Economy

(Reuters) – Moody’s Cuts Greece Government Ratings to Junk

Moody’s on Monday downgraded Greece government bond ratings into junk territory, citing the risks in the euro zone/IMF rescue package for the debt-laden country. Read More Here

(InfoClearingHouse) – Bulging Inventory Signals Next Leg Down in Housing – Mike Whitney

Did the Federal Reserve collude with the big banks to hold millions of houses off the market until the Fed finished adding $1.25 trillion to the banks reserves? Did the Fed do this to make it appear that its bond purchasing plan (quantitative easing) was stabilizing prices when, in fact, it was the reduction in supply that stopped prices from plunging? It sure looks that way. This is from Bloomberg News: Read More Here

(HuffingtonPost) – “Dr. Death Says The U.S. Is Really, Really Sick.”

According to Roubini, for the US, the second half of 2010 will be worse than the first. US industrial capacity has fallen from 70 to 65%. Restocking depleted inventories is complete.

The United States, 25% of the global economy, can’t rein in its spending or cut debt. President George Bush inherited a surplus and went on to create the biggest deficit in US history (excepting WWII). Now, President Barack Obama is making matters worse by piling on more unsustainable debt. Read More Here

(DailyBell) – Doug Casey Revisits the Greater Depression and Explains the Realities of Investing in the 21st Century – Read More Here

(MoneyNews) – Volcker Warns: We Are Running Out Of Time

America is running out of time to fix its huge economic and fiscal problems, warns former Fed chair Paul Volcker, who now heads a financial advisory board to President Obama.

“Restoring our fiscal position . . . sorting out a reasonable approach toward limiting carbon omissions, and producing domestic energy without unacceptable environmental risks all take time,” Volcker writes in The New York Review of Books. Read More Here

(MarketWatch) – Bearish Schultz says hyperinflation may happen suddenly

Commentary: Crash-predicting letter says recovery might not come until 2028 Read More Here

(WPost) – Obama pleads for $50 billion in state, local aid

President Obama urged reluctant lawmakers Saturday to quickly approve nearly $50 billion in emergency aid to state and local governments, saying the money is needed to avoid “massive layoffs of teachers, police and firefighters” and to support the still-fragile economic recovery. Read More Here

(Bloomberg) – Economy in U.S. Slows as States Lose Federal Stimulus Funds – Read More Here

(PaulWatson) – Central Bank Hid Housing Market Crash Forecast

New revelations concerning how the Irish Central Bank hid data in a 2006 report indicating that a housing market crash was imminent underscores once again how financial elites covered-up signs of the coming economic turmoil in order to exploit the crisis at the expense of the people.

Months before the Irish housing market started to crumble in early 2007, which was followed by a wider collapse in the UK property market, the Irish Central Bank buried data from a crucial report which suggested that a 15 per cent fall in house prices was around the corner.

Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Monday, June 14, 2010

“It was decided in 2006 to exclude from the main text of the report data and references to a likely 15 per cent house price overvaluation that was contained in a themed research paper,” states Professor Patrick Honohan’s report.

The Central Bank refused to release the minutes of the meeting where the report was discussed but then “deliberately” left out of the final review document.

The story mimics elements of how Goldman Sachs were secretly betting against the U.S. housing market in 2006 and 2007 while peddling to its clients more than $40 billion in securities backed by at least 200,000 risky home mortgages.

As Greg Gordon of McClatchy Newspapers reported last year, the clandestine move,”enabled the nation’s premier investment bank to pass most of its potential losses to others before a flood of mortgage defaults staggered the U.S. and global economies.”

According to a report by the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, Goldman Sachs made billions betting on a housing market collapse, not just through its short positions against the mortgage market, but “also against securities that Goldman Sachs had assembled and marketed to its customers”.

The Goldman cover-up, allied with new revelations of how the Irish Central Bank similarly conducted itself, goes right to the heart of how financial elites were aware of the imminent economic crisis and positioned themselves fully to exploit it while leaving millions of unwitting homeowners to pick up the tab as the value of their assets shrunk and their houses entered negative equity.

Source: PrisonPlanet