Sunday, February 05, 2012

Sovereign Risk

What exactly is Sovereign Risk?

Here's some fairly high-brow talk from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_risk#Sovereign_risk

The probability of rescheduling is an increasing function of debt service ratio, import ratio, variance of export revenue and domestic money supply growth. Frenkel, Karmann and Scholtens also argue that the likelihood of rescheduling is a decreasing function of investment ratio due to future economic productivity gains. Saunders argues that rescheduling can become more likely if the investment ratio rises as the foreign country could become less dependent on its external creditors and so be less concerned about receiving credit from these countries/investors.[12]

From reading that, do you even understand it?

No, neither do I.

My main question is this:

"What would actually happen should a sovereign nation default on its loans?"

For example, given the troubles with Greece and Italy 2012, what if the government of either of these two countries simply said, nope - we default! We can't pay. ??????

What would be the ramification? Who would tell that sovereign nation to hand over all its resources? Its gold, its silver, its coal, its wheat, its cotton, its bananas, its sheep, its iron ore, in effect to repay what the sovereign nation owed to its creditors?

I can't find anywhere online that answers that question.

Maybe no-one has ever considered the question - after all, there seems to be a lot of money to be made from people who bet on the currency exchange markets - they wouldn't want to see a sovereign nation go under - they'd lose too much money.

So the norm keeps on and on - all we ever hear is how the stock market is doing - the result of the stock market drives the rest of the economy, completely disregarding the fact that the majority of businesses in a country aren't even listed on the "all important" "stock exchange".

Its a manufactured market, people - from those who have the greatest to gain from the manipulation of markets - and to hell with the rest of the population who struggle day to day to gain employment, and even then, are subjected to ever increasing prices.

I ask again - what would happen should a sovereign nation default on its loans? What I'd like to see is these countries who are doing it bad saying "fuck you" - what would the creditors do? Are they going to send in an army to take over the business sector of the nation, or remove current members of parliament?

I'd think that was an act of war.

If nothing else, we need to remove this world wide scam of fractional reserve banking, because lets face it, it isn't working, and the level of worldwide debt can NOT ever been repaid, so I ask:

Why not just say "I DEFAULT"

For a home-owner, that's really bad - they have to give up their home to the bank (who will sell it at auction), and if they don't receive enough money to pay off the outstanding debt, they're still in debt.

Read that again - a family can still be in debt even after losing their home in a mortgagee sale.....and in many circumstances, through no fault of their own.

Why no fault? Maybe.... rising interest rates, rising electricity prices, rising food prices, and with the carbon tax yet to hit.... its no wonder people are losing their homes.

Now, the more important thing (sorry homeowners who are doing it tough....) is that no matter what you do in your daily life, you're always subject to the policies of the government of the day.

You know that - you've experienced it.

I ask again - what would happen if Greece were to default on their loans?

Who would come in (the bank) and try to sell the resources (your home) to try and repay what they owed (your mortgage) ?????

I'm sure you can see that there are really big issues at stake here in the world at the moment - this is not a good time to be living under a fractional reserve banking system.

One way to help our respective governments survive this ever increasing debt to foreign interests may be to implement something like a "financial transactions tax" - this would see a change in the payments *everyone* makes whenever they buy or sell something.

Remove the GST. This would help small business no end. After all, at the moment, they are unpaid tax collectors for the government - as if they didn't have enough work to do.

So no GST - what's next? No income tax - everyone would have an immediate increase in disposable income - that they can then spend in their local marketplace to increase the money supply within an economy- but wait on, that is against the bankers creed - they are the only ones who can increase the money supply through fractional reserve banking! No my friends, it'll never happen because the masters of banking WILL NOT LET THAT HAPPEN.

To come to back to the sovereign risk angle, (which is no different to the risk you face with your debt) I really wonder what would happen should a sovereign nation simply say:

"FUCK OFF - WE'RE NOT PAYING"

Its a very simplistic question - but all of this needs a very simple answer.


MY LIFE HAS VALUE!

Watch that film over and over again - sometime, it'll sink in, and I hope you get as mad as hell as to what's going on today.

YOUR LIFE HAS MEANING.

And that was a film - here's a real person who has some things to say:


I'll get no comments on this, because you are all asleep.

You don't think.
You don't question.

Yet you ask why your life is going down the toilet.

Maybe now you'll start asking questions, and start reading some material other than the latest TV "reality show", or the latest magazine stand "celebs today!"

I don't know why I even bother writing this stuff - it might seem crazy and weird, but I'm allowed to since I have a free blogger account, and hell, even if I get shut down, I still have my own "self-hosted" site (on my own server, on my own internet connection) so you might see it there too.

But lastly:

SHOUT OUT AND ASK WHY YOU ARE WHERE YOU ARE?
You've put in the hours, the work, the heartache, the headache, and the rest.

So why aren't you further ahead?

Its not your fault.

But then again, it might be.