How Much of Your Money Market Fund is in the Repo Market?

Just days ago it seems we were worried sick about money market exposures to European banks who are in turn exposed to the PIIGS.

Overall US money market funds have had just under half of their assets in short term European investments, meaning that US cash savers in such funds are actually providing perhaps as much as several trillions of dollars in liquidity to Europe's stressed banks and sovereigns.

Now Jim Jubak thinks money market exposures to the repo market should also worry people, here:

My big worry is that the current slow erosion of faith in U.S. Treasurys will turn into a cascade of unanticipated consequences if the debt ceiling isn't raised. Treasurys play a unique role in the global financial markets. They aren't important only because they're jammed into so many global portfolios, including the portfolios of so many of the world's countries. They're also important because they serve as collateral on a huge percentage of the complex deals that use derivatives to shift risk around the globe. ...

Treasurys are used as collateral for cash loans in the repo (repurchase) market. In a repo agreement, the seller of a security agrees to buy it back from a buyer at a higher price on a specified date in the future. Repos are, in effect, short-term loans; they are used to raise short-term cash by banks and corporations. Central banks, such as the Federal Reserve, also use them to manage the money supply. To expand the money supply, the Fed decreases the repo rate at which it buys back government debt instruments from commercial banks. To shrink the money supply, the Fed increases the repo rate.

It's a huge market. Bank of America Merrill Lynch estimates that 74% of primary dealer repo financing -- or about $2.1 trillion -- involves Treasurys as collateral. ...

Money market funds have big chunks of their cash in the repo market. (Anyone who remembers the problems that the Lehman crisis created for money market funds should regard any advice on using money market funds as a safe haven in the event of a U.S. default with extreme skepticism.)

North Carolina Dept. of Transportation A Little Hacked Off At Obama

For what reason, we do not know, but the sign displayed the message over the weekend and motorists pulled over to take pictures.

The story is here:

The Bernanke S and P After 2 Rounds of Quantitative Easing

600 points for $2.5+ trillion in MBS and Treasuries.

Ben Bernanke: The Very Face of Moral Hazard

Senator Jim Bunning (R-KY), quoted here:

“You are the very definition of a moral hazard.”

Damn Right Gloria: The Tea Party Stopped The Transformation

And we aim to reverse it.

Video here.

Pay It Down Now, Or Pay A Lot More Later

“I used to think that if there was reincarnation, I wanted to come back as the president or the pope or as a .400 baseball hitter. But now I would like to come back as the bond market. You can intimidate everybody.”

-- James 'Cue Ball' Carville, quoted here

Will Government Be Short $134 Billion In August as Bob Brinker Claims Today?

He made the claim on his radio show, "Money Talk." See the recap here.

Others, as for example here, maintain there's plenty of cash flow to pay for everything critical both in law and for creditworthiness:

"The Daily Treasury Statement for June 30—which any American, including the president, can look up on the U.S. Treasury Department’s website at this link—says the government took in $196.994 billion in revenue during the month ... more than enough to pay not only all Social Security benefits and veterans benefits and programs for the month, but also, on top of that, the interest on the federal debt, Medicare, Medicaid, the Indian Health Service, Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, all federal workers’ salaries, federal workers’ insurance benefits, Justice Department programs, and Defense Department venders.

"The combined costs for all of these federal expenditures in June was $195.502 billion.

"That means that out of the federal government’s $196.994 billion in revenue in June, the government would have had a surplus of $1.492 billion after it had paid the interest on the national debt, plus all Social Security benefits, veterans’ benefits, veterans’ programs, Medicare, Medicaid, the Indian Health Service, Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, federal workers’ salaries, federal workers’ insurance benefits, Justice Department programs, and Defense Department vend[o]rs."


Isn't it the potential of cutting off the cash cow for extraneous government spending which really has liberals like Brinker in a fit? After all, he called Senator Harry "The War is Lost" Reid of Nevada "a good man" more than once on his show. Brinker loves the guy.

How is it that Brinker can assert, as he did today, that advocating against raising the debt ceiling, as certain Republicans are doing presently, disqualifies one for the presidency when Obama actually voted against raising the debt ceiling in 2006, along with all the rest of his Democrat colleagues in the Senate? The Roll Call vote is here.

The minions of liberals in the federal workforce might actually have to THINK going forward and prove their competence for their exorbitant salaries by PRIORITIZING spending for a change if Republicans muster the courage to force them TO DO THEIR JOBS and leave the debt ceiling where it is. Raising the debt ceiling is the true default: It means you can't pay your bills without more borrowing.

Maybe Bob Brinker is afraid the Democrats are not really up to it. They certainly haven't been in the past. We're still waiting for a budget proposal from the Senate. The Senate under Reid hasn't passed one in over two years.

Obama Proves The Rule: Stoners Can't Remember Dates

Not only can he not remember his daughter's birthdate, he can't remember his own.

Story here.

Nor quantities and sizes: Obama's America has at least 57 states and hundreds of millions of inhabitants.

US Money Market Funds Are Keeping The PIIGS' Banks Liquid

So says Felix Zulauf, here:

[T]he banks, particularly at the periphery, are refunding themselves via the U.S. money market that is extremely liquid, and half of the money in the U.S. money market funds is really money to fund the peripheral European banks. Once those money market funds get hit by redemptions because investors find out, then you have a funding crisis of major scale at the periphery of Europe, and that is the next step. It is a never-ending drama until it breaks in a big way.

The Dollar, Then and Now

In 1913, when the Federal Reserve came into being, the 1790 Dollar had lost little value over the preceding 123 years. You needed just $1.08 to buy what a 1790 Dollar could buy.

58 years on from 1913, however, when the Dollar and Gold were finally and completely de-linked from one another in 1971, that 1913 Dollar worth $1.08 had lost over 300 percent of its value. You needed $4.56 in 1971 to buy what $1.08 could buy in 1913. Much of the devaluation of the Dollar occurred in 1933 when FDR confiscated Gold and then reset the price per ounce at $35.00 from $20.67, a 70 percent devaluation almost overnight.

By 2010, just 39 years on from 1971, that $4.56 really went south. Completely unhinged from Gold, you now needed $24.50 in 2010 to buy what $4.56 could buy in 1971. That 1971 Dollar worth $4.56 had lost over another 400 percent of its value.

Carthago delenda est? Try: Down with the Fed!

Woman Gropes TSA Agent!

It's about time!

Story here.

Obama's Got The Better Approach? Granny Hawkins Begs To Differ.

"I’m confident that I will win that [debt] debate because ... we’ve got the better approach.”

-- President Obama


Granny Hawkins:

I say that big talk's worth doodly-squat.

Moody's Downgrades 7 Portuguese Banks Which Just Passed EU 'Stress' Tests

The laughs never stop.

Story here.

DC Circuit Court Rules Naked Body Scans Do Not Violate Fourth Amendment

Because they're optional.

As in you can either get photographed naked, or groped, without which you are not "free to fly about the country."

Some option. Papers will be next. And then every form of transportation you  take will make you subject to unreasonable search and seizure.

Just roll over and take it, bitch. You'll enjoy it.

Story here.

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee Confuses Not Getting Your Way With Racism

Pretty soon anyone who says No to anyone will be a racist, too.

Story here.

'If Obama Cuts Medicare or Social Security, I'll Vote Communist'

Chicagoan Mary Ellen . . . Croteau was asked if she would still vote for Obama, "No I won't . . .. Not if he cuts Medicare and Social Security. I'm 61. I'm looking at retirement in a few years."

". . . I will vote for someone. Whether it's a Green candidate, whether it's a Communist, I don't care. Somebody who's going to stand up for people. This is disgusting. [Obama] has given away everything he pledged to stand for."

Read the full entry here.

Dr. Obama Prescribes The Same Old Medicine Of The Miserable

"I always have hope. Don't you remember my campaign? [laughter] Even after being here for two and a half years, I continue to have hope. You know why I have hope? It's because of the American people."

Video here.

The miserable have no other medicine,

But only Hope:

I've hope to live, and am prepar'd to die.

     -- Claudio, William Shakespeare's Measure for Measure, Act III, Scene I

Rasmussen Poll, Like Gallup, Shows Low Support For New Taxes at 34 Percent

Again, as part of a debt limit increase measure. While Gallup has 50 percent wanting spending cuts as the primary feature of the legislation, Rasmussen shows that at 55 percent.

The poll results are here.

Obama Says 80 Percent Want Balanced Approach, Gallup Says 32 Percent

Only 11 percent want a predominantly tax approach, while 50 percent want a predominantly spending cuts approach.

See Gallup here, and Obama here.

Why Michele Bachmann Won't Be President

TMI.