Our financial system is crumbling this week.

[Freed Roger]

Puerto Rico - America's Greece

I see a lot this Puerto Rican bonds in wealthy investors portfolios. They can take the hit. The US ties with PR may be a big drag though. Tax-haven Paradise Lost

[pioneer98]

If these guys are right, China is undertaking an intervention in their economy that will drawf TARP:

http://qz.com/445477/to-save-its-stock- ... m-at-risk/

In recent days, the Chinese government unfurled a series of measures to stop its stock markets’ free-fall the scale of which has never before been seen. It is essentially giving investors a “Xi Jinping put,” as Joyce Poon of Gavekal Dragonomics calls it (referring to Mario Draghi’s European Central Bank put) in a note today—meaning, the government is assuring investors it will do what it has to to keep the market aloft.

The measures stanched the bleeding a bit today (July 6); Shanghai Composite closed up 2.4%. However, much more is at stake than hitting numbers. Not only does the Xi Jinping put threaten to scuttle critical financial reforms; it also leaves China—and untold millions of its residents—in a bigger financial mess than ever.

China’s intervention is far bigger than TARP

First some perspective on this weekend’s activities. The most important of the salmagundi of actions is the security regulator’s promise of an initial 120 billion yuan ($19.3 billion) via 21 brokerages to stabilize the market, alongside the People’s Bank of China’s agreement to provide liquidity support for the margin-trading clearinghouse—what David Cui, strategist at Bank of America/Merrill Lynch, says might be its first step toward becoming the ailing market’s buyer of last resort.

The government also vowed to make sure the Shanghai Composite hits 4,500. The scope of this gambit is breathtaking, says Anne Stevenson-Yang, founder of J Capital Research. She notes that analysts comparing China’s current rescue efforts to Troubled Asset Relieve Program, the US government’s 2008 bank bailout package, miss the fact that TARP rescued operating companies, not a stock index. “[TARP] focused on the viability of operating companies, not the optics that a speculative derivative of the economy represented.”

[GeddyWrox]

China rigging their market can't be good long term.

[AWvsCBsteeeerike3]

So....anonymous is claiming they hacked the NYSE and caused it to shut down today? I think.

[IMADreamer]

I really don't buy that.

[AWvsCBsteeeerike3]

They sent a cryptic tweet last night about the nyse having a bad day today. So...there's that. Take it fwiw

[pioneer98]

Worth a watch:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/20 ... et-culture

[pioneer98]

The Disastrous Loan Deal That Shows Wall Street Still Has a Wild West

JPMorgan Chase & Co. knew federal authorities were investigating the largest drug-testing lab in the U.S.

But the New York-based bank didn’t share that information about Millennium Health LLC with the people who were about to lend the company $1.8 billion in April 2014 because Millennium said it wasn’t material, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter.

The case of Millennium is the latest example of the pitfalls in a market where no one regulates trading.

For its part, Millennium said the probe was disclosed to all “pertinent parties” at the time and was also cited in media reports and legal filings, according to Nicole Beckstrand, the company’s spokeswoman. Yet nothing about the probe, such as its potential impact on Millennium’s finances, was included in the official document that JPMorgan used to market the loan, four people with direct knowledge of the matter said.

[AWvsCBsteeeerike3]

If these guys are right, China is undertaking an intervention in their economy that will drawf TARP:

http://qz.com/445477/to-save-its-stock- ... m-at-risk/

In recent days, the Chinese government unfurled a series of measures to stop its stock markets’ free-fall the scale of which has never before been seen. It is essentially giving investors a “Xi Jinping put,” as Joyce Poon of Gavekal Dragonomics calls it (referring to Mario Draghi’s European Central Bank put) in a note today—meaning, the government is assuring investors it will do what it has to to keep the market aloft.

The measures stanched the bleeding a bit today (July 6); Shanghai Composite closed up 2.4%. However, much more is at stake than hitting numbers. Not only does the Xi Jinping put threaten to scuttle critical financial reforms; it also leaves China—and untold millions of its residents—in a bigger financial mess than ever.

China’s intervention is far bigger than TARP

First some perspective on this weekend’s activities. The most important of the salmagundi of actions is the security regulator’s promise of an initial 120 billion yuan ($19.3 billion) via 21 brokerages to stabilize the market, alongside the People’s Bank of China’s agreement to provide liquidity support for the margin-trading clearinghouse—what David Cui, strategist at Bank of America/Merrill Lynch, says might be its first step toward becoming the ailing market’s buyer of last resort.

The government also vowed to make sure the Shanghai Composite hits 4,500. The scope of this gambit is breathtaking, says Anne Stevenson-Yang, founder of J Capital Research. She notes that analysts comparing China’s current rescue efforts to Troubled Asset Relieve Program, the US government’s 2008 bank bailout package, miss the fact that TARP rescued operating companies, not a stock index. “[TARP] focused on the viability of operating companies, not the optics that a speculative derivative of the economy represented.”

China is a very curious situation.

[greenback44]

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/08/03/the-greek-warrior

Varoufakis recalled that Schäuble seemed “very cross,” and said, “When there’s a program that everybody has agreed to, that’s it. Elections cannot change anything, because, then, every time there’s an election everything will change.” (A spokesperson for the German finance ministry said, “Meetings of Eurogroup finance ministers are confidential.”) As Varoufakis put it to me, the idea that elections could change nothing was the “greatest gift one could give to the Chinese Communist Party.” That’s overheated, of course, and democratic governments tend to respect the binding agreements signed by their predecessors. But it was interesting, at Brookings, to hear Schäuble say that “France would be happy if someone could force” its parliament to pass unpopular labor-market reforms. It wasn’t quite clear what Schäuble meant by “France,” if it was neither its people nor its parliament.

This article is nominally about Varoufakis, but it crosses a line into something more universal. It reads like something from Kafka's "The Castle", but while Kafka basically presents the world as is, Parker is explaining to some extent why some folks have set up such a ridiculous system. The lack of transparency is a feature, not a bug.