Short term trades in the stock market •$$$$$•

[SpasticGramps]

Norway Stops Aid Payments To Greece

And here comes the first domino: according to Swiss journal NZZ, the Greek bailout is about to take a turn for the worse. "Norway will first stop all further financial aid payments to the highly indebted Greece. The reason is that Greece does not fulfill its obligations descendants, the Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Store said on Thursday before the Parliament." And with Norway which is a member of the European Economic Area, and actually one of the few solvent and non-basket case European countries saying let the chips fall where they may, it is just the first. Look for every other country currently on the sidelines vis-a-vis Greece (and just as insolvent) to follow suit as the European experiment falls apart.

From NZZ (Google translated)
Norway felt obliged to make payments to Greece until further adjust. He was "sad" about the decision because he does not aggravate the situation in Greece which would, Norway got no choice.

Norway is not an EU member, however, belongs to the European Economic Area (EEA). About this country is paying the money to compensate for economic and social disparities in Europe.

Aid does not reach receiver

As the EEA Iceland and Liechtenstein members suspect the country that its financial aid to Greece did not go to the intended recipient, reported the Norwegian news agency NTB.

Thus Athens is not following its obligation to fund under the financial assistance provided for projects to 50 percent with their own money. Of the grants of 248 million Norwegian crowns (39 million), which was originally for Greece are, so far only 13 million had been disbursed, reported NTB. The rest remains now frozen.

Greece gets more fucked by the day. Their party is just about over.

Looks like Spain may have been caught cooking the books and their insolvency may become known to all shortly.

Spain Vote Threatens to Uncover Debt As Socialists Risk Losing Key Areas WSJ

MADRID (Dow Jones)--Weekend elections that threaten to drive Spain's ruling Socialist party from power in several regions and cities also promise a potentially nasty surprise: the revelation of piles of undisclosed debt in local governments that could undercut the country's drive to avoid an international bailout.

Five months ago, a government change in Spain's Catalonia region revealed a budget deficit more than twice as big as previously reported. Now, a growing chorus of economists, local politicians and business leaders say that new governments are likely to discover, as Catalonia did, piles of "hidden debt" owed to health clinics and other ..

Looks like the EUR is going to get crushed today as Europe slips further into their blackhole. DXY should be up and stocks and equities down.

 

[SpasticGramps]

More on Spain and the collapsing Euro. I haven't heard anything in the MSM about the protests going into their 4th day now in Spain. Curious? They are protesting high unemployment and inflation. Seems kind of like a global trend, eh? Who would have thought? Fasten your seatbelts.

Goldman Warns That Spanish Bonds, EUR Poised For Technical Breakdown

As if Spain did not have enough to worry about with now daily protests gripping the main cities (the live webcam for the daily festivities in Madrid can be found here), next according to Goldman's John Noyce not only are Spanish bonds on the verge of a technical breakdown (and yields about to breakout), but due to the very high correlation between the Bund-Spain spread and the inverse EUR, it likely means that should the market start pricing in the Spanish domino, then the EUR, already lagging the move, is about to take out 1.40 rapidly. And with Spanish spreads flying as is over concerns what the Spanish elections on Sunday could mean for the country and the region, we can see something snap in advance of the weekend any minute.

 

[Madrus Rose]

GoldMan Sacks was made to do the Perp walk today like IMF Chief Dominque Strauss-Kahn ....took a dive finishing down another 4pts to $135 at the end of day approaching 52week low. Knowing Goldman they're prolly shorting their own stock and still maKing money !

*Some articles out in the day they may not escape financial probes & are being investigated . We heard that jus before the offices were going to be being raided by the Feds they had the shredding machines working full time @ Goldman offices , even brought in an industrial woodchipper cause the shredders werent fast enough ... later reports came in they had Abbey Joseph Cohen on suicide watch .

20-May-11 13:11 ET GS Goldman Sachs - - Relative Weakness (137.62 -1.72) The stock has been under pressure since the year began off its $175 high and has been accelerating lower since its late-April bearish gap back below its 200-day simple moving average. Sellers continue to press price lower here in May, with price approaching its Aug 2010 low of 135.79. Next level of interest below that is near $130 which represents the 2010 lows


Selling started out early, very weak & falling below $139 excellerated

 

[Mountain]

I think I remember this thread chattering about the $155 level for GS awhile back?

 

[SpasticGramps]

Knowing Goldman they're prolly shorting their own stock and still maKing money !

No doubt. I hope Goldman's Sach get's taken to the cleaners.

I'd love to see Blanksfien doing the perp walk.

 

[Cheeb]

Comex Registered Silver Just Hit A Fresh All Time Low

And speaking of silver, a quick glance at today's Comex holdings update indicates that while total silver continues to flirt with the 100 million ounce total on the downside (hitting a record low yesterday at 100.5 million ounces), following yet another reclassification from Registered to Eligible silver at the Comex vault for a total of 496k ounces (or 6.3% of the vault total), true physical in the Comex just dropped to a new all time low of just 32.2 million ounces.

 

[Hydrosun]

So there is less than .5oz of silver on deposit for every man woman and child in the USA. Wouldn't hurt to have some on deposit at the house.

 

[Mountain]

So there is less than .5oz of silver on deposit for every man woman and child in the USA. Wouldn't hurt to have some on deposit at the house.

Yeah Gramps has most of the rest of the silver in his safe

 

[SpasticGramps]

Yeah Gramps has most of the rest of the silver in his safe

I'm working hard at it.

Gold didn't seem to be too horribly effected by the commodities sell off. It looks like it's being pushed up as a flight to safety trade now with all the uncertainty in Europe and elsewhere. If the PMs have become defacto reserve currencies, as I think they soon will when confidence in fiat begins to really wane, then even when QEII ends they should keep going up.

 

[SpasticGramps]

Maybe going to get a little "mushy" here.

Stock investors worry: Is ride getting rougher? Market Watch

By Rex Crum, MarketWatch
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — U.S. stock investors, coming off their third week of losses, will look to home sales, GDP and handful of earnings in the coming week for clarity on whether the economy and stocks are in for a rougher ride.

Investors are facing a market that spent the past week dealing with the differing quarterly results of PC giants Hewlett-Packard Co. HPQ -0.42% and Dell Inc. DELL -2.02% , along with the thunderous public stock debut of LinkedIn Corp. LNKD -1.23% , and more concerns about the state of European economies such as that of Greece. Read more about how the market performed.

For the week, the Dow Jones Industrials Average DJIA -0.74% slipped by 0.7%, the Nasdaq Composite Index COMP -0.71% gave up almost 1% and the S&P 500 Index SPX -0.77% ended the week down by 0.3%. It was the third straight week of losses for the Dow and Nasdaq.

Mark Luschini, chief investment strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott, in Pittsburgh, said the market is in a period of reacting to economic data that he described as “mushy.” For example, first quarter GDP growth is expected to come in at 2%, up slightly from prior estimates of 1.8%.

“There’s things like the Philadelphia Fed being modestly positive, and the leading economic indicators are negative for the first time since last summer,” Luschini said. “I’m not sure there’s a lot of encouragement for investors heading toward the end of June.”

 

[Mountain]

LOL. No doubt. Sleazebags, gangsters, tyrants, shitheads.

Heh heh...they're not the only ones...

When social network LinkedIn's stock skyrocketed after its IPO debut, the financial community reeled at the fact that LinkedIn's underwriters, Bank of America Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley, had set the price so low. As Henry Blodget at Business Insider indicated, they set the price at $45 a share when they could have asked for $90, and thus effectively cheated LinkedIn out of over $130 million.

Joe Nocera furthers this claim against LinkedIn's underwriters at The New York Times, noting that while there is "nothing wrong with a small 'pop' in the aftermath of an IPO," such a tremendous rise in stock price indicates that "in reality, LinkedIn was scammed by its bankers."

The fact that the stock more than doubled on its first day of trading — something the investment bankers, with their fingers on the pulse of the market, absolutely must have known would happen — means that hundreds of millions of additional dollars that should have gone to LinkedIn wound up in the hands of investors that Morgan Stanley and Merrill Lynch wanted to do favors for. Most of those investors, I guarantee, sold the stock during the morning run-up. It’s the easiest money you can make on Wall Street.

 

[SpasticGramps]

Yeah. Bank of Meryl Countrywide America, FRBNY JP Chase Moron, Goldman's, Citi. Uncle Benny and the Gangsters. Scandalous. Just absolutely scandalous. The whole lot of 'em.

 

[SpasticGramps]

Interesting sign of the times.

Gold, silver coins to be legal currency in Utah AP

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- Utah legislators want to see the dollar regain its former glory, back to the days when one could literally bank on it being "as good as gold."

To make that point, they've turned it around, and made gold as good as cash. Utah became the first state in the country this month to legalize gold and silver coins as currency. The law also will exempt the sale of the coins from state capital gains taxes.

Craig Franco hopes to cash in on it with his Utah Gold and Silver Depository, and he thinks others will soon follow.

The idea is simple: Store your gold and silver coins in a vault, and Franco issues a debit-like card to make purchases backed by your holdings.

He plans to open for business June 1, likely the first of its kind in the country.

"Because we're dealing with something so forward thinking, I expect a wait-and-see attitude," Franco said. "Once the depository is executed and transactions can occur, then I think people will move into the marketplace."

The idea was spawned by Republican state Rep. Brad Galvez, who sponsored the bill largely to serve as a protest against Federal Reserve monetary policy. Galvez says Americans are losing faith in the dollar. If you're mad about government debt, ditch the cash. Spend your gold and silver, he says.

His idea isn't to return to the gold standard, when the dollar was backed by gold instead of government goodwill. Instead, he just wanted to create options for consumers.

"We're too far down the road to go back to the gold standard," Galvez said. "This will move us toward an alternative currency."

Earlier this month, Minnesota took a step closer to joining Utah in making gold and silver legal tender. A Republican lawmaker there introduced a bill that sets up a special committee to explore the option. North Carolina,

 

[Mountain]

Yeah I saw that Utah thing and other states very close to the same thing. Some states are talking about minting their own gold/silver currency as a hedge against federal collapse. I mean shite...for even some states to be talking about such a thing is quite interesting!

 

[SpasticGramps]

I think the market has already decided that the dollar is no longer the real reserve currency. It is no longer a flight to safety trade or not much anyway. It is just slowly unwinding at this point. The final nail in the coffin and the "official" death of the dollar as the reserve currency will be when oil is no longer traded in dollars IMO.

Markets looking like they are going to get crushed today. The Europe meltdown is spooking the herd.

 

[SpasticGramps]

Even some of the Bernanake shills are having a tough time continuing to perpetuate the "Recovery Myth."

QE2 was a bust MarketWatch
Economic data is worse than before

BOSTON (MarketWatch) — It‘s cost $600 billion of your money. And it was supposed to rescue the economy. But has Ben Bernanke’s huge financial stimulus package, known as “Quantitative Easing 2,” actually worked as planned?

QE2 is being wound down in the next few weeks. Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke has said it has left the economy “moving in the right direction.”

But an analysis of the real numbers tells a very different story.

Turns out the program has created maybe 700,000 full-time jobs — at a cost of around $850,000 each.

House prices are lower than before QE2 was launched. Economic growth is slower. Inflation is higher.

Yes, it’s sparked a massive boom on the stock market. Ordinary investors have started piling back into shares again. And last week we saw the latest example of the return of animal spirits on Wall Street, as stock in new dot-com LinkedIn LNKD -9.64% skyrocketed on its debut. How to cash in on LinkedIn .

But even the stock market boom hasn’t been what it appears. An analysis shows that most of the rise in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index SPX -1.26% under QE2 has simply been a result of the decline in the dollar in which shares are measured.

The truth? QE2 has created a massive new bubble in dollar-based financial assets, from stocks to gold. Meanwhile, it has had zero visible effect on the real economy.

Take jobs. According to the U.S. Labor Department, since last August the number of full-time workers has gone up by just 700,000, from 111.8 million to 112.5 million.

At a cost of $600 billion, that’s $850,000 a job.

The picture’s even more meager. Over the same period, the number of part-time workers has gone down by 600,000. In other words, we’ve basically shifted 600,000 or 700,000 workers from part-time jobs to full-time jobs.

The percentage of the population in work is actually lower today — 58.4%, compared to 58.5% last August. The percentage of the workforce in actual work, the so-called “participation rate,” has fallen by half a percentage point.

Some recovery.

Housing is double-dipping. Big time. According to the National Association of Realtors, the average price of an “existing” (i.e. used) home was $177,300 in August, just before QE2.

Today? It’s $163,700 — or 8% less.

Economic growth has slowed. It was 2.6% last summer. It’s a miserable 1.8% now.

Meanwhile inflation has risen, from 1.2% before QE2 to 3.1% now.

Okay, maybe the economy would have been even worse without QE2. But the data do puncture any claim that these economic policies are working as advertized. Economists are now growing more and more gloomy about the outlook ahead. Retailer Gap on Friday became the latest economic bellwether to warn on weak sales and rising costs.

Meanwhile QE2 has created an entirely artificial bubble in all dollar-based assets.

Look at the stock market. Since Aug. 27, when Bernanke unveiled his plan for QE2 in Jackson Hole, Wyo., the S&P 500 has risen by 26%.

So far, so good, right? But it’s an illusion. What’s really happened is a decline in the value of the dollars that the shares are measured in.

Measured in hard currencies, the stock market boom has been much less impressive. In Swiss francs, the S&P has risen by just 8.4% since Aug. 27. In currencies like the Swedish krone and Australian dollars it’s even less. Measured in gold, the S&P 500 is up just 4.5%.

Meanwhile the illusion of a boom is causing all sorts of investors to take crazy risks. Witness LinkedIn’s IPO. Economists from the so-called “Austrian” school say this is a reason to go back to a gold standard. It certainly makes you wonder what’s next.

But, don't worry. Uncle Benny has it all under control. We just need to print a few more trillion and everything will be ok. Just a few more trillion. Just kick the can down the road a little more.......

 

[Mountain]

I'm kind of wondering if we'll see an island reversal at the top here with a nice gap lower to really start things off?

Heh heh.... We'll see if the gap holds.

 

[SpasticGramps]

Former US Budget Director David Stockman explains the next crisis and why the United States is insolvent. Interesting interview on CNBC.

Watch out for those bond vigilantes. They will be ruthless.

 

[Sam the Caveman]

Interesting sign of the times.

Gold, silver coins to be legal currency in Utah AP

And how long will it take before he (Craig Franco) starts cooking the books and ends up issuing more debt than his gold and silver are worth?

Another scammer in the making, it wouldn't suprise me if here were a front man for the federal reserve or some sheister mega bank, who then starts doing the same thing in every state with a gold/silver backed currency.

The only way I see it being free from or limited from corruption is using real gold/silver coins at the registers with each register having a live quote feed that instantly calculates the price of the goods based on the current market value of the gold/silver, heck or even just a mean price of the commodity over a 24 hr period.

Having to use coins for payment would be a major step backwards for the average joe who is used to using his "pay pass" card. But in the end the average joe's would be the ones starving, as he eventually wouldn't be able to afford even a loaf of bread, when the "idiot with the coins" is easily buying everything he needs to feed his whole family. But the reality is, I don't see it ever going back to using real gold/silver coins/bullion at the time of payment, so there will always be corruption and money makers.

 

[SpasticGramps]

And how long will it take before he (Craig Franco) starts cooking the books and ends up issuing more debt than his gold and silver are worth?

Probably doing it already lol.

I agree about the gold/silver coins not being used at time of payment. I can't see that happening. It's not feasible. But neither is the current system we have as it is starting to wind down. What system springs up to replace this one is anyone's guess. Order will come from the inevitable chaos as it always does. What and whose order it is will be the important thing.