Posted on 06/12/2012 3:04:26 AM PDT by AAABEST
I don't often put stories in "breaking." I post vanities even less often. Hardly anything surprises me any longer, but I find this absolutely astounding. If you follow the financial threads or the situation in Europe, you really need to read this. Actually anyone with a bank account needs to read this.
I'm going to ask the mods to leave this here, unless they really feel I'm all wet here. I don't, however, believe I am. Follow me here.
BNI (Bank Network Investments) is Italy's oldest and forth largest bank. In other words, it's a biggie.
Anyway, the bank went into receivership last November. as of late last week, without any notice whatsoever to depositors, eureka, BNI suspends all payments and withdrawals. In other words the very first European bank goes on holiday. Furious depositors are left with no way to access their money or pay their bills. They will be on "holiday" (nice term btw) until at least July.
This is quite alarming in its own right on many levels. It's not, however, what is astounding. What's astounding is that there is a total media blackout. NOT A SINGLE ENGLISH SPEAKING ONLINE PERIODICAL MENTIONS THIS. Not one. Nobody. This happened last week, and we're going into Tuesday.
Don't believe me? Here is a Google News search of the terms "BNI" and "Italy" (no quotes).
Nothing. Zero, zilch, nada. Goose egg. Really?
The story is not a hoax, it was confirmed right here on FR at this thread. An astute FReeper, (Kartographer) picked up on it and worked the translation.
It's also on the bank's own website.
The only English speaking source I've been able to find it is right here on Kartographer's barely noticed FR thread, after which I found bits and pieces on a regular (not news) Google search at some other third rate websites.
Here is a site that has several stories on the matter translated from Italian.
Again, this went down last week, today is Tuesday.
any news source who is the first to lead with this will be accused of spreading panic
BobL continued to further explain and nothing was found in the post (by BobL) where disagreement was warranted (imho). (imho) the dominoes began to be lined up over fifteen years ago in Europe. The first domino to start tilting was Greece, then Spain, and now Italy. People in Europe and the United States have lived (with government help) beyond their means. Governments eventually run out of bullets (or money) to combat failures on the scale of entire countries defaulting. Bailouts are useless (imho), for once the money is gone, from the bailout, the only solution is to print more money causing inflation and devaluation of the printed product (money). A complete and full reset is one solution, yet nobody wins except those who were fiscally extravagant. All parties (imho) are looking to create some winners in this situation. As all parties (or countries) are looking to make those decisions on what institutions win and prosper from the probable coming collapse, unrest is growing in the streets by the people who will be funding the winners. Am having trouble with countries deciding who wins and who loses (myself) while the people (worldwide) are being asked (and perhaps later told) to foot the bill. The world, and the nations of the world who prospered during the illusion and spent beyond what was prudent and wise are seeking someone to blame. When all is said and done, governments will hold someone else responsible besides those who created the problems by being in power within the government. The king or queen, throughout history, has never claimed credit for a disaster, except in rare instances, and should the king or queen claim credit for the disaster, what difference will it make; the disaster will not be lessened, and each of us are being primed to take responsibility for any and all failure. Where the first dominoes will fall are known. What happens next is anyones guess. History may teach us, but most all of mankind never learns.
(imho)
nti
” I wonder why there there wasn’t an attempt to return money to depositors “
Simple - in the eyes of the Bankers and their tame Governments, depositors - especially small retail depositors - are merely sheep to be fleeced at need, or at will...
The fact that more than a few financial services knocked at the door: the idea is to measure the liquidity of the group of about 125 million euros, whereas the path of restructuring was not feasible because of the poor agreement between the partners . At this point, as is evident in Bluerating, the most sensible option seems to be that of a separate sale of the assets that make up the bank's assets.So they don't seem to be a trivially-small bank, and they were having visible problems since November 2011.Among the names of the institutions involved, there would be Banco Popolare (shareholder), and MPS Fineco. Besides, there would have to manage the network of financial advisors which now has about 400 people. On this, the institutes would Fideuram and BPM. But could spuntarne third whereas before, unless of orders from above (see Bank of Italy) Matteo Colafrancesco sees very little interest in this as they know sources interviewed by Bluerating really familiar with the matter.
As to the topic, I think the general sentiment of it being "too big to save" rings true. It's amazing in the information age how much easier it is for stories to get flushed down the memory hole.
Keep it the good work.
I agree totally about preparation. It’s always good to be prepared.
My employer (here in the Czech Republic) pays me in cash, which is always nice. I also do freelancing work, and with that, my other employers offers me the option of being paid in a wide basket of currencies, whichever offers the best exchange rate to the Czech crown. With that, I usually take a portion of what I make monthly and buy gold ingots, which are conveniently available at forex stands, or even the post office.
As far as the stock market goes, I’d likely be better off investing in one of the ubiquitous casinos around here. Like you said, the three-card-Monte dealer is more honest than the majority of banks and investment houses.
Thanks for the link to the video; I’ll definitely check it out.
Searching "BANCA NETWORK INVESTIMENTI" in Italy in Google Maps turns up it having ten branches across Italy. So it's not trivial, but also not huge (as you note). What puzzled me in the first thread was how hard it seemed to find info about it. Doing a similar map search for "Banca Popolare" in Italy turns up a lot more offices, which is appropriate for a major bank.
“Even worst Pres Obama via exec order placed US taxpayers on the hook for any derivative losses incurred by Wall Street bankers in the future.”
Really? How did he do that?
How does the US ability to print more money factor into this?
Italian asset manager Consultinvest has confirmed an offer to complete the acquisition of Banca Network Investimenti's financial adviser network.Banca Network has been in administration since November 2011.
Modena-based Consultinvest will also acquire deposits and portfolio accounts of the troubled banking group through its partner Cassa di Risparmio di Ravenna.
...
At the end of May, Banca Network suspended all payments to creditors for a month. At the time, Consultinvest was suggested as the group set to rescue the bank.
“...wouldn’t FDIC insurance eventually cover depositors?”
What do you think the FDIC is? It’s the Federal government, IOW: taxpayers; us.
Our government is flat broke now; how is it going to bail out millions of depositors with anything but absolutely worthless paper?
1,500 trillion? Good lord, that’s more money than I think God Himself has sitting around in his safe. Unbelievable.
I’d heard about the JPM 2 billion loss, but the 17 billion; wow. Hard to believe one little corner office in London can do that much damage.
From what I’ve read, in the City (the London financial district) derivatives can essentially be traded ad infinitum with no limit. There’s waaaayyyyyy too secrecy going on, and in the end, I get a feeling that this could end up as a financial Global Extinction Level Event, the monetary equivalent of a 500-mile diameter object splashing down in the Pacific or Atlantic oceans.
This is why we have FDIC insured accounts. At least we learned something from the first great financial crisis.
This is basically an orderly default with another bank buying them out...we’ve just been lucky in America so far the FDIC does these transactions over a weekend
It seems to me that the current financial situation calls for some counter-intuitive moves. Right now, the US can borrow money at 1.6% on a ten year note. But given the fact of our outrageous indebtedness, it seems likely that sooner, rather than later, cranking up the printing presses for more money is going to result in some serious inflation. So I think it is in the best interests of our country to borrow several hundreds of billions of dollars at 1.6% now while we can and use the money to take care of some of our country’s more drastic needs, like roads, bridges, electrical systems, airports, rail links, etc... Once the inevitable happens and we have a run on our currency, we will be able to pay those bills at cents on the (current) dollar.
From their website, translated via Babelfish. Of course, it doesn’t have as much feeling as the original - the English version just doesn’t lend itself to expressive hand gesturing. Ooofah!
“Extraordinary Commissioners May 31, 2012 date of Bank Network Investments S.p.A., under extraordinary administrative arrangements (MI), with the favourable opinion of the Supervisory Committee and subject to the approval of the Bank of Italy, have approved the suspension of the payment of liabilities of any kind, within the meaning of art. 74 of d.lgs. 1 September 1993, no. 385 (TUB), for a period of one month. The suspension does not include customer’s financial instruments.The measure was necessary to cope with the difficult situation of the Bank”
I’m emailing this whole thread to my listeners.
I think I’m going to make a Demotivations-style graphic with that.
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