Bank bailouts have made owners of otherwise worthless bank debt whole through a circuitous process by which taxpayers transferred their money to investors. Even in Greece. Even a bank that had siphoned off $1 billion through fraud and embezzlement. It wasn’t fair. But fairness had nothing to do with it. That’s how bailouts were done. Until now.
H-P’s Big Investors Finally Can’t Take It Anymore
by Wolf Richter • • Comments Off on H-P’s Big Investors Finally Can’t Take It Anymore
Investors are fuming. But traders, the lucky ones who got the timing right, love it. So do Wall Street firms that shuffle companies around. For decades, Hewlett-Packard did what they wanted it to do: swallow other companies, whole or in pieces, spit out some mangled limbs, and dump tens of thousands of employees. But someone ended up holding the bag.
Lies, Damned Lies, And Banks: Deutsche Bank Caught Again
by Wolf Richter • • Comments Off on Lies, Damned Lies, And Banks: Deutsche Bank Caught Again
Deutsche Bank, long coddled by the German government, is mired in “matters” from Libor rate-rigging to carbon-trading tax-fraud. Now a new “matter” seeped out: the bank had known for years about the impact of commodities speculation on food prices and the havoc it wreaked on people in poor countries. And it lied about it to the German Parliament.
What If Germany Gets Bogged Down Too? Or Has It Already?
by Wolf Richter • • Comments Off on What If Germany Gets Bogged Down Too? Or Has It Already?
By Midyear, Europe ‘Can No Longer Live With This Euro’
by Wolf Richter • • Comments Off on By Midyear, Europe ‘Can No Longer Live With This Euro’
“I’m sitting on cash,” Felix Zulauf said when he was asked in an interview where he was putting his money. With decades of asset management experience under his belt, he’d founded Zulauf Asset Management in Switzerland in 1990. But now he was worried—and has turned negative on just about everything.
Budget Hawks Till Something Gets Cut In Their Districts
by Wolf Richter • • Comments Off on Budget Hawks Till Something Gets Cut In Their Districts
“Preventing future acts of terrorism” is the most critical foreign-policy goal for Americans. Next: proliferation of nuclear weapons, energy supply, trade policies, etc. Fighting off Soviet tanks rumbling towards Frankfurt didn’t make the list. Yet Congress, in its infinite wisdom, is still pushing weapons designed to do just that, whether the Pentagon wants them or not.
‘They Tell The French Illusions and Lies.’
by Wolf Richter • • Comments Off on ‘They Tell The French Illusions and Lies.’
France is in upheaval. Arguments erupt live on TV, demonstrations block the streets, strikes shut down plants, and threats of mayhem are part of the show. The problem: an economy where businesses are suffocating under an obese public sector. Ever larger budgets have been the only source of economic growth. But now that model has run aground.
What Ferrari’s Glorious Results Tell Us About The World
by Wolf Richter • • Comments Off on What Ferrari’s Glorious Results Tell Us About The World
The announcement couldn’t have been more glorious in crisis-struck Italy: Ferrari booked records sales and profits in 2012. Dazzling in every aspect. Not a single cloud darkened the horizon. Except in Italy where sales collapsed. And in the rest of the world, where central-bank printer ink stained the records.
Facebook, Coolest Cutest Corporate Welfare Queen Of Them All
by Wolf Richter • • Comments Off on Facebook, Coolest Cutest Corporate Welfare Queen Of Them All
Last year, the government extracted $1.1 trillion in taxes from us individual taxpayers. But now it will pay, along with the states, $429 million of our taxes to the coolest Silicon-Valley beauty queen: Facebook. In net tax refunds! Part of a vast package of juicy corporate welfare programs. Facebook isn’t just hogging our data; it’s gobbling up our money.