STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Friday, 17 July 2015

[Tansy_Gold]

[font size=3]STOCK MARKET WATCH, Friday, 17 July 2015[font color=black][/font]

SMW for 16 July 2015

AT THE CLOSING BELL ON 16 July 2015
[center][font color=green]
Dow Jones 18,120.25 +70.08 (0.39%)
S&P 500 2,124.29 +16.89 (0.80%)
Nasdaq 5,163.18 +64.24 (1.26%)


[font color=green]10 Year 2.35% -0.04 (-1.67%)
30 Year 3.11% -0.04 (-1.27%) [font color=black]


[center][/font]

[HR width=85%]

[font size=2]Market Conditions During Trading Hours[/font]
[center]
(click on link for latest updates)
Market Updates
[/center]

[font size=2]Euro, Yen, Loonie, Silver and Gold[center]

[/center]

[center]

[/center]

[HR width=95%]

[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Market Data and News:[/font][/font]
[center]
Economic Calendar
Marketwatch Data
Bloomberg Economic News
Yahoo Finance
Google Finance
Bank Tracker
Credit Union Tracker
Daily Job Cuts
[/center]

[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Economic Blogs:[/font][/font]
[center]
The Big Picture
Financial Sense
Calculated Risk
Naked Capitalism
Credit Writedowns
Brad DeLong
Bonddad
Atrios
goldmansachs666
The Stand-Up Economist
The Automatic Earth
Wall Street on Parade
[/center]

[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Essential Reading:[/font][/font]
[center]
Matt Taibi: Secret and Lies of the Bailout


[/center]

[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Government Issues:[/font][/font]
[center]
LegitGov
Open Government
Earmark Database
USA spending.gov
[/center]

[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Videos:[/font][/font]
[center]
Charlie Rose talks with Roubini
Charlie Rose talks with Krugman
William Black: This Economic Disaster
Bill Moyers with Kevin Drum and David Corn
[/center]

[div]
[font color=red]Partial List of Financial Sector Officials Convicted since 1/20/09 [/font][font color=red]
2/2/12 David Higgs and Salmaan Siddiqui, Credit Suisse, plead guilty to conspiracy involving valuation of MBS
3/6/12 Allen Stanford, former Caribbean billionaire and general schmuck, convicted on 13 of 14 counts in $2.2B Ponzi scheme, faces 20+ years in prison
6/4/12 Matthew Kluger, lawyer, sentenced to 12 years in prison, along with co-conspirator stock trader Garrett Bauer (9 years) and co-conspirator Kenneth Robinson (not yet sentenced) for 17 year insider trading scheme.
6/14/12 Allen Stanford sentenced to 110 years without parole.
6/15/12 Rajat Gupta, former Goldman Sachs director, found guilty of insider trading. Could face a decade in prison when sentenced later this year.
6/22/12 Timothy S. Durham, 49, former CEO of Fair Financial Company, convicted of one count conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, 10 counts of wire fraud, and one count of securities fraud.
6/22/12 James F. Cochran, 56, former chairman of the board of Fair, convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, one count of securities fraud, and six counts of wire fraud.
6/22/12 Rick D. Snow, 48, former CFO of Fair, convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, one count of securities fraud, and three counts of wire fraud.
7/13/12 Russell Wassendorf Sr., CEO of collapsed brokerage firm Peregrine Financial Group Inc. arrested and charged with lying to regulators after admitting to authorities he embezzled "millions of dollars" and forged bank statements for "nearly twenty years."
8/22/12 Doug Whitman, Whitman Capital LLC hedge fund founder, convicted of insider trading following a trial in which he spent more than two days on the stand telling jurors he was innocent
10/26/12 UPDATE: Former Goldman Sachs director Rajat Gupta sentenced to two years in federal prison. He will, of course, appeal. . .
11/20/12 Hedge fund manager Matthew Martoma charged with insider trading at SAC Capital Advisors, and prosecutors are looking at Martoma's boss, Steven Cohen, for possible involvement.
02/14/13 Gilbert Lopez, former chief accounting officer of Stanford Financial Group, and former controller Mark Kuhrt sentenced to 20 yrs in prison for their roles in Allen Sanford's $7.2 billion Ponzi scheme.
03/29/13 Michael Sternberg, portfolio mgr at SAC Capital, arrested in NYC, charged with conspiracy and securities fraud. Pled not guilty and freed on $3m bail.
04/04/13 Matthew Marshall Taylor,fmr Goldman Sachs trader arrested, charged by CFTC w/defrauding his employer on $8BN futures bet "by intentionally concealing the true huge size, as well as the risk and potential profits or losses associated."
04/04/13 Matthew Taylor admits guilt, makes plea bargain. Sentencing set for 26 June; faces up to 20 years in prison but will likely only see 3-4 years. Says, "I am truly sorry."
04/11/13 Ex-KPMG LLP partner Scott London charged by federal prosecutors w/passing inside tips to a friend in exchange for cash, jewelry, and concert tickets; expected to plead guilty in May.
08/01/13 Fabrice Tourré convicted on six counts of security fraud, including "aiding and abetting" his former employer, Goldman Sachs
08/14/13 Javier Martin-Artajo and Julien Grout charged with wire fraud, falsifying records, and conspiracy in connection with JP Morgan's "London Whale" trade.
08/19/13 Phillip A. Falcone, manager of hedge fund Harbinger Capital Partners, agrees to admit to "wrongdoing" in market manipulation. Will banned from securities industry for 5 years and pay $18MM in disgorgement and fines.
09/16/13 Javier Martin-Artajo and Julien Grout officially indicted on charges associated with "London Whale" trade.
02/06/14 Matthew Martoma convicted of insider trading while at hedge fund SAC (Stephen A. Cohen) Capital Advisors. Expected sentence 7-10 years.
03/24/14 Annette Bongiorno, Bernard Madoff's secretary; Daniel Bonventre, director of operations for investments; JoAnn Crupi, an account manager; and Jerome O'Hara and George Perez, both computer programmers convicted of conspiracy to defraud clients, securities fraud, and falsifying the books and records.
05/19/14 Credit Suisse, which has an investment bank branch in NYC, agrees to plead guilty and pay appx. $2.6 billion penalties for helping wealthy Americans hide wealth and avoid taxes.
09/08/14 Matthew Martoma, convicted SAC trader, sentenced to 9 years in prison plus forfeiture of $9.3 million, including home and bank accounts







[HR width=95%]


[center]

[font size=3][font color=red]This thread contains opinions and observations. Individuals may post their experiences, inferences and opinions on this thread. However, it should not be construed as advice. It is unethical (and probably illegal) for financial recommendations to be given here.[/font][/font][/font color=red][font color=black]

[Tansy_Gold]

1. Things that make you go hmmmm.....

The 'toon.

First thing I noticed was the left handed handshake.

Boy Scout secret handshake?

Insult, especially to Muslims?

Promise not intended to be kept?


Hmmmmmm......

[Fuddnik]

2. Looks like he's preparing to kiss his hand or ring.

[Demeter]

3. Schaeuble Shrugs Off Greek Vote Saying Euro Exit Is Best

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-07-16/schaeuble-shrugs-off-greek-vote-saying-euro-exit-is-best

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble told Greece the only way it’ll get a debt reduction is to leave the euro and cast doubt on the country’s ability to even complete negotiations on a third bailout.

Schaeuble, who led the charge for Greece to take time out from the single currency region, said the Greek parliament’s vote to accept the austerity that is a precondition of further aid was a “step further forward.” Yet he reiterated his view that a temporary exit from the 19-nation euro region may be “the better way” since it would allow the debt forgiveness that is necessary yet banned under euro rules.

Given Greek financing needs, “we’ll see in the negotiations if there’s even a way to arrive at a program,” Schaeuble said in an interview on Deutschlandfunk radio on Thursday. “I don’t know, nobody knows at the moment how this is supposed to work without a haircut and everybody knows that a haircut is incompatible with euro membership.”

The broadside from the finance chief of Europe’s biggest economy underlines the hurdles that remain for Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras even after he had to rely on opposition votes to pass the pension curbs and state-asset sales required just to begin talks on aid of up to 86 billion euros ($94 billion).

MORE DESPICABLE ME AT LINK

[Demeter]

4. A New Versailles Treaty is Haunting Europe By Yanis Varoufakis

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article42378.htm

In the next hours and days, I shall be sitting in Parliament to assess the legislation that is part of the recent Euro Summit agreement on Greece. I am also looking forward to hearing in person from my comrades, Alexis Tsipras and Euclid Tsakalotos, who have been through so much over the past few days. Till then, I shall reserve judgment regarding the legislation before us. Meanwhile, here are some first, impressionistic thoughts stirred up by the Euro Summit’s Statement.

A New Versailles Treaty is haunting Europe – I used that expression back in the Spring of 2010 to describe the first Greek ‘bailout’ that was being prepared at that time. If that allegory was pertinent then it is, sadly, all too germane now.

Never before has the European Union made a decision that undermines so fundamentally the project of European Integration. Europe’s leaders, in treating Alexis Tsipras and our government the way they did, dealt a decisive blow against the European project.

The project of European integration has, indeed, been fatally wounded over the past few days. And as Paul Krugman rightly says, whatever you think of Syriza, or Greece, it wasn’t the Greeks or Syriza who killed off the dream of a democratic, united Europe.

Back in 1971 Nick Kaldor, the noted Cambridge economist, had warned that forging monetary union before a political union was possible would lead not only to a failed monetary union but also to the deconstruction of the European political project. Later on, in 1999, German-British sociologist Ralf Dahrendorf also warned that economic and monetary union would split rather than unite Europe. All these years I hoped that they were wrong. Now, the powers that be in Brussels, in Berlin and in Frankfurt have conspired to prove them right.

The Euro Summit statement of yesterday morning reads like a document committing to paper Greece’s Terms of Surrender. It is meant as a statement confirming that Greece acquiesces to becoming a vassal of the Eurogroup.

The Euro Summit statement of yesterday morning has nothing to do with economics, nor with any concern for the type of reform agenda capable of lifting Greece out of its mire. It is purely and simply a manifestation of the politics of humiliation in action. Even if one loathes our government one must see that the Eurogroup’s list of demands represents a major departure from decency and reason.

The Euro Summit statement of yesterday morning signalled a complete annulment of national sovereignty, without putting in its place a supra-national, pan-European, sovereign body politic. Europeans, even those who give not a damn for Greece, ought to beware.

Much energy is expended by the media on whether the Terms of Surrender will pass through Greek Parliament, and in particular on whether MPs like myself will toe the line and vote in favour of the relevant legislation. I do not think this is the most interesting of questions. The crucial question is: Does the Greek economy stand any chance of recovery under these terms? This is the question that will preoccupy me during the Parliamentary sessions that follow in the next hours and days. The greatest worry is that even a complete surrender on our part would lead to a deepening of the never-ending crisis.

The recent Euro Summit is indeed nothing short of the culmination of a coup. In 1967 it was the tanks that foreign powers used to end Greek democracy. In my interview with Philip Adams, on ABC Radio National’s LNL, I claimed that in 2015 another coup was staged by foreign powers using, instead of tanks, Greece’s banks. Perhaps the main economic difference is that, whereas in 1967 Greece’s public property was not targeted, in 2015 the powers behind the coup demanded the handing over of all remaining public assets, so that they would be put into the servicing of our un-payble, unsustainable debt.

Watch this space for detailed comments on the economics of the proposed legislation…

Yanis Varoufakis is a Greek-Australian economist who served as Minister of Finance of Greece in 2015.

[Demeter]

5. How The ECB Took Over Greek Banks, In One Chart Tyler Durden

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-07-16/how-ecb-took-over-greek-banks-one-chart


Earlier this week, when we reported that as part of the just passed latest Greek austerity package which open the way for the third Greek bailout, "one of the preconditions imposed on Greece for a deal is that it signs into law European rules that would put euro zone authorities at the ECB and in Brussels, rather than Athens, in charge of identifying and closing or breaking up sick banks." As Reuters added, "this in turn could lead to a shake-up of the sector that could see some banks close, with losses pushed onto bondholders and possibly even large depositors. In such circumstances, there would be little that Athens could do to prevent this."



That was merely the political aspect of Greek handing over its sovereignty, which also meant granting control of Greek banks to the ECB. Earlier today, Draghi also confirmed the far more practical one. First, as we learned, Greek ELA was increased by another €900 million to just shy of €90 billion. But more importantly, Draghi also stated that total ECB exposure to Greece (i.e., its banks) now stands at a total of €130 billion which includes various EFSF and other claims. Putting this in context, total Greek deposits were at about €120 billion at the last optimistic estimate, and likely well lower now. In other words, as the chart below shows, when it comes to the entire Greek financial system, the ECB is now in full control with its "support" of banks at least €10 billion more than total Greek deposits.



Incidentally, the latest total exposure to Greece is about €30 billion more than the entire capital and reserves of the Eurosystem, but that is a topic for another day...



Which brings us back to the original question: for all his pompous rhetoric, Mario Draghi showed that when it comes to determining the political fate of a nation, he will not hesitate to force capital controls. So it will be up to Greek depositors now, for whom the question is simple: will they trust the "goodwill" of the ECB ever again - sure Draghi got his way, and is allowing a modest increase in bank withdrawals once capital controls are lifted, but what happens if Greece again votes in an anti-austerity party when the next inevitable elections take place, and specifically: how long before the ECB once again freezes Greek ELA so no more deposit withdrawals will be allowed.

For the answer, look at what Greeks will doing when banks reopen: will the lines be to deposit cash... or to withdraw it. If the latter, then nothing has really changed and the ECB will be forced to keep raising its ELA until such time as it caps it once more, or all Greek deposits are withdrawn and the ECB no longer has any leverage over Greece.

FOR SOME REASON, THE GRAPHS WILL NOT LINK...SEE THEM AT THE ORIGIN OF POST

[Demeter]

6. Why Germany Would Prefer a "Grexit" to Debt Forgiveness

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-07-16/why-germany-would-prefer-grexit-debt-forgiveness

Stocks are soaring today because Greece agreed to another austerity program. However, all this really means is that negotiations can begin for another Greek bailout. The bailout itself is at least 4 weeks away assuming that everyone can agree on everything.

The next steps are:

1) Germany’s parliament must issue a mandate giving Chancellor Angela Merkel the right to negotiate a new bailout deal with Greece.

2) Finland’s, the Netherland’s, Slovania’s, Estonia’s, and Austria’s Parliaments also must agree to let their Finance Ministers negotiate a new deal with Greece.

3) EU Finance Ministers must negotiate a new bailout deal with Greece.

4) Germany’s parliament must sign off on the new deal.

5) Greece must accept the deal.



Anyone who claims a deal is within sight is out of his or her mind. This process will take weeks if not months to complete… assuming it even occurs. Indeed, there are numerous issues any of which could derail the whole process.

The most important development is that both the IMF and the ECB have floated the idea of debt forgiveness. This is the first REAL solution that could reduce Greece’s debt load… but it is completely impractical in that it sets the stage for potential debt forgiveness deals for Spain, Italy and possibly even France down the road.

All of those countries will come knocking asking for help at some point. The fact is that their Debt to GDP levels have soared since the EU nearly collapsed in 2012. Spain's Debt to GDP has risen from 69% to 98%. Italy's Debt to GDP has risen from 116% to 132%. France’s has risen from 85% to 95%.

This is why German political leaders such as Finance Minister, Wolfgang Schauble, are warming to the idea of a “Grexit”… because as painful as that might be, kicking out a problem country is a more appealing template for future negotiations with problem countries than debt forgiveness. Remember, the entire Greek debt market is about €345 billion in size. So we’re not talking about a massive amount of collateral… though the turmoil this country has caused in the last three years gives a sense of the importance of the issue.

Spain has over $1.0 trillion in debt outstanding… and Italy has €2.6 trillion. These bonds are backstopping tens of trillions of Euros’ worth of derivatives trades. A haircut or debt forgiveness for them would trigger systemic failure in Europe. EU banks as a whole are leveraged at 26-to-1. At these leverage levels, even a 4% drop in asset prices wipes out ALL of your capital. And any haircut of Greek, Spanish, Italian and French debt would be a lot more than 4%.

Remember, at the end of the day, it’s all about the big banks’ derivative exposure, NOTHING else. This is what has driven every Central Bank action since 2008. And it’s what will drive Europe’s future negotiations for a 3rd Greek Bailout. The reality is that the issues that caused 2008 (excessive leverage, toxic derivatives) were not solved. If anything they have worsened. And today, most Central banks are sporting leverage ratios well above those that took Lehman Brothers down. Another Crisis is coming. And it will feature entire countries going bust, not just a few banks.

[Demeter]

13. This Is How Quickly Greece's Future Is Deteriorating

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-07-17/this-is-how-quickly-greece-s-future-is-deteriorating

Some time ago University of Chicago economist Luigi Zingales wrote about a "horrifying joke" he heard from his colleagues that asked, "What's the difference between Japan and Greece?" The punchline was "three years." Now, even that seems too long.

The International Monetary Fund's July 14 forecast for Greece's debt as a share of gross domestic product in 2017 was almost 200 percent, up substantially from its April estimate of 151.8 percent. That also passes through an intermediate forecast of 169.7 percent made in the framework of a preliminary draft debt sustainability analysis by the IMF on June 26. The forecasts show Greece is edging closer to Japan's debt-to-GDP ratio, which is the highest in the world. Not only are the countries both archipelagos with storied histories, but they also seem to share a high and growing appetite for debt.



Looking at Greece's debt on a per-capita basis, however, paints a slightly less bleak picture. At the end of 2014 there was more than $35,000 of debt for every Greek citizen, according Eurostat, whereas in Japan it was about $79,000, Bloomberg calculations show. In the U.S., it reached about $56,600, based on data from the Treasury Department. With reference to the European countries, Greek citizens bear a public debt lower than their counterparts in Ireland, Belgium, Italy, Austria, the U.K. and France.



The IMF bent its own rules on debt sustainability in 2010 by approving a bailout of $38 billion for Greece. At the time, it was the biggest loan program in the history of the fund relative to a country's shares in the institution. Greece secured a second bailout of $36 billion in 2012. The country owes the IMF $26 billion from the funds it has drawn. The 2012 bailout expires in March.

[snot]

19. Terrible news.

[Demeter]

7. Germany Offers Verdict on Greek Aid After Draghi Backing

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-07-16/germany-offers-verdict-on-greek-aid-after-draghi-backing



German lawmakers have their say on Greece’s next bailout on Friday after European Central Bank President Mario Draghi said he views the country’s place in the euro as secure.

As Europe seeks to line up a three-year aid package worth as much as 86 billion euros ($94 billion), the lower-house vote is a renewed test of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s struggle to persuade Germans that Greece is still worth helping. While her majority in parliament suggests that passage is assured, Merkel faces growing dissent in her party bloc as she seeks approval to start bailout talks and for a bridge loan to Greece. With the European project under threat, the continent’s most powerful leader is putting her prestige on the line to hold the currency union together.

“The systemic importance of Greece for the entire euro zone hasn’t been demonstrated,” Christian von Stetten, a member of Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union, said Thursday. “There can only be one vote tomorrow, and that is no.”

German lawmakers are interrupting their summer recess to return to Berlin for a three-hour floor debate before voting at about 1 p.m. local time. Finland’s parliament gave its approval Thursday. In a closed-door test poll after an appeal for support by Merkel, 48 members of her 310-strong caucus said they would break ranks and vote against the government line, a party official said. That compares with 29 who dissented in February on a vote to extend Greece’s second bailout.

Schaeuble’s Doubts

With the International Monetary Fund urging a debt writedown for Greece that Germany says is impossible under euro rules, Draghi stepped in with an attempt to ease tension. Months of standoffs over aid and austerity between Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and creditors have led to deposit flight and capital controls, pushing Greece to the brink.

“We always acted on the assumption that Greece will remain a member of the euro area,” Draghi told reporters in Frankfurt on Thursday after ECB policy makers granted Greek lenders more emergency liquidity. “There was never a question.”

The Greek parliament’s vote early Thursday to enact reforms and a pledge by its creditors to provide bridge financing mean that broke the negative spiral, he said. That signaled a rebuff to German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble, who said hours earlier that Greece might do better temporarily outside the euro area and questioned whether the bailout talks would succeed. His comments on the eve of the parliamentary vote mirrored ambivalence among German policy makers about aiding Greece even as Merkel lobbied her caucus to back the proposed aid package.

Merkel’s coalition controls 504 of 631 lower-house seats and can count on partial support from the opposition Greens. Even Schaeuble said in a radio interview that he backs renewed talks with Greece, though “we don’t know what the outcome of the negotiations will be.” Euro-area finance ministers authorized a 7 billion-euro bridge loan to Greece, according to Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny. The financing deal is expected to be announced Friday after national parliaments vote on the aid accord. Short-term financing is needed so that Greece can make a 3.5 billion-euro payment due to the ECB on Monday, and keep the country afloat during talks on the proposed three-year bailout. That aid would come from the euro-area’s permanent firewall fund, the European Stability Mechanism.

Thomas Oppermann, parliamentary leader of Merkel’s Social Democratic coalition ally, said he’s confident the Greek aid package will pass. “Mr. Tsipras has decided to carry out the agreed reforms,” Oppermann told reporters. “There can really be only one conclusion: We have to help him turn that into a success.”

DEFINE "SUCCESS"

[Demeter]

8. Lloyd Blankfein Is Now a Billionaire

"MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!"--W

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-07-17/blankfein-becomes-billionaire-riding-goldman-s-shares-to-riches

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. made hundreds of partners rich when it went public in 1999. Its performance since then has turned Lloyd Blankfein into a billionaire.

The chief executive officer of the Wall Street bank for the past nine years, Blankfein has seen his net worth surge to about $1.1 billion as the firm’s shares quadrupled since the initial public offering, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. As the largest individual owner of Goldman Sachs stock, he has a stake in the company worth almost $500 million. Real estate and an investment portfolio seeded by cash bonuses and distributions from the bank’s private-equity funds add more than $600 million.

For Blankfein, the son of a New York postal worker, the accumulation of wealth has been dramatic. He’s one of the few current leaders of a big global bank who reached a senior-executive rank before his firm went public. That won’t happen again anytime soon, as Goldman Sachs was the last major Wall Street firm to end its private partnership.

“It will be a rare thing,” said Alan Johnson, managing director of compensation-consulting firm Johnson Associates. “Most people won’t have as long of a career at a high level, and it’s certainly unusual to keep as much of that stock that you’ve been granted. And then, of course, the firm you work for has to be really successful.”

FULSOME PRAISE AND BIO OF BLANKFEIN AT LINK

[Demeter]

9. This Is How Easy It Is to Scam Obamacare

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-07-16/this-is-how-easy-it-is-to-scam-obamacare

Federal auditors duped healthcare.gov 11 out of 12 times...When healthcare.gov opened in late 2013, it was so crippled by technical problems that critics questioned whether people would be able to sign up for coverage. Now, it may actually be too easy to enroll.

That’s according to a new government audit, presented in testimony from the Government Accountability Office, delivered at a Senate Finance Committee hearing on Thursday. When federal auditors tried to apply for insurance coverage and tax credit subsidies using fictitious applicants, they succeeded 11 out of 12 times. Here are some highlights from the GAO’s undercover investigation:

Fake applicants got through on the phone

The auditors couldn’t get coverage for fake applicants just by going online, because the website couldn’t verify their identities. But investigators successfully completed the fake applications on the phone and got coverage for almost all of them. In the one enrollment that didn’t succeed, the applicant declined to give a Social Security Number, though other cases that had missing or invalid SSNs were approved.

Communication with applicants is still mixed up

The marketplace asked eight of the fake applicants for additional documents to prove citizenship and identity, “but an accompanying list of suitable documents that could be sent in response consisted of items for proving income.” This arguably says more about healthcare.gov’s consumer experience than it does about its fraud controls.

All 11 applicants kept coverage despite missing documents

The auditors submitted either fake, partial, or no documentation in response to requests. All were automatically renewed in subsidized coverage for 2015.

Six fake applicants got kicked off in 2015, but five got back on

Auditors got the health plans reinstated by calling up the marketplace again. They even got larger subsidies, without asking for a change.

Enrolling in person was difficult

The GAO also tried to send six investigators to third-party groups known as “navigators” contracted by the government to help people sign up for coverage in person. They wanted to see whether the navigators would help applicants fudge income levels to qualify for subsidies. But in five of the six cases, they couldn’t get assistance at all.

It’s a scam with little incentive

Overall, the testimony reveals a messy system that failed to catch deliberate defrauding attempts. The GAO says its results can’t be generalized to the wider population of applicants. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which runs healthcare.gov, has terminated enrollments for more than 200,000 people because of questions over their identities.

CONSIDER THAT IN UNIVERSAL SINGLE PAYER, ONE'S IDENTITY WOULD BE NO ISSUE....

[Demeter]

10. Feds can read every email you opened last year without a warrant

http://www.zdnet.com/article/every-email-you-opened-last-year-can-be-read-by-the-fbi-without-a-warrant/

It's no longer a surprise that the government is reading your emails. What you might not know is that it can readily read most of your email without a warrant.

Any email or social networking message you've opened that's more than six months old can also be accessed by every law enforcement official in government -- without needing to get a warrant. That's because a key provision in a law almost three decades' old allows this kind of access with a mere subpoena, which doesn't require a judge...MORE

YOUR GOVERNMENT AT WORK

[Demeter]

11. Who’s Next for Berlin’s Financial Blitzkrieg? By Finian Cunningham

http://sputniknews.com/columnists/20150716/1024713727.html

Seventy-five years ago, when Europe succumbed to Nazi Germany it was the sound of trundling panzer tanks rolling into capitals that heralded defeat. Now it is German “panzer banks” that appear conquering all in front of them. The financial terms dictated to Athens over the latest so-called bailout is nothing less than the subjugation of a sovereign country to the dictate of German banks. The troubling question for several European states is: who’s next?

Even the Western media could not disguise the shocking humiliation meted out to Greece by Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel and her intransigent Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaüble. The Washington Post described Greece’s acquiescence to “punishing ultimatum”, while Reuters said Athens had “surrendered”. The Western media haven’t quite yet specified who the new financial dictators of Europe are. Reports refer blandly to “EU hardliners” and “tough EU leaders”, but reading between the lines it is clear that the paymaster calling the tune now for the rest of Europe is Berlin. And the tune is not melodious. The Greek “anti-austerity” government of Alexis Tsipras has been shamed into turning the country over to Berlin’s finance capital. For a €86 billion “loan” extension, Greece is mandated to hand over €50 billion of Greek public assets that will in the future be privatised by “EU creditors”, who in reality are the German government and its banks. On top of that, Athens will have to implement more withering austerity on its long-suffering people; and if Athens doesn’t meet the targets then Berlin will dispatch its shock-troops in pinstripe suits to ensure that it does. It’s a financial scorched-earth blitzkrieg that effectively makes Greece a “German annex”.

In 2010, Greece’s total debt was €110 billion, or about 130 per cent of its gross domestic product (GDP). In 2014, fuelled by reckless EU creditor largesse, the debt ballooned to €315 billion, or 170 per cent of GDP. With the latest bailout, the country’s debt will reach €400 billion – over 200 per cent of GDP. Most of the capital is from Germany, with the most powerful banks in Europe, and euphemistically referred to as “international creditor”.

The pattern is obvious. Greece is lured into ever-deeper, un-payable debt under the absurd guise of “reducing arrears”. In this inevitable condition of debt-slavery, the country is bled dry and its assets can then be seized. Or as the Washington Post admitted: “A financial gun is held to the head of Greece”.



When Nazi Germany rolled over Europe seven decades ago, its lesser-known instrument of conquest then was to take over central banks and force them into debt by imposing “loans”. In 1942, the Nazi occupiers of Greece compelled the country to incur a debt which in today’s terms would be $12 billion. Today, Germany does not need to physically invade countries in order to subjugate them. It can do that through modern capitalist banking systems, in the same way that Greece is now being looted lock, stock and barrel. Expensive armies, Luftwaffe and panzer artillery are dispensed with; gruesome death tolls, media outcry and legal repercussions are avoided. But the end result is the same: conquest of other countries’ resources for external aggrandisement. With typical German “efficiency” financial war has latterly replaced all-out military conquest in Europe. But in the recent battle over Greece, it wasn’t entirely a cake-walk for Berlin. Behind the scenes of frantic negotiations in Brussels, Merkel and Schaüble were involved in serious clashes with French leader Francois Hollande and Italy’s premier Matteo Renzi. The French and Italians were pleading with Berlin to “have a heart” and to afford Greece a measure of debt cancellation. In the end, Berlin and its hardline financial allies in the Netherlands, Finland, Latvia and Lithuania crushed the pleas for softer austerity terms. Greece is to be given no mercy. Merkel and Schaüble want all debt to be collected, with no-holds barred.

National debt figures across Europe show a clear North-South divide.

France, Italy, Spain and Portugal have government debts that – like Greece – exceed their national economic outputs. By contrast, Germany and its northern European neighbours have typically national debts of 50 per cent or less of their GDP. And, in all this, Berlin has emerged as the supreme paymaster, having availed of years of strong export-led growth and surpluses owing to the peculiarities of the euro monetary system. What is rattling France and the other indebted countries of the eurozone is that Berlin will now turn its fiscal dictates on them. France, with its relatively generous social welfare system and publicly owned state assets, presents rich pickings for Germany if it is forced into privatisation and austerity by the Berlin paymaster. The added attraction is that Germany would then become the undisputed economic and political heavyweight in Europe, having sidelined Paris.

In this European showdown, Washington is also alarmed, but for very different reasons. It is afraid that if Berlin exerts too much financial discipline on EU members, the tensions and splits that have arisen over Greece will lead to wide-open cracks that may crash the 28-member bloc. Washington, to be sure, is not primarily concerned about austerity and poverty across Europe. What concerns the Americans is that the EU will become fragmented from rivalries and mutual enmity – particularly between the principals Germany and France. In that case, the EU will no longer function as a cohesive bloc for Washington’s geopolitical project of confronting and isolating Russia. A divisive EU will also fatally damage the US-led NATO military alliance, which is crucial to Washington’s hegemony over Europe and indeed the Western hemisphere. That is why Washington and its close ally in Britain are also calling on Berlin to moderate its financial dictate to Greece. If Berlin pursues its scorched-earth policy too zealously, Greece may implode totally, taking the rest of the EU and NATO with it. Only days after Athens surrendered to Berlin’s ultimatum over financial looting, Washington reiterated its call for debt restructuring for Greece. Last week, US President Barack Obama urged Germany’s Merkel to write off part of the debt. She ignored Obama then. Now the Washington-controlled IMF is repeating the admonition to Berlin. And French Finance Minister Michel Sapin was quick to endorse the latest IMF advice for debt write-off, no doubt out of a sense of self-preservation for his own country. It seems strange that the IMF, which has been dubbed a “debt-collecting agency”, should on the face of it show concern for Greece and its people. The real concern in Washington is that German financial dictate to other EU members is threatening to inflame divisions and social unrest both within and between countries.

Washington doesn’t have a problem with financial fascism. Its enslavement to Wall Street banks and corporations is testimony to that. The US apprehension is that Berlin’s financial blitzkrieg will not stop at Greece, but will proceed to other European capitals, with deleterious geopolitical consequences for Washington’s unspoken objective of undermining Russia. Dirty tricks from Washington are thus on the cards for Berlin.

[Demeter]

12. How the Feds Just Knee-Capped the Gig Economy

http://www.inc.com/erik-sherman/did-the-feds-just-knee-cap-the-gig-economy.html

For the so-called gig economy, there was some painful news out of Washington earlier this week: The Feds have underscored how wary they’ve become about the concept. And whether or not you’re a fan of the trend, this is something you should know about.

Internet companies building businesses on connecting supposedly independent service providers with customers have become big business. Uber, Lyft, and Airbnb between them so far have raised $9.1 billion in investments. The sector is growing at a frantic rate. The independent status of the providers is fundamental to this. Because they don’t need to hire employees, equipment, and facilities to let all these people work, the dozens of gig economy companies that already exist save major amounts of money while still making good chunks — typically 15 percent to 30 percent on transactions — which is like a license to their own currency printing press.

There’s been pressure about some of these firms. Uber has become a target of rhetoric from candidates for the presidency, and it is a proxy for the wider industry. There are outstanding lawsuits and a ruling from the California Labor Commission that said, in a specific complaint, a driver for Uber was actually an employee of the company.

Lawsuits are still running and the California case is in appeals. But the new big news is that the Department of Labor underscored that the test to see if someone is an employee is very broad. The government, which includes other branches, like the IRS, and the states are concerned. Here are two paragraphs from the document released on Tuesday:

Misclassification of employees as independent contractors is found in an increasing number of workplaces in the United States, in part reflecting larger restructuring of business organizations. When employers improperly classify employees as independent contractors, the employees may not receive important workplace protections such as the minimum wage, overtime compensation, unemployment insurance, and workers' compensation. Misclassification also results in lower tax revenues for government and an uneven playing field for employers who properly classify their workers. Although independent contracting relationships can be advantageous for workers and businesses, some employees may be intentionally misclassified as a means to cut costs and avoid compliance with labor laws.

The Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division (WHD) continues to receive numerous complaints from workers alleging misclassification, and the Department continues to bring successful enforcement actions against employers who misclassify workers. In addition, many states have acknowledged this problematic trend and have responded with legislation and misclassification task forces. Understanding that combating misclassification requires a multi-pronged approach, WHD has entered into memoranda of understanding with many of these states, as well as the Internal Revenue Service.1 In conjunction with these efforts, the Administrator believes that additional guidance regarding the application of the standards for determining who is an employee under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA or "the Act&quot may be helpful to the regulated community in classifying workers and ultimately in curtailing misclassification.

Regulators are worried about workers getting caught without the traditional protections employers have been expected to give, and they’re concerned that important tax payments aren’t being made because companies aren’t collecting them. Although this memo is about a wider problem than only the gig economy companies, it clearly includes them.

MORE

[snot]

20. Did you see this?

I'd be interested in your and other SMW'ers' thoughts:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10249022#post5 (courtesy ichingcarpenter):

As with the end of feudalism 500 years ago, capitalism’s replacement by postcapitalism will be accelerated by external shocks and shaped by the emergence of a new kind of human being. And it has started.

Postcapitalism is possible because of three major changes information technology has brought about in the past 25 years. First, it has reduced the need for work, blurred the edges between work and free time and loosened the relationship between work and wages. The coming wave of automation, currently stalled because our social infrastructure cannot bear the consequences, will hugely diminish the amount of work needed – not just to subsist but to provide a decent life for all.

Second, information is corroding the market’s ability to form prices correctly. That is because markets are based on scarcity while information is abundant. The system’s defence mechanism is to form monopolies – the giant tech companies – on a scale not seen in the past 200 years, yet they cannot last. By building business models and share valuations based on the capture and privatisation of all socially produced information, such firms are constructing a fragile corporate edifice at odds with the most basic need of humanity, which is to use ideas freely.

Third, we’re seeing the spontaneous rise of collaborative production: goods, services and organisations are appearing that no longer respond to the dictates of the market and the managerial hierarchy. The biggest information product in the world – Wikipedia – is made by volunteers for free, abolishing the encyclopedia business and depriving the advertising industry of an estimated $3bn a year in revenue . . . .

more: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/jul/17/postcapitalism-end-of-capitalism-begun?CMP=share_btn_tw

[Demeter]

14. DOUBLE STANDARD

[Demeter]

15. Foreign holdings of US Treasury securities slip in May

WALKING AWAY FROM THE DOLLAR

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/foreign-holdings-of-us-treasury-securities-slip-in-may/2015/07/16/ad5f8dfe-2c03-11e5-960f-22c4ba982ed4_story.html

Foreign holdings of U.S. Treasury securities fell in May for a second straight month even though China, the largest foreign owner of Treasury debt, boosted its holdings.

In its monthly report, the Treasury Department said Thursday that total holdings edged down 0.1 percent in May to $6.13 trillion after a bigger 0.6 percent decline in April.

China boosted its holdings by 0.5 percent to $1.27 trillion in May, but Japan, the second biggest foreign owner of Treasury debt, trimmed its holdings 0.1 percent to $1.21 trillion.

The demand for U.S. Treasury securities, considered one of the world’s safest investments, is expected to remain strong this year.

Much of the debt is owned by foreign central banks. The holdings by foreign governments rose 0.7 percent in May to $4.16 trillion, 68 percent of the total foreign holdings.

[antigop]

16. Robert Reich:How Goldman Sachs Profited From the Greek Debt Crisis

Sorry if this has already been posted...I haven't been able to keep up lately.

http://www.thenation.com/article/goldmans-greek-gambit/

The investment bank made millions by helping to hide the true extent of the debt, and in the process almost doubled it.

The Greek debt crisis offers another illustration of Wall Street’s powers of persuasion and predation, although the Street is missing from most accounts.

The crisis was exacerbated years ago by a deal with Goldman Sachs, engineered by Goldman’s current CEO, Lloyd Blankfein. Blankfein and his Goldman team helped Greece hide the true extent of its debt, and in the process almost doubled it. And just as with the American subprime crisis, and the current plight of many American cities, Wall Street’s predatory lending played an important although little-recognized role.

In 2001, Greece was looking for ways to disguise its mounting financial troubles. The Maastricht Treaty required all eurozone member states to show improvement in their public finances, but Greece was heading in the wrong direction. Then Goldman Sachs came to the rescue, arranging a secret loan of 2.8 billion euros for Greece, disguised as an off-the-books “cross-currency swap”—a complicated transaction in which Greece’s foreign-currency debt was converted into a domestic-currency obligation using a fictitious market exchange rate.

As a result, about 2 percent of Greece’s debt magically disappeared from its national accounts. Christoforos Sardelis, then head of Greece’s Public Debt Management Agency, later described the deal to Bloomberg Business as “a very sexy story between two sinners.” For its services, Goldman received a whopping 600 million euros ($793 million), according to Spyros Papanicolaou, who took over from Sardelis in 2005. That came to about 12 percent of Goldman’s revenue from its giant trading and principal-investments unit in 2001—which posted record sales that year. The unit was run by Blankfein.

Then the deal turned sour.

[mother earth]

17. Greece: A Crime Against Humanity? - Paul Mason (Ep. 19)

Published on Jul 16, 2015

Paul Mason explains Greece's tough third bailout package as the cogs of its economy start to turn again. He meets a doctor whose hospital has had its budget slashed from €19 million to €7 million and who says the deal is 'a crime against humanity'.

[mother earth]

18. Austerity and Neoliberalism in Greece with Richard Wolff and Barry Herman | The New School

Published on May 12, 2015

Development, Thought and Policy Lecture Series: Austerity and Neoliberalism in Greece, sponsored by the Julien J. Studley Graduate Program in International Affairs (http://www.newschool.edu/public-engag...), at the Milano School for International Affairs, Management, and Urban Policy (http://www.newschool.edu/milano). GPIA Professors Richard Wolff and Barry Herman share their insights, led by chair and moderator Achilles Kallergie, PhD Candidate in the GPIA program.

What austerity is about is shifting the burden of an economic crisis from one part of the population to another. The mass of Greek people did not force Andreas Papandreou to borrow money. The mass of the Greek people didn't know about or have much to do with fiscal policy at the national level. In fact, governments, bankers, leading industrialists, ship builders, the major players of the Greek economy, got together, as their counterparts did elsewhere, to produce the decisions that then, in the wake of the international collapse of capitalism, became unsustainable, producing a crisis in Greece. Once that had happened, there was only one question left: Who was going to pay the cost of all the debt Greece has run up or all the production decisions made that have left Greece without the capacity to export, with a dependence on imports etc.? And at that point, as has happened in every country - Greece is in no way unique - the wealthy and the business community went to work, with their resources and their business connections, to make sure that they didn't pay the price.