Free Republic

While elites around the world – those in political power and in control of top financial institutions – are very much rallying around the plans to introduce central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), in Florida, the state's governor has a different take on where things should be headed. In fact, radically different – Governor Ron DeSantis thinks CBDCs should be banned. Addressing a press conference from behind a podium that had the words “Big Brother's Digital Dollar” attached to it, DeSantis repeated what critics of the CBDC push keep saying. And that is, that the centralized form of digital money controlled...

The next logical step is for the government to insure all bank deposits, which is tantamount to nationalizing the entire banking system. But to what end? A collection of seemingly random crises can spell out a sinister “conspiracy theory” when you consider their connections and where they are leading. An overplayed plot? Perhaps, but how many so-called conspiracy theories have proven to be reality recently? First, the world economy shut down with the COVID lockdown. Manufacturing stopped and capital construction projects were put on hold. No one was making anything, and consumers were buying very little. The government injected huge...

Credit Suisse Group AG said it would borrow up to 50 billion Swiss francs, equivalent to $53.7 billion, from the Swiss central bank to shore up its liquidity, capping a day in which fears about the health of global banks leapfrogged to Europe from North America and the giant lender’s shares dropped as much as 24%. The bank also said it would repurchase $3 billion worth of senior debt whose value has plunged along with the perceived health of banks on both sides of the Atlantic. The Zurich firm stressed in a press release issued in the evening in New...

Federal Reserve announces July launch for the FedNow Service For release at 5:00 p.m. EDT Share The Service will Debut with Financial Institutions and the U.S. Treasury on Board CHICAGO – The Federal Reserve announced that the FedNow Service will start operating in July and provided details on preparations for launch. The first week of April, the Federal Reserve will begin the formal certification of participants for launch of the service. Early adopters will complete a customer testing and certification program, informed by feedback from the FedNow Pilot Program, to prepare for sending live transactions through the system. Certification encompasses...

Rapidly rising food, housing, medical, and tuition prices are squeezing Americans, and many do not understand the real cause of their falling living standards...That confusion opens the door for opportunistic politicians who promise supposed freebies to ease the pain of inflation. Many, unfortunately, succumb to this siren’s call.Perverse as it is, the policies offered to people suffering from inflation create even more inflation. In other words, inflation has a way of perpetuating itself, much like a heroin addiction.We are already seeing cockamamie schemes in the US, like “inflation relief checks,” which attempt to solve the problems of inflation by creating...

In mid-November, while the whole world was focused on the Ukraine crisis, the US midterms or whatever other “big story” the media decided was more important, a truly momentous shift took place in the global financial system. It might seem like a small step on the surface, but it has the potential to bring about a real and possibly irreversible sea change in the way we use money; or better said, the way it uses us. As Reuters reported on the 15th of November, “Global banking giants are starting a 12-week digital dollar pilot with the Federal Reserve Bank of...

Once the government can control all money in America with the push of a button, anything approaching liberty is dead on arrival. When I first saw the acronym “CBDC,” I may have betrayed my California roots when I thought it was some new cannabis product that will join all the other CBD products sold everywhere, including at truck stops. I’m not so naïve now, and I know that CBDC, which stands for Central Bank Digital Currency, is possibly the most dangerous idea ever bandied about in American politics. The plan is that the federal government would end paper and coin...

The head of the National Bank of Ukraine has been charged in the case of the Ukrgasbank funds embezzlement. This was reported by the Specialized Anti-corruption Prosecutor’s Office, according to Ukrinform As noted, the detectives of the National Anti-corruption Bureau of Ukraine exposed the illegal operations of the state-owned JSC Ukrgasbank officials, which led to losses in the amount of more than UAH 206 million. “To date, in the said criminal proceedings, five main culprits have been notified of suspicion, including the incumbent governor of the National Bank of Ukraine, as well as former and current high-ranking officials of banking...

The Central Bank of Russian Federation recently discussed using bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies for international settlement.Currently, the central bank holds that Russia should only use the assets for international settlement, not within Russia.The comments were made by the head of the central bank and oppose previous positions held by the monetary authority.Elvira Nabiullina, head of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, recently attended the St. Petersburg Economic Forum (SPIEF) where she commented on Russia’s use of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies for international trade, per a report from state-media outlet Kommersant."Our position is that cryptocurrency should not be used as...

Hacking group Anonymous has claimed an attack on Russia’s Central Bank. In a post on Twitter, an account representing the group said that it would release 35,000 files in 48 hours that apparently contains “secret agreements”. The account has not yet given proof that it had successfully undertaken the hack, or that it had access to the promised documents.

The Russian central bank said it will suspend the buying of gold from banks from Tuesday to meet increased demand for the precious metal from households, its latest attempt to weather the storm on Russian markets in the face of Western sanctions. "Currently, households' demand for buying physical gold in bars has increased, driven, in particular, by the abolition of value-added tax on these operations," the central bank said in a statement. The central bank raised the key rate to 20% from 9.5% on Feb. 28 as the rouble crashed to record lows and people rushed to withdraw money from...

The Central Bank of the Russian Federation announced on Sunday that several banks will switch to the Chinese card system following the suspension of Visa, Mastercard, and Paypal in Russia. It can be recalled that Visa, Mastercard, and Paypal announced on Saturday they will suspend all operations in Russia. “We are compelled to act following Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, and the unacceptable events that we have witnessed,” said Al Kelly, chairman and chief executive officer of Visa Inc. On Sunday, several banks in Russia will start to issue new cards with the new Russian payments system “Mir” and China’s...

People in Moscow and other Russian cities stormed ATMs and bank branches in search of cash, both in roubles and dollars, as they feared a collapse of the national currency and inability to use international payment systems. Queues of people seeking to withdraw foreign currencies started to form as early as Thursday morning, after the decision by Russia’s president Vladimir Putin to start a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, sending the rouble to its historic lows. A Financial Times reporter could witness that some branches of international banks ran out of US dollars by midday that day. -snip- “I withdrew money...

The eurozone’s annual price inflation rate hit 5 percent in December 2021 and (as of this writing) the consensus is for 5.1 percent in January 2022. Eurozone industrial producer prices were up 26.2 percent in 2021.This has been pressuring the European Central Bank (ECB) to adopt a tight monetary policy (or at least a less loose one). On February 3, the ECB announced its monetary policy decisions regarding the Pandemic Emergency Purchase Program (PEPP) and the Asset Purchase Program (APP), its asset purchase programs, and interest rates, with no major changes compared to the previous announcement in December.The Pandemic Emergency...

President Joe Biden is expected to choose Omarova to run the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, which supervises about 1,200 banks and federal savings associations, as soon as this week, sources told the news agency. Omarova, a Kazakhstan native, currently teaches law at Cornell University Law School. In her academic work, she has argued in favor of policies that would tighten banking regulations across the board and give government a larger role in supervising the financial system, such as restructuring the Federal Reserve. She also has argued the central bank should provide consumer bank accounts.

The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) will test the use of central bank digital currencies with Australia, Malaysia, Singapore and South Africa in an experiment that could lead to a more efficient global payments platform. Codenamed “Project Dunbar,” the study aims to develop prototypes for a common platform that will enable international settlement in digital fiat currencies issued by central banks, BIS said in a release Thursday. The system would allow direct transactions in central bank digital currencies, or CBDCs, between institutions, while reducing time and cost, according to BIS. Globally, central banks are trying to come to terms with...

Switzerland’s attorney-general is investigating allegations that Lebanon’s central bank governor and his brother embezzled more than $300m from that institution through transactions to a mysterious offshore company. “Since April 2002 at least, it appears the central bank governor, Riad Salame, with help from his brother, Raja Salame, organised embezzlement operations, . . . exceeding $300m to the detriment of the Banque du Liban [BdL],” the Swiss attorney-general’s office wrote in a letter to the Lebanese authorities requesting mutual legal assistance

Turkey’s currency tumbled 9% on Monday, putting it on course for its biggest single-day selloff since 2018, following the abrupt ouster of the central bank governor last week. The lira fell to as low as 8.280 a dollar from 7.219, before regaining some ground to trade at about 7.9312 a dollar, according to FactSet. Turkey’s stocks also plunged. The turmoil comes after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday unexpectedly fired Naci Agbal, the central bank governor who had repeatedly raised interest rates in an effort to tame inflation since his appointment in November. Foreign investors say the move renewed concerns...

As expected, China's central bank came in today to stop the bloodletting in the markets following Monday's shocking after-market announcement by the Treasury Department that the Bank was manipulating the dollar-yuan exchange rate. Animal spirits went into near-giddyness in the market after hours Monday, thinking Treasury would deliver a blow to China assets this morning. China ended up doing better than expected, thanks in part to the actions of the central bank, led by Yi Gang. The People's Bank of China announced on Tuesday that it would provide some stability in the coming weeks to the yuan. They'll take about...

Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson provided the House Intelligence Committee with no evidence to support the allegations from the infamous Steele dossier, the salacious document that his firm commissioned while on the payroll of the Clinton campaign and DNC.But Simpson did offer some new information in the Nov. 14 testimony, a transcript of which was released by the Intelligence Committee on Thursday.Here are some fresh revelations from the 165-page transcript.Contacts with DOJ official Bruce Ohr Simpson made a jarring revelation in his House testimony. He disclosed for the first time that he met just after the election with Justice Department...