The Bust Banks of the EU

So the IMF has forced the farce over Greece finally into the open. Repayment of funds already advanced to Greece will be pushed further back into the distant future with all aware that means never, the interest rate paid will be reduced to less than one per cent with the clear understanding that following the German elections this too will get ever closer to zero with actual payments of any installments a figment of fantasy.

So much for moral hazard!

In Spain the horror of Bankia continues to be treated as other than it clearly is, read some questions raised by the Wall Street Journal from here and various earlier postings on this blog as to how that situation was allowed to develop.

In Britain we have RBS, Northern Rock, Lloyds HBOS etc while France and Belgium so far share Dexia with others no doubt waiting in the wings. The entire Greek farce of recent years has after all been designed to protect German, French and other too big to fail financial institutions from the consequences of their own decisions.

First thing this morning I tweeted that we needed a collective noun for the kind of filth who have been involved in making these obscene and disastrous policy errors as follows:

Martin Cole ‏@IroniesToo

We need a collective noun for the members of the three main political parties who have sold off our democracy and their morals: #SULLIED??

On reflection #SULLIED seems rather mild

How "Europe" is stealing the savings of the poorest and stupidest in its society

If one had thought the EU stood for anything, then surely it would be to protect those least well equipped to care for themselves. My view is that this is best achieved by giving the brightest the best opportunities to utilise and profit from their individual talents. I always knew the latter was a forlorn hope but today it appears the very opposite of the former is being applied by the EU, perhaps through the ECB, on the poorest of its citizens in Spain.

The evidence of the huge operation to steal the savings and few remaining private citizen assets of the Spanish people is everywhere across the internet so may not be denied.

The ultimate culprits are the 27 Heads of State of the member states who will wine and dine together in the European Council between now and the weekend. Collectively the lowest vermin that Europe has perhaps ever produced, gathered together in one place, during most of our lifetimes.

Here is the proof from a report by Reuters, published yesterday, and linked here, from which the following quote is the most pertinent passage:

Many of the banks which issued these products swapped them for shares and bonds. The main state-owned banks such as NGB did not. NGB has apologized and some banks have offered compensation for the worst cases. But now the banks are negotiating with Europe for capital as part of an international bailout, the terms of which will include inflicting a loss on people who in many cases handed over their life-savings.

Note how the term "Europe" has here been used to describe the odious EU, ECB and Euro Group collectively, the three structures which have presently sunk beneath that which should normally be attainable by any functioning moral human being!

Europe, all of us, are here accused of arm-twisting small Spanish savers to convert their savings into bank preference shares, not just in the apparently criminally run Bankia, but also in State owned banks such as NGB,  then Europe (ie all of us collectively,) is compelling such state banks, who so far lacked the balls (or had sufficient conscience to refrain from such theft) to steal that money, in amounts which have to be comparatively insignicant, given the massive manipulation of trillions of Euros in the complicated con-trick EU leaders have been playing with our money for decades!

Background and proof of all this is not just available from my blog, eg here, but Reuters earlier described the dreadful confidence trick played on Spanish small savings account investors in a detailed report at the end of last July, linked here.

More on the mis-selling of bank preference shares, this time from Canada, also of last July is linked here.

So what are the unprincipled, despicable and desperate scumbags who will sit around the table at the European Council in the next few days going to do to stop these obscene practises; all being undertaken in the names of all we Europeans, merely to breathe a few more moments of life into the sick and ever doomed project that is EMU, better signified by its now deeply sickening emblem - the euro currency.

Shattered & smashed Spain to put €5.5 billion into bankrupt Bankia

Olli Rehn the bumbling, mumbling and clearly grossly incompetent EU (Failed) Finances Commissioner has allowed Spain to commit yet more billions in  funds even though approval of the terms by the EU seems ever less likely and ever more weeks away, read here.

The amount is up yet another billion from that being reported over the weekend and even last evening!

Bankia - the fraud and waste continues

This from here yesterday -

Bankia, nationalised by the Spanish government in May, lost 4.448 billion euros in the six months to end-June after provisioning 2.7 billion euros in the second quarter against bad debt and assets. Spain's Fund for Orderly Bank Restructuring (FROB) said it would inject capital into Bankia immediately

This blog has been following the lies and deceit over Bankia for well over a year, some of what we posted is here, (bearing in mind as always nowadays, that this blogger has evidence that some of the past postings have been altered and tampered with by unknown third parties).

I would particularly like to repeat this warning from this July, as follows:

Given that foul, dirty and despicably fraudulent tactics were used to disguise losses within the Spanish banking sector and pass off some of the already known losses to depositers AND that this happened in one part of the EU where all that is awful, rapidly spreads throughout the other twenty-six member states while all that is worthwhile is ruthlessly turned against and eradicated, it would be worthwhile if Britain's bank account holders read of some of the tricks used, so as  to avoid being duped in the same manner and reduce similar potential losses in Britain.

This is probably particularly true regarding RBS, whose head has warned of huge coming financial penalties in respect of that bank's failings over LIBOR, events that took place before the taxpayer became obligated for its past sins, read here.

The above two paragraphs may be considered particularly apt given the pathetic compensation announced yesterday to be offered to account holders of the Ulster Bank in respect of the shenanigans earlier this year when their own money was rendered inaccessible.

How Bankia conned its customers and small investors.

Reuters has a good analysis, linked here, of some of the dirty tricks used to keep the large bank Bankia afloat for a few more months in Spain.

Given that foul, dirty and despicably fraudulent tactics were used to disguise losses within the Spanish banking sector and pass off some of the already known losses to depositers AND that this happened in one part of the EU where all that is awful, rapidly spreads throughout the other twenty-six member states while all that is worthwhile is ruthlessly turned against and eradicated, it would be worthwhile if Britain's bank account holders read of some of the tricks used, so as  to avoid being duped in the same manner and reduce similar potential losses in Britain.

This is probably particularly true regarding RBS, whose head has warned of huge coming financial penalties in respect of that bank's failings over LIBOR, events that took place before the taxpayer became obligated for its past sins, read here.

Rodrigo Rato, former head of the IMF and head of Bankia, has at least been arrested, see here, for criminal fraud in Spain as has one of the top bankers in Ireland but no such moves have been seen in Britain.

Little seems likely to happen in the UK given the glimpse we have been given into the mindset of our leaders over the London Olympics, as covered in this post from Orphans of Liberty, linked here.

The Indian government has a plan for the collapse of EMU

 The article in the Hindustan Times is linked from here.

It appears the end of the Jubilee celebrations in London which have closed marketsn in the City of London for the past two days are perhaps coming just on time, as the Spanish Budget Minister reports international credit markets are effectively closed to his country at present interest and nothing has yet been done to clarify from where Bankia will obtain the funds it needed days back!

Guardian follows this blog's concerns on BA/Bankia of this morning!

The Guardian newspaper tonight is following up on this blog's concerns of this morning on likely problems for Britiah Airways from the ever deepening Bankia banking disaster, on which the same newspaper has further startling developments this evening at the start of that aricle, read here. A brief quote on the reported desperate moves to directly involve the ECB in keeping the stricken financial dinosaur afloat is here:

Spain is considering proposals to inject €19bn (£15bn) of capital into nationalised Bankia in the form of government debt that could then be used to raise money from the European Central Bank (ECB), forcing it to get involved in what may become a far wider bailout of Spain's creaking banking sector. 
Details remain sketchy, but sources in Madrid confirmed that a refinancing involving the ECB was the most probable way forward for a Spanish government that will have trouble raising €19bn itself at a manageable interest rate.
 By avoiding the markets altogether, the government would indirectly "push the financing of Bankia's bailout on to the ECB", according to El País newspaper.

How badly will BA be squeezed in the growing Spanish shambles?

The fact that Bankia is the major shareholder stakeholder in IAG the parent group of the merged Iberia and British Airways airlune  (misad)venture which has also recently absorbed the loss-making BMI does not bode well for Britain's flag carrying airline. Read Thursday's FT comment here and the Sunday Telegraph here.

The merger never made much sense when viewed from the Madrid hub airport which the FT has it is showing "weakening commercial trade". Living in SW France it once seemed a sensible routing option for the US East Coast, but several unhappy experiences have led our most recent booking to return via Paris CDG.

Put on top of that the deteriorating economic situation in Spain and the ever growing shambles that is Heathrow and it might appear that Bankia will be unlikely to be killed in a rush of buyers for its IAG stake!

Bankia shares suspended - Spain's Sorrows set to trump Greece Grief!

The report on Bankia may be read from fellow Euro Zone member Ireland's Irish Times from here, more surprisingly also from the Daily Mail, linked here, who just recently have begun to twig the dangers to their readers from Santander Bank in Britain!

Update 1538 BST
On Spain see also this Telegraph report that Catalonia is asking for a €17 billion bailout from the Spanish government, no doubt the first of many such requests soon to follow.

Bankia's deposits fall by a billion in a week

A Spanish bond auction is presently taking the main attention of the markets, but this report on that from Bloomberg has this paragraph:

Investors are also concerned over Spain's banking sector, which is struggling with bad property loans. Clients of troubled Spanish bank Bankia, nationalised last week, have withdrawn more than 1 billion euros since last Wednesday, El Mundo newspaper said.

Spain takes on Bankia's massive debts

Bloomberg has a video that may be viewed from here. This blog has long chronicled the sorry saga of the Spanish Cajas, see here and Bankia itself from here.

So how does this look for the future of people in Spain? Absolutely grotesque, can surely be the only answer to that question. Billions of Mickey Mouse money called euros are issued through loan sharks, allowed by the EU to call themselves banks, to build properties for foreigners (often on beach front plots to which the title is unsure) and the mind-boggling losses (which none have yet to even pretend to be able to begin to start quantifying,) have been placed upon future taxpayers in a bankrupt country by combining the "so-called" loan sharks called Cajas into an outfit laughingly named Bankia, placed under the management of a former IMF official and today offloaded onto the public.

And yesterday they had the gall to celebrate something called Europe Day!

ECB may gain one good asset from Bankia - Christiano Ronaldo!

A report from Insider Business Europe that appeared last evening, may be one piece of good news for Jean-Claude Trichet before he departs on holidays, probably in St Malo again!

The troubled Spanish Caja, Bankia, it seems, may run into further difficulties and  thereby offer the ECB some proper collateral in the form of a contract with the footballer Ronaldo!