Galt's Gulch

Swiss end their artificial franc vs Euro manipulation

Posted by $ blarman 9 years, 3 months ago to Economics
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Here's my thought on the real reason they are doing it: they don't trust the Euro to maintain its value. They had been buying Euros to keep the relative price of their own currency down (a mistake IMHO), but now they are holding a ton of denominated currency in Euros. Given the weakness of the Eurozone right now with Greece on the verge of pulling out and both Spain and Italy nearing economic collapse and others inching along, buying Euros right now is tantamount to economic suicide.
SOURCE URL: http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2015-01-15/heres-what-the-swiss-central-bank-just-did-and-why-its-such-a-shocker?campaign_id=DN011615

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  • Posted by $ jbrenner 9 years, 3 months ago
    Greece has an election coming up in about a week. According to my Grecian boss, he expects that they will elect a somewhat anarchist looter rather than the more fiscally responsible person who has kept Greece out of the abyss in the last two years since their prior currency collapse. He expects that we will see financial effects here that are at least as big as the prior currency collapse in Cyprus.
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  • Posted by salta 9 years, 3 months ago
    Also Christine Lagarde complained that she had not been told in advance. The central planner, always critical of insider trading, complaining she was not on "the inside" this time?
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  • Posted by scojohnson 9 years, 3 months ago
    The socialist European economies are starting to figure out that when you have more people in the cart, than pulling the cart, sooner or later the laws of physics kick in. Unfortunately, the US is nearing that too.
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    • Posted by $ blarman 9 years, 3 months ago
      But will they change before inertia drags them backwards? The part everyone forgets in that cartoon is that the cart is being pulled up a slope - it isn't flat ground.
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      • Posted by scojohnson 9 years, 3 months ago
        Love it, great enhancement. We would have thought that maybe Greece would have figured it out, but they didn't, as much as we think we are in rough shape here (and we are), the US has about half the national debt per capita that most of the European economies have, and we have a heck of a lot more personal income per capita. Its rather hard to imagine what it would look like with 3-4 times more owed per person than we already have. But no, I agree with you, I don't really think the inertia is something they can overcome. The one thing that could change that would be a significant conflict on the European continent that kicks them back into WW2 mode or something. Personally, I think that's coming, I think their problems with Muslim (lack of) integration and segregation of people in ghettos is going to create a lot of potential for civil wars...
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        • Posted by $ blarman 9 years, 3 months ago
          I agree, and the danger there is that their people are not prepared to defend themselves and fight for their own liberty. They have been told that there is a police force that will do that for them and further, that the tools for resisting an encroachment upon their rights are forbidden to them. A sudden crippling strike on their militaries will disable them and numbers alone will overwhelm any police force.

          Islam is not stupid, and they see this. They know that the national forces of the countries in Europe are completely outnumbered in real combat, and unprepared for urban/guerrilla warfare where civilians are concerned. It's one of the reasons they haven't beaten Israel yet - there are no civilians! Their service weapons go home with them when they complete their mandatory enlistment, which includes the women!
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          • Posted by scojohnson 9 years, 3 months ago
            Its the same reason the US is not a soft target... 100s of millions of armed civilians.

            Europe has for the most part banned all private firearms ownership, so its sheep for the slaughter.
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