Podcast for Dec 5

Russia situatiion, stocks, economy, euro,

Podcast for Dec 5.

My podcast from yesterday

This podcast was cut short for some reason so here it is again.

-Mike Norman

Podcast for Dec 3, 2014

Whiny hedge fund idiot, Bill Ackman, buys the government's help to bail him out of his Herbalife short

Bill Ackman, the whining, crybaby hedge fund manager who has been disastrously selling short shares of Herbalife for two years, bleeding money in the process, has finally found someone to help his losing cause: the U.S. government.

That's right, he basically paid off the government to launch an inquiry into whether or not Herbalife is a pyramid scheme. The Federal Trade Commission has just launched an investigation on the behest of a group funded by Ackman.

We have all kinds of problems here in the U.S. folks: unemployment, income inequality, homelessness, maimed veterans, an education system that sucks, rotting infrastructure, monopolistic companies, plus much more. But no...the government feels it's more important to  get involved to protect the short position of one fucking idiot hedge fund manager.

The U.S. has become so corrupt it's almost impossible to describe at this point. Corrupt and rogue. A sham government and a nation that is rewriting the book when it comes to hypocrisy. (Sec of State Kerry: "You can't just invade a country on false pretense." LOL!!!!)

Remember that brilliant TV exchange between Carl Icahn and Ackman on CNBC a couple of years ago? It was all about Herbalife back then as well. I love the part where Icahn said that he used to beat up whiny little kids like Ackman in the schoolyard when he was growing up in Queens. I don't know about you, but I would pay handsomely to see him do it again. 

The existence of all these hedge funds is a symptom of a sick nation, a sick society and totally corrupt government. It is a glaring sign that we have our priorities soooo out of whack that it is not even funny. 

Guys like Ackman are parasites of the worst kind. This guy can't trade to save his life. He's a fucking sorry investor if you ask me. He also got his ass burned on JC Penney and I think he bought gold on the whole, "Fed is printing money," false inflation meme, just like all the other idiots. In short, what the fuck is he doing managing any money in the first place? And who invested with this guy? Whoever it was I'd like to see them go up in smoke, too.

Sorry for the editorializing here, but I guess you can tell I'm mad as hell.

Robert Murphy smears me for a cheap laugh

Here's the full audio of his lesson. The MMT critique (and he goes after Mosler quite a bit) starts around 26 minutes in.

Personal savings collapse. Thanks President Obama!

My talk at Columbia Law School symposium, "Modern Money and the Public Purpose"

My interview with Yale law professor, Jonathan R. Macey

My interview with Jonathan R. Macey from Yale Law School. His new book, "The Death of Corporate Reputation. How Integrity Has Been Destroyed on Wall Street".

Happy New Year to everyone from Mike Norman Economics!

Wishing everyone a happy and healthy 2013. From everyone here at MNE!

Me against Jeffrey Gundlach

I gotta confess, I'm long the yen. I know I'm crazy, but I'm long the yen.

You may have seen this: Jeffrey Gundlach is killing it being short yen.

So why am I going against this guy who's one of the world's best known money managers and who's currently, "killing it" being short the yen?

Here's why...

I'll start by saying that besides Gundlach, there are several other "well known" people who are short yen or who have been advising people to short the yen. They are people like Peter Schiff, Axel Merk and Kyle Bass. I'm sorry, but when those three stooges get together on a theme, wild horses can't keep me from betting against them. All I need now is for John Paulson to say he's going short the yen and I will mortgage everything I have to add to this position. By the way, they're all short because of...you guessed it...fears of BoJ "money printing" and insolvency.

And the three stooges have a lot of company. Open interest and short positions by speculators (including small specs, who are considered the dumb money) is just off record levels. Commericals are long.

Since the election the yen has sold off something like 500 basis points against the dollar, or about 6%. That's all been due to aggressive yen shorting.

The new government believes it is "out of money," so an outright fiscal expansion underpinned by printing yen, is out of the question.

Prime minister Abe has been pressuring the BoJ and the BoJ has responded by saying it will "buy more assets." Great...more QE, that is just an asset swap and does nothing to weaken the yen.

The new government is also very close to the corporate sector and it is believed that it will soon give the ok to restart the nuclear reactors, which have been shut down since the quake. If so, this will go far to reverse Japan's current trade deficit, which came about solely as a result of massive oil imports to meet energy needs.

The markets believe this to be true and imminent, as shares in Japanese power companies have been surging.

So...Japan and the BoJ are doing nothing to create net new yen financial assets. The nukes will be restarted soon and the dumb money is shorting the yen like crazy.

If that's not a prescription for a yen rally, a big, big, BIG, one, I don't know what is.

MMT and my videos getting under Peter Schiff's skin!

This idiot still doesn't know what he's talking about. It's not about the fiat (money, unit of account, etc) it's about having the labor and resources to produce the real assets (goods and services). That is the only true constraint to ever increasing, uninterrupted prosperity for all.

Schiff has no argument, so he goes with the, "If it were that easy there'd be no poverty, hunger."

Exactly. It is that easy. Just moronic ideology from people like Schiff keeping it from happening.

He's a total retard.

I say it the way I say it. If you don't like it, too bad.

I speak my mind and if it comes off as brusque or rude or insulting then too bad, go somewhere else.

And I am especially sick and tired of fellow MMT adherents telling me that I have to be cordial and accomodating, like I have to walk on eggshells for fear of not offending some critic or someone with differing (and wrong) points of view. Sorry, that's not how I roll. There's other sites that do that. Go to Mosler's.

Jesus, if MMT is so fucking insecure and run by such a bunch of sissies then it explains a lot--like why this movement is NOWHERE and why it gets BURIED by idiots like Schiff and CNBC and Fox News and all the rest of the absurdly out of paradigm "experts" and media outlets out there and why there is not one MMT commentator out there on TV except me and I'd be out there a lot more were it not for the fact that I am sick of debating idiots--be they guests or hosts--I'm done, you got that?

I have this little blog and I'm lucky enough to have some great contributors, but even if they can't handle the heat that I bring and want to bow out it's fine with me as I'll probably keep writing this anyway just for my own sake.

I'm not interested in winning a popularity contest. I couldn't give a shit. I care about truth and I like insulting idiots and morons. What I write and talk about is true and factual.

I think it's good to be polite and respectful, but there are limits. And, oh yeah, I hate weak, fucking, sissies.

My RT appearance today

MMT was right...AGAIN!! And a special shout out to Warren Mosler!

MMT was right again! And I give a special shout out to Warren Mosler! Check it out.

$54 trillion PAID BACK and counting...

Just thought I'd check in and see how much of our debt we've "paid back" so far this fiscal year. Let's see...hmmm...well, turns out it's now up to $54 TRILLION. And that was in the past 10 months.

And with absolutely no problem whatsoever. The world didn't end. Interest rates didn't spike up (they're actually at record lows...AGAIN), the dollar went up, the economy is still growing, there's no hyperinflation, gold is down, commodities are down. What else? It's all good.

What say the idiots likes Schiff, Santelli, Rogers, Faber, Paul Ryan, Simpson/Bowles, Peterson, Walker, Fox News, et al?

We don't have money? Can't pay for Social Security for our seniors? Health care? Education? Infrastructure? Basic research? Jobs for the unemployed?

What a joke. We have all the money we need and an abundance of goods and services to make and distribute. It's religion that keeps us from doing it. The proof is right here in these numbers that folks at Treasury and the Fed all understand.

Laurence Kotlkoff is insane!

Watch and enjoy as I skewer Boston University Economics Professor(seriously?) Laurence Kotlikoff.

Donald Trump, who's calling who stupid?

Donald Trump says the U.S. is not a rich country because we "borrow." In this video I debunk that dumb comment and talk about the supposed debt of the US, which is really fake and used only to program us into subservience.

Sorry, but it's time to raise taxes on $250k and up. It shouldn't only be the middle class and poor who get tax increases!

Obama is calling for the extension of the Bush Tax Cut, but only for those with incomes below $250,000 and of course the Republicans are saying that the tax cuts should be extended for everyone--including millionaires and billionaires--or no one at all.

This is the typical Republican position and it should be noted that they care little about people earning the threshold $250k; their real interest is in protecting the super wealthy. They made this clear a million times and I don't think anyone but the timid Democrats in the Senate really believe them when they try to pull this bullshit "all-inclusive" stance. It's all about protecting the rich and that's it.

As an MMT adherent I am fully aware that taxes don't fund spending and that they only serve to regulate demand yada, yada, yada, and I am also aware that with a large output gap, raising taxes on anyone just works to sustain that output gap so long as that "revenue" is not recycled back as government spending in some form.

However, as a matter of equality and PRINCIPAL I think it's about time somebody other than the poor and middle class see their taxes go up. That's right, I said the poor and middle class have had their taxes increased--BIG TIME!

It's time we all begin to learn a fundamental lesson, that spending cuts are the fiscal equivalent of tax increases and the bulk of the spending cuts (tax increases) over the past several years have been targeted at the middle class and poor.

Whether you are talking about cuts in education, Medicare and Medicaid, food and nutrition, Veterans benefits, social programs, public safety (fire, police), you name it...there has been an unrelenting and rising stream of tax increases aimed at middle and lower income people. All the while, the rich have been getting tax break after tax break along with a larger share of national income and wealth. Like Warren Buffet said, it's outright class warfare and it's HIS class that is winning.

Nor should you buy the bogus argument that the rich are the "job creators" or "wealth creators." That's just a completely hollow and ridiculous claim and one that we've debunked here numerous times (here, here, here). The fact is, a vast portion of the income of the wealthy comes from extracting wealth from assets...assets that they did not create. Gordon Gekko said it right, when he said "I create nothing. I own." And he said that 25 years ago!

The rich don't educate our kids, keep our streets safe, protect property from fire and damage, fix roads and bridges, heal or care for the sick and infirm, stock store shelves or perform any of the other myriad types of work that essential in a modern, smooth-functioning society.

And while $250k may not be a lot to some people, those who do earn at that level or above are also not performing the tasks I mentioned above. Moreover, many of them are politically favorable to the "pro-spending-cut" menatality, which as I said is the same thing as calling for a tax, except it's not a tax on them, but on poor people.

Well, it's time for these folks to get fiscally "educated" or feel some pain, too! Obama should stick to his guns this time. He should stand fast on the call for higher taxes on $250k or more. People need to learn a lesson. The stakes are too high. We cannot have a greater and greater percentage of national wealth stripped away from the very people who built it, maintain it, and paid for it. It's outright theft. So be it if the economy crashes (and it won't, expect maybe for high end real estate brokers). Maybe out of the ashes we have a chance to build something better.

My interview on Corporate Profile dot com

Talking opportunities in new media, like this blog (hopefully).

Revisiting my bearish commodity/currency/inflation call that I made back in February and debunking the myth of Fed "money printing"

This was right on the money. Had you sold commodities, currencies, gold, stocks and other risk assets (and bought bonds and the dollar) around that time, you'd be laughing all the way to the bank right now.

BusinessInsider just made my pre/post stimulus graphs their lead post!

Check it out.

Business Insider.

Cool!