Despite the evidence that migrants from the Middle East and Africa are continuing to flee war and poverty in their home countries and will strike out to Europe again in huge numbers this year, European leaders have taken no major new steps to curb the flow. Nor have they agreed on a comprehensive border policy or prepared for another influx that could rival last year’s, when more than a million asylum seekers reached the Continent, many of them headed to Germany.  Prime Minister Manuel Valls of France issued a stark warning in an interview broadcast on Friday about the future of a unified Europe, saying the very idea was under threat unless the Continent could protect its borders.  Speaking to the BBC at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Mr. Valls said the Continent could not accommodate the enormous numbers of migrants and warned that they could destabilize European societies. “If Europe is not capable of protecting its own borders, it’s the very idea of Europe that will be questioned,” he said. “Europe has forgotten that borders are required.”  The Schengen zone, which permits largely unchecked movement across most of the Continent and was described by Mr. Valls as “one of the great European projects,” has been under severe strain as countries have introduced border controls aimed at stemming the flow of migrants.

€-exposure...

Much more dangerous is the €-exposure that France, answering the exposure question in France that the ECB demanded, reduced it, and kept investor confidence, by transferring exposure to French banks outside France whilst strictly speaking answering the ECB honestly.
SocGen - St. Pierre et Miquelon and Débit Agricole Genève are 2 examples... In any case the big European lenders felt unease with the initial Bernake’s comments about restrictive monetary policy. The European financial system is currently oiled well with plenty of American dollars. If they are to be withdrawn there has to be a replacement. So Eurozone’s lenders asked and the ECB quickly responded with a completely new policy principle, the main characteristic of which will be plenty and zero cost euros for the ‘guys’.----- This decision was taken unanimously in ECB’s Governing Council last week with Germany not hesitating this time to support such a generous policy.----- The key to this Teutonic alignment with the rest of Eurozone member states is that the German banks are the first to need this ECB money bonanza. Many lenders in this country are dangerously undercapitalized and need badly this zero cost liquidity from the ECB.  All in all, either way western banks are now reassured that nothing will be done without their consent. The American Fed will continue to replenish their coffers with $85bn a month, and if the time comes for a change in the American generosity to banks, ---- the ECB is ready to take over.--"

DOWN SOUTH AS THEY SAY ...

There is a cultural problem in Portugal that makes this crisis worse. It has nothing to do with "laziness", "sunbathing culture" or other silly stereotypes often posted in these forum. The problem is a deep immersion in what I would call a "leftist cultural mindset" in a broad sense. Most people are not exactly communist, but they don't think good on entrepreneurs, they do not trust capitalists. In a conflict between a landlord and the home occupier they take position against the former, as if to be a landlord was a sinister capitalist exploitation. This makes any reforms towards a more market-driven economy much more difficult, specially so because even Constitutional Court justices fall into this leftist mindset.  Most people misunderstand this austerity measures. They blame the government, they blame the troika, they blame sometimes the Germans, and so on, as if this austerity was not necessary, as if it was a mischievous act. It's a silly thing, but unfortunately most Portuguese, not only low class, but even the middle class, feel a deep sense of entitlement and for them a wage cut or worse a job dismissal, is morally akin to a evil act. This explains the political manifestations against the troika and against austerity. Because of ignorance, people feels this austerity is an evil act designed to increase capitalist exploitation, and to line the pockets of the rich (how silly!). Then, their protest is self-righteous. Mind you, they are NOT exactly just defending selfishly their interests. They are more idealistic than that. They feel they occupy a moral highground and that the architects of austerity are wrong or even evil. Unfortunately, some writings by Ambrose suggest that he blames austerity almost as intensely, thus joining forces with the ignorant Greek and Portuguese masses, which criticize austerity without understanding the gravity of this situation.

We're not living in a world where the one billion people inhabiting the 'developed world' control 80% of the world's wealth. We're living in a world in which 65% of the world's wealth is held by the 'developing world' (mostly in the BRIC countries).

This the underpinning global economic reality of where we are. The never-ending 'Euro crisis' blog and 'Japan crisis' articles that appears on this website on a daily basis is a consequence of this profound global shift in wealth and power... More info here...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOwZwkhFemQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6a0zhc1y_Ns

What has helped mask these extraordinary transformations are cheap energy, cheap debt, and cheap imported goods. However, right now, all the chickens are coming home to roost - the west (and particularly Japan) does not have sustainable access to cheap debt and cheap energy to fuel consumption and our mobile lifestyles.

We're still in the mindset that 'we' control 80% of the world's wealth. The reality is much of our supposed wealth is entirely abstract - living in the imagination of bankers and the financial industry. Whilst much of the real economy (primary resources; secondary manufactured goods, and; increasingly the service industry) is to be found more so in the BRIC countries.

We seem unable to face up to the reality - socially, economically, or politically - and educationally, we do not want to learn from the BRIC countries. In sum total: The world has got a lot more diffuse, and multi-facetated, with its power, wealth and social relations increasingly spread. But most people would prefer to accept the social and political attitude and agenda of a dinosaur imperialist like Farage, rather than a modern internationalist voice from the BRIC countries.

In essence, every city is becoming more like Janeiro or Johannesburg and every country more like Brazil or South Africa. This is the effect of globalisation - it's unsteadying the safe and cosy world of white Europeans and Americans - who can no longer rely on cheap energy, cheap oil, cheap debt, and cheap imports.

Spain's banking crisis wiped out billions of euros of family savings on Tuesday as small investors who bought shares in the nationalized giant Bankia were finally able to trade them – but at only a fifth of their original price. The wipeout on Madrid's stock exchange means that Bankia, which was created by the fusion of seven savings banks, has now lost 99% of its stock exchange value since it was listed 22 months ago.  Preference share owners had been given the tradable shares, which came with a hefty haircut, as part of a cash injection worth billions of euros into the bank that wreaked most damage on Spain's financial system after suffering huge losses on toxic loans to real estate developers.  Bankia's 11bn new shares, part of a €15.5bn (£13.3bn) recapitalization, tumbled as soon as they started trading on Tuesday morning. By the end of the day they were worth half their €1 book value. Trading in the new shares was meant to have marked a new start for the country's fourth-largest bank by market capitalization. Last year it needed a €24bn bailout as part of a wider European rescue of Spain's financial system.

"They're cheating us again, like they did before," Maricarmen Olivares, whose parents lost €600,000 in life savings made from selling her father's car workshop, told Reuters. "Everything is a swindle, the share listing, the compensation package, the value of the stock now."

Spain took €42bn of the €100bn offered to help it clean up banks that were drowning in a sea of bad real estate loans left behind by the country's burst housing bubble. Bankia was the biggest of four nationalized banks that needed funds, along with NCG Banco, Catalunya Banc and Banco de Valencia.

Questions are already being raised about whether banks will have to find yet more capital, amid worries that they have not owned up to all their bad property loans and as the country's economy continues to deteriorate. Reports suggest they may need €10bn more, though Spain can now easily raise any additional funds the state may have to provide on the markets.  Bankia may raise several billion euros from the sale of stakes in the British Airways owner International Airlines Group, electricity company Iberdrola and insurer Mapfre. It agreed last week to sell City National Bank of Florida to the Chilean bank BCI for $883m. NCG Banco said on Tuesday it would sell its 80-branch EVO network as part of the restructuring plan negotiated with the EU after the injection of €10bn of public money into the lender.

Enough - UE has to be dismentled ASAP !!!

SOFIA, Bulgaria—Mass protests in Bulgaria against austerity measures and energy costs forced out the government in February. Elections set for Sunday could lead to more political turmoil.

Recent public-opinion surveys indicate that the conservative party that led the previous administration and its main, left-leaning challenger are running neck-and-neck, complicating prospects for the formation of a governing coalition.

Unhappiness with low living standards and perceived corruption in the European Union's poorest member state boiled over this past winter, leading to nationwide demonstrations, initially over rising electricity prices....Elsewhere in Europe :  Merkel's cabinet on Wednesday endorsed legislation putting the ECB in charge of supervising eurozone banks. But Berlin is hostile to further moves that would share risk and liability across the eurozone banking sector, such as pooled funds for winding up failed banks and spreading responsibility for guaranteeing savers' deposits. The latter is viewed as a no-go area in Germany while Berlin takes the view that a bank resolution system should be essentially national rather than European. The German finance ministry has been arguing for the past fortnight that a full eurozone banking union would need a renegotiation of EU treaties, an arduous and lengthy process. The eurozone agreed in June last year to create the banking union and to use bailout funds to recapitalize weak banks directly without adding to governments' debt levels. But the Germans then delayed and diluted the policy which is to be revisited at an EU summit next month. Washington voiced exasperation. "It is important to move forward with full banking union. Last year, European leaders vowed to break the feedback loop between banks and sovereigns, but momentum has waned," said the senior official.

A revised European Bathing Water Directive which is due to come into force in 2015 will require water to be twice as clean to achieve the highest standard – a rating of Excellent. Tourism bosses fear that the new rules could have a big impact on the communities around any beaches that fail to make the grade.
They are calling for a more flexible approach that would allow them to provide daily updates on the water quality meaning that they would only have to close the beaches to bathers on those days when the pollution reaches hazardous levels.  Malcolm Bell, the head of Visit Cornwall, said: “We are going to face a challenge to explain to people that things have not got worse – it is just that the hurdle has got higher.  “If a beach is on the new borderline, it doesn’t mean it will be borderline all the time.  “Sometimes it will be beautiful and other times there will be problems, so we want to be able to put up signs on those incidents but be able to take them down when it is more than safe.”  Jonathan Ponting, principal environment planning officer at the Environment Agency, said work was under way to improve the water quality in those areas at risk.  He said: “The vast majority of our beaches pass the current standards and they have seen a massive improvement over the past 20 years, but we are moving to a system that uses much tighter standards than the current ones that we report to.  “Tourism is a massive part of our economy in some of these areas and there is no doubt that if some of these beaches do have signs advising against bathing it could be damaging for the economies in those areas. “The Environment Agency has been working to get as many of those beaches as possible to meet those standards.”  Temperatures are expected to rise tomorrow to just shy of the hottest seen this year, with the South East expected to get up to 73.4F (23C), about the same as is forecast for the south of France.
 

Bundesbank sounds the alarm

Germany's central bank has warned that economic growth in Europe's largest economy is weakening, due to the eurozone crisis and problems across the world economy.

In a new monthly report, the Bundesbank said that German firms are more worried about Germany's future prospects. It points to the slowdown in China, Japan's now-shrinking economy, and fears over the US fiscal cliff.

The full report is online here (pdf, in German), and Reuters provides a translation of the key points:

The economy currently presents a mixed picture, which is likely to cool further towards year-end...

By now it has become unmistakable that the disturbing external factors are affecting the willingness to invest and job planning so strongly that the whole economy could be affected.

Last week's economic data showed that German GDP rose by 0.2% in the third quarter of 2012 – the question is whether it shrinks in the last three months...

History explains all....

History explains all....The EU is experiencing its 'Stalingrad' moment....Sheer hubris makes it impossible for the EU to make the right decisions. Draghi's wears his vanity as if it alone is enough to save the EU. His vision is correct in his eyes, and to him that is all that matters, and that imprisons him in a course of action that is clearly failing. He is the only one who can't see it, though his generals nod their approval to maintain their salaries and privileges. Even Greece has deferred the worst effects of their austerity measures, which means that there will be no avoiding mounting civil disorder. If Golden Dawn show some political maturity (which they haven't so far) they'll walk in to power. Samaras is trying to defuse the Golden Dawn threat with some cynical changes to citizenship law but that's only upsetting his coalition partners. His government is doomed to collapse. European governments should focus on spending cuts, not tax rises to get their deficits down, according to the head of the European Central Bank. Mario Draghi said that the ECB's action (via its €1 trillion LTRO bazooka and announcement of the OMT programme) had helped to calm markets, but that it was up to governments to regain credibility.The growing tension between Germany and Greece was on show today as public sector workers stormed a building where officials from the two countries were meeting in the Greek city of Thessaloniki. Police had to form a shield around German Consul Wolfgang Hoelscher-Obermaier as he tried to enter the building. They also pelted him with water bottles and coffee in a protest against austerity measures. The workers chanted: "It's now or never!" and held up mock gravestones and banners proclaiming "Fight until the end!" ...Workers said that they were furious at comments by German envoy Hans-Joachim Fuchtel, who reportedly told journalists on Wednesday that it takes 3,000 Greek public sector workers to do the work of 1,000 of their German counterparts. Mr Fuchtel is Angela Merkel’s special envoy to Greece. Michael Meister, a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union party, told reporters that he could "live with" giving Greece more time to bring down its debt levels, adding that the EU had "many tools" to enable this to happen. However, he said that a writedown of Greek debt would be unacceptable to Berlin, and that MPs would not rush through a vote on the country's next aid tranche.

The definition of incompetence and stupidity ....Herman van Rompuy

European Council President Herman van Rompuy has quashed reports yesterday which said that a deal on keeping Greece afloat and providing more bailout money for the near-bankrupt state is unlikely to be reached next week when eurozone finance ministers meet in Brussels.

Mr van Rompuy said a deal to keep Greece afloat by providing more bailout money will be agreed in "due time" once a report on the country is finalised by the troika of the IMF, reports Reuters.  "We need more time to reach agreements on privatisation law," Van Rompuy told reporters after a summit of Asian and European leaders in Laos. "In any case, the Europe group meeting on 12 November remains on the agenda."   Athens also needs to push through spending cuts and tax measures worth €13.5bn as well as a raft of economic reforms that will satisfy EU and IMF lenders but anger the Greek population, which has led to the anti-austerity strikes that we are seeing today in the country.  "The decision on this will be taken by the Europe group after analysis of the troika report, which is in the stage of finalisation in Athens," Van Rompuy added.   He urged the Greek government and leading political parties to decide on what is needed to reach an agreement with the troika, adding "I'm quite sure this will be done in due time"....Martin Koehring from the Economist Intelligence Unit has said these protests could convince to some MPs in the centre-left Pasok party to vote against the latest austerity package, but said he still expected the package to be approved.

The two-day general strike is yet another sign of the anti-austerity climate among the Greek population. However, the government has to pass further austerity measures to guarantee disbursement of a vital €31.5bn loan tranche from the EU and IMF.

The strike may convince more MPs from the centre-left Pasok party to vote against the latest austerity package; Pasok is part of the fragile three-party government coalition but has seen its support among voters eroded as a result of backing austerity.  The government has already suffered several setbacks in recent weeks, with the other left-wing junior coalition party, the Democratic Left, threatening to vote against the package. Wven the senior coalition party, the centre-right New Democracy party, has seen two MPs being forced out of the party for opposing further budget cuts. The government's majority is narrowing and the general strike further puts pressure on MPs to vote against the government's plans.  On balance, however, we expect the package to be approved by MPs because the alternative would be the government running out of cash by November 16 and facing default and potential euro exit.

What's worse than an unelected hack steamrolling the lives of ordinary people?

Ireland's former attorney general, former minister for Justice and now practicing senior council one Michael McDowell was on national radio earlier today, wondering out loud why the country was not debating a Federal Europe that is being foisted on small countries by dint of an economic crisis exported from the core to the periphery. He wondered why Ireland was not paying enough attention to the UK's efforts to de-couple itself from core competencies and obligations being foisted on it by EU "Euro fascists" (my words). He wondered, if crossing the border from the Irish republic was going to be akin to crossing the border from East Germany into West Berlin during the dark days of the USSR. Entering the land of the free?I agree with his sentiments, federalism is a complete misnomer, buried deep inside the velvet glove of federalism is the Iron fist that will be used more and more boldly to smash the sovereign nation state. It is nothing less than a takeover of most states within Europe by Wolfgang, Von Rompuy and other egotistical men such as Barroso and Rehn. Dangerous people who know not what they are unleashing across the Eruopean continent. These are people who would barely get people to cross the road with them under their banner of a federalist Europe but who are marveling at the power an economic crisis has bestowed upon them. Small wonder they want to make crisis permanent? It is the UK once again who are standing up for what is left of democracy in Europe and god knows that in itself tells us a lot about how far the rot has gone because we know that democracy in Britain itself has been significantly eroded over the last 40 years.

I have yet to meet any French or Germans who want to keep the Euro.

Germany led the way with regard to the Euro, due mainly to the enormous financial benefits it would reap. There is no problem with that if we accept that nation states should act in their own best interest...."Bundestag president Norbert Lammert said parliament’s integrity cannot be subordinated to the ups and downs of the markets. Free Democrat (FDP) leaders said Italy’s unelected prime minister is playing with political fire by trying to circumvent democratic legitimacy.

The dispute comes as relations between Germany and Italy touch the lowest ebb since the Second World War, with Il Giornale publishing a front-page picture of Chancellor Angela Merkel under the headline “Fourth Reich”. "..This is funny... the Germans complaining about Mr Monti not being elected... He was elected... by Merkel and Sarkozy!!! and their puppy Barroso...Wait for Berlusconi to come back with a proper election in Italy and see where you are with your Euro! However, Germany now insists that there must be financial union to support this currency; but on Germany's terms, and with no risk to their financial systems. It is not good enough to state that they are paying for the bailouts - the idea of the EU is that all are equal and it is their DUTY to give this support. If they believe differently then they can hardly be called "good europeans".The euro, as predicted from the very beginning, has proved to be in nobody's long-term interests; it gave a short term limited boost to to weaker economies but has ended up being the agent of destruction for their economies. It was only ever the zealot's attempt to create the EUSSR as a single country. Well, hell mend them. Let it go and stop pouring good money after bad keeping it up. I've yet to meet any French or Germans who want to keep the Euro.

OECD - Fast growing economies

Fast-growing economies in the east should spend the vast savings accumulated through trade on their own people rather than use it to accumulate bonds and shares in the west, an influential thinktank said today.
The organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) warned that policies designed to rebalance currencies would fail unless countries adopted more far-reaching and fundamental reforms.
The Paris-based research group, often described as the rich nations' thinktank, said in a webcast that world leaders needed to go beyond discussions about currencies at the G20 summit in South Korea next week and examine conflicts that hold back growth in the world economy.
It said: "Structural reforms, such as the strengthening of social safety nets and the development of financial markets in emerging economies, should be employed to reduce their savings and dependence on financial markets in advanced economies. The OECD sees structural reforms, such as the liberalisation of product markets, also as crucial to recover the output losses associated with the crisis and to help put public finances back on a sustainable path."
The pace of the global economy recovery had slowed since earlier this year, the OECD said, while public debt in most OECD countries was set to reach all-time highs.
"With support from fiscal stimulus fading, output and trade have softened," it said. "Average GDP growth across OECD countries is expected to be between 2.5% to 3% this year, between 2% and 2.5% in 2011 and between 2.5% and 3% in 2012. Activity is projected to vary widely across countries, particularly within the euro area.
"The US is expected to gain considerable momentum in 2012, while the Japanese recovery is expected to lose some steam. In many emerging-market economies growth is continuing robustly, although at a slightly slower pace than earlier in the recovery.
With public deficits and debt at "unsustainable levels", stabilising debt relative to GDP in most countries would require a historical consolidation effort of between 6% to 9% of GDP, said OECD secretary general Angel Gurría. "But in fact even more is needed to bring debt back to sustainable levels."
The OECD, which has promoted free trade as a route to promoting growth and easing poverty, urged the eurozone to cut taxes on employment that could reduced their ability to bring down unemployment over the next few years.
It also backed moves in the west to cut public spending as a way to "strengthen the cost-effectiveness of expenditures that enhance growth, in areas such as health care, education, innovation and infrastructure development".
Gurría said interest rates would remain at historic lows until 2012 and could be maintained at low levels if the world economy continued to struggle over the medium term.
Monetary easing by the US, the UK and Japan will brings its own problems as investors turn away from low-yielding western markets, the OECD warned. "Continued monetary easing in many advanced economies prompts capital flows to emerging economies where they risk creating asset bubbles while putting upward pressure on their exchange rates. The recent unilateral interventions in foreign exchange markets and the resulting volatility could prompt protectionist responses. Better to reach a common understanding on how global imbalances are to be reduced."