Treasures from the Threads - Number Seven

On a Rachel Sylvester column titled, 'Alistair Darling won't walk the plank alone', comes this: 'Northern Rock Nationalisation and Barclays bank surprise increased dividend' - discuss: Has no one else noticed the connection between the Government buying Northern Rock with £110 billion of taxpayers' money and Barclays bank today doleing out upped dividends? Was it not Barclays, back end of last year, which was rumoured to be all but bankrupt? Where did it suddenly, in the space of a couple of months, get all that cash? Their balance sheet has suddenly swollen by a minimum of £10 billion. Is it not the case that Northern Rock has been used by the UK governmnent to channel taxpayers' money to the big banks? Does this not the raise the question, just who does the UK government work for? And for whose benefit are people taxed? Northern Rock raised approximately 60% of all its money from loans from banks, the rest from savers accounts with them. It went bust because it could no longer pay back the rising interest on these bank loans. All of a sudden the UK Government steps in with £25 billion of tax money. Who do you think that money went to, straight away? Why did Barclays, Citibank and others suddenly go from flat-out insolvent basket-cases to flush 'loadsamoney' entities in the same time frame as the Northern Rock debacle? Work it out peeps. You've been had - big time, to the tune of £25 billion, and that's just for starters! And please, don't blame Laurel and Hardy(Brown&Darling). These clowns are just doing as they're told by the moneychangers. They were told: "We're broke, give us taxpayers money to bail us out, but don't finger us. Find some vehicle(NRock) to hide the public money bailout of us major, private banks. And any heat from this, you take the rap - after all that's why we pay you clowns so much for sod all - to be our frontmen." You've been had peeps - the bankers who run your sorryass country have just had their massive losses socialized, i.e. paid off by you. But they kept all the good-time profits private right? Off-shore, away from the UK taxman, in the Caymans and so on. And this is just the beginning. The Rock still owes approximately 60% of £110 billion = £66 billion minus the £25 billion already paid, so around min. £40 billion plus interest at say 7% to the big private banks. This will be coughed up forthwith from the UK taxpayers again. Look out for more amazing, 'surprise' dividend hikes from the other big banks, all courtesy of the UK taxpayer! What a wonderful world it is - the average little-guy PAYE taxpayer, bailing out and subsidizing non-domicile, non UK taxpaying zillionaires. Oh, but wait, the UK taxpayer gets a bargain after all. For circa £70 billion doled out to the über-rich the taxpayer gets £110 billion worth of NRock mortgages. Bargain, right?At a conservative estimate of 10% drop in house prices year on year over the next 3-5 years, this £110 billion notional book-value, will after careful calculation of mine be worth precisely, wait for it, SQUAT. Nada, zilch, go whistle for it! BOY HAVE YOU BEEN HAD - to the tune of £110,000,000,000! Posted by pj kelly on February 19, 2008 12:26 PM