css1971

Credit unions are stepping up lending, filling the void left by big money-center banks.

What a shame they have to compete against a sector subsidised to the tune of 700 billion...

Can a Global Economy Be Managed One Nation at a Time?

A world government!

Banks: Build Not Bail?

Indeed, this would cauterise the problem and leave the rest of the economy functioning.

Iceland: What It's Like to Live in a World Without Money

It has nothing to do with fiat currency, or gold/silver. It's all about credit and debt. Gold and silver can just as easily have huge pyramids of credit piled on top as paper money, so that would make no difference at all.

What is needed is debt free money; banking reform.

Take a look at Wörgl and the ideas of Silvio Gesell.

The Winners Will Be Those Who Look to Gold and Commodities

Briggsy: "You can eat food and you can burn energy. What can you do with gold?"

What do you do with little bits of green paper?

Dan Lewis James: "As a question though, does anyone have an idea what time frame we may be looking at for inflation from the bailout's to filter into the economy?"

Take a look at previous crashes.

You Are Not as Dumb as the Bear Market Makes You Feel

1: Every reduction is a new bargain.
2: The stocks aren't changing value. It's money which is changing value. You can't value anything objectively because your measuring stick is changing size.

World Oil Supplies Declining Faster Than Expected - IEA

You want to know just how important this is?

"“In the West, approximately 10 calories of hydrocarbons are required to produce one calorie of food. In short, we convert oil into food via the Earth." [1]

We use oil to power the agricultural vehicles and even more importantly. To manufacture fertilizers.

When the oil goes, so do the machines and the fertilizers. The end of oil is not just about transport it is about a *massive* reduction in the energy available to humanity. If we get the changeover to something else wrong, it will also mean a massive reduction in food production. And a massive reduction in food production will mean a massive population reduction.

How about, a matching 6% population reduction every year? 360 million people.

[1] ec.europa.eu/research/...

The Favorable Outlook for Gold

Did it fall or is it being pushed?

Take a look at the gold, silver, platinum lease rates.

www.kitco.com/lease.ch...

The Physics of Money

The velocity of money brings up an interesting experiment in Germany during the depression. Wörgl. Silvio Gesell developed a monetary system which uses a currency which deliberately depreciates at a set rate; 1% per month. This caused the velocity of the currency to be very high. 14 times higher than the national currency.

This currency was designed specifically to be a means of exchange and *not* a store of value.

First Comes Deflation, Then Comes Inflation

Pretty much agree, but deflation can run for a while. I suspect gold is going to follow silver and platinum in the short term, so no point holding it now at $700 when I can hold it at $500.

In the meantime Y'all just keep selling silver and platinum for me won't you. I'm looking for $600 in platinum and $4 on silver please.

One more thing though... I use the financial sector as "early warning radar".

The stock market is basically a big sponge for inflation. The banks churn out credit and it gets splurged in the market pushing everything higher... The banks stop lending and the market collapses.

So... Watch bank figures... The more they lend, the more money they make. When their figures falter there is trouble coming, step out into cash.

Motorola's Android Phone: Too Little Too Late?

Motorola is seriously messed up internally. There are a dozen different little fiefdoms all fighting one another. You can see the results in the product line and in the bottom line. Nokia is going to eat them for breakfast when they seriously enter the US market.

Basically, the CEO needs to start firing people.

Are Big Banks Too Big to Fail?

Regulated? Oh come on, you must be kidding.

The Federal Reserve is a cartel set up to protect and serve the biggies in *exactly* this kind of situation. And it is working like a bloody charm.

Here's the thing. If you are "too big to fail" then you are literally, a threat to national security. If you are a threat to national security then you should be run as a government department. The banks which are too big to fail should become fully owned parts of the treasury. Otherwise you just have a government supported and mandated oligopoly.

Cloud Computing: What Are the Barriers to Entry and IT Diseconomies?

Or... You could buy a mainframe.

Learning from Japan

bearfund wrote:

"Which corporations, countries, political systems, etc. are really best positioned to deliver sustainable long-term growth? It's every bit as hard to filter out the effects of a credit collapse as it is to filter out the effects of the monetary binge that led up to it."

Much as I agree with much of what you say, just one comment.

"Sustainable growth" is an oxymoron.

e.g.
www.youtube.com/watch?...

The answer is "no" BTW.

How Does the Financial Crisis Affect the Peak Oil Thesis?

Reduction in supply of oil is going to be like a hammer to the economy. Everything uses it.

Well, we've just seen the first wave of demand destruction as a result. Expect economic growth to resume until we again hit the new (lower) supply limit and the price spikes again. And again, demand is destroyed.