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http://www.reuters.com/article/bondsNews/idUSN1946360420090619 Fri Jun 19, 2009 By David Lawder WASHINGTON, June 19 (Reuters) - A purported $134 billion in U.S. government bearer bond certificates seized by police near the Italian-Swiss border are fake, the U.S. Treasury said on Friday. "Based on the photograph we've seen online, they are clearly fake. And not even good fakes," said Stephen Meyerhardt, a spokesman for the Treasury's Bureau of the Public Debt. He added that there is only $105 million in Treasury bearer bond securities outstanding, so the $134 billion amount seized far exceeds the universe of outstanding securites. The Treasury's determination confirmed the suspicions...

Milan (AsiaNews) – Four weeks have passed since American bonds were confiscated from two Japanese who were travelling on a direct train to Chiasso, Switzerland, and while there has been clarification of some points, very few, Italian authorities have remained silent on the rest of the episode. In addition, a strange coincidence in the timing of the arrest of a director of an internet radio who had made revelations regarding the incident increases the already strong oddities surrounding the case. This added to the revaluation of the fact that among the evidence seized there were "Kennedy Bond" all points toward...

Ever since two middle-aged men with Japanese passports were caught in Italy this month trying to smuggle a purported $134.5 billion in United States government bearer bonds into Switzerland, the Internet has been abuzz with theories. Was the Japanese government, or some other creditor nation, secretly trying to dump Treasury bonds to drive down the value of the dollar? Had the Italian mafia stolen the equivalent of 1 percent of the American gross domestic product, using the paper, which supposedly was instantly convertible into cash, to run a giant scam? Adding spice was the whole Bond — James Bond —...

Rough translation by a softwareIn suitcase 134 billion fake bond: mystery on two Asian stopped at Chiasso ROME (22 June) - Remains fixed the mystery on two Asian pecked past June 4 to Chiasso from the revenue Officer while wanted to enter in Switzerland with in suitcase fake U.S. bonds of the value of 134 miiardi of dollars (about 100 billion euro), more or except for the gross domestic product of the New Zealand. The U.S. Treasury had not doubtful: the titles of U.S. credit for a nominal value of 134 billion dollars - 249 bond of the Federal Reserve...

ROME — Two Japanese nationals were detained by Italian financial police last week after trying to enter Switzerland with $134 billion worth of undeclared U.S. bonds, mostly Treasury bonds, an Italian daily said Wednesday. The Japanese consulate general in Milan confirmed that the detention had taken place and said it was trying to confirm with Italian authorities whether the two were indeed Japanese nationals and their identities. According to the report in il Giornale, two unidentified Japanese in their 50s concealed the bonds, including 249 U.S. Treasury bonds each worth $500 million, in a suitcase with a false bottom that...

Well, just when you thought that the Bearer Bond story was finished, it gets twisted yet again. Remember, this was the claim: “They’re clearly fakes,” said Stephen Meyerhardt, a spokesman for the U.S. Bureau of the Public Debt in Washington. Uh, Bloomberg..... how about an accurate quote? "Based on the photograph we've seen online, they are clearly fake. And not even good fakes," said Stephen Meyerhardt, a spokesman for the Treasury's Bureau of the Public Debt. Online? You mean that the Treasury Department hasn't been sent a high-resolution digital photo of what was seized? A week after the fact? I...

One summer afternoon, two “Japanese” men in their 50s on a slow train from Italy to Switzerland said they had nothing to declare at the frontier point of Chiasso. But in a false bottom of one of their suitcases, Italian customs officers and ministry of finance police discovered a staggering $134bn (€97bn, £82bn) in US Treasury bills.

Good morning America! On June 3, either an attempted attack on the economy of the U.S. on an unprecedented scale was narrowly averted--or a criminal conspiracy involving the U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve that would legitimize the most radical of globalist conspiracies of all time--was exposed. In either event, a deliberate media blackout was employed in the U.S. When news of the event gained traction in the foreign media, the U.S. media was compelled to report it as well, but only after facts could be changed and damage control employed by the highest levels of the U.S. government, aided and...

MILAN, June 18 (Reuters) - Italy has asked U.S. authorities to check the authenticity of what appear to be U.S. government bonds worth $134 billion seized near the Swiss border, a senior Italian tax police officer said on Thursday. Early in June, Italy's Guardia di Finanza, or tax police, said they had seized the U.S. bonds from two Japanese nationals at the Chiasso rail station in the north of Italy close to the frontier with Switzerland.

Today’s Notes reads more like a John le Carre novel than an investment newsletter. But bear with us. It tracks one of the most fascinating news stories you’ve never heard of. The news reports are maddeningly sketchy. And the mainstream media is doing a damn good job of not reporting the story. But it’s clear the arrests by Italian authorities of two “Japanese-looking” men allegedly attempting to smuggle $134.5 billion worth of US bearer bonds across the Swiss border is the biggest financial crime in history. And one with major implications for America’s economic security. For those of you who...

Check out the article on Drudge. There's a bloomberg story (can't post it due to rules) saying two men had a suitcase filled with 134 billion in US government bonds they were taking out of Italy. That would make them the fourth largest creditors of the US govt, and it's a big problem if they are real . . . or if they are fake.

A reporter is sent to Italy to learn more about the bond smuggling story. But nobody knows where the two men are. At least the Japanese press is sitll interested in story of the two Japanese men caugh withs ome $134.5 billion in (presumably fake) US bearer bonds. We can't read Japanese, and Google Translate isn't particularly helpful, but a reader informs us that the gist of this story is that a newspaper sent a reporter to Como, Italy and found that the men had been released, with their whereabouts unknown. Now, the easiest, most-benign explanation for this whole thing...

According to Japan Today, two Japanese nationals were detained by Italian financial police last week after trying to enter Switzerland with $134 billion worth of undeclared U.S. bonds, mostly Treasury bonds, an Italian daily said Wednesday. The Japanese consulate general in Milan confirmed that the detention had taken place and said it was trying to confirm with Italian authorities whether the two were indeed Japanese nationals and their identities. According to the report in il Giornale, two unidentified Japanese in their 50s concealed the bonds, including 249 U.S. Treasury bonds each worth $500 million, in a suitcase with a false...

ROME — Two Japanese nationals were detained by Italian financial police last week after trying to enter Switzerland with $134 billion worth of undeclared U.S. bonds, mostly Treasury bonds, an Italian daily said Wednesday. The Japanese consulate general in Milan confirmed that the detention had taken place and said it was trying to confirm with Italian authorities whether the two were indeed Japanese nationals and their identities. According to the report in il Giornale, two unidentified Japanese in their 50s concealed the bonds, including 249 U.S. Treasury bonds each worth $500 million, in a suitcase with a false bottom that...

It just gets more and more odd after my original report, with the latest coming from a German newspaper (translation courtesy of Google): Hit for the Zöllner: The contraband securities valued at 134 billion U.S. dollars are apparently real. Die italienische Finanzpolizei hatte zwei Japaner ertappt, die im doppelten Boden eines Koffers milliardenschwere Anleihen in die Schweiz schaffen wollten. The Italian financial police had two Japanese caught in the false bottom suitcase billion-dollar bonds in Switzerland wanted to create. Von dem Fund profitiert das hochverschuldete Italien. Note that this has received very little coverage in the so-called "mainstream US media"...

Fox's Glenn Beck is the first mainstream outlet to pick up on this intriguing story Surprise surprise. Fox News is the only "mainstream" US news outlet to be interested in the story of the $134.5 billion in (probably fake) bonds that were seized in Italy. Host Glenn Beck had us on to talk about the story, and they even got the first quote from the Treasury.

Two Japanese citizens carrying $134 billion worth of U.S. bonds were detained last week by Italy's financial police at Chiasso (40km from Milan) on the border between Italy and Switzerland, an Italian daily said Wednesday. According to the report, they include 249 U.S. Treasury bonds each worth $500 million, plus 10 Kennedy bonds and other U.S. government securities worth a billion dollar each. The two unidentified Japanese citizen were searched on June 3 when they were in Chiasso. They were detained on suspicion of attempting to take a large amount of securities out of Italy without declaring it. The bonds...

Milan (AsiaNews) – Italy’s financial police (Guardia italiana di Finanza) has seized US bonds worth US 134.5 billion from two Japanese nationals at Chiasso (40 km from Milan) on the border between Italy and Switzerland. They include 249 US Federal Reserve bonds worth US$ 500 million each, plus ten Kennedy bonds and other US government securities worth a billion dollar each. Italian authorities have not yet determined whether they are real or fake, but if they are real the attempt to take them into Switzerland would be the largest financial smuggling operation in history; if they are fake, the matter...

Bloomberg can't be excerpted. The link is below. Good roundup of what is known about this very interesting and very murky situation.

So far as I can tell the only Bloomberg among all US MSM have published any news reports on the $135 billion of US bearer bonds being smuggled by two Japanese businessmen from Italy into Switzerland. This story has raised many interesting and important questions, to which there have been no answers yet. But there is another interesting and important question I haven't seen discussed. Why, when major European and Japanese media have reported it, have none of the US MSM done so? I can think of only two reasons: 1) the story is now known to be only an...