Wall Street's Protection Racket of Covert Derivatives: JPMorgan Derivatives Prop Up U.S. Debt

Why the Senate Won’t Touch Jamie Dimon

By~ Ellen Brown

Global Research, June 20, 2012

Web of Debt

When Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase Bank, appeared before the Senate Banking Committee on June 13, he was wearing cufflinks bearing the presidential seal. “Was Dimon trying to send any particular message by wearing the presidential cufflinks?” asked CNBC editor John Carney. “Was he . . . subtly hinting that he’s really the guy in charge?”

The groveling of the Senators was so obvious that Jon Stewart did a spoof news clip on it, featured in a Huffington Post piece titled “Jon Stewart Blasts Senate’s Coddling Of JP Morgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon,” and Matt Taibbi wrote an op-ed called “Senators Grovel, Embarrass Themselves at Dimon Hearing.” He said the whole thing was painful to watch.

“What is going on with this panel of senators?” asked Stewart. “They’re sucking up to Jamie Dimon like they’re on JPMorgan’s payroll.” The explanation in a news clip that followed was that JPMorgan Chase is the biggest campaign donor to many of the members of the Banking Committee.

That is one obvious answer, but financial analysts Jim Willie and Rob Kirby think it may be something far larger, deeper, and more ominous. They contend that the $3 billion-plus losses in London hedging transactions that were the subject of the hearing can be traced, not to European sovereign debt (as alleged), but to the record-low interest rates maintained on U.S. government bonds.

The national debt is growing at $1.5 trillion per year. Ultra-low interest rates MUST be maintained to prevent the debt from overwhelming the government budget. Near-zero rates also need to be maintained because even a moderate rise would cause multi-trillion dollar derivative losses for the banks, and would remove the banks’ chief income stream, the arbitrage afforded by borrowing at 0% and investing at higher rates.

The low rates are maintained by interest rate swaps, called by Willie a “derivative tool which controls the bond market in a devious artificial manner.” How they control it is complicated, and is explored in detail in the Willie piece here and Kirby piece here.

Kirby contends that the only organization large enough to act as counterparty to some of these trades is the U.S. Treasury itself. He suspects the Treasury’s Exchange Stabilization Fund, a covert entity without oversight and accountable to no one. Kirby also notes that if publicly-traded companies (including JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley) are deemed to be integral to U.S. national security (meaning protecting the integrity of the dollar), they can legally be excused from reporting their true financial condition. They are allowed to keep two sets of books.

Interest rate swaps are now over 80 percent of the massive derivatives market, and JPMorgan holds about $57.5 trillion of them. Without the protective JPMorgan swaps, interest rates on U.S. debt could follow those of Greece and climb to 30%. CEO Dimon could, then, indeed be “the guy in charge”: he could be controlling the lever propping up the whole U.S. financial system.

Hero or Felon?

So should Dimon be regarded as a national hero? Not if past conduct is any gauge. Besides the recent $3 billion in JPMorgan losses, which look more like illegal speculation than legal hedging, there is JPM’s use of its conflicting positions as clearing house and creditor of MF Global to siphon off funds that should have gone into customer accounts, and its responsibility in dooming Lehman Brothers by withholding $7 billion in cash and collateral. There is also the fact that Dimon sat on the board of the New York Federal Reserve when it lent $55 billion to JPMorgan in 2008 to buy Bear Stearns for pennies on the dollar. Dimon then owned nearly three million shares of JPM stock and options, in clear violation of 18 U.S.C. Section 208, which makes that sort of conflict of interest a felony.

Financial analyst John Olagues, a former stock options market maker, points out that the loan was guaranteed by $55 billion of Bear Stearns assets. If Bear had that much in assets, the Fed could have given it the loan directly, saving it from being swallowed up by JPMorgan. But Bear did not have a director on the board of the NY Fed.

Olagues also notes that JPMorgan received an additional $25 billion in TARP payments from the Treasury, which were evidently paid off by borrowing from the NY Fed at a very low 0.5%; and that JPM executives received some very large and highly suspicious bonuses called Stock Appreciation Rights and Restricted Stock Units (complicated variants of employee stock options and restricted stock). In 2009, these bonuses were granted on the day JPMorgan stock reached its lowest value in five years. The stock quickly rebounded thereafter, substantially increasing the value of the bonuses. This pattern recurred in 2008 and 2012.

Olagues has evidence of systematic computer-generated selling of JPMorgan stock immediately prior to and on the dates of the granted equity compensation. Collusion to manipulate the stock to accommodate the grant of options is called “spring-loading” and is a violation of SEC Rule 10 b-5 and tax laws, with criminal and civil penalties.

All of which suggests we could actually have a felon at the helm of our ship of state.

There is a movement afoot to get Dimon replaced on the Board, on the ground that his directorship represents a clear conflict of interest. In May, Massachusetts Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren called for Dimon’s resignation from the NY Fed board, and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has used the uproar over the speculative JPM losses to promote an overhaul of the Federal Reserve. In a release to reporters, Warren said:

“Four years after the financial crisis, Wall Street has still not been held accountable, and that lack of accountability has history repeating itself—huge, risky financial bets leading to billions in losses. It is time for some accountability. . . . Dimon stepping down from the NY Fed would be at least one small sign that Wall Street will be held accountable for their failures.”

But what chance does even this small step have against the gun-to-the-head persuasion of a nightmare collapse of the entire U.S. debt scheme?

Propping Up a Pyramid Scheme

Is there no alternative but to succumb to the Mafia-like Wall Street protection racket of a covert derivatives trade in interest rate swaps? As Willie and Kirby observe, that scheme itself must ultimately fail, and may have failed already. They point to evidence that the JPM losses are not just $3 billion but $30 billion or more, and that JPM is actually bankrupt.

The derivatives casino itself is just a last-ditch attempt to prop up a private pyramid scheme in fractional-reserve money creation, one that has progressed over several centuries through a series of “reserves”—from gold, to Fed-created “base money,” to mortgage-backed securities, to sovereign debt ostensibly protected with derivatives. We’ve seen that the only real guarantor in all this is the government itself, first with FDIC insurance and then with government bailouts of too-big-to-fail banks. If we the people are funding the banks, we should own them; and our national currency should be issued, not through banks at interest, but through our own sovereign government.

Unlike Greece, which is dependent on an uncooperative European Central Bank for funding, the U.S. still has the legal power to issue its own dollars or borrow them interest-free from its own central bank. The government could buy back its bonds and refinance them at 0% interest through the Federal Reserve—which now buys them on the open market at interest like everyone else—or it could simply rip them up.

The chief obstacle to that alternative is the bugaboo of inflation, but many countries have proven that this approach need not be inflationary. Canada borrowed from its own central bank effectively interest free from 1939 to 1974, stimulating productivity without creating inflation; Australia did it from 1912 to 1923; and China has done it for decades.

The private creation of money at interest is the granddaddy of all pyramid schemes; and like all such schemes, it must eventually collapse, despite a quadrillion dollar derivatives edifice propping it up. Willie and Kirby think that time is upon us. We need to have alternative, public and cooperative systems ready to replace the old system when it comes crashing down.

---

Bilderberger Ponzi Austerity Fraud Hits ‘I Won’t Pay’ Resistance

by horse237

Ponzi Austerity is a banking fraud quite popular with the banker occupied governments of Europe though not with the people. Americans are silent but unwilling participants who were volunteered for a campaign of human sacrifice by Ben Bernanke and the Federal Reserve which created tens of trillions of dollars in swaps to bailout banks all over the world.

This is how the scheme works. Last week Spain got a 100 billion euro ($126 billion) bailout for its banks. Italy was already 2 trillion dollars in debt. Its share of the Spanish bailout was 20 billion euros. Italy agreed to pay almost 7% interest on that loan and even more in the future on loans. The Italians will be paid 3% on their investment in Spanish bonds. In Bernie Madoff's Ponzi scheme older investors were paid by new investors. The Italians were volunteered by their appointed Prime Minister Mario Monti who is a Bilderberger and A former Goldman Sachs VP to cut their pay and pensions and to pay more taxes so they can pay for Spain's Austerity which was just transferred to them.

This will not work much longer. The Spanish Finance Minister Luis De Guidnos is auditing the books of their banks in order to give the EU a better estimate of the bailout needed for the banks. The G-20 summit has announced a 750 billion euro bailout for Italy and Greece. The real need is much greater. . But no amount of bailouts will stop the run on the banks in Spain, France, Italy, Portugal and Greece. The bank runs will continue because the people are fleeing the coming devaluation when the euro fails and is converted into drachma, lira, pesetas, escudos and francs. And the wealthy are fleeing higher taxes. Capital flight contracts the money supply and contracts the economy causing dwindling tax revenue and more social unrest.

The French voted the Socialists enough seats in their Parliament so they can vote for systematic restructuring (i.e. Austerity) without the votes of the hard Left and the Greens. French bankers were pleased that Austerity was coming the way of the taxpayers. President Francois Hollande appointed a man from the Rothschild Investment bank to be his main economic adviser. Hollande is Jewish and won the backing of millions of Muslim voters. He promised a Palestinian state before the election but afterwards said only if the Israelis said yes. He has said he will raise taxes. The bankers love that too.

Long before we were born it was decided by committees of bankers that they would issue your currency including checking account money through creation of loans at interest. These debts were unpayable because the banks only created the principal amount of for example a ten thousand dollar loan but not the thousand dollar interest on the loan. These debts were rolled over along with the interest until we now face a monstrous Debt Bomb. Today the interest on that US 15.78 trillion dollar Treasury debt is 535 billion dollars a year. Some people are still alive who can remember President Kennedy's budget was under 100 billion dollar a year. The interest rate on US government bonds is less than the inflation rate. This will only last for as long as Ben Bernanke can run the printing press without inflation ripping through financial markets and grocery shelves across America. Daniel Estulin says the Bilderbergers decided at their recent meeting to devalue the dollar. And he says they have the permission of the Chinese to do so. This indicates a faster paced inflation to be followed by hyperinflation.

Obviously, devaluing the US currency means that anyone fleeing from the euro to the dollar for more than a week or two is just being foolish. I had been expecting this for some time and that is why I predicted American prices will double between January of 2012 and August of 2013. At 10% interest the cost of debt service on 20 trillion dollars would be 2 trillion dollars a year which would grow to 3 and then 4 trillion dollars. We are talking about the mathematical certainty that the United States government will cease to function before the next presidential term is half over.

A News Roundup from the frontlines in Europe: The EU has issued new rules on pensions. They say your money is not safe unless it is invested in government bonds. It has been calculated that In England people with funded pensions will lose £1,100 a year. A British Army sergeant was fired 3 days before his retirement so he could not collect his army pension and would have to wait until he was 65 to retire. In the UK youth unemployment lasting longer than 12 months rose 264% in the past year. In Greece 155,000 civil servants were laid off and pay was cut 20% for everyone still working. The new government is expected to make further pay cuts and raise more taxes and fees. The situation is so bad that many workers in Greece keep working even months after their boss stops paying them. The two main parties forming the coalition ran the country for the past 38 years. The brother of the former Prime Minister George Papandreou was a doctor and had no substantial income. He bought a Greek island for 750 million dollars. The two brothers are Jewish. European observers do not expect the government to last more than 2 months. Daily life has deteriorated so rapidly in Spain over the last 6 months that Daniel Estulin is seriously considering leaving for a safer country.

Five years ago, OECD countries sovereign debt/GDP ratios were 70%. Today it’s 106% and rising. The Rogoff and Reinhard study (This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly) showed that when the debt to GDP ratio goes above 90% that default on government debt is inevitable.

The last part of the title of this essay implies that a groundswell of public opinion will somehow coalesce over a refusal to pay any more taxes and fees to subsidize the bankers who have been robbing us blind over the past hundred years. I think this will happen a lot sooner than you might think. It seems that the powerful interests in this country have decided to dump Obama in favor of Romney. Mayor Bloomberg whose personal financial manager attended Bilderberg 2012 endorsed Romney. They also decided to devalue the dollar which does mean sharply higher prices possibly before election day. Ben Bernanke will continue to print money until the collapse. It might not happen after the elections or it could happen this summer or fall. But it will happen most likely within 12 months though I would not count on it taking that long. Start preparing today. Have an escape route ready if you live in an American city.

Larry Summers, Clinton's former Treasury Secretary, says what we really need is an international dictatorship run by the bankers. This man lost Harvard a ton of money when he ran their investments. In 1999 Summers (nee Samuelson), Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin and SEC Chairman Arthur Levitt told Brooksley Born, the Commodities Futures Trading Commission, that she was not allowed to regulate Credit Default Swaps. A CDS is a a combination of a derivative which is a bet of a future value of a bond or a commodity like golf or oil and wildly risky insurance. Suppose you want to bet that Spain will default on its bonds. You buy a CDS. Compare that to fire insurance on your home. You can bet that Spain's bonds will go into default whether or not you own any bonds. But you cannot insure a home you do not own. The company that sells you fire insurance has to set aside money to pay for potential losses. If they do not do that, they will go to jail. Compare that to JP Morgan when it sells a CDS. They take your payment and immediately invest in commodities or shorting stocks to make more money. Then at the end of the quarter, they pay it all out in bonuses and dividends. Before the current crisis the average compensation at Morgan was $750,000 a year and that includes the receptionists. It was a JP Morgan employee named Blythe Masters who invented CDS, She is a not so nice Jewish girl from England. Morgan and the big banks who sell CDS do not have to set aside money to pay losses because they own the government. And the government thinks it owns you. They expect you to pay. It is my opinion that the latest bailout is structured to buy Spanish and Italian bonds so that any default on those bonds is delayed in order to avoid trillions of dollars in CDS claims. I think the bankers know we have reached our limit and will refuse to pay.

It is obvious that the Federal Reserve and the European Central banks as well as CDS were all designed to fail. Bilderbergers believe that you will soon be so indebted to the banks and so desperate for something to eat that you can be frightened enough to be stampeded into accepting a World government with one Big Bank owning you and running every aspect of your life.

The only way out is the 'I won't pay' wall of resistance. They are bankers. You will not win a war against them until you are willing to let the banks go bankrupt. And after you win, you will have to take away their money to make restitution for all they have stolen.

If you accept their New World Order, they will kill 6 billion or more people. I think more than 6 billion because I believe the Jews want to become 10% of the world's surviving population.

Notes: I updated my background research on the Bilderbergers to include evidence that Peter Thiel's PayPal worked with HSBC to launder money. A former VP investigated  found that 70% of HSBC customers in one town were fraudulent.

Annotated Bilderberg 2012 Member List

This is where I predicted prices doubling.Translating Zero Hedge: Your Wages Will Be Cut In Halfhttp://vidrebel.wordpress.com/2012/01/19/translating-zero-hedge-your-wages-will-be-cut-in-half/The Mathematics Of Austerity: Proving Austerity Never Was Even Intended To Workhttp://vidrebel.wordpress.com/2011/09/12/the-mathematics-of-austerity-proving-austerity-never-was-even-intended-to-work/

If you still think the Israelis are rational, please consider this:
5 Minutes To Self-Immolation Of The Israeli Empire