Majorityrights News > Category: Business & Industry

The Himalayan Times, ‘Fact check: Greatest hits of a fact-challenged presidential campaign’, 05 Nov 2016:

WASHINGTON: At times it has seemed as though this presidential campaign was occurring in some alternate universe. Up is down, no means yes, day is night.

Donald Trump’s tweets, speeches, interviews, debate statements, news conferences and off-the-cuff remarks — that is, pretty much every utterance made during his waking hours — have been a source of hyperbole at hyper-speed. His misstatements have been so ubiquitous that Hillary Clinton’s slippery words often slithered right on by unnoticed.

Trump made pernicious use of fictional numbers, concocted certain events and both contradicted and mispresented his earlier self.

Clinton took actual facts and went beyond them, promising more than she can deliver, cherry-picking numbers and otherwise standing for the lawyerly Washington tradition of paying partial heed to reality while bending it to her advantage. Cautious by nature, she was most inclined to stretch facts to their snapping point when on the defensive about her email practices, which was often. Clinton’s defensive position, in essence: The dog ate my homework.

With Election Day finally, nearly upon us, some lowlights from both candidates:

For Trump, day is night

On Clinton’s approach to borders: “She wants to let people just pour in. You could have 650 million people pour in and we do nothing about it. Think of it. That’s what could happen.”

The facts: For this to happen, every other country in the Americas, from Mexico south to Chile’s southern tip, and a chunk of Canada would have to empty its entire population into the US.

But wait, there’s more.

Trump said that under Clinton, this could happen “in one week.”

This was no a slip of the tongue — at several events he’s spoken of 600 million coming in under Clinton; at another, 650 million. This doesn’t faintly resemble anything Clinton has proposed for the US (population 325 million).

Trump is riffing off of a leaked Clinton speech to bankers in which she spoke of her dream of a “hemispheric common market, with open trade and open borders.” The remarks in context suggested an interest in free commerce, not necessarily the free movement of people. But no one is talking about packing whole populations from other Western Hemisphere countries into the US like sardines.

Numbers are always pliable in the political arena; for Trump they are often whatever he wants them to be. He routinely overstates the US trade deficit by hundreds of billions of dollars, no matter how many times he’s called on it.

On the battle of Mosul, Iraq, and other operations against Islamic State militants: “Whatever happened to the element of surprise?”

The facts: Many generals agree with Trump that it is folly to tell ISIL that it is about to be attacked. But those are armchair generals. Real ones tend to see the value in pre-announcing a major offensive.

In the case of Mosul, signaling an assault in advance was a way for Iraqi forces to warn civilians in the city and to encourage a resistance movement to weaken ISIL before the battle began. Moreover, any element of surprise had been long lost; preparations for the battle began more than a year ago, with the US part in it under close scrutiny by Congress.

More broadly, Trump’s theory that secrecy should surround all such operations reflects a lack of understanding of how this battle against ISIL has developed over the past two years, as well as certain obligations to keep Congress informed. Basic decisions like when to assault Mosul are left to the Iraqi government, because it is the Iraqis who will have to govern the place when the fighting is done.

The US wants the Iraqis to own the Mosul problem – both militarily and politically — so they don’t repeat the mistakes that allowed ISIL to capture the city in the first place.

Mosul was the obvious last major target of an Iraqi counteroffensive against ISIL, whose ability to defend the city had been undermined by months of US airstrikes against its leaders and financial and military resources. Surprise was not an option.

When Clinton accused him of calling climate change a hoax invented by the Chinese: “I did not. I did not.”

When asked about telling people on Twitter to check out a sex tape: “It wasn’t ‘check out a sex tape.’”

The facts: On these and other occasions, Trump has blithely denied making statements he plainly made — even though he was caught on tape making them.

In a 2012 tweet, he wrote: “The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make US manufacturing non-competitive.” He later claimed he was kidding, but he’s also repeated the claim that climate change is a hoax, and one that benefits China. In 2014: “Snowing in Texas and Louisiana, record setting freezing temperatures throughout the country and beyond. Global warming is an expensive hoax!”

During this campaign, he also tweeted “check out sex tape and past” of former 1996 Miss Universe Alicia Machado, whom Clinton discussed in a presidential debate as an example of Trump’s derogatory comments about women.

Machado, a Clinton supporter, criticised Trump for body-shaming her by calling her “Miss Piggy” when she gained weight. Was there a sex tape? In a manner, yes. Machado was filmed in a 2005 Spanish-language reality show in bed with a man; no nudity is seen but she said they were having sex in the footage.

Trump: “I was against the war in Iraq, because I said it’s gonna totally destabilise the Middle East. … I was opposed to war from the beginning. … “I would not have had our troops in Iraq.”

The facts: Trump publicly supported the war before it started and praised its early progress. He’s insisted otherwise uncountable times, despite the record.

It’s true he wasn’t a cheerleader for the March 2003 invasion. For example, he said a few months before the war that the economy and North Korea were bigger problems. But that’s hardly opposition. In September 2002, he told Howard Stern on the radio, when asked if he would back an invasion, “Yeah, I guess so.” Days after the invasion, he said it “looks like a tremendous success from a military standpoint.”

Moreover, Trump offered support for a hypothetical invasion of Iraq in his 2000 book, suggesting he would favor a pre-emptive strike if Iraq were viewed as a threat to national security.

Trump did turn against the long-running war before many in Washington did. But that does not show the foresight he claimed when campaigning against Republican primary rivals who backed the invasion and when campaigning against Clinton, who voted in the Senate for the war. He was not against it when the decisions were being made about whether to start it.

Trump: “I watched when the World Trade Centre came tumbling down. And I watched in Jersey City, New Jersey, where thousands and thousands of people were cheering as that building was coming down. Thousands of people were cheering. … It was on television. I saw it.”

The facts: This early head-scratcher, from November 2015, helped set a pattern of tall tales that would continue through the campaign. It also fed into one of the signature insults of a campaign full of them — when Trump appeared to mock the disabilities of a New York Times reporter whose recollections from New Jersey after the 9/11 attacks did not support his own.

No video or other proof of large-scale celebrations of the falling towers by Muslims in New Jersey ever emerged.

Serge Kovaleski of the Times, who was working for The Washington Post in 2001, reported in the week after 9/11 that authorities in New Jersey detained and questioned “a number of people who were allegedly seen celebrating the attacks.”

Kovaleski has a congenital condition that restricts joint movement. In a speech, Trump went after the “the poor guy, you oughta see this guy” — making jerking gestures and taking a mocking tone.

Trump later denied he was imitating Kovaleski and further claimed “I have no idea” who he is and didn’t know of his condition. But Kovaleski said he had met Trump repeatedly, in face-to-face face interviews and at news conferences, and “Donald and I were on a first-name basis for years.”

On why he continued to raise questions about Barack Obama’s country of birth even after the president produced his birth certificate in 2011: “Nobody was pressing it, nobody was caring much about it.”

The facts: Trump himself continued to press false theories about Obama’s birthplace after they were debunked. His claim that the matter faded when the birth certificate came out belies his efforts to keep the myth alive.

“Was it a birth certificate?” he asked in a 2012 interview. “He was perhaps born in Kenya. Very simple, OK?” Trump said in 2014. “Who knows about Obama?” Trump asked in January 2016.

Clinton: The dog ate my homework

“For those of you who are concerned about my using personal email, I understand. And as I’ve said, I’m not making excuses. I’ve said it was a mistake and I regret it.”

The facts: She has made a variety of excuses on the way to a grudging acknowledgment that her use of a personal server and email for State Department business was wrong.

She’s said she used personal email because she wanted the simplicity of a single digital device, although it turned out she carried several devices. She said her email practices were “approved” when they were not — they merely had not been expressly prohibited at the time for the secretary of state.

She said she didn’t understand that material marked with a “c” that passed through her personal communications system meant it was confidential. She said other secretaries of state did it first. That’s partly true, but in a limited way and not with their own servers. She said she never passed on classified material in her system. The FBI found she passed on three email chains with information that had classified markings in the body of the emails; the State Department contended two of those chains held unclassified material.

On the Trans-Pacific Partnership: “I did say I hoped it would be a good deal.”

The facts: Clinton heartily supported the Pacific trade deal in speeches around the world as secretary of state; she did not merely hope it would turn out well. Clinton declared in Australia in 2012, “This TPP sets the gold standard in trade agreements to open free, transparent, fair trade, the kind of environment that has the rule of law and a level playing field.” Similar speeches elsewhere affirmed her belief that the deal, still under negotiation, was “groundbreaking,” ”exciting” and “embodied” 21st century standards.

That position became awkward if not untenable in her Democratic primary race against Bernie Sanders, a foe of the deal, and she turned against it. Her less-than-detailed explanation: The deal as finally negotiated did not measure up to her standards for protecting US wages, jobs and national security. Yet the final deal contains some of the strongest labor protections of any US trade agreement.

The subject became Exhibit A in the case made by critics that she lets political currents, instead of personal conviction, guide her.

A hacked email from Clinton adviser Joel Benenson may have inadvertently lent weight to that suspicion. “Do we have any sense from her what she believes or wants her core message to be?” he asked. “Sanders has simplicity and focus.”

Clinton: “I don’t add a penny to the national debt.”

The facts: Not true, according to the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. It estimates her increased spending in areas such as infrastructure, more financial aid for college and early childhood education, would increase the national debt by $200 billion over 10 years. That is far less than their estimate for Trump, who they predict would add $5.3 trillion over 10 years. But it’s plenty more than a penny.

One for the road

Trump to Clinton: “You’ve been fighting ISIS your entire adult life.”

The facts: The Islamic State group did not exist for almost all of Clinton’s adult life. She’s 69. ISIL is 4.

Trump’s “New Deal”: Ethnonationalism for blacks, proposition nationalism for you, gentile other - what else is new?

Trump’s “New Deal” promises massive assistance to blacks on the basis of their race - what else is new?

Blacks are the only group for which Donald Trump has proposed a plan of help on the grounds of their race/ethnicity.

What else is new? This only further ensconces their status as quasi feudal lords: a people of privilege, a people of a different set of laws, a people whom we cannot discriminate against, of enhanced penalties for crimes against them (“hate crime” laws), a people whom we must hire, a people whose children we must pay for (and try to) educate - with knowledge for which we sublimated, endured pain and indifference and ridicule to acquire, while they, the blacks, have been pampered and lavished - a people whom we must serve.

We are their servants…not because they add value to our lives - quite the opposite (they take away from us vastly, markedly in regard to EGI) but because they are backed by terror - the intimidation of their bio-power, hyper-assertiveness, aggression, violence, destruction and Jewish machination.

This is to say nothing of the trillions in welfare, government handouts and programs, while their advocates demand “reparations” from generations who had nothing to do with their oppression in history but have in fact been penalized hideously for it - to the point of societal and national displacement, rape, murder and genocide.

Donald Trump is the kind of cowardly sell-out who has aided and abetted this circumstance.

“Trump’s New “Deal”, shafting the goyim of the world on behalf of blacks.

Bloomberg, “Donald Trump proposes new deal for black Americans”, 27 Oct 2016:

Today I want to talk about how to grow the African American middle class and provide a New Deal for black America.

That deal is grounded in three promises

1) Safe communities

2) Great education

3) High paying jobs

My vision rests on a principle that has defined this campaign right from the beginning.  You’ve seen where we’ve come from and where we are right now.  It’s called ‘American first’.

Every African American citizen in this country is entitled to a government that puts their jobs, wages and security first.

One of the greatest betrayals has been the issue of immigration.

Illegal immigration violates the civil rights of African Americans.

That’s what’s been happening (applause).

No group has been more economically harmed by decades of immigration than low income African American workers.

I will also propose tax holidays for inner city investment; a new tax incentive to get foreign companies to relocate in blighted American neighborhoods; and they will do that. it will be worthwhile; it’s called incentive - they will do it.

I am very humbled, beyond words, to be the nominee of the Party of Abraham Lincoln, a lot of people don’t know that, its the party of Abraham Lincoln.  And it is my highest and greatest hope that the Republican party can be the home in the future and forever more for African Americans and the African American vote; because I will produce and I will get others to produce; and we know for a fact it doesn’t work with the democrats; and it certainly isn’t going to work with Hillary.

And so Donald Trump’s agenda to rope implicit White Nationalists back into the Republican proposition nationalism - a naivete seized upon for the Jewish race mixing agenda - suckering “the Alternative Right” with dog whistles to anti-PC, has become apparent, all but explicit.

Trump’s New Deal: ethno-nationalism for blacks - the only group proposed help on basis of race/ethnicity - proposition nationalism for gentile others, a.k.a., the goyim.

“That deal” is grounded in three promises

1) Safe communities - can only be done relatively, with partial success only, through a Giuliani type active policing - a burden and social expense which would not be necessary in a White ethnostate.

2) Great education - can only be done at a terrible cost to non-blacks - we must (try to) educate them - with knowledge for which we sublimated, endured pain and indifference and ridicule to acquire, while they, the blacks, have been pampered and lavished, to do nothing but indulge themselves and have offspring - a people whom we must serve.

3) High paying jobs - they already have that: blacks are vastly over represented in government jobs that are easy, well paying, with good benefits, reasonable hours, vacation time and overtime pay available for those want it. As for the corporations, there is no more coveted and lavished employee than a black from privileged education and of those precious few at the higher end of the bell curve to round out their quota and non-racist credentials. Disobey at the price of being sued and otherwise maneuvered into the loss of your enterprise ...while government contracts are set aside for black businesses and private contracts are compelled to use black contractors as well.

So what else is new?

Donald must not try breaking those promises of privilege, promises granted in cowardice to the hyper-assertive, hyper-aggressive, rioting, Jewish lawyer backed black American populace.

But we are supposed to hate: Mexicans, who are either White, close to White, identify and assimilate as such, or more AmenIndian, benign and minding their business where not helpfully industrious; we are supposed to resent and penalize Asians ..so that they can remain the labor force to pay for black and Jewish privilege.

Yes, sure, Trump is playing 57 dimensional chess, so are his supporters - right.

Chinese President Xi Jinping called Rodrigo Duterte’s visit a “milestone” in ties, as he pulled out all the stops to welcome the Philippines’ leader.

Huffington Post, “Philippine President Duterte Announces ‘Separation’ From The U.S.”, 20 Oxt 2016:

BEIJING (Reuters) - Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte announced his “separation” from the United States on Thursday, declaring that it had “lost” and he had realigned with China as the two agreed to resolve their South China Sea dispute through talks.

Duterte made his comments in China, where he is visiting with at least 200 business people to pave the way for what he calls a new commercial alliance as relations with longtime ally the United States deteriorate.

His trade secretary, Ramon Lopez, said $13.5 billion in deals would be signed.

Duterte’s efforts to engage China, months after a tribunal ruling in the Hague over South China Sea disputes in favor of the Philippines, marks a reversal in foreign policy since the 71-year-old former mayor took office on June 30.

“America has lost now,” Duterte told Chinese and Philippine business people at a forum in the Great Hall of the People, attended by Chinese Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli.

“I’ve realigned myself in your ideological flow and maybe I will also go to Russia to talk to (President Vladimir) Putin and tell him that there are three of us against the world ― China, Philippines and Russia. It’s the only way,” he added.

“With that, in this venue, your honors, in this venue, I announce my separation from the UnitedStates,” Duterte said to applause. “I have separated from them. So I will be dependent on you for all time. But do not worry. We will also help as you help us.”

China has pulled out all the stops to welcome Duterte, including a marching band complete with batton-twirling band master at his official welcoming ceremony outside the Great Hall of the People, which most leaders do not get

Xi told Duterte their countries are now “brothers,” who can “appropriately handle disputes,” in an apparent nod to previous standoffs over the South China Sea.

RED CARPET WELCOME

President Xi Jinping, meeting Duterte earlier in the day, called the visit a “milestone” in ties.

Xi told Duterte that China and the Philippines were brothers and they could “appropriately handle disputes,” though he did not mention the South China Sea in remarks made in front of reporters.

“I hope we can follow the wishes of the people and use this visit as an opportunity to push China-Philippines relations back on a friendly footing and fully improve things,” Xi said.

Following their meeting, during which Duterte said relations with China had entered a new “springtime”, Chinese vice foreign minister Liu Zhenmin said the South China Sea issue was not the sum total of relations.

“The two sides agreed that they will do what they agreed five years ago, that is to pursue bilateral dialogue and consultation in seeking a proper settlement of the South China Sea issue,” Liu said.

China claims most of the energy-rich South China Sea through which about $5 trillion in ship-borne trade passes every year. Neighbours Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam also have claims.

In 2012, China seized the disputed Scarborough Shoal and denied Philippine fishermen access to its fishing grounds.

Liu said the shoal was not mentioned and he did not answer a question about whether Philippinefishermen would be allowed there. He said both countries had agreed on coastguard and fisheries cooperation, but did not give details.

Duterte’s declaration of a separation with the U.S. comes after he called President Barack Obama a “son of a bitch” and told him to “go to hell” while alluding to severing ties with the old colonial power.

SEA ROW TAKES ‘BACK SEAT’

Duterte’s tone toward Beijing is in contrast to the language he has used against the United States, after being infuriated by U.S. criticism of his bloody war on drugs.

He has called U.S. President Barack Obama a “son of a bitch” and told him to “go to hell” while alluding to severing ties with the old colonial power.

On Wednesday, to the cheers of hundreds of Filipinos in Beijing, Duterte said Philippine foreign policy was veering toward China.

“I will not go to America anymore. We will just be insulted there,” Duterte said. “So time to say goodbye my friend.”

The same day, about 1,000 anti-U.S. protesters gathered outside the U.S. embassy in Manila calling for the removal of U.S. troops from the southern island of Mindanao.

Duterte on Wednesday said the South China Sea arbitration case would “take the back seat” during talks, and that he would wait for the Chinese to bring up the issue rather than doing so himself.

Xi said issues that could not be immediately be resolved should be set aside, according to the Chinese foreign ministry.

China has welcomed the Philippines approaches, even as Duterte has vowed not to surrender any sovereignty to Beijing, which views the South China Sea Hague ruling as null and void.

China has also expressed support for his drug war, which has raised concern in Western capitals about extrajudicial killing.

Duterte’s overtures to China have been accompanied by signs of improving business ties with the world’s second largest economy.

China’s Liu said Beijing will restore Philippine agricultural exports to China and provide financing for Philippine infrastructure.

Interesting that The Huffington Post made this the caption beneath the title of its article, though there is nothing in the article that discusses Russia -

“America has lost now,” Rodrigo Duterte said, flagging closer ties with China and Russia during a visit to Beijing.

There is a strange misconception circulating among some in the west that Russia and China are good friends, some speaking as if they are practically joined at the hip.

And speaking of NOT friends, there are some interesting facts to come about the history of The US in The Philippines - a history that will explain much as to why The Philippines would be eager to declare their separatism and The US the loser.

I was discussing this article with Kumiko. We came to the conclusion that the most charitable explanation for its penultimate confusion - exactly who, really, is to be persuaded and of what? has to do with perhaps a shyness in having to talk in a situation controlled by right wing interests: Euractiv, The EU, corporate industries invested in Asia, and German corporate interests - rather, the difficulty in getting them to see their interests aright.

Seeing the article’s argument more clearly, German, Dutch and other European workers and Asian workers should have higher salaries. That would allow Germans in particular to buy more of their own product and export less and allow Asian economies to buy more European exports in addition to their own domestic product.

The key is to dissuade corporate feudalism - the idea that low wages are a corollary to profitable business. The article argues in effect that low wages are only a corollary to enormous profit for a narrow group of elites, poorer workers and not to successful industry and healthy economic balance.

Where Germany, for example, does not let some of its industry go abroad, it should be incorporating more robotics to increase the better output as they might provide and “make-work” if necessary, with better paid “workers”, with more capacity to buy more of their own domestic product.

Euractiv, “Who fears the wolf of globalisation?”, 14 Oct 2016:

Trade unions and companies are more closely aligned against the harmful competition stemming from emerging economies’ low salaries and working conditions than ever before. The EU’s export of jobs is harming itself and the global economy, write Ernest Maragall and Jordi Angusto.

Ernest Maragall is an MEP with the Green/EFA group and Jordi Angusto is an economist.

They are accused of taking our jobs as a result of the low-cost products we buy from them. But the fact is that the EU’s external surplus has now reached an astonishing amount, close to half a trillion euros. This is 20% bigger than the Chinese surplus and both together pose a serious threat to the world economy.

In other words, by restricting our domestic demand through austerity we’re harming both ourselves and our major trading partners.

There is no ‘foreign enemy’ taking our jobs, rather the EU is taking jobs to the rest of the world. Prime examples are countries such as Germany and the Netherlands which are the main contributors to the EU surplus and which today have historically high employment thanks to third country demand, mostly from the US, UK, Canada, Brazil and Australia. And this is most definitely not because Germany and the Netherlands have low salaries.

In fact, companies tend not to invest where salaries are lower but where the difference between product per worker and salary is greater; i.e. where profitability can be greatest. In the case of Germany, the reunification process and the Schröder 2010 plan led to a huge contraction in wages and a notable increase in the product to salary difference.

Some might say they gained in terms of competitiveness, increasing economic activity, jobs and exports. Others, however, would see this not only as ‘beggar-thy-neighbour’, but their own people too, becoming unable to absorb increased production and depending on exports.

Whilst productivity gains can allow profits and wages to increase and support growth; competitiveness gained through wage dumping leads to a substitution effect, with jobs and profits gained here at the expense of jobs and profits lost elsewhere. This, in turn, leads to contraction because of a fall in demand.

That’s why institutions which could never be accused of being leftwing such as the IMF, the G20 and the OECD, have called upon Germany to increase domestic demand through public investment and salary increases, in order to help boost global growth whilst also contributing towards an improvement in labour conditions in emergent-economies.

Or do we think we’ll help them by competing to see who has the lowest salaries?

Globalisation brings many problems and with it comes the need for political action at a global level to heal our planet, eradicate tax havens and avoid the consolidation of a new corporate feudalism; but the fact that millions of people are emerging from poverty in Asia and Africa is not a problem. The critical problem today is much more how to convince those countries in surplus to increase their domestic demand.

GoldenDawn, “N. G. Michaloliakos at RAI 1: Golden Dawn will fight sturdily against those who aspire to sell off our Homeland! VIDEO”, 11 Oct 2016:

     

At the beginning of August, the Italian journalist Franco di Mare made an all-inclusive interview with the Secretary General of People’s Association-Golden Dawn, N. G. Michaloliakos.

The interview was filmed in the headquarters at Mesogeion avenue and was broadcasted as a part of the television program “Frontiere”, on the 27th of August.

The Leader of Golden Dawn answered questions about the identity of the Popular Nationalistic Movement, clarifying that Golden Dawn fights against all those who aspire to sell off the Homelands.

At the same time, he responded in regard to reports on his political part, the symbols that are used by Golden Dawn along with the other nationalistic movements in Europe;.

He specified that Golden Dawn constitutes in fact the opposition in Greece, since SYRIZA and New Democracy vote in common line with all the EU memoranda legislation. The most crucial problem for Europe and for Greece is demographic crisis, as the massive illegal immigration threatens the permanent radical alteration of the country’s population

Finally, he made it clear that Golden Dawn strongly resists against the international loan sharks and the attempted islamization of our Homeland.

Mirror, “Britain warned NO full access to EU free market without free movement of workers”, Oct 6 2016:

       

German chancellor Angela Merkel has also said Brexit negotiations will not be easy

German chancellor Angela Merkel has warned Britain there can be no full access to the EU single market without free movement of workers,

[...]

Number 10 responded by referencing Ms May’s Brexit speech to the Tory conference, when she said: “I know some people ask about the ‘trade-off’ between controlling immigration and trading with Europe.

“But that is the wrong way of looking at things. We have voted to leave the European Union and become a fully independent, sovereign country.

“We will do what independent sovereign countries do. We will decide for ourselves how we control immigration. And we will be free to pass our own laws.”

The PM also warned there would be “bumps in the road” on the way to Brexit .

TEC, “Deutsche Bank Collapse: The Most Important Bank In Europe Is Facing A Major ‘Liquidity Event”, 30 Sept 2016:

The largest and most important bank in the largest and most important economy in Europe is imploding right in front of our eyes.  Deutsche Bank is the 11th biggest bank on the entire planet, and due to the enormous exposure to derivatives that it has, it has been called “the world’s most dangerous bank“.  Over the past year, I have repeatedly warned that Deutsche Bank is heading for disaster and is a likely candidate to be “the next Lehman Brothers”.  If you would like to review, you can do so here, here and here.  On September 16th, the Wall Street Journal reported that the U.S. Department of Justice wanted 14 billion dollars from Deutsche Bank to settle a case related to the mis-handling of mortgage-backed securities during the last financial crisis.  As a result of that announcement, confidence in the bank has been greatly shaken, the stock price has fallen to record lows, and analysts are warning that Deutsche Bank may be facing a “liquidity event” unlike anything that we have seen since the collapse of Lehman Brothers back in 2008.

At one point on Friday, Deutsche Bank stock fell below the 10 euro mark for the first time ever before bouncing back a bit.  A completely unverified rumor that was spreading on Twitter that claimed that Deutsche Bank would settle with the Department of Justice for only 5.4 billion dollars was the reason for the bounce.

But the size of the fine is not really the issue now.  Shares of Deutsche Bank have fallen by more than half so far in 2016, and this latest episode seems to have been the final straw for the deeply troubled financial institution.  Old sources of liquidity are being cut off, and nobody wants to be the idiot that offers Deutsche Bank a new source of liquidity at this point.

As a result, Deutsche Bank is potentially facing a “liquidity event” on a scale that we have not seen since the financial crisis of 2008.  The following comes from Zero Hedge
:
  It is not solvency, or the lack of capital – a vague, synthetic, and usually quite arbitrary concept, determined by regulators – that kills a bank; it is – as Dick Fuld will tell anyone who bothers to listen – the loss of (access to) liquidity: cold, hard, fungible (something Jon Corzine knew all too well when he commingled and was caught) cash, that pushes a bank into its grave, usually quite rapidly: recall that it took Lehman just a few days for its stock to plunge from the high double digits to zero.

  It is also liquidity, or rather concerns about it, that sent Deutsche Bank stock crashing to new all time lows earlier today: after all, the investing world already knew for nearly two weeks that its capitalization is insufficient. As we reported earlier this week, it was a report by Citigroup, among many other, that found how badly undercapitalized the German lender is, noting that DB’s “leverage ratio, at 3.4%, looks even worse relative to the 4.5% company target by 2018″ and calculated that while he only models €2.9bn in litigation charges over 2H16-2017 – far less than the $14 billion settlement figure proposed by the DOJ – and includes a successful disposal of a 70% stake in Postbank at end-2017 for 0.4x book he still only reaches a CET 1 ratio of 11.6% by end-2018, meaning the bank would have a Tier 1 capital €3bn shortfall to the company target of 12.5%, and a leverage ratio of 3.9%, resulting in an €8bn shortfall to the target of 4.5%.

The more the stock price drops, the faster other financial institutions, investors and regular banking clients are going to want to pull their money out of Deutsche Bank.  And every time there is news about people pulling money out of the bank, that is just going to drive the stock price even lower.

In other words, Deutsche Bank may be entering a death spiral that may be impossible to stop without a government bailout, and the German government has already stated that there will be no bailout for Deutsche Bank.