The Global Economic Crisis Is Accelerating As We Enter The Last Half Of 2014

This is an excellent article by Michael Snyder. Don't let the record stock prices dissuade you, there are some serious problems in the domestic U.S. and international economies. 

18 Signs That The Global Economic Crisis Is Accelerating As We Enter The Last Half Of 2014

Michael Snyder

Economic Collapse Blog

A lot of people that I talk to these days want to know “when things are going to start happening”.  Well, there are certainly some perilous times on the horizon, but all you have to do is open up your eyes and look to see the global economic crisis unfolding.  As you will see below, even central bankers are issuing frightening warnings about “dangerous new asset bubbles” and even the World Bank is declaring that “now is the time to prepare” for the next crisis.  Most Americans tend to only care about what is happening in the United States, but the truth is that serious economic trouble is erupting in South America, all across Europe and in Asian powerhouses such as China and Japan.  And the endless conflicts in the Middle East could erupt into a major regional war at just about any time.  We live in a world that is becoming increasingly unstable, and people need to understand that the period of relative stability that we are enjoying right now is extremely vulnerable and will not last long.  The following are 18 signs that the global economic crisis is accelerating as we enter the last half of 2014…

#1 The Bank for International Settlements has issued a new report which warns that “dangerous new asset bubbles” are forming which could potentially lead to another major financial crisis.  Do the central bankers know something that we don’t, or are they just trying to place the blame on someone else for the giant mess that they have created?

#2 Argentina has missed a $539 million debt payment and is on the verge of its second major debt default in 13 years.

#3 Bulgaria is desperately trying to calm down a massive run on the banks that threatens of spiral out of control.

#4 Last month, household loans in the eurozone declined at the fastest rate ever recorded.  Why are European banks holding on to their money so tightly right now?

#5 The number of unemployed jobseekers in France has just soared to another brand new record high.

#6 Economies all over Europe are either showing no growth or are shrinking.  Just check out what a recent Forbes article had to say about the matter…

Italy’s economy shrank by 0.1% in the first three months of 2014, matching the average of the three previous quarters. After expanding 0.6% in Q2 2013, France recorded zero growth. Portugal shrank 0.7%, following positive numbers in the preceding nine months. While figures weren’t available for Greece and Ireland in Q1, neither country is showing progress. Greek GDP dropped 2.5% in the final three months of last year, and Ireland limped ahead at 0.2%.

#7 A few days ago it was reported that consumer prices in Japan are rising at the fastest pace in 32 years.

#8 Household expenditures in Japan are down 8 percent compared to one year ago.

#9 U.S. companies are drowning in massive amounts of debt, but the corporate debt bubble in China is so bad that the amount of corporate debt in China has actually now surpassed the amount of corporate debt in the United States.

#10 One Chinese auditor is warning that up to 80 billion dollars worth of loans in China are backed by falsified gold transactions.  What will that do to the price of gold and the stability of Chinese financial markets as that mess unwinds?

More >>>

30 Reasons The Bear Phase In Gold Ends This Summer

www.jsmineset.com

Here are the 30 reasons, 23 new and 7 set in cement, of why the Bear phase in the bull market for gold ends this summer without any new lows.

1. The New definition of warfare is economic. Sanctions against Russia and the implications for the Petrodollar

2. FACTA and the universal long arm of the US government via any transaction internationally that passes even momentarily through the dollar as a contract settlement mechanism. The negative implications for the dollar’s future as a contract settlement mechanism internationally.

3. EU split over sanctions due to Russian energy demand and Russian business interests.

4. Middle East Western Hegemony and Arab Spring is defunct.

5. Iran to assist in Iraq if asked, which is the failure of "Misssion Accomplished."

6. Iraq oil production challenged by ISEL.

7. Kurds emboldened by ISEL.

8. US relationship with Saudi Arabia and Qatar is strained.

9. BRICs uniting economically and politically as a standalone force.

10. China expands Yuan/Renminbi as an international currency.

11. China’s China Sea energy tensions with Japan and Vietnam.

12. USA’s position on the China Sea crisis where Japan is concerned.

13. The militarization of Japan.

14. The distinct scent of inflation.

15. General dissatisfaction with answers to questions to Chair Yellen regarding FOMC meeting last week

16. IMF reduced expectations of US economic recovery.

17. US Zombie Banks as defined by banks leveraged generally 30 to 35 times the size of their capital of total OTC derivative exposure.

18. Condition of the flooded municipal bond market.

19. Decline in volume with rise in value of equities, making equity price shadows our reality.

20. Totally irrational exuberance driven by hyper liquidity.

21. Hyper liquidity can become hyper inflation via the velocity of money in a crisis of confidence of the dollar. Therefore hyperinflation will be a currency motivated event.

22. Reaction in the momentum equity leaders of the last 2 years burning a public.

23. Strength of the utilities group which has historical attachment to tops in equity markets.

Old problems:

24. The one quadrillion, one hundred and forty four trillion dollars real size of the OTC derivatives market.

25. Economic underpinning of the dollar in jeopardy as recovery sputters globally

26. Absurd size of the Fed balance sheet and lack of marketability of significant size legacy derivative positions.

27. Taper of QE and little Belgium to the QE rescue.

28. China and Russia on the sell side of the US treasuries.

29. MY RA exposes consideration of invasion of retirement accounts, and GOTS (Get out of the system) as a defense strategy.

30. The huge drop out of the labor pool in the US, making employment figures sketchy at best.

Source/link >>>

US dollar domination makes world economy unstable, new reserve currencies needed

The Voice Of Russia

Devaluation wars are in full swing and the death of the dollar as the international currency seems almost inevitable. Jacques Sapir, a French economist and the director of the Higher School of Social Sciences in Paris, and a prominent expert on the issue, shared his forecast regarding the future of the global financial capital with Radio VR.

Agreeing that Russia's and China's desire to get rid of the dollar in their gas transactions is quite likely to be fulfilled, he pointed out that many countries, especially the producers of raw materials, would like to end their dependency on dollar for international transactions.
"And let’s add something else here: the complaint of the American government regarding the French bank BNP Paribas," noted Mr. Sapir. "They complained about the fact that that bank performed operations that contradicted the American legislation, although that bank’s offices were located outside of the territory of the United States, but because the dollar was used and the clearinghouse was in the USA, the American government decided that the American legislation was violated. It is an extremely complicated legal issue, but we clearly understand that that precedent, in legal terms, can only make concerned a number of countries, which do their transactions in dollars and can only push them towards choosing other currencies for transactions."
Mr. Sapir also remarked that the desire to create another world reserve currency besides the dollar is hardly new, as General de Gaulle attacked the US dollar’s status in 1965-66, and that every currency crisis sparkles similar debates. "On the one hand, it is clear that the current system based on non-exclusive, but very dominant use of the dollar as the reserve currency is unsatisfactory! And actually, one can see that in the structure of currency reserves of various central banks. For example, one can see that besides the dollar there is the euro, and now also a number of new currencies – for example, the Canadian dollar, Australian dollar, Singapore dollar and so forth. Thus, in the least there is a natural need for diversification, and perhaps even the need to change the system," said Mr. Sapir.
He also added that in order to fully restructure the international currency system it needs to be politically feasible to conduct an international conference similar to the Bretton Woods Conference of 1944. "Another path is to develop currencies, which at the regional level are beginning to play the role of the regional reserve currency. I believe that China’s goal is to make its national currency, the yuan, in a few years become the reserve currency at the level of the Asia-Pacific Region

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India displaces Japan to become third-largest world economy in terms of PPP: World Bank

By ET Bureau | 30 Apr, 2014, 06.59AM IST

NEW DELHI: India has displaced Japan to become the world’s third biggest economy in terms of purchasing power parity (PPP), according to a World Bank report released on Tuesday.

The 2011 round of the bank’s International Comparison Program (ICP) ranked India after the US and China. The last survey in 2005 had placed the country on 10th place.

PPP is used to compare economies and incomes of people by adjusting for differences in prices in different countries to make a meaningful comparison.

India’s share in World GDP in terms of PPP was 6.4% in 2011 compared with China’s 14.9% and the US’ 17.1%, the latest ICP showed. The survey covered 199 economies.

"The United States remained the world’s largest economy, but it was closely followed by China when measured using PPPs. India was now the world’s third largest economy, moving ahead of Japan," the report said. More >>>

World Bank: China to overtake US as biggest economy THIS YEAR

 Frik Els | April 30, 2014

A new study by the World Bank predicts that the US will lose its status as the world’s largest economy later this year.
Previous studies forecast the US will only lose the top spot – which it took from the United Kingdom in 1872 – at the end of this decade at the soonest.
The report by the International Comparison Program at the World Bank estimates total economic output between countries by using purchasing power parity or PPP which takes into account the relative costs of goods and services and inflation rates, rather than simply using volatile exchange rates which give you nominal GDP figures.
The World Bank’s updated methodology for PPP indicates that the gap of $3.4 trillion in 2012 (on a nominal basis that gap was closer to $8 trillion) has now shrunk dramatically.
In 2005, the ICP estimated China’s economy was less than half the size of the US, accounting for only 43.1% of the US total. That proportion grew to 86.9% in 2011. More >>>>

The Signs That Most Are NOT PREPARED for The Coming Economic Collapse

16 Signs That Most Are NOT PREPARED for a Coming Economic Collapse.

Sometimes I think that I sound like a broken record.  I am constantly using phrases such as “get prepared while you still can” and “time is running out”.  In fact, I use them so often that people are starting to criticize me for it.  But the truth is that only a small percentage of people out there are actively taking steps to get ready for what is coming.  Most of the country is not prepared at all.  In many ways, it is just like 2007 all over again.  There were many people that could see what was about to happen and were doing all they could to warn people, but most did not listen.  And then the great financial crisis of 2008 struck and millions of people lost their jobs and their homes.  Unfortunately, the next great wave of the economic collapse is going to be even more painful than the last one.  It is imperative that people get prepared for what is on the horizon, but for the most part it is just not happening.
A lot of it has to do with the fact that we have such short memories and such short attention spans in America today.  Thanks to years of television and endless hours on the Internet, I find myself having a really hard time focusing on anything for more than just a few moments.  And we are accustomed to living in an “instant society” where we don’t have to wait for anything.  In such a society, we are used to “news cycles” that only last for 24 hours and very few people take a “long-term view” of anything.
And another one of the big problems that we are facing is something called “normalcy bias”.  The following is how Wikipedia defines it…

The normalcy bias, or normality bias, refers to a mental state people enter when facing a disaster. It causes people to underestimate both the possibility of a disaster occurring and its possible effects. This often results in situations where people fail to adequately prepare for a disaster, and on a larger scale, the failure of governments to include the populace in its disaster preparations. The assumption that is made in the case of the normalcy bias is that since a disaster never has occurred then it never will occur. It also results in the inability of people to cope with a disaster once it occurs. People with a normalcy bias have difficulties reacting to something they have not experienced before. People also tend to interpret warnings in the most optimistic way possible, seizing on any ambiguities to infer a less serious situation.

Over the past several years, the U.S. economy has been relatively stable.  And that is a good thing.  But it has also lulled millions upon millions of people into a false sense of security and complacency.  At this point, most Americans consider 2008 to be a temporary bump in the road, and most assume that the U.S. economy will always be strong.
Unfortunately, that is not the truth.  As I have written about previously, the long-term trends that are destroying our economy have continued to get worse since 2008, and none of the problems that caused the last financial crisis have been fixed.
We are steamrolling toward the edge of an economic cliff, and most people in our entertainment-addicted society are totally oblivious to what is going on.  So they are not doing anything to get ready for the immense economic pain that is coming.  The following are 16 signs that most Americans are completely unprepared for the coming economic collapse…
#1 Could you come up with $2000 right now?  According to a shocking study that was just released, most Americans could not…

Forty percent of individuals in the U.S. said they could not or probably could not come up with $2,000 if an unexpected need arose, according to research by Atif Mian of Princeton University and Amir Sufi of the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

#2 In that same study, Americans were asked the following question…

“Do you have 3 months emergency funds to cover expenses in case of sickness, job loss, economic downturn?”

An astounding 60 percent of people that responded said that they do not.
#3 Another study found that less than one out of every four Americans has enough money stored away to cover six months of expenses.
#4 Some people are actually trying really hard to get ahead, but admittedly that is really tough to do when we are all being taxed into oblivion.  In fact, it was reported this week that Americans now spend more on taxes than they spend on food, clothing and housing combined.
More…

What Is Hyperinflation?

Is Hyperinflation coming to the United States.? Here is a three part video that explains what is and why we may to see it here. From The National Inflation Association. This is an excellent video that explains why one in the U.S. might start preparing for Hyperinflation.

More info on Hyperinflation and dollar devaluation