Nov 26 2008

How To Steal Eight Trillion Dollars And Get Away With It

( – promoted by buhdydharma )

The easiest way is to steal $26,000 from you. And then steal $26,000 from everyone you know. And then steal $26,000 from everyone you don’t know.

Nomi Prins is a journalist and Senior Fellow at Demos. She writes about politics, money and relationships.

Nomi is the author of Other People’s Money: The Corporate Mugging of America and also author of Jacked: How “Conservatives” are Picking your Pocket.

Before becoming a journalist, Nomi worked on Wall Street as a managing director at Goldman Sachs, and running the international analytics group at Bear Stearns in London.

Financial “bailouts” spending your money just since Monday this week… yes, since two days ago… have been over One Trillion Dollars.

With the credit crisis continuing to worsen, the US federal government is pledging a seemingly endless amount of money to shore up failing institutions hit hard by toxic assets. Federal government pledges now top $8 trillion with the most recent $800 billion announced Tuesday.

The Real News Network spoke to journalist and author Nomi Prins.

Real News: November 26, 2008 – 8 min 54 sec

Bailout costs $8.5 trillion

The US Federal Government has pledged $8.56 trillion in economic bailout for financial institutions so far

12 comments

Skip to comment form

    • Edger on November 26, 2008 at 18:21
      Author
    • #


  2. Wha’s up wit dat?  Sure it isn’t a bail-down?

    • Edger on November 26, 2008 at 23:59
      Author
    • #

    …under the weight of bad loans in November 2006, when executives at Irvine-based New Century Financial Corp. held a conference call to release their latest earnings.

    Loan volume was down and defaults were up, the earnings report showed, and in recent weeks at least five stock analysts had downgraded the company’s shares. Moreover, four executives had sold nearly $20 million in stock in the last four months, six times as much as they had sold over the previous 12 months.

    That led one analyst to ask whether there was anything investors should know.

    “It’s just part of their personal financial diversification plan,” Chief Executive Brad A. Morrice said in response to the question during the Nov. 2 earnings call.

    Those executive stock sales, however, have emerged as a central element in the Justice Department’s criminal investigation of New Century, according to a person familiar with the inquiry who was not authorized to speak publicly.

    As mortgages went bad, executives cashed out

    LA Times, today…

    • Edger on November 27, 2008 at 04:03
      Author
    • #

    A trillion or two or eight here and there… hell, pretty soon well be talking REAL money when we want to do business with each other. 😉

    Bartering back in tough economy

    Vito Pilieci,  Canwest News Service

    Published: Monday, November 24, 2008

    The global economic downturn is driving more and more cash-conscious companies to barter between themselves rather than spend precious cash.

    Businesses such as Microsoft Corp., Yahoo, Maple Leafs Sports and Entertainment and even Rogers Communications Inc. are finding innovative and old-school ways of getting the goods and services they need by trading with one another, says the head of a major Canadian barter brokerage.

    “A lot of bigger companies have now jumped on the bandwagon,” said David Holland, vice-president of Barter Network Ltd. in Toronto. “Once they realize what we are all about, people think ‘I didn’t realize this existed,’ and they do it.”

    The number of businesses and organizations that facilitate bartering has exploded in recent months. According to Holland, interest in his company has never been hotter.

    According to economists, every recession triggers bartering. However, facilitated by the Internet, trading has never been more popular.

    Dozens of barter exchanges are servicing thousands of companies across Canada. One of the world’s largest barter exchanges is Itex Corp., which has offices in Toronto and facilitates trades across North America. The company reported  registrations jumped by 36 per cent during October. Itex has more than 26,000 members.

    “People don’t have dollars to spend, and they need to spend, so this is a great option for them,” said Holland. “We are now doing between $55 million and $60 million a year in trading.”

    Holland’s Barter Network has about 2,500 member companies in Ontario and Quebec. The brokerage negotiates deals on behalf of companies so they can swap products or services.

    More…

Comments have been disabled.