Paper Assets No Safer Today than in 2008
from Wealth Cycles:
In 2008 in order to justify the taxpayer-funded Wall Street bailout, the world was pitched a three-page term sheet explaining how ATMs would go dark and McDonalds wouldn’t be able to pay its employees. The premise: either pay for financier blunders, or else.
Strong-arm fascism was employed, more or less, while brokers quietly took to Federal Reserve facilities for funding, after their ultra-levered businesses threatened to send American account holders to the bankruptcy courts as creditors—meaning many almost had to say good bye to access to their retirement funds, at least until the bankruptcy concluded.
Brokers, a part of Morgan Stanley and Jefferies, amidst others, have come under fire for holding dubious securities at the corporate level while utilizing significant leverage by lending cash short-term against client securities.
