Credit is not flowing. In fact, credit is contracting. That means things aren’t getting better; they’re getting worse. When credit contracts in a consumer-driven economy, bad things happen. Business investment drops, unemployment soars, earnings plunge, and GDP shrinks. The Fed has spent more than a trillion dollars trying to get consumers to start borrowing again, but without success. The country’s credit engines are grinding to a halt.
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Bernanke has increased excess reserves in the banking system by $800 billion, but lending is still slow. The banks are hoarding capital in order to deal with the losses from toxic assets, non performing loans, and a $3.5 trillion commercial real estate bubble that’s following housing into the toilet. That’s why the rate of bank failures is accelerating. 2010 will be even worse; the list is growing. It’s a bloodbath.
The standards for conventional loans have gotten tougher while the pool of qualified credit-worthy borrowers has shrunk. That means less credit flowing into the system. The shadow banking system has been hobbled by the freeze in securitization and only provides a trifling portion of the credit needed to grow the economy. Bernanke’s initiatives haven’t made a bit of difference. Credit continues to shrivel.
The S&P 500 is up 50 percent from its March lows. The financials, retail, materials and industrials are leading the pack. It’s a “Green Shoots” Bear market rally fueled by the Fed’s Quantitative Easing (QE) which is forcing liquidity into the financial system and lifting equities. The same thing happened during the Great Depression. Stocks surged after 1929. Then the prevailing trend took hold and dragged the Dow down 89 percent from its earlier highs. The S&P’s March lows will be tested before the recession is over. Systemwide deleveraging is ongoing. That won’t change.
No one is fooled by the fireworks on Wall Street. Consumer confidence continues to plummet. Everyone knows things are bad. Everyone knows the media is lying. Credit is contracting; the economy’s life’s blood has slowed to a trickle. The economy is headed for a hard landing.
Bernanke has pulled out all the stops. He’s lowered interest rates to zero, backstopped the entire financial system with $13 trillion, propped up insolvent financial institutions and monetized $1 trillion in mortgage-backed securities and US sovereign debt. Nothing has worked. Wages are falling, banks are cutting lines of credit, retirement savings have been slashed in half, and home equity losses continue to mount. Living standards can no longer be bandaged together with VISA or Diners Club cards. Household spending has to fit within one’s salary. That’s why retail, travel, home improvement, luxury items and hotels are all down double-digits. The easy money has dried up.
According to Bloomberg:
“Borrowing by U.S. consumers dropped in June for the fifth straight month as the unemployment rate rose, getting loans remained difficult and households put off major purchases. Consumer credit fell $10.3 billion, or 4.92 percent at an annual rate, to $2.5 trillion, according to a Federal Reserve report released today in Washington. Credit dropped by $5.38 billion in May, more than previously estimated. The series of declines is the longest since 1991.
A jobless rate near the highest in 26 years, stagnant wages and falling home values mean consumer spending… will take time to recover even as the recession eases. Incomes fell the most in four years in June as one-time transfer payments from the Obama administration’s stimulus plan dried up, and unemployment is forecast to exceed 10 percent next year before retreating.” (Bloomberg)
__________________ "To ignore factual reality by believing it to be otherwise does not mean that a person is removed from that reality. It only means that they suffer it ignorantly."
What a mess. The Fed has assumed near-dictatorial powers to fight a monster of its own making, and achieved nothing. The real economy is still dead in the water. Bernanke is not getting any traction from his zero-percent interest rates. His monetization program (QE) is just scaring off foreign creditors. On Friday, Marketwatch reported:
“The Federal Reserve will probably allow its $300 billion Treasury-buying program to end over the next six weeks as signs of a housing recovery prompt the central bank to unwind one its most aggressive and unusual interventions into financial markets, big bond dealers say.”
Right. Does anyone believe the housing market is recovering? If so, please check out this chart and keep in mind that, in the first 6 months of 2009, there have already been 1.9 million foreclosures.
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The Fed is abandoning the printing presses (presumably) because China told Geithner to stop printing money or they’d sell their US Treasuries. It’s a wake-up call to Bernanke that the power is shifting from Washington to Beijing.
That puts Bernanke in a pickle. If he stops printing; interest rates will skyrocket, stocks will crash and housing prices will tumble. But if he continues QE, China will dump their Treasuries and the greenback will vanish in a poof of smoke. Either way, the malaise in the credit markets will persist and personal consumption will continue to sputter.
The basic problem is that consumers are buried beneath a mountain of debt and have no choice except to curtail their spending and begin to save. Currently, the the ratio of debt to personal disposable income, is 128% just a tad below its all-time high of 133% in 2007. According to the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco’s “Economic Letter: US Household Deleveraging and Future Consumption Growth”:
“The combination of higher debt and lower saving enabled personal consumption expenditures to grow faster than disposable income, providing a significant boost to U.S. economic growth over the period. In the long-run, however, consumption cannot grow faster than income because there is an upper limit to how much debt households can service, based on their incomes. For many U.S. households, current debt levels appear too high, as evidenced by the sharp rise in delinquencies and foreclosures in recent years. To achieve a sustainable level of debt relative to income, households may need to undergo a prolonged period of deleveraging, whereby debt is reduced and saving is increased.
__________________ "To ignore factual reality by believing it to be otherwise does not mean that a person is removed from that reality. It only means that they suffer it ignorantly."
Going forward, it seems probable that many U.S. households will reduce their debt. If accomplished through increased saving, the deleveraging process could result in a substantial and prolonged slowdown in consumer spending relative to pre-recession growth rates.” (”U.S. Household Deleveraging and Future Consumption Growth, by Reuven Glick and Kevin J. Lansing, FRBSF Economic Letter”)
A careful reading of the FRBSF’s Economic Letter shows why the economy will not bounce back. It is mathematically impossible. We’ve reached peak credit; consumers have to deleverage and patch their balance sheets. Household wealth has slipped $14 trillion since the crisis began. Home equity has dropped to 41% (a new low) and joblessness is on the rise. By 2011, Duetsche Bank AG predicts that 48 percent of all homeowners with a mortgage will be underwater. As the equity position of homeowners deteriorates, banks will further tighten credit and foreclosures will mushroom.
The executive board of the IMF does not share Wall Street’s rosy view of the future, which is why it issued a memo that stated:
“Directors observed that the crisis will have important implications for the role of the United States in the global economy. The U.S. consumer is unlikely to play the role of global “buyer of last resort”— other regions will need to play an increased role in supporting global growth.”
The United States will not be the emerge as the center of global demand following the recession. Those days are over. The world is changing and the US role is getting smaller. As US markets become less attractive to foreign exporters, the dollar will lose its position as the world’s reserve currency. As goes the dollar, so goes the empire. Want some advice: Learn Mandarin.
SAGGING EMPLOYMENT: A “no new jobs” recovery
July’s employment numbers came in better than expected (negative 247,000) lowering total unemployment from 9.5% to 9.4%. That’s good. Things are getting worse at a slower pace. What’s striking about the BLS report is that there’s no jobs-surge in any sector of the economy. No signs of life. Outsourcing and offshoring are ongoing, and downsizing is the new path to profitability. Businesses everywhere are anticipating weaker demand. The jobs report is a one-off event; a lull in the storm before the layoffs resume.
Unemployment is rising, wages are falling and credit is contracting. In other words, the system is working exactly as designed. All the money is flowing upwards to the gangsters at the top. Here’s an excerpt from a recent Don Monkerud article that sums it all up:
“During eight years of the Bush Administration, the 400 richest Americans, who now own more than the bottom 150 million Americans, increased their net worth by $700 billion. In 2005, the top one percent claimed 22 percent of the national income, while the top ten percent took half of the total income, the largest share since 1928
Over 40 percent of GNP comes from Fortune 500 companies. According to the World Institute for Development Economics Research, the 500 largest conglomerates in the U.S. “control over two-thirds of the business resources, employ two-thirds of the industrial workers, account for 60 percent of the sales, and collect over 70 percent of the profits.”
… In 1955, IRS records indicated the 400 richest people in the country were worth an average $12.6 million, adjusted for inflation. In 2006, the 400 richest increased their average to $263 million, representing an epochal shift of wealth upward in the U.S.” “Wealth Inequality destroys US Ideals”
Working people are not being crushed by accident, but according to plan. It is the way the system is supposed to work. Bernanke knows that sustained demand requires higher wages and a vital middle class. But what does he care. He’s not a public servant. He works for the banks. That’s why the Fed’s monetary policies reflect the goals of the investor class. Bubblenomics is not the way to a strong/sustainable economy, but it is an effective tool for shifting wealth from one class to another. The Fed’s job is to facilitate that objective, which is why the economy is headed for the rocks.
The free market has become a sham to conceal the crimes of the rich.
The financial meltdown is the logical outcome of the Fed’s monetary policies. That’s why it’s a mistake to call the current slump a “recession”. It’s not. It’s a planned demolition.
__________________ "To ignore factual reality by believing it to be otherwise does not mean that a person is removed from that reality. It only means that they suffer it ignorantly."
There is no economy left to recover. The US manufacturing economy was lost to offshoring and free trade ideology, The real economy was traded away for a make-believe economy. When the make-believe economy collapsed, Americans’ wealth in their real estate, pensions, and savings collapsed dramatically while their jobs disappeared. Americans are over their heads in debt. Jobs are disappearing. America’s consumer economy, approximately 70% of GDP, is dead. Those Americans who still have jobs are saving against the prospect of job loss. Millions are homeless. Some have moved in with family and friends; others are living in tent cities.
Forced part-time work is at an all-time high, going all the way back to 1956 and including the 1982 recession. In May 2009, 8.8 million workers were forced to work part time for economic reasons, in other words they were forced out of the job market by the banksters and their long-standing plot to turn the country into a third world cesspool.
During the last bankster engineered economic depression in the 1930s, the official unemployment rate was 24.9%. If we accept the premise that the actual unemployment rate is double the officially cooked figures, then the states with 12 percent or higher unemployment are actually experiencing unemployment on par with the so-called Great Depression.
The GDP is now floundering in negative territory — officially at -1.89% — which means massive job losses will continue. Conventional economic wisdom states that in order to maintain stable employment, the GDP must be around 2.5% per year and it must go much higher to make up for the catastrophic losses suffered since the “recession” began in November, 2007.
Once again, the government is playing a shell game with the numbers. The GDP numbers are distorted by manipulation of the money supply, which creates inflation. If you look at the Federal Reserve’s M3 data, you will see that GDP has decreased substantially since 1990. In order to hide this from the American people, the Fed stopped publishing the M3 monetary aggregate report on March 23, 2006. The discontinuation of the M3 detracts from the transparency the Fed preaches and adds to the suspicion that the Fed wants to hide anything showing money growth high enough to fuel inflation, just so people won’t know how bad it is and possibly react and thus make it worse.
Earlier this month, the U.S. government told the one-worlders at the European Union that at the end of the third quarter it will not meet its forecast for the annual budget deficit and the forecast must be revised to a figure in excess of 10.75%. On Saturday, Obama’s budget office said the figure will be 11.2% of GDP, a staggering $1.8 trillion, the highest deficit as a percentage of GDP since 1945 when the people were obliged to pay for the last world war created by the banksters and their international minions.
In order to give this dire situation a somewhat softer and fuzzier glow, Obama’s folks removed from the 2009 budget deficit projection $250 billion given away to the banksters.
Even if the “recession” ends this quarter — and in the meantime, you may as well wish for a pony — Obama’s number crunchers admit unemployment will continue to skyrocket.
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out things will get worse — much worse.
__________________ "To ignore factual reality by believing it to be otherwise does not mean that a person is removed from that reality. It only means that they suffer it ignorantly."
Manufacturing employment in the U.S. peaked in June 1979 with 19,553,000 jobs, and by July of this year manufacturing employment had fallen to 11,817,000, the lowest level of manufacturing jobs since April 1941.
As a percent of the total labor force, manufacturing employment fell below 9% in July, the lowest level in BLS history (back to 1939).
Delinquency and foreclosure rates for U.S. mortgages continued to rise in the second quarter, with loans to the most qualified borrowers going bust at an unnerving clip, especially in hard-hit states such as Florida and California.
The quarterly National Delinquency Survey showed that almost one in 10 homeowners with a mortgage was at least one payment late, and thus delinquent, while another 4 percent had entered the foreclosure process on their loan.
__________________ "To ignore factual reality by believing it to be otherwise does not mean that a person is removed from that reality. It only means that they suffer it ignorantly."
Private employers cut 298,000 American jobs last month, far above economists’ expectations, and squeezed more work out of staff over fewer hours.
The ADP Employer Services report on jobless numbers in August exceeded the 250,000 staff cuts economists had forecast.
Employees who kept their jobs worked even harder over shorter hours, according to the Labor Department today.
__________________ "To ignore factual reality by believing it to be otherwise does not mean that a person is removed from that reality. It only means that they suffer it ignorantly."
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. reported late last week that the fund that insures some $4.5 trillion in U.S. bank deposits fell to $10.4 billion at the end of June, as the list of failing banks continues to grow. The fund was $45.2 billion a year ago, when regulators told us all was well and there was no need to take precautions to shore up the fund.
__________________ "To ignore factual reality by believing it to be otherwise does not mean that a person is removed from that reality. It only means that they suffer it ignorantly."
These overheated economic markets could be headed toward catastrophe.
Ten Bubbles in the Making
One year after America's brush with economic catastrophe, there's plenty of looking back at the bubbles that caused financial chaos.
But what's next?
There are surely dangerous economic bubbles forming as we speak. As Alan Greenspan warned this week, "They [financial crises] are all different, but they have one fundamental source," he said. "That is the unquenchable capability of human beings when confronted with long periods of prosperity to presume that it will continue."
The trick, of course, is spotting them. By definition, most people don't spot a bubble before they form and burst.
Here's 10 for which you should be on alert:
1. China bubble: Despite the weak global economy, the Chinese stock market has soared like crazy this year. But many believe the rally has been driven purely by government-supplied liquidity, rather than fundamentals. The fear is that companies are flush with cash, but have little "real" to do with the cash, so they're parking it in the stock market casino. The Chinese real estate market appears to be on a similar trajectory.
2. Green bubble: Green has been everywhere. With observers saying the "Age of Cleantech and Biotech" will be the next major economic revolution, and Washington pouring billions of dollars into alternative energy projects, you'd think a bubble would have already formed. But, as we noted this spring, it did not, at least from an investment perspective.
Still, as the economic recovery takes shape, alternative energy could see excess investment on hopes of big future returns. There's plenty of hype left, and if investors regain the cash to get in the game, could green become the next internet or housing bubble?
3. Gold bubble: Gold prices just keep going up. They've risen for seven straight years, recently breaking $1,000 per ounce.
Is it a bubble? Right now, it doesn't look too bad. Gold is good in both inflationary and deflationary periods, as it holds wealth tangibly. And, as the Telegraph notes, there's real demand, especially from China.
But with some predicting a doubling of prices to $2,000 an ounce, too many people could jump in and spike the real value of the precious metal. The "rise forever" mentality usually means trouble.
4. Federal Reserve bubble: Is the Fed saving the financial system or creating another dangerous credit bubble by snapping up mortgage-backed securities?
At first glance, the Fed's effort to clean up mortgage-backed securities is a winner. But, as Heidi Moore wrote for Slate's The Big Money, the Fed is actually creating a bubble similar to the one it's trying to do damage control on. By eagerly trying to save banks and stabilize the housing market, Washington is taking on too much: $1.25 trillion of mortgaged-backed securities, including both the original toxic assets and products of foreclosures to come. So who would bail the Fed out? You.
5.Trash stock bubble: There's a rush to trash going on. Stocks like Fannie Mae (FNM), Freddie Mac (FRE), AIG (AIG) and even GM made big runs in August -- trading in trash financials made up nearly one-third of NYSE's August volume.
So why are people buying junk? Charlie Gasparino says shares of junk financials -- companies like Fannie, Freddie, AIG, Citi and Bank of America -- are being pushed up by a short squeeze. The Wall Street Journal suspects its high frequency traders. And others say its retail speculation and day traders getting their way while Wall Street went on vacation.
6. Education bubble: More people are going back to college and taking on huge debt to do it, despite questions about what the degree is really worth.
Last year, the amount borrowed by students and received by schools grew some 25% over the previous year, to $75.1 billion. That's a huge amount, especially with weak, low-paying job prospects for graduates in this economy.
As we've noted, all this student loan debt is crazy. Despite the desire to see more subsidization of college, we suspect there will be a collapse in student loan debt availability and desire to take on new debt.
Short of telling kids not to go to college, something's going to give.
The pop may be starting already. As Bloomberg reports, as many as one-third of all private colleges surveyed said they expected enrollment to drop in the next academic year. And almost 40 percent of those colleges said some of their students dropped out due to personal economic reasons and a quarter said full-time attendees switched to part time. Half said families had to cut back their expected contributions as the value of college savings plans dropped 21 percent last year.
7. Subprime bubble, 2.0: What are banks doing with all those subprime mortgages? They're repackaging with a higher rating -- "re-securitization of real estate mortgage investment conduits" -- and selling them.
As we've noted, it's a plan nearly identical to the complicated investment packages of the financial crisis a year ago. That being said, the problem was not strictly securitization, but the underlying housing bubble. So the return of complicated products isn't necessarily the end of the world.
8. Life insurance securitization bubble: In its search for new profits, Wall Street is planning on securitizing “life settlements" -- policies that the sick and elderly can sell for cash while they're alive -- much like it did subprime mortgages. The New York Times warns that we could be looking at subprime all over again.
Maybe. As we've noted, it wasn't securitization that caused the financial meltdown. It was the bursting of the housing bubble. Yes, there was a feedback loop, whereby securitization allowed more money to flow towards housing, but it seems unlikely that "life settlements" would get big enough to infect all portions of the financial world.
9. Commercial real estate bubble: This bubble is already hissing, if not popping outright.
While the economy is improving and some home sales are slowly coming back, the commercial real estate market could get far worse.
As The New York Times reports, "Even though industry lobbyists were able to persuade Congress to extend a loan program aimed at prodding the stalled securitization market back to life, several analysts said it was unlikely to head off a spate of defaults, foreclosures and bankruptcies that could surpass the devastating real estate crash of the early 1990s."
As UPI notes, commercial mortgage defaults could reach 4.1 percent by the end of the year, up from 2.25 percent in the first quarter, and Real Capital Analytics estimates commercial property loans worth $83 billion have been involved in default, foreclosure or bankruptcy in 2009.
Badly hit will likely be malls. "The next financial tsunami to hit will be the widespread failure of shopping center mortgages," says Peter Monroe, co-chair of REOMAC, a not for profit trade association to CNBC. "Half a trillion dollars of commercial loans financed on historically low rates, are due for refinancing in the next three years," says Monroe. "The negative impact of these shopping center mortgages is enormous."
10. Emerging market bubble: It's not just China. Risk-tolerant investors are bidding up emerging market shares to valuations not seen in 9 years. With an average PE of 20x, they're not in bubble territory just yet, but watch for things to get out of hand.
__________________ "To ignore factual reality by believing it to be otherwise does not mean that a person is removed from that reality. It only means that they suffer it ignorantly."
__________________ "Every daring attempt to make a great change in existing conditions, every lofty vision of new possibilities for the human race, has been labeled Utopian."
Of course you still live with your parents. Why would you care.
__________________
"To the last, I will grapple with thee... from Hell's heart, I stab at thee! For hate's sake, I spit my last breath at thee!" - Khan (reciting Melville)
Very well written as I take a second look at it, people should really read this and become a bit more open minded to the serious nature of the truth to the fact that the American economy is dying... and Britain is following close on the heels.
__________________ "Every daring attempt to make a great change in existing conditions, every lofty vision of new possibilities for the human race, has been labeled Utopian."
I fact the world economical system, dominated by the Dollar is eventually going to be stood on its head, the US and other western countries could be the ones with famine and rioting in the future!!
Why was he banned? I see no spamming he was merely using multiple posts to organise better, and another thing, he didn't plagerise he put his sources down... maybe its the government trying to snuff out all truth!
__________________ "Every daring attempt to make a great change in existing conditions, every lofty vision of new possibilities for the human race, has been labeled Utopian."
Too bad NW got banned because I wanted to let him know that he came across an interesting point here upon the recession that I never considered as being a possibility. But I am a bit puzzled by how some of these occurrences reflect on a possible plot financially. The charts make sense but not in his alternative perspective really. The logic of spending for consumer spending and failing at the same time kind of....numbs my mind.
Again, too bad he was banned. I would love to hear more.
__________________ (MEMBER WAS BANNED FOR THIS POST)
The more you question it, the less you will understand.
it's a recession, we had the happy profitable good times, now it's time for the bad time, it's happenned before, it'll happen again, its newtonic, every action has an opposite and equall reaction.
as for the economy crash in america, it is indeed far worse than they were letting on, america owes shits load of money to just about everone, and have done a somewhat decent job of covering it up. funny thing is above all the money they owe china is just about number one on that list. if china was smart they wouldn't invade, just tell america they want their debt paid, and boom instant economical crash of america. It's been a long time coming, and we most likely will go down with them (Canada) but america is no longer #1 they are merely riding an illusion of power
__________________
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__________________ "Every daring attempt to make a great change in existing conditions, every lofty vision of new possibilities for the human race, has been labeled Utopian."
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Sep 14th, 2009 11:42 AM
