OK I've got it. I've figured out one way that Frau Merkel and the Euro leadership can use their favorite motivator (force) to compel the European voters to float the bill to keep the club-med countries in the Euro. It comes in the form of several administrative steps which should not require the approval of European voters:
1. A new class of sovereign debt is designed which is paid only by the issuing country but is administered by the ECB. The Coupon, prepayment concerns, issuance amount etc is all managed by the ECB as if it were the issuing banker and bond administrator. But this debt does not encumber the ECB or any other non-issuing country as being liable for payment should the issuing country default.
2. All public pensions in the issuing countries will implement new rules to share any shortfalls between current and future pensioners equally.
3. All public pensions are required to purchase a set amount of the new debt issuance - precise amounts depending upon the the pension size and the needs of the issuing country.
4. The issuing countries elect to "write down" ONLY the newly issued class of debt to a fixed percentage of the face value. The debt is structured as a convertible so that any write down of face value is automatically replaced with a callable zero coupon instrument of an equal face value. The zero paper is pegged at a 20 years, but can be called and replaced with new paper at any time. The initial write down "conversion" does not trigger a default event.
So the losses are immediately transferred to the public pensioners and the public balance sheets are corrected in the form of reduced pension outlays. Of course it screws the pensioners, but someone has to get screwed. And up to now those public pensioners are the ones who have been doing all the screwing. Besides, you can't screw the bond holders because, as I've written before, they are not required to participate in this farce and can leave at any time. The burden will only be paid by someone who has no choice in the matter. The pensioners have no choice.
I may be a little fast and loose with the regs here - I'm no expert on European pension rules. But I think the Eurocrats can squeak it by if they do it late at night and all at once. It's an option anyway.
5 comments:
YOu are spot-on!
This is the point with Eurobonds.
Hollande and Italy want the Eurobonds adopted Yesterday! Ultimately they will continue to assign blame to the institutions charged with allocating the debt rather than the one's issuing the debt.
Result of today's summit: Nothing Done.
CNBC had a commentator on this am regarding the validity of the EURO if one or all break.
A lot of analysts tread lightly here, but they need not. Nigel Farage is correct. If Greece or any single country exits the Euro, "It is a Failure".
While street types try to assign hypothetical values to the cloudy future of the currency - no one truly knows the current value of the currency since it is based on a ponzi.
I'm guilty of speculating what the value would be after secession. One glimmering moment of clarity emerged from CNBC this morning with the utterance of the words: "Confederate Money".
The Euro is worthless, however - too many players are in too deep in the ponzi to want it to end.
We really haven't hit bottom yet. Unfortunately - the European crisis will slam world markets across several asset classes.
The Summits should be about how to get out of the currency trap, but they want their new found Federalism.
Kudos to Enda Kenny of Ireland - they stand opposed to a federal Europe. I believe Ireland could readily repatriate back to the GBP with litlle pain.
Here's the thing... the "Eurobond" name implies that the non issuing countries will bear some responsibility for repayment. Germany will be the cosigner to Italy and Greece. They should really change the name.
But this structure I'm proposing allows the issuing countries to exchange their sovereign debt for paper with no cashflow just as if they had gone back to the Drachma or Lira - only they haven't.
Best of all though is that it would no longer require them to do things which win the approval or the markets. The markets are a bathroom scale, but they want to eat all they want and still have it tell them that they're thin and beautiful. They ain't. But this will allow the leaders of Europe to order the pensioners to call them beautiful anyway.
Check out this Rube Goldberg machine: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ve4M4UsJQo
007.........Thanx..I needed a good chuckle this am..
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