Non-Satirical Onion: Financial Sector Thinks It's About Ready To Ruin the World Again

[HughBeaumont]

http://www.theonion.com/articles/financial-sector-thinks-its-about-ready-to-ruin-wo,32865/

Representatives from all major banking and investment institutions cited recent increases in consumer spending, rebounding home prices, and a stabilizing unemployment rate as confirmation that the time had once again come to inflict another round of catastrophic financial losses on individuals and businesses worldwide.

“It’s been about five or six years since we last crippled every major market on the planet, so it seems like the time is right for us to get back out there and start ruining the lives of billions of people again,” said Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein. “We gave it some time and let everyone get a little comfortable, and now we’re looking to get back on the old horse, shatter some consumer confidence, and flat-out kill any optimism for a stable global economy for years to come.”

“People are beginning to feel at ease spending money and investing in their futures again,” Blankfein continued. “That’s the perfect time to step in and do what we do best: rip the heart right out of the world’s economy.”

According to sources, the overwhelming majority of investment bankers are “ready to get the ball rolling” by approving a host of complex and poorly understood debt-backed securities that are doomed to quickly default, as well as issuing startlingly high-risk loans certain to drive thousands of companies into insolvency.

Side note - Did you know that, even after taxes, Lloyd Bankfiend can purchase a $40,000 automobile every three days and it would make not an iota of difference in his wealth?

[KurtNYC]

1. In reality, there ARE some troubling trends right now

banks and hedge funds buying into a new Las Vegas bubble:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/05/30/1212507/-Another-housing-bubble

Banks stepping up the rate of foreclosures and using tax liens to foreclose:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/morganbrennan/2013/06/04/wall-street-buying-leads-to-housing-boom-is-a-new-bubble-on-the-way/

It is not really gambling -- they can't lose. If they do we will have to bail them out.

We are transitioning to a 2-tiered society where the lower class owns nothing at all -- not your MP3 collection, not your software or Xbox games, certainly not your home.

[cbdo2007]

2. Not this year - no election. Probably next fall...

[byeya]

3. CDOs and other dubious financial instruments are already on the market.

They made out like the bandits they are once,so since there's nothing or nobody stopping them, here we go! It'll be worse this time because the Fed is about maxed out on QE3 and there're won't be QE4 and the RepubliKKKans don't care about no friggin' infrastructure unless it interferes with their plane rides or the private planes of their sponsers.

[snot]

4. Ditto what byeya said. WE NEVER STOPPED the speculation in credit derivatives;

that's the main way wealth was sucked out of us last time (NOT the bad mortgages -- the focus on those was largely diversionary); and speculation in such derivatives by the Too-Big-to-Fail banks has continued unabated.

Anyone who still doesn't clearly understand how bad mortgages probably accounted for only 5% of the losses in 2008 meltdown and bailout, while derivatives accounted for 95%, needs to figure it out NOW.

One starting point at http://c-cyte.blogspot.com/2009/05/credit-derivatives-for-dummies.html

More at http://c-cyte.blogspot.com/search?q=derivatives

[Rex]

5. Who regulates a plutocracy?

Certainly not the cops. Their pay grade is was too low. Not politic ans, they are all bought and branded. Maybe no one? When you don't have any oversight on the Owners and they continuously destroy the worlds economy - what do you call it?