L'Algérie devrait immédiatement liquider ses euros (future ex-zone euro) et investir dans l'OR et le Dollar américain ainsi que la future monnaie "euroasiatique" (Eurasie) actuellement en cours de négociation entre la Russie, l'Allemagne, l'Angleterre, la Chine, l'Inde et les USA avec comme observateurs le Japon, le Brésil et l'Afrique du Sud.
Cette nouvelle future monnaie "euroasiatique" (Eurasie) devrait intégrer rapidement des pays africains majeurs dans une nouvelle monnaie Afro-Eurasiatique ou l'Afrique du Sud et l'Algérie devront avoir un rôle pivot tant que la Libye et l'Egypte sont hors-service (tant que la Libye et l'Egypte sont hors-service).
Apparemment et dès maintenant, l'Algérie devrait gérer habilement et intelligemment avec des équipes compétentes cette période critique de transition financière internationale car on est maintenant devant un nouveau " Far West " financier international.
That's all folks !,
c'est tout pour aujourd'hui les amis !DEATH OF THE EURO Friday November 11,2011 By Macer Hall, Political Editor
http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/283060PREPARATIONS were under way last night for the break-up of the euro as Europe’s debt crisis spiralled out of control.
As Treasury officials worked through the night to soften the impact on Britain, David Cameron warned that the single European currency was facing its “moment of truth”.
Business Secretary Vince Cable went further and spoke about “Armageddon” while Brussels officials warned that the chaos threatened to plunge us all into a new recession.
Ministers are understood to be deeply concerned that French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel are secretly plotting to build a new, slimmed down eurozone without Greece, Italy and other debt-ridden southern Euro- pean nations.
Well-placed Brussels sources say Germany and France have already held private discussions on preparing for the disintegration of the eurozone.
At the same time, City insiders yesterday speculated that the “death warrant” for the euro had already been written, with a new economic bloc dominated by Germany and France almost certain to emerge in its place.
Howard Wheeldon, senior strategist at BGC Partners, said the single currency experiment had failed.
“Undoubtedly it has failed. We know the concept of a single currency was flawed right from the start. There were too many big differences, in language, in culture and in the economies. There is absolutely no chance of the euro surviving in its current form. It cannot happen.
“There are limits to what the markets, the people and the voters will accept. That doesn’t mean the euro won’t carry on with fewer members, but it has been a failure.”
Stephen Lewis, of Monument Securities, said the search for some sort of Grand Plan or mega-fund to save the euro was corroding the whole project.
“Whatever they do, the underlying economic divergence will still exist,” he said. “It may be that there is no solution and that it would be better to finance an orderly break-up of the euro.”
Economist Nouriel Roubini said on Twitter: “It will be soon an end-game for the eurozone: restructurings and exits till break-up. Slow motion train wreck.”
And Gideon Rachman, of the Financial Times, said: “The euro is not an end in itself. The single currency is just an instrument, aimed at promoting economic prosperity and political harmony across Europe.
“As the evidence mounts that it is doing the precise opposite, it is time to think not about how to save the euro but about how to scrap it, or at least allow the weakest members to leave. Rather than insisting that the break-up of the euro is unthinkable, Europe’s leaders need to start planning for it.”
The secret plans being drawn up are for the creation of a “smaller eurozone” consisting of “fewer members” who would push towards economic and fiscal union.
Britain would be excluded from the new economic grouping, to the delight of many Eurocrats.
French and German officials have already set up a secretive cabal known as the “Frankfurt Group” to pursue their federalist agenda and bully Britain.
The Brussels source insisted the plan was not about creating a two-tier Europe but a radical re-drawing of the entire euro project.
Mr Cameron, in his starkest assessment of the crisis yet, confirmed that the Government was engrossed in contingency planning for the unravelling of the single currency.
“If the leaders of the eurozone want to save their currency then they, together with the institutions of the eurozone, must act now. The longer the delay, the greater the danger,” he said. “Here in Britain, outside the euro, we must prepare for every eventuality, and that is exactly what we will do.”
Mr Cable went even further by conceding that officials were examining the dangers of an “Armageddon narrative” in the eurozone.
Confirming that the Government’s contingency planning for a euro break-up was well under way, he said: “We have a plan. There’s a lot of scenario planning, thinking about all possible outcomes. We have to deal with the world as it is.”
He added: “I don’t think we should be panicking, and although the situation is very difficult and we’re inevitably affected by it, I think the extreme pessimism and gloom really isn’t justified in this case.”
Conceding that preparations for an economic doomsday scenario were under way, he said: “Certainly it affects our trade and potentially, in this Armageddon narrative, it affects the banking system, but we’re not there yet.
We have a very clear commitment to stabilising our own country’s finances, and for shifting the base of the economy and its investments into manufacturing.”
Official European Union statistics yesterday slashed the growth forecast for the eurozone next year from 1.8 per cent to 0.5 per cent and raised fears that Britain will be hit by the fallout from the euro crisis.
And in a chilling admission that the continent’s debt crisis is having an even more ravaging impact than previously expected, EU finance commissioner Olli Rehn said: “Growth has stalled in Europe and there is a risk of a new recession.
“This forecast is in fact the last wake-up call. The recovery in the EU has come to a standstill and there is a risk of a new recession.”
The revised economic forecast from Brussels slashes predicted growth levels by nearly two thirds compared with six months ago. A section of the report dealing with the British economy said: “Risks from the euro-area sovereign debt markets and the banking sector heighten this uncertainty. As such, a contraction in Gross Domestic Product in at least one of the next few quarters cannot be ruled out.
“However, the outlook for corporate investment and net exports still appears positive enough to justify a forecast of modest positive growth, with the economy expanding by 0.7 per cent in 2011, 0.6 per cent in 2012 and 1.5 per cent in 2013.
“The substantial downward revision from the spring forecast is explained mainly by the bleaker outlook for household consumption, corporate investment and exports, offset partially by slower expected import growth.”
In Italy, the threat of crippling interest rates eased slightly as the country’s banks bought £4billion of Government debts and Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi confirmed he will quit at the weekend.
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IDIOT'S GUIDE TO THE EURO CRISISFriday November 11,2011 By Simon Edge
http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/283104/Idiot-s-guide-to-the-Euro-crisisWE seem to be peering over a financial precipice but it’s one that is so obscured by jargon that very few of us can see the sides of it, let alone the bottom. You may think you’re the only one who doesn’t know what a bond yield or a debt rollover is but you’re in good company.
Greece’s outgoing premier George Papandreou, who has a master’s degree from the London School of Economics, has admitted he only recently learned what a credit default swap was.
It would be too glib to say in that case it’s not surprising his country is teetering on the verge of bankruptcy. The point is that all this stuff is bewildering in the extreme.
So hopefully our simple guide will help you understand...
How do countries borrow ?If you have money in a savings account you are essentially lending money to the bank or building society.
The interest you get is your fee. You can usually get a higher rate if you put your savings in a fixed-rate bond.
That’s where you give the bank your money for a fixed term, typically one to five years, and you get a guaranteed rate of interest paid at pre-arranged intervals.
Bonds are also what governments use in order to borrow cash. Instead of individual savers like you or me, the lenders are commercial banks or institutions such as pension funds.
The borrower – Italy, Portugal, Greece or Britain – issues a bond (ie borrows the money) for a fixed term, undertaking to return the cash at a pre-determined point.
Throughout that time it will pay a fixed rate of interest agreed at the start of the loan.
Why have these bonds suddenly hit the headlines ?When 11 European states ditched their currencies for the euro in 1999 (followed by six more countries later), they allowed the new
European Central Bank to set monetary policy in the new “eurozone”.
This was good news for the weaker economies. Effectively guaranteed by their stronger partners, they found they could borrow money at much more favourable rates of interest than before.
Fuelled by this cheap credit, countries such as Greece (which had an Olympic Games to stage), Italy, Portugal and Ireland embarked on an orgy of spending.
In practical terms it meant they issued lots and lots of government bonds.
So what went wrong ?As we discovered in the New Labour years, politicians find it very easy to spend their way into their voters’ good books, knowing that paying the debt back will be someone else’s problem.
In Greece and Italy much of the borrowed cash went on public-sector wage rises.
In the global financial meltdown that followed the collapse of Lehman Brothers bank in 2008 all economies contracted and it became painfully clear that the governments of the weakest countries in the eurozone had precious little means of paying back the money.
The debt totals in question are massive. While Britain’s entire debt is around 63 per cent of gross domestic product, Italy’s is 120 per cent and Greece owes 160 per cent of GDP.
That’s like having an income of £20,000 a year and debts of £32,000 on your credit card. And the point of bonds is they need paying back on a specific date. Not doing so is defaulting.
Has anyone defaulted yet ?No, but several countries have come pretty close. With those 10-year bonds maturing virtually on a daily basis, there is always someone needing their money back.
For heavily indebted economies that are spending far more on salaries, services and debt interest than they are raising through taxes, the only way of honouring the debt is to resort to fresh borrowing and suddenly the terms have become much tougher.
For once it is hard to blame the banks for that. With lending to these countries suddenly looking a much riskier proposition, it’s hardly surprising that the lenders are jacking up the rates of interest.
Why is defaulting a big deal ?If a government defaults on just one bond repayment, the effect will be catastrophic. No lender in their right mind will loan it the money it needs to carry on paying public-sector salaries and the country will run out of cash very quickly.
Countries that control their own currencies can start printing money (as the Bank of England has been doing, under the euphemism “quantitative easing”) but members of the eurozone can’t do that because monetary policy is controlled by the European Central Bank rather than in Athens or Rome.
What are bond yields ?This is one of those confusing terms that make the situation seem impossibly technical. But it’s worth mastering because rising bond yields are a sign that a country is getting into deeper and deeper trouble.
The yield is the return a lender can expect to make on a sovereign debt issue.
In the simplest case it’s basically just the interest as a percentage of the original loan.
But there’s also a secondary trade in government bonds – if I start losing confidence that I’ll get my cash back at the end of the loan period I may prefer to cut my losses and sell the bond at a discount to someone else. For the new owner of the bond that pushes the yield up.
Bond yields rise when lenders sell off their bonds and they are therefore the equivalent of a plummeting share price.
This week the bond yields on Italian sovereign debt passed the seven per cent mark, which economists regard as the upper limit of repayability. That’s why it all looks so serious now.
If it’s just the eurozone, why should we worry ?It’s hard to overstate the potential hazards. Greece has already had two massive bailouts to stop it defaulting, and Ireland and Portugal have had one each.
This basically involved the European Union and the International Monetary Fund stumping up further loans on easier terms on condition that the governments in question enacted tough austerity measures to try to reduce their debt.
The donors weren’t doing this out of the goodness of their hearts. Greek, Irish and Portuguese sovereign debt is held in British, French, German and US banks which could be severely weakened if those countries started defaulting on their capital repayments. The domino effect doesn’t bear thinking about.
Even if default is avoided, the eurozone economies are already suffering as austerity measures kick in and consumer demand slows. With 40 per cent of Britain’s exports going to the eurozone, recession there is the last thing we need.
How bad is it going to get ?The crisis in Italy is seriously scary. While Portugal, Ireland and Greece received bailouts because they were regarded as too big to fail, Italy – the third largest economy in the EU and the eighth largest in the world – could be too big to save.
The only course of action may be for the ECB to print euros and buy up Italian debt, which the Germans have been resisting because it smacks of the last frantic days of the Weimar Republic.
Another option would be for Italy to leave the euro.
It could return to the lira which it could devalue thereby reducing the cost of its exports and establishing the conditions to rebuild its economy.
Such eurosceptics as MEP Daniel Hannan say this might actually be the best hope, reducing the national antagonisms which are said to be soaring within the EU as a result of this extraordinary crisis.
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France plots eurozone 'breakaway group’By Bruno Waterfield, Brussels 10:08PM GMT 10 Nov 2011
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/8882643/France-plots-eurozone-breakaway-group.htmlFrance is drawing up plans to create a breakaway organisation of eurozone countries with its own treaty, parliament and headquarters – a move that could significantly undermine the existing European Union.
The proposal would see a formal "union within a union" created, but would lead to a significant deterioration in Britain's influence in Europe.
David Cameron is drawing up urgent plans to stop Britain being "railroaded" into agreeing to decisions taken by the new eurozone bloc.
France and Germany are understood to want to strengthen the union between eurozone countries with new taxes and legal measures to stop nations borrowing and spending too much in future.
Weaker countries such as Greece could even be barred from the new eurozone, under radical suggestions from some of those involved in discussions over the plan.
It comes amid growing concerns that France could be the next nation to become embroiled in the single currency crisis.
Gordon Brown, the former prime minister, said France was "in danger of being picked off by the markets in the coming weeks and months".
Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, has warned Mr Cameron that unless he accepts unconditional changes to the Lisbon Treaty a split will take place, leaving Britain isolated and in a voting minority within the EU.
"She explicitly told Cameron that if there was no treaty change at the level of the 27 EU members then others will peel off, which is not what she wants," a senior EU diplomat told The Daily Telegraph. According to diplomatic notes, Mr Cameron is pushing for "concrete and effective mechanisms" to "ensure essential economic interests of non–participating member states are fully protected".
Friday is expected to be another crucial day in the ongoing crisis as Italian politicians vote on plans to cut public spending and delay retirement.
European leaders are hoping the vote will be passed, paving the way for Silvio Berlusconi to be replaced as prime minister.
Greece on Thursday finally installed a new prime minister – Lucas Papademos, a former central banker – and the country is expected to unveil its national unity government today.
EU diplomatic sources indicate that Britain is fighting France and Germany to resurrect the "Ioannina compromise", which would allow a blocking minority of countries to stop the new eurozone vanguard bloc pushing decisions through the EU.
The mechanism, named after a meeting of EU foreign ministers in the Greek city 17 years ago, was abandoned by Tony Blair during negotiations for the Treaty of Nice in 2000.
A Government spokesman said: "Discussions about possible further changes to the EU treaties are at a very early stage. But we are clear that any changes would need to protect the rights of those countries in the EU but outside the eurozone, and ensure that any additional enforcement measures would not apply to the UK as a result of our opt-out from the single currency." Any proposals to change the EU treaties must also be agreed by all member states."
Jean-Claude Piris, a former senior EU official, has come out of retirement to "help the eurozone in the current crisis" by working on a blueprint for the new union and its separate institutions. Mr Piris is the "eminence grise'' of EU legal texts and is credited with the Lisbon Treaty, the failed EU Constitution and their predecessors, the Nice, Amsterdam and Maastricht treaties.
He has argued that it would be “far better” to create “an avant-garde group, probably based on the current 17 members of the euro area” than attempt treaty change.
“Willing euro members would conclude an additional treaty compatible with international and EU law,’’ he wrote in a paper circulated last week. ''This would contain additional obligations for them, as well as a definition of the organs and rules that would govern their supplementary co-operation in the best way possible.”
The emphasis by Mr Piris on “willing” members and ''additional obligations’’ has stoked rumours, denied in Paris, that Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, is trying build a smaller eurozone without the highly indebted or bailed-out countries of Greece, Ireland, Portugal or Italy.
Speaking yesterday, Mrs Merkel insisted that Germany would not support a smaller eurozone.
“We have a single goal and it is to stabilise the eurozone as it is today, to make it more competitive, to make progress in balancing budgets,” she said.
Michael Meister, the Bundestag finance spokesman for Mrs Merkel’s Christian Democrats, said “such a shrinking process would be deadly for Germany”. He added: “It would be a deadly development for an export country like Germany.’’
S&P says mistakenly announced French downgradeNov 10 12:34 PM US/Eastern
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.e8ba3a17d9d6a9c6b1271ab17326ef64.21&show_article=1Ratings agency Standard and Poor's said Thursday that it had mistakenly announced to some of its clients that it had downgraded France's top "AAA" credit rating, at a time when many in the markets are speculating on just such a move.
"As a result of a technical error, a message was automatically disseminated today to some subscribers of S&P's Global Credit Portal suggesting that France's credit rating had been changed," S&P said in a statement.
"This is not the case: the ratings on Republic of France remain 'AAA/A-1+' with a stable outlook and this incident is not related to any ratings surveillance activity. We are investigating the cause of the error."
The agency's embarrassing error came as the spread between France's 10-year government bond rates and Germany's hit new record highs, in a sign of markets' failing confidence in non-German eurozone debt.
President Nicolas Sarkozy's government has launched an austerity programme and insists its finances are under control, vowing to balance its budget by 2016 despite the economic slowdown and trouble in eurozone neighbour Italy.
But another ratings agency, Moody's, warned France last month its "financial strength has weakened" and that it was "among the weakest of its AAA peers".
Meanwhile, many commentators warned Thursday that the bond spread with Germany and rising French borrowing costs show that the markets already regard French debt as riskier than its perfect rating implies.
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Cette crise qui défait les gouvernements de la zone euro
Après l'Irlande, la Grèce, l'Italie et bientôt l'Espagne, à qui le tour ?10 novembre 2011 Par QUENTIN GIRARD
http://www.liberation.fr/monde/01012370594-cette-crise-qui-defait-les-gouvernements-de-la-zone-euro?google_editors_picks=trueBérézina chez les instantes dirigeantes des pays de la zone euro. Ces derniers jours, deux Premiers ministre sont tombés : le président du Conseil italien, Silvio Berlusconi, et le Grec Georges Papandréou. Ce n'est pas tellement surprenant. Presque tous les pays les plus touchés par la crise ont vu leurs gouvernements perdre de leur légitimité et, souvent, s'effondrer. La crise de la dette a eu pour effet de complètement rebattre les cartes politiques de la zone euro. Et ce n'est pas fini. Round-up en quatre étapes :
1. Les gouvernements qui ont déjà basculé
L'Irlande Centre > Centre droit
Brian Cowen, en fonction depuis mai 2008, a été la première victime de la crise, en mars 2011. Après des années de très fortes croissances où Dublin était considéré comme un eldorado, tout a basculé. Son parti, le Fianna Fail (centre) a subi une déroute aux législatives, remportant seulement une vingtaine de sièges alors que l'opposition en empochait 113. Brian Cowen a quitté la politique et a été remplacé à la tête du pays par Enda Kenny du Fine Gael, parti de centre droit. Le gouvernement de coalition mis en place a repris les grandes lignes du plan de sauvetage.
Le Portugal Gauche > Centre droit
La deuxième victime est un socialiste, José Socrates. Elu en 2005, il a perdu les élections législatives de juin 2011 face à Pedro Passos Coelho, du Parti social-démocrate (centre droit). Avec seulement 28% des suffrages, son partie paye durement trois plans d'austérité en moins d'un an et un «repêchage international» en mai, avec 78 milliards d'euros de prêt. «Les Portugais ont puni ce père la Rigueur dont le mérite a été de ne pas donner dans la démagogie et d'annoncer des temps à venir encore plus difficiles», indiquait alors le Diário de Notícias. Sauf que les Portugais ont choisi quelqu'un qui a promis d'être encore plus strict. Et les partis qui ont fait campagne en déclarant qu'ils refusaient de se soumettre au FMI n'ont pas fait recette.
L'Estonie Droite > Droite
Le pays balte, l'un des derniers entrants dans la zone euro, fait figure de presque-anomalie. Malgré sa promesse de plus d'austérité, le gouvernement conservateur sortant a remporté les élections en mars 2011. «Nous n'avons pas promis le nirvana avec l'euro. Il faut poursuivre la discipline fiscale», expliquait alors Martin Poder, responsable des affaires européennes au ministère des Finances.
2. Les gouvernements qui sont en train de chuter
La Grèce Gauche > Alliance socialistes-conservateurs
Geroges Papandréou III, dit «le Petit», va donc finalement quitter le pouvoir. Après avoir résisté pendant plusieurs mois à la crise, l'annonce du référendum – vu comme un coup de Jarnac par ses partenaires européens – a sans doute sonné le glas de sa légitimité. «J'adresse tous mes vœux de réussite au nouveau Premier ministre», a affirmé Papandréou mercredi après-midi, sans toutefois encore nommer son successeur. Les tractations ont débuté hier soir et ont recommencé ce jeudi matin, les candidats ne se bousculant pas pour récupérer ce poste empoisonné. Des élections anticipées se dérouleront le 19 février.
L'Italie Droite > ...
Des affaires en tous genres au bunga-bunga, Silvio Berlusconi avait résisté à tout jusqu'à mardi, et la perte de sa majorité à la Chambre des députés. Celui qui avait été rappelé à l'ordre par le FMI et le G20 la semaine dernière – placé «sous surveillance» – a voulu être César jusqu'au bout, souhaitant «voir en face qui aura le courage de me trahir». En vain. Selon une étude publiée par la banque Barclays, l'Italie aurait atteint «le point de non-retour». Le maintien de Silvio Berlusconi devenait impossible pour l'opposition et ses alliés.
Les mesures budgétaires et les réformes économiques promises à l'Union européenne devraient être adoptées en fin de semaine, puis le richissime homme d'affaires remettra son mandat. Pour l'instant, on ne sait pas encore s'il y aura des élections anticipées, ou un nouveau gouvernement de coalition. Jeudi matinpour sa succession, Berlusconi a apporté son soutien à Mario Monti, économiste et commissaire européen pendant dix ans, qui a été nommé la veille sénateur à vie.
La Slovaquie Centre droit > ...
«Vous avez voté, non ? Eh bien, vous allez revoter» fut en substance ce que l'Union européenne fit comprendre à la Slovaquie lorsque le Parlement rejeta le renforcement du Fonds de secours de la zone euro, début octobre. Et si le FESF a bien été adopté quelques jours plus tard, le gouvernement de centre droit d'Iveta Radicova n'a pas résisté au premier refus, l'opposition sociale-démocrate ayant négocié son soutien au plan en l'échange d'organisation des élections anticipées qui se dérouleront en mars 2012.
3. Les gouvernements qui vont chuter
L'Espagne Gauche > ...
Arrivé au pouvoir juste après les attentats de Madrid en 2004, le Premier ministre socialiste, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, a décidé fin juillet d'avancer de quatre mois les élections législatives, initialement prévues en mars 2012. Elles se dérouleront donc dimanche prochain et la gauche n'a pratiquement aucune chance. Tous les sondages donnent largement gagnant le chef du Parti populaire (PP), Mariano Rajoy, loin devant Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba, la tête de liste du Parti socialiste (PSOE).
Dans un pays très énervé par les mesures de rigueur et qui a vu naître le mouvement des Indignés, le probable futur vainqueur veut intensifier les coupes budgétaires.
La Slovénie Centre gauche > ...
Le petit pays va connaître en décembre les premières élections législatives anticipées de son histoire. Elles font suite au rejet, le 20 septembre dernier, de la motion de confiance présentée par le gouvernement dirigé par le Parti social-démocrate de Borut Pahor. La coalition en place a échoué à faire passer de nombreuses réformes, notamment celle des retraites, exigée par le FMI et la Commission européenne. La Fondation Robert Schuman note elle que «la Slovénie a été le pays le plus touché des 27 Etats membres de l'UE par la crise financière internationale, en raison de sa dépendance aux capitaux étrangers et aux exportations.»
Comme toujours, l'alternance risque de jouer et les partis de droite sont favoris, même si des affaires menacent Janez Jansa, le leader du Parti démocrate, la principale formation.
4. Ceux pour qui c'est mal parti
La France Droite > ...
La gauche est largement favorite pour les prochaines élections – présidentielle et législatives. Depuis son élection en 2007, l'UMP a perdu tous les scrutins, jusqu'à la défaite historique au Sénat en septembre dernier. Et l'activisme de Nicolas Sarkozy au G20 ou en Libye n'a pour l'instant pas inversé la tendance. Toutefois, un nouveau sondage du CSA-Les Echos, montre que sa cote de confiance est en forte hausse ce mois-ci, passant de 32 à 40%.
Pour se maintenir au pouvoir, la stratégie de la droite est claire, jouer le plus possible sur la rigueur et l'orthodoxie budgétaire face à ces socialistes qui ne penseraient qu'à dépenser.
L'Allemagne Droite > ...
Même Merkel... Alors que certains analystes déclarent que l'Allemagne fait désormais la loi dans la zone euro, son parti, le CDU, cumule les échecs électoraux. En septembre dernier, les conservateurs ont été défaits largement dans cinq Länders sur sept dont celui de Hambourg, la deuxième ville du pays et dans l'industriel Bade-Wurtemberg qu'il contrôlait depuis près de soixante ans.
Lors d'un sondage début novembre de l'institut Forsa pour l'hebdomadaire Stern, 46% des personnes interrogées jugeaient que la chancelière n'avait pas géré correctement la crise de l'euro. Réélu en 2009 après un premier mandat de quatre ans, Angela Merkel a annoncé qu'elle en briguera un troisième en 2013. Si les sondages la placent pour l'instant derrière ses adversaires du SPD, il reste encore du temps.
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It’s The End Of The Eurozone As We Know It
But the agenda for centralized economic tyranny remains the samePaul Joseph Watson Infowars.com Friday, November 11, 2011
http://www.infowars.com/its-the-end-of-the-eurozone-as-we-know-it/Stick a fork in it, the eurozone as we know it is done. That’s the message we’re hearing from every media outlet and talking head this morning. But whether the EU survives in its current incarnation or takes on a new form, the agenda remains the same, the evisceration of all national sovereignty and the centralization of power into a dictatorial federal superstate.
Words like “depression,” “collapse,” and “apocalypse,” are not normally uttered by people in positions of power, but such terms have become the staple of this week’s news diet, as the deepening of the euro crisis begins to make headlines about Greece look like they should be consigned to the “and finally” segment.
- President of the European Commission and Bilderberg luminary José Manuel Barroso last night warned that any break up of the eurozone would cause a continent-wide “depression,” shave 50 per cent off GDP and cost a million jobs in Germany alone.
- The UK Treasury and the Bank of England are making contingency plans for “economic armageddon” should the eurozone collapse. Business secretary Vince Cable said that Britain was was preparing for “all eventualities,” including the breakup of the euro.
- The Secretary-General of the Ibero-American Secretariat Enrique Iglesias warns that the crisis will “definitely” impact countries in Asia and Latin America, calling for preventive measures to protect against the “chain reaction” of a eurozone collapse.
- France and Germany are secretly plotting to cut their losses and create an entirely new eurozone absent problem countries in a last ditch effort to save the European project.
Whether such apocalyptic rhetoric is a ruse designed to concentrate more power into the hands of the EU as part of the drive towards a federal superstate remains to be seen. The fact that the euro currency itself has actually risen over the past 48 hours suggests that the collapse is by no means imminent.
We know that the agenda is to create a centralized European economic government that would dictate decisions to all member states. Whether that takes the form of a newly stripped-down eurozone or whether it will come into being as a result of Brussels exploiting the current crisis to pose as saviors matters little – the goal remains the same.
Eurocrats are keen on exploiting the debt crisis in a bid to create a “United States of Europe” led by European Council president Herman van Rompuy, a move that frighteningly parallels plans by top Nazis, may of whom went on to found the EU, and their mission to build a continent-wide economic government.
For months, EU leaders have been fearmongering over the consequences of member states abandoning the single currency, warning that a euro collapse would lead to martial law and even civil war.
Their “solution” is to hand themselves even more power to create a common economic policy that all member states would be forced to follow at the expense of their national sovereignty, a de facto financial government for the whole of Europe.
Whatever the outcome, the fact remains that the euro single currency has been a miserable failure. Currency unions are only ever as strong as their weakest member. This completely undermines the case for a global currency, an idea that has been promoted frequently by globalists.
Back in June, top elitist and Harvard Professor Kenneth Rogoff wrote in the Financial Times that the collapse of the euro would put an end to the dream of multi-regional currencies like the Amero.
“The euro experiment has also brought us to a crossroads in the whole international monetary system,” warned Rogoff. “Will our grandchildren inherit a world with a huge number of national currencies, or a very small number of multi-country currencies?”
Since the single currency and the eurozone in general have exacerbated the threat posed by “too big to fail” countries like Greece and Italy, in turn menacing economic stability worldwide, we can only hope that the experiment of multi-regional power blocs and currencies, which we were told would provide security yet have ended up giving us the exact opposite, is consigned to the slag heap of history along with the failed euro.
Paul Joseph Watson is the editor and writer for Prison Planet.com. He is the author of Order Out Of Chaos. Watson is also a regular fill-in host for The Alex Jones Show.
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Eurozone collapse 'will send continent into depression’By Bruno Waterfield 6:20AM GMT 11 Nov 2011
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/8882812/Eurozone-collapse-will-send-continent-into-depression.htmlThe collapse of the eurozone would cause a crash that would instantly wipe out half of the value of Europe’s economy, plunging the continent into a depression as deep as the 1930s slump, the president of the European Commission has warned.
José Manuel Barroso issued his chilling warning as France began diplomatic overtures to create a eurozone vanguard, potentially with fewer than the 17 existing members of the single currency.
Mr Barroso said that if the euro area of the 17 member states or the wider 27-country EU broke apart the estimated initial cost would be up to 50 per cent of European gross domestic product. “It would jeopardise the future prosperity of the next generation. That is the threat that hangs over us,” he said.
In a speech in Berlin aimed at tackling any support for a smaller elite eurozone comprised of the EU’s strongest economies, Mr Barroso warned that the consequence of a split would be a million lost jobs in Germany.
The result of such an economic shock would be emergence of extremism and divisions within Europe, the former Portuguese prime minister told his German audience.
“Populism and sometimes even nationalism raises its head across our continent,” he said. “This is ignoring the global realities as well as our common history that teaches us that this continent is simply too small and too inter-dependent for us to stand apart, to turn our backs to each other.”
Financial markets tumbled yesterday as news broke that MPs in Germany’s ruling Christian Democratic Union party plan to debate a motion next week allowing countries to leave the euro area.
Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, and Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, first raised the prospect of a country exiting the euro last week when they said that a proposed Greek bailout referendum would be an in-or-out vote on euro membership.
Leaving the currency area is not envisaged under current euro rules.
George Papandreou, the Greek prime minister, scrapped the ballot before stepping down and handing over power to a national unity government.
Reminding Germany of the legacy of the Second World War, Mr Barroso called on Europe’s largest country and economy to “take its responsibilities seriously”.
“Just as the founding fathers had a vision of Europe after two devastating world wars, we must also now act with resilience and with vision towards a Europe that is strong but open,” he said. “Now is Germany’s time to show that it is fighting the cause of a strong, integrated and competitive Europe.”
A eurozone crash, the commission has predicted, would see £10 trillion wiped off the value of the European economy, a catastrophe that would send living standards plummeting to the levels of Latin America.
The shock would wipe out all the gains of Europe’s longest period of peace since the Second World War and herald the political chaos and collapse of governments that ushered in Nazism 80 years ago.
“It would be worse than anything our post-war generation can even imagine,” said an official. “Only those Europeans in their late eighties will have any idea about bad it could get.”
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IMF warns rich states may fall back into recessionBy Lesley Wroughton | Reuters 10 Nov 2011
(Reporting by Lesley Wroughton; Editing by Jan Paschal)
http://news.yahoo.com/imf-warns-advanced-nations-may-fall-recession-151610553.htmlWASHINGTON (Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund on Friday warned that advanced economies could fall back into recession unless policy-makers move with greater urgency to agree on policies to boost growth.
In a note prepared for the G20 summit in Cannes, France, last week but only published on Friday, the IMF said the economic recovery in advanced economies "remains in low gear."
"Policy paralysis and incoherence have contributed to exacerbating uncertainty, a loss of confidence, and heightened financial market stress," the IMF said.
The fund said advanced economies urgently need to spell out credible medium-term fiscal plans and outline further financial sector reforms. In key emerging economies, governments should allow for faster exchange-rate appreciation, it added.
In particular, the IMF said there was "considerable uncertainty" about how fiscal sustainability will be achieved in the United States, Japan, and some euro area economies.
"To reduce this uncertainty, these economies need to move quickly to put in place credible medium-term consolidation plans, which will help preserve room for adequate short-term fiscal support to the recovery," it added.
The G20 summit was taken up with trying to avert a euro- zone meltdown, in particular in Greece and Italy.
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As The European Debt Woes Spiral Out Of ControlBob Chapman
International Forecaster
November 13, 2011
http://www.infowars.com/as-the-european-debt-woes-spiral-out-of-control/http://theinternationalforecaster.com/International_Forecaster_Weekly/As_The_European_Debt_Woes_Spiral_Out_Of_ControlAs Chancellor Merkel and PM Sarkozy search for a solution that doesn’t exist they continue to lose credibility. Nothing of substance has been agreed upon that is legal and can be implemented. At the IMF Christina LeGarde is frantically waving her arms like a cheerleader telling anyone that will listen that if the six sovereigns in financial trouble are not aided the euro will fail and peace in Europe will disappear. The elitists are frantic because they cannot find a solution. LeGarde says without help there will be ten years of depression. She obviously hasn’t done her homework. Try 30 or more years. Sarkozy, Merkel and Jans Weidmann council member of the ECB has said the ECB cannot bail out governments by printing money. He is also head of the Bundesbank and said a key lesson of what is being proposed is the hyperinflation in Weimer Republic, which followed WWI. Over in Italy PM Berlusconi, who looks and acts like Benito Mussolini has been unseated and as a result the Italian bond market is on the edge of collapse. There is big pressure downward in stock and bond markets as a result and the US Treasury again attacks gold and silver hoping they can keep gold from breaking about $1,800. The PPT’s ability to achieve this is more than questionable.
At Cannes PM Sarkozy and President Obama discuss what a liar Israel’s PM Netanyahu is. Their candor was accidentally picked up by a supposedly muted speaker. What is now realized is that euro zone government bonds contain unexpected credit risks. All the European politicians and bureaucrats want to save the euro, but their promises and solutions are not worth the paper they are written on. They are so believable that China won’t lend them money. These characters have been kicking the can down the road since last spring with little or no long-term solutions, and no solutions to affect a recovery and create jobs. Austerity has replaced growth and that is expediting a failing economy, even in Germany. If economies don’t grow tax receipts fall and the ability to service debt is impaired. Big euro zone banks are broke just as their counterparts in NYC are. As this proceeds we ask how long can the ECB buy Italian and Spanish bonds?
In Greece a coalition has been made and Mr. Samaras has shown his true colors by backing Trilateral-Bilderberg Lucas Papademos, as interim PM. We hope Greek citizens realize that Papademos will sell them out. It is only a matter of when. The debt deal will probably be ratified, but at what price? Will it bring revolution or a coup? Who knows, but under the circumstances anything goes. 60% to 65% of Greeks oppose the bailout, but 71% want to stay in the euro, which is impossible.
If further austerity measures are taken in Italy there will be demonstrations and violence. In the meantime bond market yields climb; Italy’s access to the bond market lessens and as a result stock markets fall. There is no coordination between the ECB and its members. The French banks and others are selling bonds, which the ECB is being forced to buy. All of these factors lend to political, financial and economic uncertainty. This is a major full-blown crisis and the US realizes that. Why else would they be strongly trying to suppress gold and silver prices? Europe is in disarray and Germany has to come to terms with cutting loose the six loser countries. That means leaving the euro and perhaps the EU. We see no other choice in this unnatural association.
Europe’s banks are leveraged 26 to 1, whereas 9 to 1 is normal. A 4% fall in asset prices will wipe out equity. Debt to equity for corporations is 145% in Portugal, 135% in Italy; 113% in Ireland, Greece 218%, Spain 152% and 89% in the UK. In Germany it is 105% and in France 76%. EU financial problems are endemic not just in the six countries in trouble. Europe is an accident waiting to happen, which we have pointed out for some time. We are now seeing failed bond auctions even in Germany. The sale of EFSF bonds had to be put off due to lack of interest. If it hadn’t been for the ECB buying the bonds of Italy, Spain and Portugal the bond market would have already collapsed. Europe is the catalyst and eventually it probably will take the financial system down. The ECB probably has already bought close to $300 billion in just these countries alone.
European banks are howling that they have to increase capital reserves to 9% by June 30, 2012. In the wings we see $610 billion allocated to bailout by sovereigns, which they believe will be stretched to $1.4 trillion via the use of derivatives. That may never happen if the German Federal Court disallows it. On the other hand more savings would allow further business expansion but are we going to see that in a falling economy?
This last recovery as an example in Germany was caused in great part by an increase in government debt from 74% in 2009 to 83% in 2010, in France 79% to 82% and in Greece and Italy 130% to 160% versus 116%. Thus, it is fair to assume that the recent recovery came from an extension of money and credit. This leveraging now leads to de-leveraging, which may bring balance, but is not good for growing an economy. It diminishes the ability of the economy to generate capital. That means the economies statuses are going to worsen. This results in lower manufacturing activity, which we already see falling. Year-on-year the PMI has already fallen from 54.6 to 47.3 in Germany. The service index is 47.2. Both have been and will continue to fall in tandem. At the same time the ECB has monetized $300 billion by purchasing bonds and that is inflationary. Worse yet the ECB has lifted monetary growth from 9.5% in June to 23% in October. Loose monetary policies cause these problems, but debt is so onerous that they have to continue or they will fall into a deflationary depression. In the meantime inflation grows. There can be no real healthy growth until de-leveraging has ended. The banks and the governments won’t do that for fear of losing control. That means more debt and higher inflation and perhaps even hyperinflation.
In Italy Silvio Berlusconi is off again, on again, as to whether to resign as PM. His closest coalition ally Umberto Bossi of the Northern League, has told him he should resign.
There is no question that Europe’s debt crisis has spiraled out of control. That is something we predicted would happen long ago. Finally, Germany and France are discussing a breakup of the euro zone to allow the six weak countries to exit the euro, but stay in the EU. Italy and Spain show signs of serious trouble and they are simply too big to rescue, because that would bankrupt the solvent countries.
Italy’s 10-year T-notes traded as high as 7.5% and are now back below 7%, but the ECB and other countries, plus perhaps the Fed, were buyers.
We have to laugh as all these bureaucrats and politicians try to save six countries, as their own countries are in serious trouble. Mrs. Merkel, German Chancellor, says it is all so unpleasant. Lady, it is a lot worse than unpleasant. Europe is in a defining moment as they face collapse.
Bob Chapman – James Corbett Interview – Nov. 8, 2011
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lE8ABzj28bM&feature=emailBob Chapman – Radio Liberty 3rd Hour – November 07, 2011
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIL54opt7LM&feature=emailBob Chapman – The Financial Survival 09 Nov 2011
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBV-diIcbtY&feature=emailBob Chapman – A Marine Disquisition – 10 Nov 2011
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLcHs5uhUMc&feature=emailAs the world economy slows the EU is focusing on growth, because if it doesn’t it will fall behind in a very competitive world. Europe, England and the US, as well as others are facing inflationary depression and then deflationary depression.
There is not from our viewpoint at this time, enough time to make treaty changes. All efforts have to be pointed toward immediate financial solutions and to allow those six nations to exit the euro zone, but allow them to stay in the EU. Recession is fast closing in on the world, just not Europe. If they have to increase money and credit on the short term so be it.
Giving Berlusconi his due, he inherited a can of worms and ran a decent austerity plan. He kept the government and the economy functioning for a few more years. The problem was extreme levels of debt, not the PM.
All of the above ongoing problems should lead to collapse, which means gold and silver prices are headed higher.
Confidence among U.S. consumers rose more than projected in November, offering additional support to the biggest part of the economy.
The Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan preliminary index of consumer sentiment climbed to 64.2 this month, the highest since June, from 60.9 in October. The median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News called for a reading of 61.5. [This is the theater of the absurd.]
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Eurozone bail-out fund has to resort to buying its own debtBy Harry Wilson and Kamal Ahmed9:30PM GMT 12 Nov 2011
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/8886380/Eurozone-bail-out-fund-has-to-resort-to-buying-its-own-debt.htmlEurope's €1 trillion (£854bn) rescue fund has been forced to buy its own debt as outside investors become increasingly concerned about the worsening eurozone sovereign debt crisis.
The European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) last week announced it had successfully sold a €3bn 10-year bond in support of Ireland.
However, The Sunday Telegraph can reveal that target was only met after the EFSF resorted to buying up several hundred million euros worth of the bonds.
Sources said the EFSF had spent more than € 100m buying up its own bonds to help it achieve its funding target after the banks leading the deal were only able to find about €2.7bn of outside demand for the debt.
The revelation will be seen as a major failure and a worrying sign of future buyers strike after EFSF officials and their bankers had spent recent weeks travelling the world attempting to persuade key investors, including China's national wealth fund and Japanese government funds, to buy its bonds.
Chinese and Japanese money was crucial to last year's first bond sales by the EFSF, but they have since been dismayed by the eurozone's failure to resolve the worsening debt crisis and alarmed at how fund has morphed from being a rescue facility for European banks into a potentially €1 trillion leveraged first-loss insurer for eurozone governments.
Other European Union funds are also understood to have supported the EFSF's bond sale. The failure of the EFSF will increase pressure on the European Central Bank to effectively become the lender of last resort for the eurozone, a move it has strongly resisted.
At a private breakfast organised by PI Capital last week, Mark Hoban, the Treasury minister, said: "What it doesn't do is provide the next stage of the solution, which is how do you stop this from happening again?" he said.
The move, by the European Investment Bank, will cause more disquiet among non-eurozone EU members who have become concerned about their growing exposure to the cost of rescuing the currency bloc.
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European Ponzi Goes Full Retard As EFSF Found To Monetize… ItselfZero Hedge
November 13, 2011
http://www.infowars.com/european-ponzi-goes-full-retard-as-efsf-found-to-monetize-itself/http://www.zerohedge.com/news/european-ponzi-goes-full-retard-efsf-found-monetize-itselfWe have long mocked and ridiculed the Fed for being the ultimate ponzi instrument: after all, why worry, when your central bank will buy up almost three trillion in US paper in about 2 years (a very comforting fact for US politicians who never have to fear that those trillions in new porkbills, pardon fiscal stimulus programs, may end up without funding). Well, as it turns out those wily veteran bankers from across the Atlantic have just one upped America yet again.
According to the Telegraph, the abysmal, and barely successful, 3 EUR billion issuance of EFSF bonds (which was originally supposed to be 10 EUR billion, on its very very gradual climb to 1 EUR trillion) had one more very curious feature to it, aside from confirming that it is Dead On Arrival as expected. It turns out that in addition to being the most convoluted and complex creation ever conceived by JPM which is advising Europe on coming up with structured finance products that are so complex nobody will ask any questions and will automatically assume someone else has done the homework, it is also the quintessential ponzi instrument.
The Telegraph reports that the already reduced 3 EUR billion “target was only met after the EFSF resorted to buying up several hundred million euros worth of the bonds.” You read that right: in its first bond issuance since its transformation to the European Bank/Soveriegn Bailout Swiss Army Knife, the EFSF not only failed to raise a minimum token amount, but also had to… buy its own bonds.
We can assume that the money the EFSF needed to fund said purchase came from the money growing tree, as at last check the ECB was still not funding the EFSF with crisp, new zEURq.PK equivalent binary 1s and 0s. But at least we all know what happens when the global ponzi goes full retard.
More on this surreal story which will be promptly buried in the barrage of Monday headlines because an international advisor to Goldman Sachs is now in charge of Italy.
Sources said the EFSF had spent more than € 100m buying up its own bonds to help it achieve its funding target after the banks leading the deal were only able to find about €2.7bn of outside demand for the debt.
The revelation will be seen as a major failure and a worrying sign of future buyers strike after EFSF officials and their bankers had spent recent weeks travelling the world attempting to persuade key investors, including China’s national wealth fund and Japanese government funds, to buy its bonds.
And just in case one monetization vertical was not enough, Europe used, well, all the other ones it could:
Other European Union funds are also understood to have supported the EFSF’s bond sale. The failure of the EFSF will increase pressure on the European Central Bank to effectively become the lender of last resort for the eurozone, a move it has strongly resisted.
At a private breakfast organised by PI Capital last week, Mark Hoban, the Treasury minister, said: “What it doesn’t do is provide the next stage of the solution, which is how do you stop this from happening again?” he said.
The move, by the European Investment Bank, will cause more disquiet among non-eurozone EU members who have become concerned about their growing exposure to the cost of rescuing the currency bloc.
The explanation, for anyone whose brain just exploded, is that despite the marionette rotation at the top, the math of Europe is still not only absolutely hopeless, not to mention meaningless, but somehow just got even worse, because take away the magical powers of modern finance to be one with the ponzi, and Europe would have already imploded.
It also means that our earlier observation that the EFSF is an AA+ equivalent credit instrument has to be revised: pro formaing out the ponzi, means it is at best AA if not A, and most likely D if one takes away all the magic bells and Keynesian whistles, unicorns and other end of the western financial world loopholes that modern finance is forced to resort to every single day to mask the fact that every country in the developed world is now 100% bankrupt.
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Europe fears credit squeeze as investors sell bond holdings19 Nov, 2011, 12.22PM IST, New York Times
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/markets/global-markets/europe-fears-credit-squeeze-as-investors-sell-bond-holdings/articleshow/10791117.cmshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_crunchNervous investors around the globe are accelerating their exit from the debt of European governments and banks, increasing the risk of a credit squeeze that could set off a downward spiral.
Financial institutions are dumping their vast holdings of European government debt and spurning new bond issues by countries like Spain and Italy. And many have decided not to renew short-term loans to European banks, which are needed to finance day-to-day operations.
If this trend continues, it risks creating a vicious cycle of rising borrowing costs, deeper spending cuts and slowing growth, which is hard to get out of, especially as some European banks are having trouble meeting their financing needs.
"It's a pretty terrible spiral," said Peter R. Fisher, vice chairman of the asset manager BlackRock and a former senior Treasury official in the Clinton administration.
The pullback - which is increasing almost daily - is driven by worries that some European countries may not be able to fully repay their bond borrowings, which in turn would damage banks that own large amounts of those bonds. It also increases the already rising pressure on the European Central Bank to take more aggressive action.
On Friday, the bank's new president, Mario Draghi, put the onus on European leaders to deploy the long-awaited eurozone bailout fund to resolve the crisis, implicitly rejecting calls for the European Central Bank to step up and become the region's "lender of last resort."
The flight from European sovereign debt and banks has spanned the globe. European institutions like the Royal Bank of Scotland and pension funds in the Netherlands have been heavy sellers in recent days. And earlier this month, Kokusai Asset Management in Japan unloaded nearly $1 billion in Italian debt.
At the same time, U.S. institutions are pulling back on loans to even the sturdiest banks in Europe. When a $300 million certificate of deposit held by Vanguard's $114 billion Prime Money Market Fund from Rabobank in the Netherlands came due on Nov. 9, Vanguard decided to let the loan expire and move the money out of Europe. Rabobank enjoys a AAA credit rating and is considered one of the strongest banks in the world.
"There's a real sensitivity to being in Europe," said David Glocke, head of money market funds at Vanguard. "When the noise gets loud it's better to watch from the sidelines rather than stay in the game. Even highly rated banks, such as Rabobank, I'm letting mature."
The latest evidence that governments, too, are facing a buyers' strike came Thursday, when a disappointing response to Spain's latest 10-year bond offering allowed rates to climb to nearly 7 percent, a record. A French bond auction also received a lukewarm response.
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Standard Chartered voit un risque d'éclatement de la zone euroCréé le 01-01-2012 à 20h15 - Mis à jour à 20h15
http://tempsreel.nouvelobs.com/economie/20120101.REU6154/standard-chartered-voit-un-risque-d-eclatement-de-la-zone-euro.htmlLONDRES (Reuters) - Le directeur général de la banque Standard Chartered, Peter Sands, juge de plus en plus possible qu'un ou plusieurs pays quittent la zone euro.
"Nous abordons 2012 avec une perspective très difficile pour la zone euro (...), avec un risque accru de voir des pays sortir de la zone euro", déclare le dirigeant de cette banque essentiellement tournée vers l'Asie, dans une interview que publie le Sunday Telegraph.
"Nul ne doit sous-estimer l'impact que cela aurait, car il serait difficile de gérer le risque de contagion, même s'il s'agit seulement de la Grèce. Les perturbations que cela engendrerait seraient vraiment fortes. Elles auraient des ramifications dans le monde entier".
Matt Falloon; Eric Faye pour le service français
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Standard Chartered sees higher risk of euro splitLONDON | Sun Jan 1, 2012 7:35am EST
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/01/01/europe-standardchartered-split-idUSL6E8C105D20120101Jan 1 (Reuters) - The head of Standard Chartered bank sees a growing likelihood of one or more countries leaving the euro zone, telling a Sunday newspaper that political leaders have yet to offer a meaningful solution to the bloc's debt crisis.
"We enter 2012 with a very difficult outlook for the euro zone ... with an increasing possibility of countries actually leaving the euro zone," Peter Sands, chief executive of the Asia-focused bank, told the Sunday Telegraph newspaper in an interview.
"Nobody should underestimate what a big deal that would be, because it would be very difficult to manage the contagion risk, even if it was only Greece. The disruption from that would really be quite significant. That will have ramifications all over the world."
In France, the European Central Bank's Christian Noyer defended the currency union, saying the euro could yet become the world's leading currency if leaders of the 17-nation bloc succeed in tightening fiscal integration.
"In 10 years, maybe the euro will be the world's number one currency," Noyer said in an article for Journal du Dimanche to mark the 10th anniversary of the launch of euro notes and coins.
European Union leaders agreed at an emergency summit in Brussels on Dec. 9 to draft a new treaty for deeper economic union, with Britain the only country among the 27 EU nations declining to join the initiative.
"If we implement all the decisions taken at the Brussels summit we will emerge stronger," Noyer, who is also governor of the Bank of France, said in the article.
However, Journal du Dimanche also published an opinion poll showing 50 percent of French people thought the single currency had been a bad idea, compared with 35 percent who approved.
Euro zone leaders and policymakers have been scrambling to come up with a way to reassure investors and stop the 2-year-old crisis spreading through vulnerable debtor states.
"I think the probability of countries leaving the euro zone has increased because we have had several successive plans announced to solve the problem of the euro zone which simply haven't convinced the market -- and ultimately, the current structure and shape and scope of the euro zone only works if the market believes it's worth supporting," Sands said.
"The solutions available at any one time are not necessarily available at the next step and so I think the solutions base has narrowed because we have missed opportunities."
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Le Brésil se rebelle contre la politique monétaire des pays développésPar MARC VIGNAUD Le Point.fr - Publié le 06/03/2012 à 09:17
http://www.lepoint.fr/economie/le-bresil-se-rebelle-contre-la-politique-monetaire-des-pays-developpes-06-03-2012-1438249_28.phpBrasilia dénonce la guerre des monnaies provoquée par l'injection massive de liquidités dans le système financier des économies avancées.
Un véritable "tsunami monétaire". Voilà comment Dilma Roussef, la présidente brésilienne, qualifie désormais les conséquences de la politique menée par les banques centrales des grands pays développés. Utilisant une rhétorique très ferme, celle qui a remplacé Lula à la tête du pays a promis jeudi devant un parterre de chefs d'entreprise et de syndicalistes de lutter contre les politiques "perverses mises en oeuvre par les pays riches tels que l'Union européenne qui inondent le marché de dollars".
De fait, pour faire face à la crise financière, les États-Unis, l'Angleterre, l'Europe et le Japon ont beaucoup baissé leurs taux d'intérêt. Pire, la Réserve fédérale américaine, si prompte à dénoncer la sous-évaluation du yuan chinois arrimé au billet vert, n'a pas hésité à inonder le marché de liquidités en achetant massivement des obligations d'État américaines (les deux "quantitative easing", comme on dit dans le jargon financier). Quant à la BCE, elle a accordé aux banques de la zone euro, jeudi dernier encore, près de 530 milliards d'euros sur trois ans, à un taux d'intérêt dérisoire de 1 %, après leur avoir alloué 489 milliards en novembre.
"Carry trade"Quel rapport avec le Brésil ? L'abondance de liquidités a entraîné une hausse spectaculaire de sa monnaie à cause de l'afflux massif de capitaux qu'elle provoque. Attirés par les perspectives de rendements élevés, les investisseurs (banques, fonds de pension, fonds monétaires américains, hedge funds) placent volontiers une partie de leur argent frais sur des actifs des pays émergents. Ils le font d'autant plus facilement que les perspectives de croissance sont bien supérieures à celles des pays développés pour un risque relativement faible.
Certains misent sur des gains à court terme en utilisant la stratégie dite de "carry trade", qui consiste à s'endetter dans une devise à faible taux d'intérêt, comme le dollar, pour placer les fonds empruntés dans une autre devise à taux d'intérêt plus forts, comme le real (la banque centrale sert 10,5 % d'intérêt) et profiter ainsi du différentiel de taux d'intérêt.
Bilan, le real brésilien s'est apprécié de quelque 9,5 % par rapport au dollar depuis le début de l'année, une tendance problématique pour les exportations du pays, pourtant essentielles pour la croissance. Mais le Brésil est loin d'être le seul pays émergent touché, au point qu'ils se plaignent d'une véritable "guerre de monnaies".
Des flux déstabilisateursL'afflux de capitaux pose d'autres problèmes que le renchérissement des exportations. Les investissements réalisés sont en effet souvent des investissements de portefeuille, c'est-à-dire d'achats d'actions et obligations de sociétés sans prise de contrôle, très volatiles. S'ils répondent pour une part à des besoins réels de financement des entreprises visées, ils peuvent donc avoir un effet très déstabilisateur : le flux s'inverse très vite en cas de retournement de la conjoncture ou de montée de l'aversion au risque des investisseurs, qui rapatrient alors massivement leurs capitaux, risquant de déclencher une crise financière majeure.
En attendant, l'afflux a aussi tendance à favoriser l'inflation, déjà tirée par une forte croissance. Les taux d'intérêt élevés, censés lutter contre la hausse des prix, ne sont alors plus efficaces, au contraire. La banque centrale peut bien essayer de réabsorber la création de devise locale liée aux entrées de capitaux, mais cela lui coûte cher, explique Jean-Pierre Allegret, professeur d'économie à l'université Paris-Ouest Nanterre-La Défense.
Les investisseurs étrangers risquent enfin de générer des bulles sur certains actifs, en investissant démesurément sur les actions ou l'immobilier, par exemple. Et quand elles explosent, cela peut faire mal, très mal. Heureusement, ce n'est pas encore le cas.
L'arme du contrôle des capitauxPour enrayer le mouvement de hausse à temps, le gouvernement brésilien ne s'est pas limité aux attaques verbales. Comme la Corée du Sud, il a instauré un contrôle des capitaux entrant dans le pays : jeudi, Guido Mantega, le ministre des Finances, a porté de deux à trois ans la durée d'application de l'impôt de 6 % sur les emprunts des entreprises à l'étranger, une mesure qui renforce un mouvement entamé en octobre 2010. Des contrôles parfois tellement nécessaires qu'ils commencent à trouver grâce aux yeux d'institutions comme le FMI, qui y étaient jusque-là très opposés.
Reste que, comme le note Natixis, le Brésil a toujours besoin des sources de financement externes pour augmenter ses investissements, vu le faible niveau de son épargne intérieure. Dilma Roussef devra donc veiller à ne pas décourager les investissements étrangers de long terme.
