/05/2008 7:03:33 PM PDT by Arkinsaw
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