Spain on the otherhand is developing into a complete basketcase. The first sign that a country is getting into trouble is when the leader blames everybody else for his policies not working. Spain’s Prime Minister has blamed the Chinese, the Arab sheiks, the Americans, the Russians, and the City of London for various bad news events regarding the Spanish banking system. The one thing he will not do is admit that Spain has serious problems. And as long as this denial continues, the problem will get only worse. Spain’s biggest problem is the Labour Market. It is badly regulated, and not regulated – depending on what area you are talking about. This is the root cause of the unemployment problem. Spanish Labour cannot compete with labour in Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, or even France. And government policy seems to be to deal with this crisis by helping out the voting blocks of insiders with jobs, who Zapatero needs to keep in power. End result, outsiders like young people looking for work are sidelined and suffer the highest rate of youth unemployment this side of the Mediteranean.

http://www.safehaven.com/article/17667/spain-reports-20-unemployment-a-structural-problem-that-may-persist-for-some-time?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+safehaven%2Fall-articles+%28Safehaven+-+Most+Recent+Articles%29&utm_content=My+Yahoo

Now, this has very serious implications for the Euro. Spain is simply too big to bail. I expect this to be the story of 2011 in Europe.

Which begs the question – given that the Irish media has completely ommitted to cover the story of the continual deterioration of the Spain’s finances, in preference to softy soft depictions of everything being under control, how will the Irish media cover the story next year of Spain causing a massive headache for the ECB ? I mean you can only get away with sweeping the dirt under the carpet for so long !!!

And secondly, and more importantly, what will it do to the other government bond interest rates in other members of the PIGIS. If the price of real estate in Germany, the Netherlands and Finland increases too much the ECB will be under pressure to increase interest rates. But Spain is deteriorating consistenly, and will be in a bad way for lower interest rates. As indeed with other PIGIS. Expect a line up of the clowns (Cowen, Zapatero, Berlosconi, Papandreou-they are pals anyway) against the bouncers (Merkel, and the PMs of the BeNeLux).

Ireland needs to reset the clock . Start again . There is no way that FF /FG or Labour will return Ireland to real growth with a sustaibable economy .

Only when ireland is free of corrupt FF’ers and a party that that contuines to have Kenny has its leader could it even have a chance in the global economy .

“Imposing a haircut on sovereign debt presupposes that European Sovereigns are going to default on their obligations.”

“It is the intention of the ECB that Greece and Ireland WILL default. That’s the game.”

Anyone got any idea what that’s about?

(Thought I’d posted this already but can’t find it here.)

“It is the intention of the ECB that Greece and Ireland WILL default. That’s the game.”

“Did you find the levels of haircut interesting? To me it says that the sovereigns might default on the interest payments, but that the capital might be, eh, ‘underwritten.’”

Anyone got any idea what that’s about?

http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/martina-devlin/martina-devlin-time-to-grab-this-thief-by-his-dirty-white-collar-2267858.html

Lynn’s wife successfully used legislation originally brought in to protect abandoned wives to challenge the forfeiture of substantial property which had been seized on behalf of her husband’s creditors. Apparently her husband had cheated her and she didn’t know where he was but it turns out they’ve been seen together since – in the Algarve (quelle surprise!).

Next it was the turn of an expert in women’s legal affairs who said that while such a situation was of course deplorable the authorities had due procedures already in place to deal with Lynn. At this stage I had to go to bed.

Did anyone see how this finished? Did she then go on to argue that, while any abuse of this legislation would be regrettable, it should not be amended because to do so would put married women at risk. That it would be ‘retrograde’ and ‘unacceptable’? (I’m just guessing here.) That the justice card was trumped by a moral one of higher value. And that in a wider sense our financial overlords and our legal guardians and agents of moral enlightenment are in the end just two sides of the one (golden) coin? I’ve really no idea. I guess I’m just too cynical.

I was thinking about David’s comment about focussing on what he sees as being the main issue, ie what the ‘insiders’ are up to. I’m sure he has his good reasons for this. But only the insiders know what’s really going on and they’re not telling. Maybe it’s the case that David is being as forthright as he can be in the circumstances. I suppose for our part all we can do is join the dots and add the numbers together. Trouble is, all I get is a picture of a sailing boat and 2+2=5!

Quote of the day from Mr Hudson:

“New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer’s prosecutions and reports by Congressional committees on investigations have done more to describe corporate and banking practices than a generation of management textbooks has done.”

Nah, forget about it, that’s too conspiratorial.

Wellington. According to the Dublin tour guide it was him who brought in ‘Catholic Emanstipation’.