Highway to a Cashless,

[Ross]

Negative Nominal Interest Rates:
Highway to a Cashless,
Statist Hell

I warned about this in part two of my 2.5 hour Economics Video Presentation back in November of ARSH 2012, and, sure enough, it has now happened.  Because, as I have been saying all along, for anyone who knows ANYTHING about ANYTHING having to do with economics, finance and/or banking, and who does not have their brain bucket completely and firmly inserted up their rectal vault, it is obvious what is happening and how the chain of events will unfold.  If a mouthy broad with a mere bachelor's degree in animal husbandry from a land-grant university can see this stuff coming years in advance, what excuse do your so-called leaders and media "experts" have?   Oh, yeah.  I forgot.  They're all either teetering on the precipice of mental retardation, or are black-hearted psychopath whores.  Or, as with Nancy Pelosi and countless others, both.

Mario Draghi, chief psychopath of the European Central Bank went full-stupid on June 5th and announced mandated NEGATIVE INTEREST RATES on the excess reserves of European banks held and the European Central Bank  (which is the equivalent of the Federal Reserve Bank in the U.S.).  What does this mean?  It means that when a European commercial bank deposits excess cash reserves with the ECB, the commercial bank must PAY the ECB to store that money.  The commercial bank does not earn any interest income on that money, it in fact has a percentage of its deposit CONFISCATED from its account every month by the ECB.

As you can see in the article linked above and countless others, the publicly stated rationale behind this negative interest rate paradigm is "stimulus".  If the banks have to pay to store cash, they will instead lend their excess cash out to customers rather than have a percentage  confiscated every month.  This is utter bee-ess on multiple levels.  These top-tier central bankers know that negative interest rates have NOTHING to do with stimulus, and will, in fact, lead to exactly the opposite.  In fact, they know that the inevitable outcome of negative interest rates is the complete nationalization of the banking sector and total governmental control of all capital flows – which means today a CASHLESS ECONOMY.  Yup.  If you're interested, I'll walk you through the chain of events and differentiate between the propaganda that will be used to justify this evil and the reality of how the world actually works.

Banks today are sitting on huge cash reserves because the economy sucks and banks have rightly discerned that lending money into a sucky economy is NOT IN THEIR BEST INTERESTS.  If the economy sucks, then lending money to Joe Schmoe to start a business is likely going to end up in default.  So, if YOU were a bank and your choice was between losing one percent by depositing money at the Central Bank at negative interest, or losing FIFTEEN percent on your loan portfolio because the economy sucks and a high percentage of your borrowers would default on their loans, which would you do?  Well, duh.  You would opt for the SMALLER loss of ONLY one percent, and you would continue to hold cash reserves and be VERY stingy with your loan portfolio.

Okay.  That's easy to understand, right?  Well, the propaganda coming from the Banksters and willingly regurgitated by the useful idiot class is that negative interest rates will absolutely, positively result in increased lending by banks and thus "economic stimulus".  And bear in mind, they have been bleating EXACTLY the same line of crap in regards to "quantitative easing".  They have been saying for YEARS that all of the money printing done by the Federal Reserve and European Central Bank would provide "stimulus" in the form of increased lending.  And, as we all know, that didn't happen.  All that has happened is that the Banksters have taken the "new money" printed by the Central Banks and pumped it into the stock and derivatives markets, thus blowing a massive, unprecedented bubble.  But Joe Schmoe still can't get a loan to open a business.  The evil, malignant Banksters KNOW that the whole stimulus meme is a lie.  The useful idiots are so indescribably stupid that they can't comprehend simple logical progressions even when they have a current experiential dataset right in front of their faces that clearly demonstrates the fallacy: not only does QE and other forms of synthetic "liquidity boosting" NOT stimulate the economy, it actually depresses it even more.

So now banks will be even more incentivized to offload cash by plowing it into relatively "safe" paper that has a higher interest yield than the negative rate at the Central Bank.  What does this imply?  Increased demand for Sovereign debt (bonds issued by nations), and derivatives on Sovereign debt.  Now here is where it gets positively sick.  Very soon, banks will be able to borrow money from the "discount window" at the Central Bank at either zero, or at a NEGATIVE rate.  Think about that.  The Central Bank, because the interest rate is negative, actually pays banks to borrow money from them.  And this utter PERVERSITY is the root of the whole satanic mess.  The first mover in all of this is the evil, perverse Central Bank.  The Central Banks are completely content to pay banks to borrow money – a perversity – because the Central Bank doesn't give a shit.  It can just "PRINT" as much money as it "needs".  And, as we have discussed at length, the "printing" of money, money being a proxy for the human capacity to labor and create through time, is simply the leveraging of HUMAN LIFE, specifically at this late hour not just the life of every man, woman and child alive today OUTSIDE the oligarch class, but now generations upon generations of human beings who DO NOT YET EXIST, and are thus utterly powerless to object or mount a counter-revolt.

Okay, so now Bank A goes to the discount window and borrows "new money" from the Central Bank at NEGATIVE one percent, which means the loans generates a yield TO THE BORROWER.  Then, Bank A turns around and plows that money, which is already generating a yield in and of itself, into French Sovereign bonds that yield 1.5%.  Bank A does this because it is certain that France will never be allowed to default – the Central Bank will just keep printing money and printing money to keep France (or any other country) from defaulting on its debt.  So, What is the total yield to Bank A?  The one percent yield on the money borrowed at negative interest from the Central Bank, PLUS the 1.5% yield on the French bonds = +2.5%.  Do you see why this dynamic INCREASES DEAMND for sovereign debt?  It incentivizes governments not to PAY DOWN their debt, but to in fact EXPAND their balance sheets by going deeper into debt.  And because the demand for sovereign debt is increased because there is more money chasing after it, the interest rates are driven DOWN (a lower interest rate is the same thing as higher price on bonds), and thus the politicians tell the people that not only is more government debt good, it is extremely good because "the interest rate is so low".  And the glassy-eyed sheeple nod passively and return to their tee-vee shows.

This will also increase demand for derivatives on sovereign debt (i.e. repurchase agreements and credit default swaps), again, because the banks are quite confident that the Central Banks will never permit a sovereign default.  And who, pray tell, are the main counterparties on almost all sovereign debt derivatives?   J.P. Morgan, Goldman Sachs and Deutschebank.  Uh-huh.  And where do ALL of the people come from who populate the Central Banks, both in the U.S. and in Europe?  J.P. Morgan, Goldman Sachs and Deutschebank. Uh-huh.

Kids, this isn't terribly complicated.  Really.

Now, to YOU, the people who PAY FOR ALL OF THIS.

Negative interest rates will be a cost to YOU is two ways.  First, the obvious: you will have a confiscatory tax levied on your bank deposits every month – that's what a negative interest rate is, sweetie.  It is a TAX on the PEOPLE, NOT the banks, because the banks will pass through to the customers the cost for the bank to store reserves at the Central Banks PLUS a margin.  Next, in an economy that is perceived to be relatively stronger or safer (of which the former United States is still at the top of the list because of its size, both economically and militarily) capital will flow IN to that economy, thus causing ASSET BUBBLES and CONSUMER PRICE INFLATION.  Been to the grocery store lately?  Looked into buying any farm ground lately?  Uh-huh.  So when consumer prices inflate, what do banks do to interest rates in order to cover the resulting increased risk in lending to consumers who now are having a much more difficult time making ends meet?  Yep.  They RAISE interest rates to borrowers.  And so therefore a negative interest rate at the Central Bank not only does not stimulate the economy, it increases the contraction and deepens the depression (because let's face it, if your economy is at the point that the Central Bank is going NEGATIVE on interest rates, honey, yo' ass is already in a DEPRESSION, not a recession).

Now to the big ugly.  Since the Central Bank is, despite any and all lying propaganda to the contrary, a government entity backed fully by the government and thus ultimately backed by the people, and since the Sovereign bond market is also a pure function of the government and thus ultimately backed by the people, when banks receive payment on both their capital borrowed from the Central Bank at negative interest AND receive a positive interest yield on their government bond holdings, that means that THE PEOPLE are PAYING THE BANKS... ON BOTH SIDES.

This is a backdoor way of confiscating collateral from the people and using it to RECAPITALIZE THE BANKS.  And also pay the bankster oligarchs' eight and nine-figure salaries and compensation packages, which, let's be honest, is their top priority. 

So now you may be thinking that this will cause a feedback loop to occur and rates will continue to be driven more and more negative.  Yes.  Absolutely.  Because the Central Bank will have to keep adjusting its rate down to stay "more negative" than the Sovereign bond and other money markets.  What happens when customer deposit rates go sufficiently negative so as to compel normal people to withdraw their cash from the banks and hold it in cash?  The answer is, the oligarchs will enact government policies outlawing the use of cash.  Think I'm crazy?  Have you tried paying your car insurance bill with cash lately?  Cash.  As in hundred dollar bills.  How about your phone or utility bill?  Guess what.  You can't.

One of the big reasons why I had to move into the "Van Down by the River" was because I simply COULD NOT FUNCTION using cash.  When I was foreclosed upon because I could not provide the bank with a tax return (because I have declared a tax strike), I began investigating possible rental scenarios in preparing to move.  Kids, you CANNOT rent an apartment "above the table", pay the utilities on said apartment, insure a vehicle and scores of other necessary expenses in the former U.S. using cash today.  Between IRS liens and mortgage foreclosures, my credit score is destroyed, which also disqualifies above-board rental.  If you think that cash controls and the move to outlaw the use of cash is crazytalk, just stop and think about all of the myriad ways that IT IS ALREADY IMPOSSIBLE to pay with cash.  We're already 75% of the way there.

So, there would be increased economic depression causing new lending to crater and thus squeezing commercial banks' margins and causing them to demand a way to dump ALL consumer debt, including business loans, car loans and credit cards, off on the government in the form of guarantees (this is precisely what already happened in the real estate market with almost all mortgages being bundled and dumped onto Fannie and Freddie).  Couple this with the confiscatory tax on deposits AND the paying of banks to borrow from the discount window by the government (aka the people) in order to recapitalize the banks, and what you have is nothing less than the COMPLETE NATIONALIZATION OF THE BANKING SECTOR.  This will inevitably require the outlawing of sovereign currency (cash), which will inevitably lead to the REJECTION of the sovereign currency, and the emergence of a "black" alternative.  We are talking, ladies and gentlemen, about nothing less that the final, complete destruction of the economy, which will inevitably lead to the total collapse of the extant government and what scattered vestiges remain of the Rule of Law.

This, and nothing less than this, has been, is, and will continue to be the explicit goal of the oligarchy that has already overthrown the former United States.  This is part and parcel of the Cloward Piven Strategy.  And it is all happening RIGHT NOW, and given the ignorance and cowardice of the broad populace will not be stopped excluding supernatural intervention, of which we are utterly undeserving.  Get ready, and don't you dare say you weren't warned.  And please, spare me any droolingly stupid emails telling me how lending money at interest is evil.  A positive interest rate is ESSENTIAL.  What is immoral, and what actually constitutes the lion's share of USURY, is UNSECURED lending with no collateral against it.  Well, actually there IS collateral against an unsecured loan:  the future LIFE and productive capacity of the borrower.  THAT is usury.  All Central Bank money printing is therefore USURIOUS because, as we discussed above, it is simply the leveraging of the lives of the people, both present AND future, who comprise the sovereign entity that backs the money of said nationstate.  In other words:  YOU and your descendants for multiple generations hence.

I hope this helps you understand the utterly critical and thoroughly evil concept of negative interest rates.

http://www.barnhardt.biz/2014/06/26/negative-nominal-interest-rates-highway-to-a-cashless-statist-hell/

[Ross]

I didn't see this when it was posted, think it fits nicely with the above story.

Posted  June 6, 2010 - 12:00am 

Obama's agenda:
Overwhelm the system

Rahm Emanuel cynically said, "You never want a crisis to go to waste." It is now becoming clear that the crisis he was referring to is Barack Obama's presidency.

Obama is no fool. He is not incompetent. To the contrary, he is brilliant. He knows exactly what he's doing. He is purposely overwhelming the U.S. economy to create systemic failure, economic crisis and social chaos -- thereby destroying capitalism and our country from within.Â

Barack Obama is my college classmate (Columbia University, class of '83). As Glenn Beck correctly predicted from day one, Obama is following the plan of Cloward & Piven, two professors at Columbia University. They outlined a plan to socialize America by overwhelming the system with government spending and entitlement demands. Add up the clues below. Taken individually they're alarming. Taken as a whole, it is a brilliant, Machiavellian game plan to turn the United States into a socialist/Marxist state with a permanent majority that desperately needs government for survival ... and can be counted on to always vote for bigger government. Why not? They have no responsibility to pay for it.

-- Universal health care. The health care bill had very little to do with health care. It had everything to do with unionizing millions of hospital and health care workers, as well as adding 15,000 to 20,000 new IRS agents (who will join government employee unions). Obama doesn't care that giving free health care to 30 million Americans will add trillions to the national debt. What he does care about is that it cements the dependence of those 30 million voters to Democrats and big government. Who but a socialist revolutionary would pass this reckless spending bill in the middle of a depression?

-- Cap and trade. Like health care legislation having nothing to do with health care, cap and trade has nothing to do with global warming. It has everything to do with redistribution of income, government control of the economy and a criminal payoff to Obama's biggest contributors. Those powerful and wealthy unions and contributors (like GE, which owns NBC, MSNBC and CNBC) can then be counted on to support everything Obama wants. They will kick-back hundreds of millions of dollars in contributions to Obama and the Democratic Party to keep them in power. The bonus is that all the new taxes on Americans with bigger cars, bigger homes and businesses helps Obama "spread the wealth around."

-- Make Puerto Rico a state. Why? Who's asking for a 51st state? Who's asking for millions of new welfare recipients and government entitlement addicts in the middle of a depression? Certainly not American taxpayers. But this has been Obama's plan all along. His goal is to add two new Democrat senators, five Democrat congressman and a million loyal Democratic voters who are dependent on big government.

-- Legalize 12 million illegal immigrants. Just giving these 12 million potential new citizens free health care alone could overwhelm the system and bankrupt America. But it adds 12 million reliable new Democrat voters who can be counted on to support big government. Add another few trillion dollars in welfare, aid to dependent children, food stamps, free medical, education, tax credits for the poor, and eventually Social Security.

-- Stimulus and bailouts. Where did all that money go? It went to Democrat contributors, organizations (ACORN), and unions -- including billions of dollars to save or create jobs of government employees across the country. It went to save GM and Chrysler so that their employees could keep paying union dues. It went to AIG so that Goldman Sachs could be bailed out (after giving Obama almost $1 million in contributions). A staggering $125 billion went to teachers (thereby protecting their union dues). All those public employees will vote loyally Democrat to protect their bloated salaries and pensions that are bankrupting America. The country goes broke, future generations face a bleak future, but Obama, the Democrat Party, government, and the unions grow more powerful. The ends justify the means.

-- Raise taxes on small business owners, high-income earners, and job creators. Put the entire burden on only the top 20 percent of taxpayers, redistribute the income, punish success, and reward those who did nothing to deserve it (except vote for Obama). Reagan wanted to dramatically cut taxes in order to starve the government. Obama wants to dramatically raise taxes to starve his political opposition.

With the acts outlined above, Obama and his regime have created a vast and rapidly expanding constituency of voters dependent on big government; a vast privileged class of public employees who work for big government; and a government dedicated to destroying capitalism and installing themselves as socialist rulers by overwhelming the system.

Add it up and you've got the perfect Marxist scheme -- all devised by my Columbia University college classmate Barack Obama.

http://www.reviewjournal.com/opinion/obamas-agenda-overwhelm-system