LEAP/E2020 Summer 2008 Alert – July-December 2008: The world plunges into the heart of the global systemic crisis


- Public announcement GEAB N°26 (Summer 2008 Special Edition - 31 pages!) -



LEAP/E2020 Summer 2008 Alert – July-December 2008: The world plunges into the heart of the global systemic crisis
On the occasion of this 26th – Summer 2008 Special – edition of the Global Europe Anticipation Bulletin, the LEAP/E2020 team has decided to launch an alert on the July-December 2008 period. Indeed, our team is now convinced that this period will consist for the whole world in a major plunge into the heart of the phase of impact of the global systemic crisis. The upcoming six months are in fact the core of the unfolding crisis. The troubles met in the past six months were mere harbingers.

US consumer confidence index (1978-05/2008) – Source: Briefing.com / Conference Board
US consumer confidence index (1978-05/2008) – Source: Briefing.com / Conference Board
In the next semester indeed, all the components of the crisis (financial, monetary, economic, strategic, social, political… ones) will converge at the height of their intensity (1). Avoiding to repeat a description of the various sequences already anticipated in the previous editions of the GEAB, our researchers have decided to describe the trends that will be at work in the world’s main regions in the next six months. Therefore they analyse eight fundamental processes that will mark the next semester and affect decisively the years 2009-2010, i.e.:

1. A Dollar in distress (EUR 1 = USD 1.75 at the end of 2008): Panic-fear of a US currency and economy collapse eats into the American collective psyche

2. Global financial system: An impossible requirement – placing Washington under international trusteeship – provokes the system’s break

3. European Union: The periphery sinks into the recession, the Eurozone only slows down

4. Asia: The « double whammy » inflation/export-collapse

5. Latin America: Difficulties increase but growth remains steady in most parts of the region, Mexico and Argentina in crisis

6. Arab world: Pro-Western regimes go adrift / 60 percent risk of socio-political explosion on Egypt-Morocco axis

7. Iran: 70 percent probability of an attack by October 2008 confirmed

8. Banks/Speculative bubbles: When bubbles collide

In parallel, LEAP/E2020 presents five strategic advices for the intention of central banks, governments and regulatory authorities, aimed at reducing and channelling the very bad consequences of the phase of impact of the crisis.

As to private investors, LEAP/E2020 develops in this 26th issue of the GEAB, a series of 8 operational advices for them to avoid committing fatal mistakes in the course of the next semester.

For this public announcement, LEAP/E2020 chose to present its anticipation on the upcoming break of the global financial system.

Global financial system: An impossible requirement – placing Washington under international trusteeship – provokes the system’s break

Who owns the US debt? – Source: Fincher
Who owns the US debt? – Source: Fincher
Washington’s decision to raise the bids for the return to a « strong Dollar », by compelling Ben Bernanke to intervene, bears the seeds of an acceleration of the global financial system’s breaking process (2).

Ben Bernanke is indeed the last wall before the largest US currency and asset owners become fully aware of the fact that Washington no longer has the means of its monetary policy. What used to be a deliberate policy of currency drop (when it was decided to stop publishing M3 in March 2006, as announced by LEAP/E2020) in order to reduce the country’s trade deficits and the real value (for themselves) of the their debt (labelled in Dollar), turned against its perpetrators entailing a major outflow (capital outflow, steadiness of trade deficits, soaring inflation...). The « Bernanke » card is the last « psychological » card Washington can play. The fact of using it proves that US leaders have reached the last limits of what they can do to hold back their partners into the system founded after 1945 and based on the US economy and currency (3).

In a few weeks time (after the next G8- and other organisations-meetings have taken place), when it will be confirmed that there is no way to stabilise the US currency (not to mention the eccentric idea of pushing it up) because the US economy is sinking always deeper into the recession and because the world is already filled with US Dollars no one knows what to do with, then the global financial system will burst out in various sub-systems trying to survive as much as they can before a new global financial equilibrium is found (4). As he is embarking on this road to nowhere, consciously or not, voluntarily or not, Ben Bernanke is signing the end of the current financial system. The return to a “strong Dollar” is a bit like the « liberation of Iraq » : wishful thinking turning into a nightmare.

The inverted pyramid of global liquidity - Sources: Bank of International Settlements / Independent Strategy
The inverted pyramid of global liquidity - Sources: Bank of International Settlements / Independent Strategy
As a matter of fact, if Washington really intended to stabilise the Dollar or, more ambitiously, to push it up against the other currencies, there would only be one way (5), in two parts: raising significantly the Fed’s interest rates, and lowering drastically the pace of money printing. But if the government decided to implement this type of policy, the US economy (both real and financial) stops dead a few weeks after : the real estate market falls to zero by lack of affordable credit and as a result of soaring interests on Adjustable Rate Mortgage loans, consumption becomes negative (i.e. shrinks back each month), corporate failures multiply exponentially, Wall Street collapses under the burden of innumerable debts and succumbs to the instantaneous implosion of the CDS market due to counterparties default...

Such a series of events, sure to happen if Washington implements a voluntary policy of dollar-rescue, is probably unacceptable by the US authorities. Therefore, apart from talking – and further self-discrediting – they cannot do anything. The method used in the past decades is no longer available: no one will accept to buy large amounts of Dollars in order to rescue the US currency if some voluntary policy (like the one described previously) is not implemented by Washington. As they will not do it, the rest of the world will draw its own conclusions: everyman for himself, knowing that from mid-August onward, as Beijing is relieved from the constraint of the Olympic Games, a large number of “tough” options (6), put on the back burner until the Games, will resurface (7).

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Notes:

(1) For a more detailed calendar of these trends, see GEAB N°18.

(2) The Bank of International Settlements is beginning to worry about a risk of global Great Depression. Source: Banking Times, 06/09/2008

(3) Source: Euro Pacific Capital, 05/23/2008

(4) On this subject, read in GEAB N°26 our advice to central banks, governments and regulatory authorities.

(5) We will disregard the other option consisting in bombing the ECB, the Bank of China and the Bank of Japan.

(6) Source: ContreInfo, 04/21/2008

(7) As Russia is becoming the largest oil-producer - before Saudi Arabia - in the world, the balance of power on the oil market is also changing a lot. Source: Times of India, 06/12/2008

Lundi 16 Juin 2008

GEAB N°41 - Contents

- Published on January 16, 2010 -

Calendar 2010 – 2020 / The « tragic twilight » of the world-before-the-crisis
The publication of this first GEAB of the year, where we usually publish our anticipations for the next twelve months, exceptionally coincides with the beginning of a new decade and, what is more, a decade which all careful observers feel will mark an upheaval in the world order. Our team has seized this occasion to give our subscribers the benefit of a rational geopolitical « dive » into what the coming decade holds for us… (page 2)
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To prepare 2010 - ’15 UP AND 15 DOWN’, 30 KEY TRENDS FOR 2010 – Fifteen topics which are going to increase in importance during 2010 / Fifteen key subjects which are going to fade away between now and the end of 2010
The US Federal reserve; The Very Great US Depression; The future of the United Kingdom; Global warming; Gold; Yuan; Unemployment and social dislocation; Global geopolitical dislocation; Eurozone; Speculative bubbles; Dollar, Pound Sterling and Yen; Greece as a Eurozone menace; Latin America; BRIC summits; Global recovery; Globalisation; EU governance; China’s economic miracle; The likelihood of a NATO victory in Afghanistan; G20; The middle-East “Peace Process”; State bankruptcies; Israel-USA/Iran conflict; Social safety net systems; Trade blocs; US T-bonds; Tax reductions; Nicolas Sarkozy… (page 8)
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The Decade 2010 – 2020: Towards a knockout victory by gold over the Dollar
We have often reminded readers in different GEAB issues that gold constitutes both a medium/long term investment intended to protect one’s capital against the risk of a loss in value of paper currencies and financial assets, and an eventual means of payment in the event of a very serious monetary crisis. In these two cases the choice of placing a portion of one’s assets in gold is a response to anticipating events and risks in the coming years (and not the coming weeks or months). For this GEAB N°41, a special edition at the beginning of a new decade, it seems opportune to LEAP/E2020 to put forward its anticipations on gold’s progress for 2010 – 2020, completing what the team wrote in issue N°34 of the GEAB in April 2009… (page 19)
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The GlobalEurometre - Results & Analyses
Citizens’ discontent with European government action compared to the expectations of their people climbs slightly, though remaining at very high levels (96%). The « Lisbon Treaty » effect clearly hasn’t happened.… (page 24)
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