Saudis, China Dump Treasuries; Foreign Central Banks Liquidate A Record $346 Billion In US Paper

US Treasury Sales 201609
One month ago, when we last looked at the Fed’s update of Treasuries held in custody, we noted something troubling: the number dropped sharply, declining by over $27.5 billion in one week, the biggest weekly drop since January 2015, pushing the total amount of custodial paper to $2.83 trillion, the lowest since 2012. One month later, we refresh this chart and find that in the latest weekly update, foreign central banks continued their relentless liquidation of US paper held in the Fed’s custody account, which tumbled by another $22.3 billion in the past week, pushing the total amount of custodial paper to $2.805 trillion, another fresh post-2012 low.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-10-18/saudis-china-dump-treasuries-foreign-central-banks-liquidate-record-346-billion-us-p

The questions that should be asked of Australia’s banks by Parliament:

I received an email from the CEC that went:
What is your over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives position, and what is the ratio of your derivatives exposure to equity, and to deposits?
[To CBA:] Why did you suddenly stop disclosing your true derivatives position in 2012, after a period of rapid growth when it went past $3 trillion? What is the full, face-value derivatives exposure of your bank as of right now?
In a Lehman Brothers-style chain reaction meltdown of your derivatives exposure, would you remain solvent?
If, as is claimed, your derivatives “hedging” is in “safe”, plain-vanilla derivatives, why has your derivatives speculation grown so rapidly since the 2008 global financial crisis, while banks around the world have been aggressively reducing their derivatives exposure?
Why did total Australian bank derivatives expand by a record $6.2 trillion in just the June quarter of this year, to an all-time high of $38 trillion—around 23 times Australian GDP (and many more times total bank assets and deposits)? What undisclosed event in the financial system sparked such a massive increase?
With house prices in Sydney and Melbourne more than nine times annual household income, compared with the historical ratio of around three times, if and when the market snaps under the increasing lack of affordability and prices collapse by 40-50 per cent, would your bank survive?
Why are you targeting unsuspecting retail investors—mum-and-dad retirees—to buy risky hybrid securities that other jurisdictions such as the UK forbid banks from selling to retail investors? Are you doing it because you need to raise capital in a hurry, and if so, why?
Were the bad products the sales staff in your wealth management division sold to customers, which have caused massive losses and ruined many investors, designed to shore up the underlying position of your bank at the expense of your customers? Did your bank have a separate commercial interest in any investments that were sold?
How much do you love the major political parties, Labor and the Liberals/Nationals, which since Hawke, Keating and Howard colluded to deregulate you, privatise the Commonwealth Bank so your private cartel wouldn’t have any competition, and thereby unleash you for your present profit-gouging spree? When you add up all of the donations you give to the major parties, compared with your profits, can you believe how cheap they have been to buy?
Impending crisis
Deutsche Bank is looming as the next Lehman Brothers, but is far more interconnected and therefore will have far greater consequences for the global financial system. When Australia’s banks begged the Rudd government in October 2008 for guarantees in order to survive, their combined derivatives exposure was around $14 trillion. Just eight years later, it is now $38 trillion!
In March 2014 the Citizens Electoral Council toured Parliament with the former Deputy Director of Japan’s Ministry of Finance, Daisuke Kotegawa, who successfully managed a derivatives crisis in the Japanese banking system in 1999, by over the course of a weekend closing out the Japanese banks’ derivatives so that the crisis did not spark a global meltdown. Kotegawa spoke to Australian MPs and the office of then-Treasurer Joe Hockey of the need for Australia and the world to adopt a Glass-Steagall separation of commercial banking from all other financial activities, including investment banking, insurance, stock broking and wealth management.
With another global crisis looming around Deutsche Bank, Kotegawa has reiterated what all governments should do to secure their banking systems, which the politicians who question Australia’s banks this week should heed:
Break up their banks along Glass-Steagall lines;
Send criminal bankers to jail—much more effective in stopping bad behaviour than fines;
Set and announce a target date to cancel all bank derivatives, so that banks can begin to “net out” their positions and the cancer of derivatives speculation can be excised in an orderly fashion.
Glass-Steagall is the number one financial issue in the world. People and increasingly more political leaders are recognising that it is the only way to protect the public from the next collapse of the global financial system, but the London and Wall Street bankers who don’t want to give up their scam of being able to gamble with depositors’ money are fighting to stop governments from enacting it. This is a fight we can and must win if Australia is to survive economically—join the Citizen’s Electoral Commission!

BIG BANK CUSTOMERS TO BE DESTROYED IN NEXT ECONOMIC MELTDOWN: HELEN CHAITMAN

Greg Hunter interviews Helen Chaitman, author of the book ‘JPMadoff’, which describes the complicity of the “Too Big to Fail” bank, JPMorgan-Chase in the $64 billion Bernie Madoff fraud against his clients. She is also the lead attorney in an ongoing lawsuit against JPMorgan-Chase. Her website, JPMadoff.com has links to 1,100 pages of documentation, proving their decades-long pattern of fraud.
Helen describes how JPMorgan-Chase is hardly alone among the “Too Big to Fail” banks and that she could have just as easily have written the book about any of the other ones but the notoriety of the Bernie Madoff case and of his conviction make the story of this bank more accessible to the general public.
Chaitman says that she can’t get arrested to do an interview on a mainstream news show because the government and the media are complicit in these crimes. The latter accept advertising dollars from them and run their commercials.
The only interview she was able to get on FOXNEWS was abruptly cut short when she explained that she was suing JPMorgan-Chase – and the host’s earpiece started to crackle and she promptly called an “emergency commercial” and booted Chaitman out of the studio!
http://forbiddenknowledgetv.net/big-bank-customers-destroyed-in-next-economic-meltdown-helen-chaitman-27750

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Update on pension entitlement for all

As a self funded retiree, I’m frustrated with Canberra’s continuous fiddle with Superannuation contributions and rule changes, plus the measure to Rebalance the Pension Assets Test to be implemented on 1 January 2017.
So here’s fair warning to all politicians of any persuasion, this group of aged voters may be about to make the greatest impact on any Federal election in history. Ignoring them may be the start of a changed political environment in this country.
Change the Entitlements
I absolutely agree, if a pension isn’t an entitlement, neither is theirs. They keep telling us that paying us an aged pension isn’t sustainable. Paying politicians all the perks they get is even less sustainable! The politicians themselves, in Canberra, brought it up, that the Age of Entitlements is over:
The author is asking each addressee to forward this email to a minimum of twenty people on their address list; in turn to ask each of those to do likewise. In three days, most people in Australia will have this message. This is one idea that really should be passed around because the rot has to stop somewhere.
Proposals to make politicians shoulder their share of the weight now that the Age of Entitlement is over:
1. Scrap political pensions. Politicians can purchase their own retirement plan, just as most other working Australians are expected to do.
2. Retired politicians (past, present & future) participate in Centrelink. A Politician collects a substantial salary while in office but should receive no salary when they’re out of office. Terminated politicians under 70 can go get a job or apply for Centrelink unemployment benefits like ordinary Australians. Terminated politicians under 70 can negotiate with Centrelink like the rest of the Australian people.
3. Funds already allocated to the Politicians’ retirement fund be returned immediately to Consolidated Revenue. This money is to be used to pay down debt they created which they expect us and our grandchildren to repay for them.
4. Politicians will no longer vote themselves a pay raise. Politicians pay will rise by the lower of, either the CPI or 3%.
5. Politicians lose their privileged health care system and participate in the same health care system as ordinary Australian people. i.e. Politicians either pay for private cover from their own funds or accept ordinary Medicare.
6. Politicians must equally abide by all laws they impose on the Australian people.
7. All contracts with past and present Politicians men/women are void effective 31/12/2015.
The Australian people did not agree to provide perks to Politicians, that burden was thrust upon them.
Politicians devised all these contracts to benefit themselves.
Serving in Parliament is an honour, not a career.
The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators, so our politicians should serve their term(s), then go home and back to work. If each person contacts a minimum of twenty people, then it will only take three or so days for most Australians to receive the message. Don’t you think it’s time?
THIS IS HOW YOU FIX Parliament and help bring fairness back into this country! If you agree with the above, pass it on.
If you wonder why the above individuals are asking for your help look at the figures below.
STATUTORY OFFICES
Date of Effect 1 July 2014
Specified Statutory Office
Base Salary (per annum)
Total Remuneration for office (per annum)
Chief of the Defence Force > $535,100 – $764,420
Commissioner of Taxation > $518,000 – $740,000
Chief Executive Officer, Australian Customs And Border Protection Service > $483,840 – $691,200
Auditor-General for Australia > $469,150 – $670,210
Australian Statistician > $469,150 – $670,210
Salaries of retired Prime Minister and Politicians
Salary as of 1 July
Prime Minister $507,338
Deputy Prime Minister $400,016
Treasurer $365,868
Leader of the Opposition $360,990
House of Reps Speaker $341,477
Leader of the House $341,477
Minister in Cabinet $336,599
Parliamentary secretary $243,912
Other ministers $307,329
Shadow minister $243,912
Source: Remuneration Tribunal.
So if I press all the right buttons, the TOTAL annual wages for the 150 seats in the Parliament are: $17,317,752
The TOTAL ANNUAL SALARIES (for 150 seats) = $41,694,311 – PER YEAR!
And that’s just the Federal Politicians, no one else!
For the ‘lifetime’ payment example (below) I used the scenario that:
1. They are paid ‘lifetime’ salaries the same as their last working year and
2. After retiring, the ’average’ pollie’s life expectancy is an additional 20 years (which is not unreasonable).
It’s worth remembering that this is EXCLUDING all their other perks!
SO, for a 20 years ‘lifetime’ payment (excluding wages paid while a Parliamentarian)
Prime Minister @ $507,338 = A$10,146,760
Deputy Prime Minister @ $400,016 = A$8,000,320
Treasurer @ $365,868 = A$7,317,360
Leader of the Opposition @ $360,990 = A$7,219,800
House of Reps Speaker @ $341,477 = A$6,829,540
Leader of the House @ $341,477 = A$6,829,540
Minister in Cabinet @ $336,599 = A$6,731,980
Parliamentary Secretary @ $243,912 = A$4,782,240
Other ministers** @ $307,329 = A$6,146,580 x 71 = A$436,407,180
Shadow ministers** @ $243,912 = A$4,878,240 x 71 = A$346,355,040
Conclusions:
TOTAL ‘life time’ (20 year) payments, (excluding wages paid while in parliament) = A$833,886,220 – OVER $833 MILLION.
Julia Gillard, Kevin Rudd, John Howard, Paul Keating, Malcolm Fraser, Bob Hawke, et al, add nauseum, are receiving $10 MILLION + EXTRA at taxpayer expense.
Should an elected PM serve 4 years and then decide to retire, each year (of the 4 years) will have cost taxpayers an EXTRA Two and a half million bucks a year! A$2,536,690 to be precise.
A 2 year retirement payment cut-off will SAVE our Oz bottom lineA$792,201,909 *** NEARLY $800 MILLION.
There are 150 seats in House, minus the 8 above = 142 seats, divided equally for example = 71 each for both shadow and elected ministers.
This example excludes all wages paid while a parliamentarian AND all perks on top of that – travel, hotels, secretarial staff, speech writers, restaurants, offices, chauffeured limos, security, etc. etc. 150 seats, 20-year payment of A$833,886,220 less annual salary x 2 years of A$83,388,622. [$41,694,311 x 2]
“Instead of giving a politician the keys to the city, it might be better to change the locks.”
YOU’RE RIGHT, YOU HAVE FOUND WHERE THE CUTS SHOULD BE MADE!
ACTION: Push for a MAX 2 year post retirement payment (give ‘em time to get a real job).
Spread it far and wide folks. People should know.