It was no oversight on the part of the billionaire owned and controlled 'news' media that the public is unaware that ex SEC Chair Mary Schapiro(and Zionist financial crime partner to Bernie Madoff) colluded with ex IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman, when they controlled NASD or FINRA,to sell over 25 per cent to the corrupt 911 connected Sheik Mohamed Al Rashid bin Maktoum of Dubai and move it 'offshore'
where the Zionist war criminals and money launderers whp are his partners could manipulate the NASDAQ
with even less oversight than it has had since its formation.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/global-stock-market-sell-off-highlights-fraud-and-financial-parasitism/5366260
Global Stock Market Sell-off Highlights Fraud and Financial Parasitism
Stock
markets around the world plunged Friday as emerging market currencies
hit record lows. The rout on financial markets began Thursday and
intensified Friday, triggered by a report showing a slowdown in the
growth of Chinese factory output and anxiety over the impact of a
further cutback in the US Federal Reserve’s multi-billion-dollar
bond-buying program.
Stock
prices plummeted from North America to Europe, Asia and South America.
In the US, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 318 points (-1.96
percent) to close at 15,879, ending below 16,000 for the first time
since December 17. On Thursday, the Dow fell 176 points. For the week,
the blue chip index dropped 579 points, its worst point drop since
September of 2011.
The
broader Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index fell 38 points (-2.09
percent), ending below 1,800 for the first time since December 17. The
tech-heavy Nasdaq composite index declined 90 points (-2.25 percent).
Trading
volume was sharply higher than in previous weeks and the markets closed
at session lows, suggesting a further sell-off to come.
In
Europe, all of the major country indexes fell sharply. Britain’s FTSE
declined 1.6 percent; Germany’s DAX dropped 2.5 percent; France’s CAC
fell 2.78 percent; Greek stocks fell 3.21 percent. The composite Stoxx
Europe 600 index dropped 2.4 percent, adding to Thursday’s 1.0 percent
slide. The index was down 3.3 percent for the week.
In
Asia, Japan’s Nikkei fell 1.94 percent; Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was down
1.3 percent; the Jakarta Composite dropped 1.31 percent.
In Latin America, Argentina’s stock index plunged 3.93 percent and Brazil’s fell 1.1 percent.
The
financial turmoil was sharpest in the so-called “emerging market”
economies, including China, India, Brazil, Turkey, Russia and South
Africa. The iShares MSCI Emerging Markets exchange-traded fund, which
tracks emerging market stocks, plunged 2.1 percent on Friday after
falling 2.5 percent on Thursday, to close at a four-and-a-half-month
low.
The
decision of the Fed to begin cutting back its money-printing,
bond-buying program, combined with slowing growth in China and fears of
deflation in Europe, has destabilized economies around the world that
experienced rapid growth on the basis of massive inflows of speculative,
“hot” money from banks and hedge funds in the US, Europe and Asia.
The
Fed’s policy of keeping interest rates at near-zero and pumping $85
billion a month into the financial markets by purchasing US Treasuries
and mortgage-backed securities cheapened the US dollar and lowered US
interest rates relative to those in “emerging market” countries.
Parallel polices by the European Central Bank, the Bank of England and
the Bank of Japan had a similar effect.
This
flood of cheap credit to the banks encouraged frenzied financial
speculation, sending waves of cash seeking higher returns into the
economies of countries such as Argentina, Brazil, India, Turkey,
Indonesia and South Africa. Now this flow is being reversed back to the
US, as the Fed’s “tapering” of its bond-buying program increases the
value of the US dollar on world currency markets and drives US interest
rates higher.
At
its last policy-making meeting, in mid-December, the Fed cut the scale
of its bond-buying from $85 billion a month to $75 billion, while
reassuring the markets that it would continue to hold interest rates at
near-zero for at least another year. It is widely believed that the Fed
will further “taper” its bond-buying program by another $10 billion when
it meets next week.
The
result is a financial unraveling of countries that could precipitate
another global financial meltdown. On Thursday, the Argentinian peso
plunged 15 percent in early trading, forcing the government to withdraw
controls and allow the currency to devalue. It ended the day down 12
percent to a record low against the US dollar.
The
same day, the Turkish lira depreciated 1.4 percent, extending declines
for the month to 8.2 percent. The Turkish central bank intervened
directly in foreign exchange markets for the first time since 2012 but
failed to prevent the lira from falling to new lows “as doubts grew over
its ability to prevent a run on the currency” (Financial Times, January 23).
The South African rand sank 0.9 percent to its weakest level since October 2008.
Venezuela
partially devalued its currency on Wednesday, and the Russian ruble
fell to new lows on Thursday. The Australian dollar fell 1 percent
versus the US greenback.
A
Bloomberg gauge tracking 20 emerging market currencies fell to the
lowest level since April 2009 on Friday, dropping 9.7 percent over the
past 12 months.
Since
the Fed first signaled last May that it might begin scaling back its
bond purchases, more than $940 billion has been erased from the value of
emerging market stocks.
A
recent report by Goldman Sachs entitled “Emerging Markets: As the Tide
Goes Out” warned that economic problems in China, Brazil, Russia, Turkey
and other countries are not just cyclical, but call for “a significant
reassessment of emerging market countries.” The report predicted
“underperformance and heightened volatility over the next five to ten
years” in these economies.
A
Reuters article published Friday under the headline “Rout in emerging
markets may only be in Phase One” stated: “The flight of investors from
the once-booming emerging markets they previously favored with $7
trillion worth of inflows may have only just begun.”
These
developments highlight the degree to which the world economy is
dominated by the most parasitical and quasi-criminal forms of financial
speculation. While the real economy continues to stagnate or decline,
the capitalist system is kept afloat by massive infusions of virtually
free cash into the financial markets. Central banks have pumped an
estimated $10 trillion into the markets since the Wall Street crash of
September 2008.
This
has been paid for through the destruction of jobs, wages and social
welfare programs upon which hundreds of millions of working people
depend.
The
banks and corporations have not used the handouts from governments and
central banks for productive investment—to rebuild crumbling
infrastructures or expand the productive forces. TheFinancial Times reported
Friday that US capital spending is expected to grow this year at its
slowest pace in four years. And it is estimated that American
non-financial companies are currently sitting on a cash hoard of $1.5
trillion.
Instead,
the massive subsidies have been used to drive up the stock market and
underwrite a speculative frenzy that has increased the wealth of the
richest 1 percent at the expense of the overwhelming majority of the
world’s people. The S&P 500 index has risen by 170 percent from a
twelve-year low in March of 2009, soaring 30 percent in 2013 alone.
The
result is a staggering growth of personal wealth among a miniscule
layer of society. This week, as the world’s bankers and CEOs gathered at
the annual World Economic Forum in the Swiss Alpine resort of Davos,
the charity Oxfam released a report showing that the richest 85
individuals have more wealth than the bottom 50 percent of the world’s
population—3.5 billion people.
The
domination of the globe by a new financial aristocracy driven by greed
and immersed in criminality was symbolized Friday by the announcement
that JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, currently being feted at Davos, was
awarded a 74 percent pay raise for 2013.
Dimon’s
bank had to pay $20 billion in fines in 2013 to settle charges of
mortgage fraud, concealing losses by lying to regulators and fixing the
books, complicity in the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme and other crimes.
This crook, who by rights should be serving time in prison, saw his
compensation jump from $11.5 million for 2012 to $20 million for 2013.
Such is the historically unprecedented scale of parasitism at the very heart of the world capitalist system.
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