The Big One - Are we facing a global economic crash?

[Makalakumu]

According to this economist, we are.

The banking system breakdown is very far along, but still early. Remember USFed Chairman Bernanke stated over a year ago that the mortgage problem was contained. Try not to laugh. The bond crisis is absolute, broad, deep, and all-inclusive, enough to kill the USTreasurys after it kills the US banking system. The heart attack signals are with the LIBOR spreads over USTreasurys, the money market, the TED spread (Treasury versus EuroDollar), and short-term USTreasurys. Charts resemble heart attacks and EKG electro-cardiogram monitors. Many details appear in the October Hat Trick Letter report just posted. The bank runs have begun in earnest. Nevermind the big banks for a moment. The smaller ones are entering seizures. The small and medium sized cities are also entering seizures. Here are two stories, one about a city and another about the bank holiday coming.

This from a friend in Seattle: “I was talking to my neighbor last night. He is in finance in the county government, King County (Seattle). He said there are some very secretive budget talks being held, very hush, hush. Apparently, the county has lost around $200 million of taxpayer money in toxic paper investments, with huge implications on the budget. He says he is not privy to the details, but he is taking a 10-day vacation starting today, because he has nothing to do since everything is in flux.”

This from a friend in Atlanta with strong banking connections: “Reliable word that Bank of America branch managers just received a letter or memo from the USFed instructing them to perhaps be ready for a one-week universal shut-down of the banking system, including access to checking accounts, savings accounts and credit cards. Reliable word has it that BofA bank branches received a shipment of signs last week, reading “WE'RE SORRY, BUT DUE TO CIRCUMSTANCES BEYOND OUR CONTROL, WE CANNOT BE OPEN AT THIS TIME.”

 

[Makalakumu]

I received this e-mail from a friend who works in finances...

Well I'm pretty sure this is the big one...or at least a tremor of the
big one.
My advice...which has fallen on def ears to all my friends and family is
this
1. withdraw money from the bank ( a run seems immanent and at any point
what's a paltry .05 percent interest?)
Here's talk of a one week bank holiday
(http://www.learcapital.com/marketcommentary/6785.html)
2. buy food (you can't eat paper)
http://www.efoodsdirect.com/product-display.html?c=1&id=1001
this stuff stores for 18 years so even if the worst doesn't come you've
got insurance for the next 18 years.
3. buy physical silver and gold (may be able to buy food when paper is
worthless)
4. take steps to secure your family...
5. do this quietly don't be the guy to yell fire in a crowded theater
(people are burned out on the news due to the election and the bailout
and they won't see this coming until a special broadcast from Charley
Gibson interrupts dancing with the stars telling them to report for
their ID cards, work schedule, and food vouchers the next morning)


http://www.learcapital.com/marketcommentary/6785.html
http://www.efoodsdirect.com/product-display.html?c=1&id=1001
http://www.efoodsdirect.com/local_storage_list.html

 

[Makalakumu]

Are people right to be THAT afraid?

 

[Nolerama]

I think it's coming. In previous threads, I've stated that I'm going to start a guinea pig farm (thanks to Andrew Zimmern of the Travel Channel) to raise them as meat for the community.

With the bartered goods available from that, I'm going to get some friends together to start a communal garden so we can survive. My MMA club will serve to defend this little patch of sanity in a world gone insane...

Then 50 years after the crash, I can look back, count my millions made on the guinea pig market and watch as the machines take over.

 

[terryl965]

Yes I am sure we are going to have another great depression. It is just when.

 

[shesulsa]

I'm on the line, really. I'm very disturbed by the feds buying up all the short-term loans. I think it's not smart to not be prepared anyway.

You might want to tell your friend that it's illegal for anyone but the government to own gold in any form other than jewelry and collector coins and award items. Gold for the sake of currency is outlawed at this time, IIRC.

 

[celtic_crippler]

....can you say "Mad Max: The Road Warrior"?

I'm waiting for a guy in a suped up dune buggy with a green mohawk to come riding up beside me shooting cross-bow bolts at my truck in an attempt to steal my gas.

 

[Twin Fist]

oh for craps sake people

the dow has only been over 10K for the last couple years.

it could drop to 8K and we would be back at what? 1995 levels?

there will be no new great depression

this is a market CORRECTION, nothing more. the strong will survive, as always

 

[Andrew Green]

I doubt it, people will survive. We might see a big drop in SUV's, 55" Plasma TV's, and other such things that everyone feels they "need" nowadays. More families might go back to having 1 car in the family, houses will go back to a "normal" size.

A few industries might crumble and be rebuilt, hopefully with more competent people running them.

But, at the end of the day, it won't be a huge thing, people will get buy.

We've also got safeguards against a repetition of the great depression of the 30's, so despite some of the causes (deficit spending, cheap loans, loads of debt) being similar, I doubt the result will be as wide spread.

There will be a crash, and people will have to give up some luxuries, and some people might get burnt pretty badly, but in the end everyone will get through.

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

I do not think there is going to be a crash. Yet, I have taken a few safe guards just in case.

 

[Sukerkin]

But the problem is more deeply entrenched than the current situation. It all stems, as we've touched on several times in discussions here, on the way that the money supply has been 'managed' (oh the irony) by fractional reserve banking for the past eighty years or so.

Because it's all based on debt (rather than anything concrete) and all debt accrues interest, the system carries the seeds of it's own destruction.

Depending on how much of a 'readjustment' the presently forming depression will cause, there is still not much more life left in it. The States in particular have been propping up this unstable mechanism by robbing the rest of the world blind (sorry chaps, I know that's not really very PC of me to say). Even so, there are not many more decades left before the interest payable on the debt owed by the government to the Federal Reserve becomes too great to be covered.

Then, as I said a few days ago, the wings come off.

 

[Makalakumu]

Now the Fed wants to drop rates. The printing presses are fired up and the dollar is extremely at risk.

Entire countries are starting to go bankrupt. Iceland, as reported on NPR is a hairsbreadth away.

If all of this goes down, what then?

If not, will it eventually?

 

[celtic_crippler]

...it's looking like we may be facing a global economic crash.

REYKJAVIK, Iceland - This volcanic island near the Arctic Circle is on the brink of becoming the first "national bankruptcy" of the global financial meltdown.

According to the article, Iceland banks are seriously tied to the Brithish economy.

Read more -> http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081007/ap_on_re_eu/eu_iceland_meltdown_1

 

[Cryozombie]

The way I see it, is I have enough Ammo so that I don't need to hoard if my paper money becomes useless... and failing that I can MAKE more ammo for my crossbow. So I'll be able to get food.

But... I also have a decent stash of vegtable seeds in case I need to garden...

 

[theletch1]

Global meltdown? Might be time to take another look at this thread as we decide how we'll handle it. I've always attempted to be as self sufficient as possible so I hope the family and I would be able to get by if we wind up in a worst case scenario. How far would I go to keep us alive and going? Hard to say. If I dig too deeply down that path I may well see things I don't like but remain optimistic that, while there will be an adjustment, we'll come through alright.

Perhaps it's because I'm an American but I can't see how it's all Americas fault. As long as mankind has been on the planet it our present form there has been greed. I can put the blame on greed and we Americans have plenty of that to spare but I can't see how we're the only ones on the planet who taken part in the current debacle.

 

[crushing]

The more we think it will happen, the more likely it becomes. The global economy, particularly currencies are based on and backed by the intangible of confidence.

When Greens. . . .errr. . .Bernanke sneezes. . .

Also, I thought that Iceland was so small that a Sugarcubes reunion would help fix their economy.

 

[AceHBK]

Who knows but I have been on China's Careerbuilder website as well as looking for work in Dubai.

 

[Catalyst]

I'm waiting for a guy in a suped up dune buggy with a green mohawk to come riding up beside me shooting cross-bow bolts at my truck in an attempt to steal my gas.

I want to apologize for that, I didn't realize it was you - you just look different when you're not in your Martial Arts Uniform. Awfully sorry about the arrow that's in the side of your truck.... I'm kidding, I'm kidding

As a government, we've lived on borrowed money for the last 40 years.
When it wasn't a tax & spender in there, it was a borrower & spender in there. At least when it was a tax & spender in there, the books were closer to being balanced. No side (republican vs. democrat, red vs. blue, left vs. right) is innocent, they all played a part in it. "We the People" are just as guilty for allowing them to do this to us.

As a society, we've lived on credit card debt for the last 10-15 years.
The mantra of I want it, I want it big and I want it now; is due for a reality check.

I don't think there is going to be anarchy and chaos, however, I think we will have some very tough times ahead and people's expectations of lifestyle and material comforts available to them are really going to be adjusted downward.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

Considering that I rarely carry more than $5 in cash, might be time to pull a few extra bucks out, and sharpen some blades.

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

You know I was reading an economic article today and they were intimating that the dollar is going to be on the rise and that the US economy probably will come out of the world recession sooner than Europe, etc. I found it very interesting as the author was very positive about the whole thing.