Thomas Ferguson: A few small useful measures, but the bill strengthens the Fed and is weak on big issues. Thomas Ferguson is Professor of Political Science at the University of Massachusetts, Boston and a Senior Fellow of the Roosevelt Institute. He received his Ph.D. from Princeton University and taught formerly at the Massachusetts Institute...
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Markets
Financial Reform Bill Shows Power of Wall Street
How Brokers Became Bookies: The Insidious Transformation of Markets Into Casinos
Ever since December 2008, the Federal Reserve has held short-term interest rates near zero. This was not only to try to stimulate the housing and credit markets but also to allow the federal government to increase its debt levels without increasing the interest tab picked up by the taxpayers. The total public U.S. debt...
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The US Treasury and the Federal Reserve are Manipulating the Gold Market
Recently we were again witness to three gold market takedowns. The first was engineered just prior to and into gold and silver options expiration. Then prior to the ETF GLD gold option expiry and the last manipulative attack commenced just prior to the dreadful unemployment housing and inventory statistics. This sort of action began...
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Will Hollywood Go The Way of Enron?
Derivatives come to the movies As if attacks from paparazzi and star-crazed fans weren’t enough, Hollywood stars may soon have a literal price put on their heads by investors in the Cantor Exchange, a real-money trading platform where people can bet on the gross profits of upcoming movies. Sales of The Dark Knight skyrocketed...
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Computer Program Designed To Save The Free Market Turned Into A Monster
While the SEC is busy investigating Goldman Sachs, it might want to look into another Goldman-dominated fraud: computerized front running using high-frequency trading programs. Market commentators are fond of talking about “free market capitalism,” but according to Wall Street commentator Max Keiser, it is no more. It has morphed into what his TV co-host...
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Moral Bankruptcy: Why Are We Letting Wall Street Off So Easy?
It is said that a near-death experience forces one to reevaluate priorities and values. The global economy has just escaped a near-death experience. The crisis exposed the flaws in the prevailing economic model, but it also exposed flaws in our society. Much has been written about the foolishness of the risks that the financial...
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Obama’s Big Sellout
The president has packed his economic team with Wall Street insiders The president has packed his economic team with Wall Street insiders intent on turning the bailout into an all-out giveaway Barack Obama ran for president as a man of the people, standing up to Wall Street as the global economy melted down in...
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Efficient Markets or Herd Mentality? The Future of Economic Forecasting
Ever wonder why you succumbed, yet again, to advertising hype or deceptive packaging and overpaid for a product? Or bought securities that you know were overvalued when the herd instinct was just too strong to resist? Such irrationality is the focus of behavioral economists, who appear to be gaining greater credibility in macroeconomic circles...
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Cut Wall Street Out! How States Can Finance Their Own Recovery
Pouring money into the private banking system has only fixed the economy for bankers and the wealthy; it has not done much to address either the fundamental problem of unemployment or the debt trap so many Americans find themselves in. President Obama’s $787 billion stimulus plan has so far failed to halt the growth...
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Derivatives Collapse and the China Gold and Silver Markets
In 2009, China opened up various exchanges for investment in both gold and silver to the Chinese public, which previously was not allowed to invest in gold and silver. The opening of silver exchanges to the Chinese public is the most recent development and was accompanied by a ban on silver exports. The Chinese government...
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