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Trading in the securities of Spanish lender Bankia has been suspended "due to circumstances that may affect the normal share trading," stock market regulator CNMV said on Friday. Bankia will ask the state for more than 15 billion euros ($19 billion) to bail it out when its new management team presents a restructuring plan on Friday, a financial sector source said late on Thursday.

Your credit card's been stolen- and the punk that  did it has been running hog-wild ever since Every American voter needs to see this stuff...  please help to drill reality into some of the thicker skulls within your own personal sphere from now until the election.  Just look at the charts, what's to debate unless you're talking to some hard-core, incurable Cloward-Pivenist?  We're doomed if we don't 86 this guy... period More at Reaganite Republican... RightChange  SodaHead   PoliticoMafioso   FinanceWand   Oddhammer.com One Conservative Voice   TownHall   DittoRush   The Roanoke Slant    TerrellAfterMath   Cartoon-a-Day   Two Minute Conservative   BabylonToday

In 2008, the financial world as we know it changed. Many of the principles we were taught were invalidated, it seemed. Save for retirement and live happily ever after was the conventional wisdom. Then the market crashed! In his book The Age of Turbulence, Alan Greenspan discusses the importance of the rule of law in a healthy economy. Dr. Greenspan notes that the vast majority of business transactions go through normally because of trust and the "rule of law." But what if the rule of law changes such that the circumstances under which normal commerce is undertaken become disrupted? In...

We in America today live in a country circumscribed by entitlement policies devised by an America that has steadily been disappearing. Those policies established over a generation ago cannot possibly in mathematical or demographic terms support the America of the present much less the America of the future. That is the stark reality. We need to reform those policies or we shall go bankrupt, and raising taxes on the so-called rich will not fix things. Even raising taxes on the middle class will not fix things. Nor will spending a trillion dollars more than we have on hand fix things....

As large parts of the world turn green to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, the Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny has been flying the green, white and gold flag on a charm offensive around the world. Kenny is packing in trips to London, China and New York within a couple of weeks in an effort to carry forward the country’s gradual return to economic health, which has been based largely on attracting foreign investment. He opens the New York Stock Exchange on Monday, after visiting at the White House over the weekend. “This is a very important push for Ireland,” Irish...

This is a stunner. In the new book The Escape Artists: How Obama’s Team Fumbled the Recovery, journalist Noam Scheiber uncovers this tantalizing tidbit: In May 2009, the president asked [White House budget director Peter Orszag] to draft a secret memo laying out the government’s options in the event of a fiscal crisis, in which a runaway deficit sent interest rates spiraling upward. No other member of the Obama economic team was even aware of the assignment. OK, let’s take this step by step:1. The Obama administration has already conceded it has no long-term plan to deal with rising U.S....

Thursday, Dec. 15, 2011 Time for IMF to save Europe By LAURENCE H. SUMMERS The Washington Post WASHINGTON — European leaders met last week for yet another "historic" summit at which the fate of Europe is said to hang in the balance. Yet it is clear that this will not be the last one convened to deal with the financial crisis. Given that Europe is the largest component of the global economy, the rest of the world has a stake in helping to avoid major financial accidents. It also has a stake in aiding continued growth in Europe and ensuring...

Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill are moving to block the International Monetary Fund from using U.S. money for European bailouts, as talks intensify across the pond over how to stanch the debt crisis. Some U.S. lawmakers want their concerns addressed as part of the feverish end-of-year budget talks. On the House and Senate side, lawmakers have introduced legislation to wall off U.S. taxpayer money from playing any role in averting a European meltdown. "It's time to stop the bailouts and start restoring fiscal discipline to our own economy," Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., said in a statement, as he and 25...

With the European debt crisis dominating the news and threatening to pull the world into a double-dip recession, there are growing calls for Uncle Sam to come to the rescue. The U.S. is already committing untold billions to the $1.4 trillion European bailout fund, but that's not enough, according to some European leaders and even U.S. politicians. They say that while the EU bailout is costly, it's also necessary. They are only right about the cost. These endless bailouts are not only unnecessary, but are in fact dangerous. "The problem with socialism," former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher once said, "is...

Milton Friedman was an extraordinary Nobel Prize-winning economist whose ideas helped underpin modern conservative economic theory. His contributions to economics and the conservative movement cannot be underestimated. Sadly, Milton Friedman passed away a little more than five years ago at the ripe old age of 94. Although Friedman is no longer with us, his words, his ideas, and his legacy live on. In honor of Friedman, here are some of his best quotations. 10) "If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there'd be a shortage of sand." 9) "I am in favor...

Obama is a national embarrassment and each day proves himself even more incapable of honestly confronting the nation’s urgent issues.  Just days ago, Americans were once again left gob-smacked as Obama beat the drums for the SAVE awards, his signature effort to cut the $1.4 trillion annual deficit.    This Obama initiative hopes to demonstrate the president’s commitment to fiscal sanity by cutting wasteful spending. The basic idea of the SAVE awards is a good one.  Federal employees are encouraged to identify and propose cost-saving ideas and to finger poorly performing programs that should be cut.  With an almost $4 trillion...

Very notable news, via Vatican expert Sandro Magister, following the aftermath of the Justice & Peace’s ill-advised white paper (emphasis mine) Precisely when the G20 summit in Cannes was coming to its weak and uncertain conclusion, on that same Friday, November 4 at the Vatican, a smaller summit convened in the secretariat of state was doing damage control on the latest of many moments of confusion in the Roman curia. In the hot seat was the document on the global financial crisis released ten days earlier by the pontifical council for justice and peace. A document that had disturbed many,...

DELONG: It Is 1931. We Are Austria. If The Fed Doesn't Save Us Here Comes Another Great Depression... Henry Blodget Nov. 9, 2011, 5:21 PM How does Berkeley professor Brad Delong feel about what's going on in Europe? He's freaking out: Time to Spread Foam on the Runway: The Federal Reserve Needs to Act Now to Firewall Off the Eurocrisis I have been complaining for some time now that Reinhart and Rogoff think that the time is always 1931 and that we are always Austria--that the great fiscal crisis is about to erupt and send us lurching down toward Great...

"The plan of initiatives calls for a confidence vote," Papandreou told his Socialist party lawmakers in parliament, moments after he had also announced a referendum would also be held on the EU deal. "The command of the Greek people will bind us," he said.

David Cameron clashed repeatedly with Nicolas Sarkozy today after the French President tried to exclude Britain and non-eurozone countries from a critical Brussels summit to rescue European banks. During two hours of bitter exchanges during a meeting of all 27 EU leaders before a crisis summit of the eurozone’s 17 members on Wednesday, President Sarkozy fought hard to get the Prime Minister barred from talks that would finalise a 100billion euros cash injection into banks. ”We’re sick of you criticising us and telling us what to do. You say you hate the euro, you didn’t want to join and now...

Monster Prediction From BofA: Another US Debt Downgrade Is Coming In Just A Few Weeks Joe Weisenthal | Oct. 22, 2011, 7:04 AM | 4,055 | 48 In an analyst note, Bofa/ML Ethan S. Harris drops a bit of a bombshell prediction: We expect a moderate slowdown in the beginning of next year, as two small policy shocks—another debt downgrade and fiscal tightening—hit the economy. The “not-so-super” Deficit Commission is very unlikely to come up with a credible deficit-reduction plan. The committee is more divided than the overall Congress. Since the fall-back plan is sharp cuts in discretionary spending, the...

Unions representing around half of Greece's 4 million-strong workforce have called a 48 hour general strike for Wednesday and Thursday to protest against a sweeping package of austerity measures due to be passed in parliament this week. A wave of smaller strikes over recent days by groups ranging from rubbish collectors to tax officials, journalists and seamen has given a foretaste of this week's protest which will culminate in mass demonstrations in front of parliament, the scene of violent clashes in June. The protest, dubbed "the mother of all strikes" by the daily Ta Nea newspaper, is expected to be...

IMF Issues Brand New Warning About The Massive Risks To The Banking System Joe Weisenthal Sep. 21, 2011, 9:37 AMReleased this morning by the IMF. A new statement on huge risks to the banking sector. ------------------------------ * Weak growth, balance sheets and political resolve cause crisis of confidence * Large number of countries effected by government debt risks * Policymakers need to act to repair household, government and financial balance sheets Financial stability risks have risen sharply in recent months, as slower economic growth, market turbulence in Europe, and the credit downgrade of the United States have weighed on the...

HERAKLION, Greece—The first time he despaired of his debts, Vaggelis Petrakis drank a poisonous brew of beer and gasoline. A note he left didn't mention the financial woes of his fruit and vegetable business, of which his family was well aware. Instead, he left instructions for his children on how to look after his animals. "Put mother rabbit in a different place from the little rabbits," the note began. Then he had second thoughts and called his son, Stelios, who took him to a hospital. Mr. Petrakis survived that suicide attempt. But Greece's collapsing economy and the ruin of his...

<p>PARIS (Dow Jones)--The former International Monetary Fund's Managing Director, Dominique Strauss Kahn, Sunday said Greece is unable to pay its debt and its creditors will have to take losses on the debt they hold.</p> <p>"Greece got poorer, we can say Greeks will pay on their own, but they can't," Strauss Kahn said in an interview on French TV channel TF1. "There is a loss and it must be taken by governments and banks," he said.</p>

This is the fiery face of Greece’s financial crisis. A small-business owner, unable to pay off bank loans that have plagued him for months, set himself on fire yesterday -- his third attempt, authorities said. The unidentified 56-year-old went to a Piraeus Bank branch in Thessaloniki in northern Greece and tried to renegotiate payments on loans he had taken out on his home and failing business, police said. When bank officials refused, the man went outside, doused himself with gasoline from a can and set his clothing on fire -- as he shouted that he was in debt.

...Geithner is expected to attend the euro zone meeting on Friday and then return to Washington. The Treasury said on Monday only that he will discuss efforts to boost global recovery and cooperate on financial regulation, but U.S. attention is focused on risks posed by potential European debt contagion. The danger that a Greek debt default could roil bigger European economies was underlined on Monday as heavily exposed French banks' shares plunged and investor confidence in the euro zone's ability to surmount a sovereign debt crisis ebbed. Underscoring concerns by the United States about the global economic dangers from Europe's...

Europe is in disarray, stock markets are plunging, the banking crisis is back in full swing, gold is at record levels, and both the UK and US are self-evidently slipping back towards recession – not since the autumn of 2008 have things looked quite so ominous. We appear to be at another pivotal moment, with Western economies once more staring into the abyss. At a conference in Frankfurt this week, Josef Ackermann, chief executive of Deutsche Bank, compared events to the Lehman Brothers catastrophe of 2008 and warned that many banks in Europe are essentially bust. His opposite number at...

Once again the bond markets have spoken, and once again the message is the same: default. Greek two-year bonds are near 44%, having touched as high as 46%. The interest rate on 1-year Greek government debt is a stunning 59.8%.  Greece Not Saved  Supposedly "Greece was Saved" on that blue circle when yet another bailout (throwing more good money after bad) was approved.  The deal unraveled for numerous reasons but demands by Finland for collateral are at or near the top of the list. Austria, Slovakia, and the Netherlands now want collateral as well.  Under great pressure from Germany, the...

German Chancellor Angela Merkel no longer has enough coalition votes in the Bundestag to secure backing for Europe's revamped rescue machinery, threatening a consitutional crisis in Germany and a fresh eruption of the euro debt saga. Mrs Merkel has cancelled a high-profile trip to Russia on September 7, the crucial day when the package goes to the Bundestag and the country's constitutional court rules on the legality of the EU's bail-out machinery. If the court rules that the €440bn rescue fund (EFSF) breaches Treaty law or undermines German fiscal sovereignty, it risks setting off an instant brushfire across monetary union....

China paper warns of impact from euro crisis "Black Death" Reuters By Chris Buckley | Reuters – 3 hrs ago BEIJING (Reuters) - The "Black Death" of debt crisis across the Euro zone will hurt China by sapping demand for exports, although Beijing's relatively small holdings of euro assets will limit any damage to foreign exchange reserves, the nation's top official newspaper said on Monday. The bleak diagnosis for the euro's prospects appeared in the overseas edition of the People's Daily, the top newspaper of China's ruling Communist Party, in a commentary by a former central bank official and an...

Borrowing looms large in American life from homes to cars. But the explosion of student debt in the last decade is a pernicious trend that the colleges themselves are encouraging. How do colleges manage it? Kenyon has erected $70 million sports palace featuring a 20-lane olympic pool. Stanford's professors now get paid sabbaticals every fourth year, handing them $115,000 for not teaching. Vanderbilt pays its president $2.4 million. Alumni gifts and endowment earnings help with the costs. But a major source is tuition payments, which at private schools are breaking the $40,000 barrier, more than many families earn. Sadly, there's...

highlights of Harrington's story below. Here are some key points: Moody's ratings often do not reflect its analysts' private conclusions. Instead, rating committees privately conclude that certain securities deserve certain ratings--but then vote with management to give the securities the higher ratings that issuer clients want. Moody's management and "compliance" officers do everything possible to make issuer clients happy--and they view analysts who do not do the same as "troublesome." Management employs a variety of tactics to transform these troublesome analysts into "pliant corporate citizens" who have Moody's best interests at heart. Moody's product managers participate in--and vote on--ratings decisions....

During the 2008 presidential campaign, then-candidate Hilary Clinton ridiculed Barack Obama's inexperience with the famous ad asking who you wanted to answer the phone during a crisis at 3AM. Today, it is apparent that our nation desperately needs someone with experience, decisiveness, and leadership to navigate these troubled economic waters. .... Blame at 3AM is not the issue. The issue in time of crisis is the response and only the response. Thus far, our nation's response has been to increase the debt ceiling and provide a tepid response to critical spending issues. It's now 3AM and the world is wondering...

While I was doing research for another blog post, I happened upon a lamestream media (LA Times) story from 2008 about the massive budget surplus that accumulated under Sarah Palin’s bountiful watch as governor of Alaska. Try to imagine waking up one morning and reading a newspaper article in which the experts quoted had something like this to say about our nation’s federal budget:...

Liberals outline stimulus agenda in 'Contract for the American Dream' By Erik Wasson - 08/09/11 10:57 AM ET Liberal organizations and unions are frustrated that President Obama has not aggressively pushed a new jobs stimulus agenda and they are offering up a consolidated fall agenda for Democrats to embrace as an alternative to austerity. Representatives of MoveOn, Rebuild the Dream and the Center for Economic Policy and Research will join Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) on Tuesday to launch a progressive “Contract for the American Dream” to urge the administration and Congress to turn away from budget cutting and focus on...

Conquering the Storm by Sarah Palin on Monday, August 8, 2011 at 3:53pm In the coming days we’ll sort through the repercussions of S&P’s downgrade of our credit rating, including concerns about the impact a potential interest rate increase would have on our ability to service our suffocating $14.5 trillion debt. I’m surprised that so many people seem surprised by S&P’s decision. Weren’t people paying attention over the last year or so when we were getting warning after warning from various credit rating agencies that this was coming? I’ve been writing and speaking about it myself for quite some time....

The American Dream can be restored to reality. I have never been as optimistic about the future of our great nation as I am today despite significant leadership shortfalls in our elected leaders. The solutions to our crisis are so apparent and so easy to enact once our Congress either gets in the fight or gets out of the way. The sheer unwillingness of Congress to stand firm on a national program of controlling spending is mindboggling. It can only be explained by recognizing that entitlements are and stimulus funding is how politicians get reelected. Many legislators are only about...

The markets are "finally just revolting against all this insanity" and forcing us to come to grips with the reality of our debt crisis, Social Security, health care and all the problems with the European countries, Mark Fisher, oil and natural gas trader and CEO of MBF Clearing, told CNBC Friday. The anxiety level is at such a high that people, it doesn't matter whether we are or not [going into a recession], it's the perception of where we are,"

August 5, 2011 Euro Builder Ends His Career on a Bitter Note By JACK EWING FRANKFURT — Jean-Claude Trichet, the president of the European Central Bank, has spent much of his career building and defending the euro. But now, in a bitter twist, it looks as if his career may well end with the common currency in shambles. Mr. Trichet, 68, will retire at the end of October after an eight-year term. Yet markets are crashing, bond investors have turned on Italy and Spain, and it appears certain that when Mr. Trichet returns to civilian life on Nov. 1, the...

A government official tells ABC News that the federal government is expecting and preparing for bond rating agency Standard & Poor’s to downgrade the rating of US debt from its current AAA value. Officials reasons given will be the political confusion surrounding the process of raising the debt ceiling, and lack of confidence that the political system will be able to agree to more deficit reduction.

Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi confirmed that they would be moving toward a balance budget amendment on Friday, after rampant speculation that the European Central Bank would intervene bond markets and purchase Italian and Spanish debt in exchange for structural reforms.

China said Friday that debt deals in the United States and in Europe would not be enough to save their economies and "concrete steps" must be taken to rebalance the global economy. "The only way the Americans have come up with to improve economic growth has been to take on new loans to repay the old ones," a blistering commentary published on the official Xinhua news agency said. "To eat May's grain in April, however, will never be a permanent solution to a problem," the report said. China warned on Wednesday that Washington's efforts to raise the US limit on...

Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords returned to Washington, D.C. Monday, seven months after her tragic attack to cast her vote in favor of raising the debt ceiling. Her timing couldn't be better to unveil the absolutely relentless hypocrisy of left-wing media and politics. The vicious attack on Giffords sparked a whirlwind of criticism over the violent rhetoric of the right in which the media castigated the tea party for its tone. Sarah Palin was criticized relentlessly over a map depicting crosshairs over vulnerable democrats, similar to the DNC's use of targets on Republicans. Most heinously, Giffords' attacker, Jared Loughner, was assumed by...

"We, the Senate Majority Leader, The President, and myself, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, have had a further meeting today and are agreed in recognizing that the question of the debt ceiling and possible default is of the first importance for both houses of Congress, the President, and for our country. "We regard the Bill passed by the House and the companion Bill in the Senate and the President's promise to sign the reconciled bill as symbolic of the desire of both Parties never to put politics above country again. "We are resolved that the method of consultation...

VAN SUSTEREN: Well, you know, I think -- it will be interesting to see what happens. The Tea Party, I think, had an enormous victory, because they did change the discussion here in Washington. It's a little bit like trying to change the direction of an aircraft carrier. It's not easy. So they certainly, I mean, that's huge. And I'm sort of curious whether the American people will now sort of take a bow, those who are Tea Party activists, and go back to their lives, which are very busy and very full, and they're worried about their own lives,...

Let’s begin with a brief quiz. It’s the middle of the night and you awaken to the sound of your dog barking. You open your eyes and notice smoke drifting in beneath your door. The room is noticeably warm, and you can make out a faint, flickering, orange glow through the smoky haze. Your house is on fire. What’s your first response? Should you (a), go online to take advantage of that terrific offer you received for a “his and her” burial plot; or (b), get everyone safely out of the house and phone the fire department? Call me psychic,...

Much is going on in Washington, DC …the debt ceiling vote and debate…and the harsh words for the Tea Party movement and caucus. Governor Sarah Palin joins us to discuss these issues…10pm eastern, ON THE RECORD !

The American government is at risk of defaulting on their debt. To remedy it, they want to go into even more debt. This cannot go on forever. It has to stop.

@BarackObama you're wrong, threatening to throw seniors under the bus because you refuse to prioritize govt spending.Time to #womanup & lead @BarackObama wants us to support a "balanced deficit solution." Great idea! How about a balanced budget amendment?

“The White House immediately dismissed the new version, with spokesman Jay Carney calling it "moot and irrelevant" and certain to fail in the Senate.” This is a quote from an AP story by the following: Charles Babington and Donna Cassata, Associated Press, On Friday July 29, 2011, 1:47 pm EDT It is about the changes to the “Boehner plan” that are causing the Tea Party conservatives to agree to vote for it. This version will only increase a second time if the congress sends a Balance Budget Amendment to the States. So the White House is arrogant enough to believe...

"WASHINGTON—Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid served notice Friday that he's pushing ahead with his debt-limit bill as House Speaker John Boehner's rival measure languished in limbo, further escalating a wrenching political standoff that has heightened fears of a market-rattling government default. "This is likely our last chance to save this nation from default," Reid declared glumly on the Senate floor, as a Tuesday's deadline drew closer. Reid's move came with Boehner's bill still in wait of a vote and a bitter standoff between GOP leaders and their conservative rank and file. Demoralized House Republicans were striving for a third straight...

The Tight Rope The dilemma of Speaker Boehner resembles the act of a tight rope walker, if he ventures too far to the right he faces the twin risks of a default which might well lead to an financial meltdown for which he and the Republicans are liable to get the blame, the alienation of the independents, and the loss of the 2012 election. If he leans too far to the left, he risks alienating his base and the Tea Party by compromising too much and thereby risks a third-party rupture which will hand the 2012 election to the Democrats....

Sarah Palin criticizes Boehner for trying to reinvent the wheel and not sticking with Cut, Cap, and Balance which is why he is having trouble getting enough votes to pass his current plan. But she also criticizes Obama for scaring the American people with this crisis mentality and says he doesn’t understand that we have a spending problem in this country, which prompts her to reiterate: “It’s the spending stupid!” "That's the hypocrisy that I guess is inherit in this politics as usual from these Washington DC characters, they say one thing as candidates and they get elected and do...

The following is a comparison of previous increases in the nation's legal ability to borrow money, known as the debt ceiling: Total increase in debt ceiling under Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton: $3.15 trillion Total increase in debt ceiling during President Obama's 28 months in office when it hit May 16th: $3.144 trillion ========================== Under President Ronald Reagan: 17 debt ceiling hikes from $935 billion to $2.8 trillion Debt ceiling increased $1.865 trillion -- an average of $109.7 billion each hike. --- Under the first Bush administration:...