Purposefully Tanking The Economy?

[Annie]

Anyone else hear of this?

Capitalism Gone Wild: Electronic Run On Banks - $550 Billion Withdrawn In 1 Hour, Federal Reserve Halts Withdrawls - US Economy Would Have Collapsed

Electronic Run On Banks - $550 Billion Withdrawn In 1 Hour, Federal Reserve Halts Withdrawls - US Economy Would Have Collapsed
Top

Rep. Paul Kanjorski of Pennsylvania explains what former Treasury Secretary Paulson and Fed Chairman Bernanke told congress during the September 2008 closed door session. During the first third of the video an enraged caller is ranting to Rep. Kanjorski about how wasteful the first $700 billion bailout was. The best part is 2 minutes and 15 seconds into the tape where Rep. Kanjorski reveals what Paulson and Bernanke told congress that shocked them into supporting the first $700 billion bailout.

On Thursday Sept 15, 2008 at roughly 11 AM The Federal Reserve noticed a tremendous draw down of money market accounts in the USA to the tune of $550 Billion dollars in a matter of an hour or two. Money was being removed electronically.

The Treasury tried to help, opened their window and pumped in $150 Billion but quickly realized they could not stem the tide. We were having an electronic run on the banks. So they decided to closed down the accounts.

Had they not closed down the accounts they estimated that by 2 PM that afternoon. Within 3 hours. $5.5 Trillion would have been withdrawn and the entire economy of the United States would have collapsed, and within 24 hours the world economy would have collapsed....

More here.

 

[michiganFats]

First I've heard of it. If that's true, they need to find the parties responsible and do nasty things to them. On a side note, didn't Obama break a single day Internet fund-raising record about that time?

 

[midcan5]

Yes, he mentioned that in a cspan Washington Journal interview some time ago. We in Pennsylvania have had some really good, down to earth, rational politicians, Casey, Ridge, Specter, Rendell, and he, are all sensible people in a world of nonsense (and that idiot Santorum is gone). Economic and personal fears create a herd mentality that unfettered leads to any number of disasters.


http://www.economics.harvard.edu/faculty/rogoff/files/Banking_Crises.pdf

 

[Old Rocks]

OK, someone with lots of money in the US Banking System tried to get a lot of it out. Now who could that possibly be? Not US labor unions. Their money has been depleted just like every other institution here. Not people with 401-Ks. They could not all act in concert. Hmmmmm.......... Well, who does have that much money here? Some of our very rich? I don't think Warren Buffet and Bill Gates could have done it, not enough between them. So who?

To whom do we owe the most? And who has funded attacks on us in the past? What group of nations would like to see us go down? This has the fingerprints of Saudi Arabia all over it. Members of the Saud Royal family funded 9-11, and still fund Bin Laden. They own vast amounts of our economy, but unlike China, are not that dependent on us for income. Everybody else uses oil, also.

So essentially, we had a second attack on this nation in September of 2008. One that damn near succeeded, and would have wreaked far more lasting damage than 9-11. So now we feel the result of failing to get Bin Laden. Two very damaging attacks on our nation during Bush's two terms. Once again, miserable failure.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

OK, someone with lots of money in the US Banking System tried to get a lot of it out. Now who could that possibly be? Not US labor unions. Their money has been depleted just like every other institution here. Not people with 401-Ks. They could not all act in concert. Hmmmmm.......... Well, who does have that much money here? Some of our very rich? I don't think Warren Buffet and Bill Gates could have done it, not enough between them. So who?

To whom do we owe the most? And who has funded attacks on us in the past? What group of nations would like to see us go down? This has the fingerprints of Saudi Arabia all over it. Members of the Saud Royal family funded 9-11, and still fund Bin Laden. They own vast amounts of our economy, but unlike China, are not that dependent on us for income. Everybody else uses oil, also.

So essentially, we had a second attack on this nation in September of 2008. One that damn near succeeded, and would have wreaked far more lasting damage than 9-11. So now we feel the result of failing to get Bin Laden. Two very damaging attacks on our nation during Bush's two terms. Once again, miserable failure.

Sure thing, blame it on Bush. I believe the Government can and does have the ability to pin point who withdrew money especially in large amounts. So ask your Democratic Congress to investigate and prove your claim. Or you could just quit blaming Bush cause you got wet today when it rained.

 

[Annie]

OK, someone with lots of money in the US Banking System tried to get a lot of it out. Now who could that possibly be? Not US labor unions. Their money has been depleted just like every other institution here. Not people with 401-Ks. They could not all act in concert. Hmmmmm.......... Well, who does have that much money here? Some of our very rich? I don't think Warren Buffet and Bill Gates could have done it, not enough between them. So who?

To whom do we owe the most? And who has funded attacks on us in the past? What group of nations would like to see us go down? This has the fingerprints of Saudi Arabia all over it. Members of the Saud Royal family funded 9-11, and still fund Bin Laden. They own vast amounts of our economy, but unlike China, are not that dependent on us for income. Everybody else uses oil, also.

So essentially, we had a second attack on this nation in September of 2008. One that damn near succeeded, and would have wreaked far more lasting damage than 9-11. So now we feel the result of failing to get Bin Laden. Two very damaging attacks on our nation during Bush's two terms. Once again, miserable failure.

Actually George Soros comes to mind.

 

[Ravi]

oooh....my tinfoil hat is too tight!

 

[Old Rocks]

Well, it's all over the right wing blogosphere. So there will inevitebly be either denials, or an investigation. As for blaming George Bush, the flagrant spending of money we did not have for things that did not help our nation was the hallmark of his Presidency. That left us in an economically vulneble position. A position that Paul Krugman and others repeatedly warned us about. Were we in the position that we were in 2000, we could have shut that operation down, and taken care of it's perpetrators. As is, if they still hold economic leverage over us, and I would bet that they do, we will just try to keep it as quiet as possible to stem further damage.

Going to be a very interesting years, 2009.

 

[toomuchtime_]

oooh....my tinfoil hat is too tight!

I've got to agree with you here. These are bank accounts we're talking about as near as I can see, who would keep that kind of money in bank accounts? If you have trillions of dollars you wanted to keep in the US, even if you wanted to keep it very liquid, you would put it in Treasuries and collect interest on it, not leave it lying in bank accounts.

How old is Kanjorski? Has he displayed any other kinds of unusual behavior?

 

[Valerie]

Anyone else hear of this?

Capitalism Gone Wild: Electronic Run On Banks - $550 Billion Withdrawn In 1 Hour, Federal Reserve Halts Withdrawls - US Economy Would Have Collapsed

Electronic Run On Banks - $550 Billion Withdrawn In 1 Hour, Federal Reserve Halts Withdrawls - US Economy Would Have Collapsed
Top

Rep. Paul Kanjorski of Pennsylvania explains what former Treasury Secretary Paulson and Fed Chairman Bernanke told congress during the September 2008 closed door session. During the first third of the video an enraged caller is ranting to Rep. Kanjorski about how wasteful the first $700 billion bailout was. The best part is 2 minutes and 15 seconds into the tape where Rep. Kanjorski reveals what Paulson and Bernanke told congress that shocked them into supporting the first $700 billion bailout.

On Thursday Sept 15, 2008 at roughly 11 AM The Federal Reserve noticed a tremendous draw down of money market accounts in the USA to the tune of $550 Billion dollars in a matter of an hour or two. Money was being removed electronically.

The Treasury tried to help, opened their window and pumped in $150 Billion but quickly realized they could not stem the tide. We were having an electronic run on the banks. So they decided to closed down the accounts.

Had they not closed down the accounts they estimated that by 2 PM that afternoon. Within 3 hours. $5.5 Trillion would have been withdrawn and the entire economy of the United States would have collapsed, and within 24 hours the world economy would have collapsed....

More here.

It is scary when you really think about the possibilities, but I don't think the world wants to collapse the economy that has been the engine driving the world economy.

No doubt there are powers that be who would like to see our ultimate destruction, but rational minds know that destruction is not progress.
American Thinker: Shadow World: Resurgent Russia, The Global New Left, and Radical Islam


It is in the world's best interest that the US economy thrives:

Department of the Treasury/Federal Reserve Board
January 16, 2009


MAJOR FOREIGN HOLDERS OF TREASURY SECURITIES
(in billions of dollars)
HOLDINGS 1/ AT END OF PERIOD

http://www.treas.gov/tic/mfh.txt

 

[Munin]

OK, someone with lots of money in the US Banking System tried to get a lot of it out. Now who could that possibly be? Not US labor unions. Their money has been depleted just like every other institution here. Not people with 401-Ks. They could not all act in concert. Hmmmmm.......... Well, who does have that much money here? Some of our very rich? I don't think Warren Buffet and Bill Gates could have done it, not enough between them. So who?

To whom do we owe the most? And who has funded attacks on us in the past? What group of nations would like to see us go down? This has the fingerprints of Saudi Arabia all over it. Members of the Saud Royal family funded 9-11, and still fund Bin Laden. They own vast amounts of our economy, but unlike China, are not that dependent on us for income. Everybody else uses oil, also.

So essentially, we had a second attack on this nation in September of 2008. One that damn near succeeded, and would have wreaked far more lasting damage than 9-11. So now we feel the result of failing to get Bin Laden. Two very damaging attacks on our nation during Bush's two terms. Once again, miserable failure.

I wouldn't be so sure about that, Suadi Arabia depends as much on the world economy as China. If the world-economy collapses, no government/business is favored (except investors that are good speculators). To have high oil prices you need a good working economy (High oil demand = High oil prices).

It could be an individual rich person (or group of individual rich persons), who will make a lot of money by doing so. I m thinking of speculators, investors, really rich people who can now buy anything they want (low stock prices).

 

[Diuretic]

I'd just like to take this opportunity to assure America that...........it wasn't me

 

[DiveCon]

um, didnt they say "money market accounts"
these are not 401k's they are talking about, but more like the CD's people have

 

[rayboyusmc]

I listened to him on Countdown. He never indicated that this was on person or group, but I got the impression it was people in general panicing and pulling out their money just like they did in past bank failures.

Funny how this has not been on the big news programs.

He did say had it not been stopped, we would today be without an economic and government system. The last part might make some librarians happy.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

Well, it's all over the right wing blogosphere. So there will inevitebly be either denials, or an investigation. As for blaming George Bush, the flagrant spending of money we did not have for things that did not help our nation was the hallmark of his Presidency. That left us in an economically vulneble position. A position that Paul Krugman and others repeatedly warned us about. Were we in the position that we were in 2000, we could have shut that operation down, and taken care of it's perpetrators. As is, if they still hold economic leverage over us, and I would bet that they do, we will just try to keep it as quiet as possible to stem further damage.

Going to be a very interesting years, 2009.

And yet you support the flagrant spending of EVEN more money we do not have to fix the problem. Go figure.

 

[DiveCon]

I listened to him on Countdown. He never indicated that this was on person or group, but I got the impression it was people in general panicing and pulling out their money just like they did in past bank failures.

Funny how this has not been on the big news programs.

He did say had it not been stopped, we would today be without an economic and government system. The last part might make some librarians happy.

um, why would Librarians be happy?
you sure you dont mean Libertarians?

 

[KittenKoder]

You know ... this whole thread is kinda ... well stupid. Wonder ... how many people have bank accounts that got scared of the financial crisis ... how much money would all those people have in accounts ... realize that if the economy collapses that electronic money will be worthless ... drawing all that money out and stuffing under their mattresses instead ... it's not hard to see the most obvious possibility instead of all these nutjob conspiracy theories on both sides.

 

[toomuchtime_]

um, didnt they say "money market accounts"
these are not 401k's they are talking about, but more like the CD's people have

They're not like cd's. Cd's have a penalty for early withdrawal and neither money market accounts at banks nor accounts at money market funds have any penalty for withdrawal. These are very different kinds of accounts. Money market accounts at banks are really just bank accounts that generally require a somewhat higher balance to open than regular savings accounts and pay a slightly higher rate of interest based of what some real or hypothetical bundle of short term debt would pay, and they are insured by FDIC. Money market funds are mutual funds that invest in high quality short term debt and generally pay an interest rate slightly higher than banks. Until our current financial crisis, money market funds were generally thought to be as safe as insured bank accounts although your account at a money market fund was not insured.

Jankorski isn't clear about whether he means money market accounts at banks or money market funds, but I'm guessing he meant the latter since I couldn't find any references to a run on the banks, but there was a sharp decline in money market funds between Sept. 11 and Sept. 18 from $5.1 trillion to $3.4 trillion, but that was because the market value of the debt the money market funds invested in fell and investors started to have doubts about how safe money market funds were. However, the situation was stabilized on Sept. 19 when the Treasury and Fed combined forces to guarantee the first $50 billion of losses the funds might have from bad debts and to lend commercial banks what they needed to buy debt from the money market funds in the event of a run.

TARP was passed on Oct. 3, two weeks after the actions by the Fed and Treasury had settled the money market anxieties, so this couldn't have been Jankorski's reason, as he alleges, for voting for TARP. What's more, his numbers don't add up. At the rate of $550 billion per hour, it would take 10 hours, not 3, for $5.5 trillion to have been withdrawn, and in any case the total value of all money market funds during this period was never more than $5.1 trillion even if you cashed in the paper clips.

What we have here is a politician trying to justify an unpopular vote to an angry voter and adding a little zest to the story so the voter will be properly impressed with his actions.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/20/business/20moneys.html?hp

 

[garyd]

150 million people each draw out anywhere from 100 to 1,000 bucks? Retirees take the cash out of there IRA's and 401 k's while there's still some money left in them? Wouldn't take that long especially with every pol in washington talking about the emminent collapse of the system and an economic melt down of ghastly proportions...

So no not real likely the only people who really want a US economic collapse are for the most part people who meither don't ahve the cash to bring it off or those who would be hurt far worse than us by such a collapse.

 

[Terry]

First I've heard of it. If that's true, they need to find the parties responsible and do nasty things to them. On a side note, didn't Obama break a single day Internet fund-raising record about that time?

My exact thoughts when I read the OP!