You know the sad part to all this. I think we all want this to happen, but unfortunately, this will not touch Trump or his family or the other enablers. The people that will pay financially will be the American people. Because Trump doesn’t give one damn and never has. And when it does come down to that, I think the American people will all stand up in unison and say we’ve had enough. But I would say everyone of us want to see Trump and his family held financially for the they have done to this country.😡😡
The reason Trump can get away with his various world-domination adventures is the same reason Putin can continue his so-called “special operation” in Ukraine: the people back home are not bearing the cost. US Americans are not living with the existential risk and the associated fear. Many may recognize that the erratic, adolescent figure running their country is damaging the world, but they do not feel it in their daily lives. For them, it is an embarrassment, not a threat.
I absolutely don’t believe the US American public deserves this, but history has shown us that real resistance only emerges when the relevant people begin to experience the pain and insecurity themselves, and when they clearly connect that pain and fear to the actions of the person responsible. Only then do large numbers stand up to stop it - assuming they still can.
No, the Americans feel it every single day. We fill it in our jobs, we feel it in our homes, our paychecks, and when we go out to buy items. Many are homeless, many are broke. So yes, we do feel it. Our problem right now is that we have a Senate and Congress that is enabling all of this. So yes as somebody said yesterday, well then the Americans need to do an insurrection. That only feeds into what Trump wants to happen. He wants the American people to do that so he can put the military out on the streets. And then guess what happens. Then people can’t vote. So folks on the outside also have to understand what is truly going on in the inside here.
I get it. There are no simple answers but right now, public opinion in the US suggests the focus is primarily (and understandably) on strictly domestic issues. The fact that support for Ukraine has stopped and that the US is, effectively, supporting Russia’s position to acquire much of it (and their ongoing terror campaign targeting civilians, thousands of which are now freezing in the dark and not by accident), or that Trump is planning to take over an allied sovereign nation by force or plans to absorb another through economic coercion, or that he is ordering extra judicial killing at sea and killing civilians in Venezuela - these things do not register. Perhaps the internal turmoil is precisely so he can get away with his international adventures. Who knows. Trump still appears to have support where he needs it. I’m not that familiar with internal politics in the US but the fact that other politicians are not holding him to account implies that they do not feel the pressure from their constituents. I could be way off on all this. Not an expert.
I’m just sick of all of it. I mean for many of us our parents fought in World War II to fight. What’s going on in our country right now. I’m in my God, my dad went in at 17 years old to the army to fight this kind of stuff. It’s so disheartening. With Elon Musk getting involved again I can only think that they’re doing all of this because they know they don’t have the damn votes so they’re gonna do what they can to get those votes moved over. It’s horrifying. And what this SOB is doing in Minnesota I can guarantee he’s gonna do it every state. He does it here in Ohio. I’ll be out protesting like the rest of them. I think we’re just trying to figure out where the hell do we go from here? 🥺💔
As per Ukraine conceding your loss is not the same thing as supporting Russia. And the west has lost in Ukraine. As for terror campaigns and targeting civilians you should look to the US support and complicity in Gaza not Russia. Not to mention Trump has just made escalation in Ukraine the responsibility of the EU. US EU and NATO are those responsible as Russia was ready to sign a deal only months into the SMO. Who squelched it? Not Ukraine and not Russia but the west.
First, outcomes in war are not knowable in advance, and you don’t abandon a country because an aggressor gained marginal ground over a year. That’s a massively catastrophic decision based on speculation, not analysis.
Second, there is no factual basis for the claim that Ukraine was prepared to accept a peace proposal that was blocked by the EU or the West. That did not happen. The only terms Russia has shown interest in involve permanent territorial loss for Ukraine, enforced demilitarization, sanctions relief, and no accountability. Ukraine has rejected those terms, as any sovereign state would.
Finally, criticism of U.S. policy elsewhere does not change the basic fact that Russia is deliberately targeting civilians in Ukraine. That reality stands on its own.
On the narrower point: supporting Russia does not require sending it weapons. Advancing Russian objectives can just as effectively be done by cutting off Ukraine’s defence, promoting “peace” terms that mirror Moscow’s demands, declining to implement approved sanctions, and repeatedly legitimizing Russia’s leadership while undermining Ukraine’s. By that standard, the claim that Russia is not being supported simply doesn’t hold.
Reasonable people can debate strategy. But these specific claims don’t align with the record.
The aggressor was the west. Namely US UK EU and NATO. I'd also remind you it was a war of attrition not territorial gains. Nor was the territory gained marginal. In fact it's all the best bits of Ukraine. No e of which is speculation but fact. There is plenty of evidence and witness to the signing of a peace treaty in Instabul. Both from the Ukraine and Russian side. Ukraine has not been a sovereign state since 2014. When the powers that be decided it was going to be their proxy against Russia. As for civilians contrary to your assertions Russia has never targeted civilians going out of it’s way to avoid civilian casualties. That's Ukraine's modus operandi. Ignorance is forgivable but wilful ignorance is not. There's a reason they chose the poorest most corrupt country in Europe (also a fact)as a proxy.
I know you didn't vote for him, so many of you didn't. The fact is more Americans chose not to get out and vote, how tragic for your country. Wake up America and do whatever you can, fight the good fight. I'm thinking of all of you tomorrow, Jan 20th as you come together to peacefully protest this regime. Stay safe
That is not accurately stated. Because there were thousands of voter registrations and voting ballots that were dismissed and voided in the red states. And what pissed the majority of us off is that nobody fought for those. So yes, our government absolutely let the American people down. But folks should not combine all of us into one lump sum that we voted for this SOB. And then on top of that we had Elon Musk and all of his BS. And now Musk is going to do the same in the 2026 election elections. Guaranteed. And then you think, why would Elon Musk be involved in all of this? Again. Why? More than likely to help tamper with the votes again.
No we did not vote this moron into office. And I guarantee you’re down the line. They will find out that it was Harris that actually won. 😑
All folks have to do is look at when Harrison waltz were holding their rallies and the thousands upon thousands of people that were there. Then you switch over and look at the rallies for Trump. That tells you all you need to know. It wasn’t that people didn’t go out and vote. It was because votes were discounted.
Trumplethinskin has brazenly admitted in his inaugural address that Musk's tinkering with the vote swung it his way. Subsequent research has revealed that the Big Tech moguls tossed millions of Harris votes. Yes, this election WAS stolen by the creep who has never acquired a thing honestly in his whole rotten life.
This administration and its broligarchs want to switch to cryptocurrency and get rid of the dollar. I want them to be so financially devastated that none of that can happen. They should never be allowed to do anything in Greenland. I’d love to see them stripped of their wealth just like they’re trying to do to all of us in the United States.
European nations collectively only hold about $3T of US debt. Not sure about other assets outside of treasury debt. About $8T of US debt is held by all non-US entities. In any event, $3T is enough to cause a major global shock if all European nations tried to sell off their debt holdings at one time. Bond prices would plummet & yields would skyrocket. That would hurt both the US and the debt holders.
As SRC notes, it would hurt ordinary people. It would actually be harmful to both the US and Europe. I think hitting the tech companies and other targeted entities would be more effective and less destructive overall. I do see why anyone holding US debt would want to divest right now - especially in Europe.
I welcome any pushback that anyone does to the staggeringly corrupt and insane administration that my country somehow let happen. It cannot end soon enough.
I don't things will be getting better anytime soon. Be safe and kind to each other. When elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers - African Proverb.
Keep posting and educating us! I know nothing about international finance markets and this is really interesting. I'm very grateful to the European investors for standing shoulder to shoulder with all inhabitants, including The indigenous people of Greenland.
A lot of americans have taken a lot of actions, including contacting congress, writing strongly worded letters, getting sprayed in the face with tear gas, getting killed, and nothing seems to get through to this current administration. they only understand lining Their own pockets. Apparently, their thinking is quite dualistic, either something lines their pockets and should be done at all costs or it does not. It's like the K.I.S.S. Principle on steroids. Their policies ceased being about serving humanity the day they took office. But most people do not understand global financial markets. spell it out for us.
What happens if oligarchs here buy up the 3 trillion dumped by EU? They have so much money by that collectively they could cover it. Would that stabilize US economy? I'm assuming they could care less but I'm curious.
I think it very unlikely that US oligarchs would buy US debt for several reasons. First, private individuals or entities (i.e. not countries) would have to purchase with cash or very liquid assets that could be converted to cash. Most oligarchs are not going to have a lot of cash. Their assets are usually fully invested in stocks, land, fine art, homes, precious metals, etc. The oligarchs are looking for outsize returns. Debt instruments would not usually generate sufficient returns (absent buying at very deep discounts) for them. Further, that much debt into the market would likely cause the Fed to print money to absorb some of the debt as a defensive move. That would substantially increase US inflation.
If oligarchs want cash for some transaction, they would often use their asset holdings as collateral for a private banking loan. With the secured overnight financing rate at 3.66% as of now, they could probably get loan rates in the range of 4.5% to 5% or a bit higher. If they were to just sell the asset to raise cash, they might have to pay 24% to over 40% capital gains tax. It's much cheaper for them to take out a loan than pay the tax since a loan is not taxable income and the interest could likely be structured to be deductible. Part of why our tax system is so unfair to average wealth people compared to high wealth people.
So, I don't see oligarchs stepping up to soak up a large quantity of US debt that suddenly hit the market because it's subject to a big inflation hit, doesn't generate sufficient returns and it's unlikely that private banking would put up that much loan capital just for purchasing US debt.
Quite correct. Their net worth is a paper asset. It assumes they could sell all their holdings for the current market price. The assumption fails when one trìes to implement. On a large sale, the market value of their "assets" would drop like a stone.
Agree. Plus when they borrow against assets they transfer asset price risk and inflation risk to the creditor. Those creditors are often big banks who work to transfer their risk of loss to the public treasury (you and me). Until we get a Congress that actually represents all of the public instead of monied interests, nothing will change and it will get more hazardous for all of us who are not oligarchs.
A link to a long comment I made to a Robert Reich substack titled The reckoning.
This is very difficult to predict because the potential amounts are so large and unprecedented that the players might do several different things. Some nations could use a portion of the debt as leverage or a bargaining chip for trade concessions or swaps for other assets rather than just selling the debt outright and crashing the market. There is no way of knowing who would play this game and how it would play out. Think about a global game of musical chairs and nations scrambling to grab a decreasing number of chairs.
The Fed could start printing money to buy the debt put onto the market to prevent a total collapse of the debt markets. That would likely cause a steep rise in inflation and hurt the value of the dollar.
If that would cause too much pain, the US might try to create incentives for US holders to soak up some of the debt by US holders - essentially the Japan model where much of its debt is held internally rather than externally.
The US could also allow the dollar to deflate essentially making public debt worth less and not inconsequentially making everyone's dollar denominated financial assets worth less and making hard assets worth much more in dollars. Would also ramp up inflation.
It's also very likely that it would really hurt the dollar and accelerate the shift away from a dollar standard around the world to one or more other currencies. The only realistic candidates are the Euro or the Yuan. I think that would cause huge harm to the US in ways that would require a large paper to explore. It's unlikely that there would be one currency that took over. Far more likely that there would be different currencies depending on the regions and trading partners.
What this administration is doing internally to the rule of law, constitutional rights, etc. pales in comparison to the harm that it is doing to our worldwide reputation and the harm to future generations. I'm very unlikely to live long enough to see the harm being done right now even be partially repaired. I'm at the leading edge of the baby boom. The generations after me are going to take the brunt of the harm to come. I can only hope that younger generations will realize what is being done to them and take action before much longer.
How did we end up being "lead" by someone who doesn't understand economics, science, the law and the Constitution, or basic common sense? If the U.S. had actual leaders, this idiot running the country off a financial and moral cliff would have been impeached, removed, and perhaps jailed during his first stint in office. It isn't too late, but time has nearly run out. He is making the U.S. a fourth-world country, and I cannot blame intelligent world leaders for fighting back.
We elected every one of those so called leaders. I think we just got lazy, failed to learn from history, and have a lot of apathetic dvmb constituents. Surely, if we were smarter we would have figured a way out before we got to this point. Theres a lot of repairs we have to do.
European Union, please, bring it on. The criminal tRump Family must liquidate all their ill-gotten gains to repay the U.S. Treasury for what they have stolen. The Venezuelan oil money sitting in an off-shore account in Qatar must be held in escrow in the U.S. Treasury for the Venezuelan people. And by all means, please, attack the odious tech oligarchs. I am in my eighties and spend at least half of every day fighting this criminal, fascist regime. Thank you for helping people like me and millions of my fellow citizens as we oppose this madness that is unfortunately infecting the rest of the world.
Even though this will be a financial hit, I see no other carrots to dangle. When it hits the purse it will hurt, and get American citizens to wake the fuck up.
I hope Europe doesn’t “blink” and back off. Bring it on and let’s see what little Donnie and fancy pants do. Probably start crying and fancy pant’s mascara will run.
I am 77 and autism spectrum disordered. School was cruel and unusual punishment for me. I read Shakespeare and soiled my diapers and had a PHD vocabulary at 7 and failed Dick ,Jane and white picket fences. I read constantly. I took the buses to the library after school and my parents said I was allowed to read EVERYTHING. My father landed in New York in 1928 with a Jesuit High School diploma AND A PROFICIENCY IN Jewish RITUALS, BELIEFS AND HISTORY. My father spoke and read 10 languages including Polish, Yiddish, Russian, English, Ukrainian and Hebrew. My father told me 70 years ago what DNA from Columbus and son told us in 2024. Columbus was a goddamned Jew like us. Columbus was no Italian sailor, he was a western European fleeing a previous Roberts' Holy Roman Court of Inquisition. My mother's father was from the Russian Pale of Settlement and I met my great grandparents who had fled the Czar during the pogroms in Romania. School made no sense to me I was outside the normal spectrum of human behaviour known as autism which is the entire spectrum, everyone is autistic. I am high functioning Asperger's Syndrome like Elon the Nazi from Apartheid South Africa. We are all autistic even the comatose electorate of America.
Charlie Lindbergh and Henry Ford were Nazis and Adolph Hitler and Joseph Goebbels financed America First. The holocaust began in 1939 in Havana Cuba with the acquiescence of Roosevelt, Chamberlain, Mackenzie King, Pope Pius xii AND all of Europe, the British Empire and the Roman Catholiques in the Americas.
The only thing we need in Greenland is a prison with a golf course for Trump , Putin, Orban and Netanyahu and their minions in New York , Texas , Florida, Russia, Israel, Hungary and Canada. Woodie Guthrie wrote this land was made for you and me and the ballad of the Nazi Charlie Lindbergh and his Amerika first. "They say America First but they mean Amerikkka Next.
Please start with the tech oligarchs ; especially those whom flooded our politics with dark money and literally helped steal our election .
More importantly they have our personal data.
Turning off their propaganda machine is critical. Especially when a major international platform like TIK TOCK is poised to be scooped up by bad actors ( this time American ones) . You see they wanted their ridiculous tax breaks to continue. Average Americans are struggling financially so concurrently with taking down the corrupt leadership could you plan to send international aid for our 98 %.
Apparently there are billions to be given to bad people whom want to build internment camps here .
If you don’t stop these tech monopolies , we will never be free of their endless soulless extraction.
And while you’re at it could you please freeze all Trump family dollars as their wealth is not just ill gotten . It needs to be a primary accountability tool.
Thanks for this important piece. I do not believe in religion and do not pray....but I pray pray pray that the EU does not back done and moves forward with these actions. Our congress, our SCOTUS, both parties, and a painfully/depressingly large percentage of the American public have been content to sit by and let this authoritarian pig and his billionaire ass kissers and thuggish cabinet members progressively destroy American democracy.
WE should learn from the Europeans. We should emulate them and consider similar actions such as boycotting these corporations who support Trump. All they care about is the bottom line and what they can stash away so that is our weapon. If you have any doubts, look at Davos and how these billionaires/corporations are all there to kiss Trump''s ass.
You know the sad part to all this. I think we all want this to happen, but unfortunately, this will not touch Trump or his family or the other enablers. The people that will pay financially will be the American people. Because Trump doesn’t give one damn and never has. And when it does come down to that, I think the American people will all stand up in unison and say we’ve had enough. But I would say everyone of us want to see Trump and his family held financially for the they have done to this country.😡😡
100%. We need an American Spring! It's nice to know the EU knows the meaning of diplomacy. Trump doesn't have the power he thinks he does.
The reason Trump can get away with his various world-domination adventures is the same reason Putin can continue his so-called “special operation” in Ukraine: the people back home are not bearing the cost. US Americans are not living with the existential risk and the associated fear. Many may recognize that the erratic, adolescent figure running their country is damaging the world, but they do not feel it in their daily lives. For them, it is an embarrassment, not a threat.
I absolutely don’t believe the US American public deserves this, but history has shown us that real resistance only emerges when the relevant people begin to experience the pain and insecurity themselves, and when they clearly connect that pain and fear to the actions of the person responsible. Only then do large numbers stand up to stop it - assuming they still can.
No, the Americans feel it every single day. We fill it in our jobs, we feel it in our homes, our paychecks, and when we go out to buy items. Many are homeless, many are broke. So yes, we do feel it. Our problem right now is that we have a Senate and Congress that is enabling all of this. So yes as somebody said yesterday, well then the Americans need to do an insurrection. That only feeds into what Trump wants to happen. He wants the American people to do that so he can put the military out on the streets. And then guess what happens. Then people can’t vote. So folks on the outside also have to understand what is truly going on in the inside here.
I get it. There are no simple answers but right now, public opinion in the US suggests the focus is primarily (and understandably) on strictly domestic issues. The fact that support for Ukraine has stopped and that the US is, effectively, supporting Russia’s position to acquire much of it (and their ongoing terror campaign targeting civilians, thousands of which are now freezing in the dark and not by accident), or that Trump is planning to take over an allied sovereign nation by force or plans to absorb another through economic coercion, or that he is ordering extra judicial killing at sea and killing civilians in Venezuela - these things do not register. Perhaps the internal turmoil is precisely so he can get away with his international adventures. Who knows. Trump still appears to have support where he needs it. I’m not that familiar with internal politics in the US but the fact that other politicians are not holding him to account implies that they do not feel the pressure from their constituents. I could be way off on all this. Not an expert.
I’m just sick of all of it. I mean for many of us our parents fought in World War II to fight. What’s going on in our country right now. I’m in my God, my dad went in at 17 years old to the army to fight this kind of stuff. It’s so disheartening. With Elon Musk getting involved again I can only think that they’re doing all of this because they know they don’t have the damn votes so they’re gonna do what they can to get those votes moved over. It’s horrifying. And what this SOB is doing in Minnesota I can guarantee he’s gonna do it every state. He does it here in Ohio. I’ll be out protesting like the rest of them. I think we’re just trying to figure out where the hell do we go from here? 🥺💔
You got it sir. As an American, I will tell you that you are NOT way off.
As per Ukraine conceding your loss is not the same thing as supporting Russia. And the west has lost in Ukraine. As for terror campaigns and targeting civilians you should look to the US support and complicity in Gaza not Russia. Not to mention Trump has just made escalation in Ukraine the responsibility of the EU. US EU and NATO are those responsible as Russia was ready to sign a deal only months into the SMO. Who squelched it? Not Ukraine and not Russia but the west.
A few points, respectfully.
First, outcomes in war are not knowable in advance, and you don’t abandon a country because an aggressor gained marginal ground over a year. That’s a massively catastrophic decision based on speculation, not analysis.
Second, there is no factual basis for the claim that Ukraine was prepared to accept a peace proposal that was blocked by the EU or the West. That did not happen. The only terms Russia has shown interest in involve permanent territorial loss for Ukraine, enforced demilitarization, sanctions relief, and no accountability. Ukraine has rejected those terms, as any sovereign state would.
Finally, criticism of U.S. policy elsewhere does not change the basic fact that Russia is deliberately targeting civilians in Ukraine. That reality stands on its own.
On the narrower point: supporting Russia does not require sending it weapons. Advancing Russian objectives can just as effectively be done by cutting off Ukraine’s defence, promoting “peace” terms that mirror Moscow’s demands, declining to implement approved sanctions, and repeatedly legitimizing Russia’s leadership while undermining Ukraine’s. By that standard, the claim that Russia is not being supported simply doesn’t hold.
Reasonable people can debate strategy. But these specific claims don’t align with the record.
The aggressor was the west. Namely US UK EU and NATO. I'd also remind you it was a war of attrition not territorial gains. Nor was the territory gained marginal. In fact it's all the best bits of Ukraine. No e of which is speculation but fact. There is plenty of evidence and witness to the signing of a peace treaty in Instabul. Both from the Ukraine and Russian side. Ukraine has not been a sovereign state since 2014. When the powers that be decided it was going to be their proxy against Russia. As for civilians contrary to your assertions Russia has never targeted civilians going out of it’s way to avoid civilian casualties. That's Ukraine's modus operandi. Ignorance is forgivable but wilful ignorance is not. There's a reason they chose the poorest most corrupt country in Europe (also a fact)as a proxy.
I’m so glad to read this concise, insightful response, you summed it up better than I could.
I'm reminded of Mencken. Paraphrasing - "voters deserve to get what they want, good and hard"
But then, the American people elected him, or failed to not-elect him, so maybe the placement of this consequence is not so outrageous.
I didn't vote for him.
I know you didn't vote for him, so many of you didn't. The fact is more Americans chose not to get out and vote, how tragic for your country. Wake up America and do whatever you can, fight the good fight. I'm thinking of all of you tomorrow, Jan 20th as you come together to peacefully protest this regime. Stay safe
That is not accurately stated. Because there were thousands of voter registrations and voting ballots that were dismissed and voided in the red states. And what pissed the majority of us off is that nobody fought for those. So yes, our government absolutely let the American people down. But folks should not combine all of us into one lump sum that we voted for this SOB. And then on top of that we had Elon Musk and all of his BS. And now Musk is going to do the same in the 2026 election elections. Guaranteed. And then you think, why would Elon Musk be involved in all of this? Again. Why? More than likely to help tamper with the votes again.
No we did not vote this moron into office. And I guarantee you’re down the line. They will find out that it was Harris that actually won. 😑
All folks have to do is look at when Harrison waltz were holding their rallies and the thousands upon thousands of people that were there. Then you switch over and look at the rallies for Trump. That tells you all you need to know. It wasn’t that people didn’t go out and vote. It was because votes were discounted.
Trumplethinskin has brazenly admitted in his inaugural address that Musk's tinkering with the vote swung it his way. Subsequent research has revealed that the Big Tech moguls tossed millions of Harris votes. Yes, this election WAS stolen by the creep who has never acquired a thing honestly in his whole rotten life.
Political consequences are rarely personally placed and often not personally fair.
This administration and its broligarchs want to switch to cryptocurrency and get rid of the dollar. I want them to be so financially devastated that none of that can happen. They should never be allowed to do anything in Greenland. I’d love to see them stripped of their wealth just like they’re trying to do to all of us in the United States.
Take it all and use it for good all over the world. What they have could save humanity 100x over. It’s mind bending.
We’ve seen the TACO phenomenon previously when China and other Asian countries began selling Treasury bonds.
He is more unwell now and crazier than he has ever been.
I think Europe needs to do this at least partially and then ban major Rump backers from their countries for 10 years
European nations collectively only hold about $3T of US debt. Not sure about other assets outside of treasury debt. About $8T of US debt is held by all non-US entities. In any event, $3T is enough to cause a major global shock if all European nations tried to sell off their debt holdings at one time. Bond prices would plummet & yields would skyrocket. That would hurt both the US and the debt holders.
As SRC notes, it would hurt ordinary people. It would actually be harmful to both the US and Europe. I think hitting the tech companies and other targeted entities would be more effective and less destructive overall. I do see why anyone holding US debt would want to divest right now - especially in Europe.
Cory Doctorow has a good article on something that could be done to hit the big techs. https://pluralistic.net/2026/01/17/erin-lets-go/#circumvention-haven
I welcome any pushback that anyone does to the staggeringly corrupt and insane administration that my country somehow let happen. It cannot end soon enough.
For those interested, here's a link to a table of major foreign holders of treasury securities. https://ticdata.treasury.gov/resource-center/data-chart-center/tic/Documents/slt_table5.html
Danish pension fund AkademikerPension announced it will sell off its holding of U.S. Treasuries of about $100M. https://www.reuters.com/business/danish-pension-fund-divest-its-us-treasuries-2026-01-20/. Not significant overall but maybe an indicator since they stated the reason was "rooted in poor U.S. government finances."
I don't things will be getting better anytime soon. Be safe and kind to each other. When elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers - African Proverb.
Keep posting and educating us! I know nothing about international finance markets and this is really interesting. I'm very grateful to the European investors for standing shoulder to shoulder with all inhabitants, including The indigenous people of Greenland.
A lot of americans have taken a lot of actions, including contacting congress, writing strongly worded letters, getting sprayed in the face with tear gas, getting killed, and nothing seems to get through to this current administration. they only understand lining Their own pockets. Apparently, their thinking is quite dualistic, either something lines their pockets and should be done at all costs or it does not. It's like the K.I.S.S. Principle on steroids. Their policies ceased being about serving humanity the day they took office. But most people do not understand global financial markets. spell it out for us.
What happens if oligarchs here buy up the 3 trillion dumped by EU? They have so much money by that collectively they could cover it. Would that stabilize US economy? I'm assuming they could care less but I'm curious.
I think it very unlikely that US oligarchs would buy US debt for several reasons. First, private individuals or entities (i.e. not countries) would have to purchase with cash or very liquid assets that could be converted to cash. Most oligarchs are not going to have a lot of cash. Their assets are usually fully invested in stocks, land, fine art, homes, precious metals, etc. The oligarchs are looking for outsize returns. Debt instruments would not usually generate sufficient returns (absent buying at very deep discounts) for them. Further, that much debt into the market would likely cause the Fed to print money to absorb some of the debt as a defensive move. That would substantially increase US inflation.
If oligarchs want cash for some transaction, they would often use their asset holdings as collateral for a private banking loan. With the secured overnight financing rate at 3.66% as of now, they could probably get loan rates in the range of 4.5% to 5% or a bit higher. If they were to just sell the asset to raise cash, they might have to pay 24% to over 40% capital gains tax. It's much cheaper for them to take out a loan than pay the tax since a loan is not taxable income and the interest could likely be structured to be deductible. Part of why our tax system is so unfair to average wealth people compared to high wealth people.
So, I don't see oligarchs stepping up to soak up a large quantity of US debt that suddenly hit the market because it's subject to a big inflation hit, doesn't generate sufficient returns and it's unlikely that private banking would put up that much loan capital just for purchasing US debt.
Quite correct. Their net worth is a paper asset. It assumes they could sell all their holdings for the current market price. The assumption fails when one trìes to implement. On a large sale, the market value of their "assets" would drop like a stone.
Agree. Plus when they borrow against assets they transfer asset price risk and inflation risk to the creditor. Those creditors are often big banks who work to transfer their risk of loss to the public treasury (you and me). Until we get a Congress that actually represents all of the public instead of monied interests, nothing will change and it will get more hazardous for all of us who are not oligarchs.
A link to a long comment I made to a Robert Reich substack titled The reckoning.
https://substack.com/@jcooksv/note/c-192568239?utm_source=notes-share-action&r=79lih9
Thank you.
This is very difficult to predict because the potential amounts are so large and unprecedented that the players might do several different things. Some nations could use a portion of the debt as leverage or a bargaining chip for trade concessions or swaps for other assets rather than just selling the debt outright and crashing the market. There is no way of knowing who would play this game and how it would play out. Think about a global game of musical chairs and nations scrambling to grab a decreasing number of chairs.
The Fed could start printing money to buy the debt put onto the market to prevent a total collapse of the debt markets. That would likely cause a steep rise in inflation and hurt the value of the dollar.
If that would cause too much pain, the US might try to create incentives for US holders to soak up some of the debt by US holders - essentially the Japan model where much of its debt is held internally rather than externally.
The US could also allow the dollar to deflate essentially making public debt worth less and not inconsequentially making everyone's dollar denominated financial assets worth less and making hard assets worth much more in dollars. Would also ramp up inflation.
It's also very likely that it would really hurt the dollar and accelerate the shift away from a dollar standard around the world to one or more other currencies. The only realistic candidates are the Euro or the Yuan. I think that would cause huge harm to the US in ways that would require a large paper to explore. It's unlikely that there would be one currency that took over. Far more likely that there would be different currencies depending on the regions and trading partners.
What this administration is doing internally to the rule of law, constitutional rights, etc. pales in comparison to the harm that it is doing to our worldwide reputation and the harm to future generations. I'm very unlikely to live long enough to see the harm being done right now even be partially repaired. I'm at the leading edge of the baby boom. The generations after me are going to take the brunt of the harm to come. I can only hope that younger generations will realize what is being done to them and take action before much longer.
How did we end up being "lead" by someone who doesn't understand economics, science, the law and the Constitution, or basic common sense? If the U.S. had actual leaders, this idiot running the country off a financial and moral cliff would have been impeached, removed, and perhaps jailed during his first stint in office. It isn't too late, but time has nearly run out. He is making the U.S. a fourth-world country, and I cannot blame intelligent world leaders for fighting back.
We elected every one of those so called leaders. I think we just got lazy, failed to learn from history, and have a lot of apathetic dvmb constituents. Surely, if we were smarter we would have figured a way out before we got to this point. Theres a lot of repairs we have to do.
European Union, please, bring it on. The criminal tRump Family must liquidate all their ill-gotten gains to repay the U.S. Treasury for what they have stolen. The Venezuelan oil money sitting in an off-shore account in Qatar must be held in escrow in the U.S. Treasury for the Venezuelan people. And by all means, please, attack the odious tech oligarchs. I am in my eighties and spend at least half of every day fighting this criminal, fascist regime. Thank you for helping people like me and millions of my fellow citizens as we oppose this madness that is unfortunately infecting the rest of the world.
I am in my 70s and spend my time fighting also.
Even though this will be a financial hit, I see no other carrots to dangle. When it hits the purse it will hurt, and get American citizens to wake the fuck up.
Yes, the American people will get hurt disproportionately more than the broligarchs.
Yes, the Euro countries will get blamed.
But I say pull the pin. We're on the course of self-destruction. This is what it's going to take to change the trajectory.
Canada holds a significant amount of the debt as well
At this point, I'm just rooting for Europe to drag Trump down.
And I'm saying this as a very disgruntled American.
You are definitely not alone. 😉
Oh good
May it be so. The ripple effects will be bad, but better than the alternative
If our economy fails maybe there will be no more money for ICE agents. Win-win for EU and Lady Liberty.
I hope Europe doesn’t “blink” and back off. Bring it on and let’s see what little Donnie and fancy pants do. Probably start crying and fancy pant’s mascara will run.
I am 77 and autism spectrum disordered. School was cruel and unusual punishment for me. I read Shakespeare and soiled my diapers and had a PHD vocabulary at 7 and failed Dick ,Jane and white picket fences. I read constantly. I took the buses to the library after school and my parents said I was allowed to read EVERYTHING. My father landed in New York in 1928 with a Jesuit High School diploma AND A PROFICIENCY IN Jewish RITUALS, BELIEFS AND HISTORY. My father spoke and read 10 languages including Polish, Yiddish, Russian, English, Ukrainian and Hebrew. My father told me 70 years ago what DNA from Columbus and son told us in 2024. Columbus was a goddamned Jew like us. Columbus was no Italian sailor, he was a western European fleeing a previous Roberts' Holy Roman Court of Inquisition. My mother's father was from the Russian Pale of Settlement and I met my great grandparents who had fled the Czar during the pogroms in Romania. School made no sense to me I was outside the normal spectrum of human behaviour known as autism which is the entire spectrum, everyone is autistic. I am high functioning Asperger's Syndrome like Elon the Nazi from Apartheid South Africa. We are all autistic even the comatose electorate of America.
https://www.autisme.qc.ca/
Charlie Lindbergh and Henry Ford were Nazis and Adolph Hitler and Joseph Goebbels financed America First. The holocaust began in 1939 in Havana Cuba with the acquiescence of Roosevelt, Chamberlain, Mackenzie King, Pope Pius xii AND all of Europe, the British Empire and the Roman Catholiques in the Americas.
https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/voyage-of-the-st-louis
The only thing we need in Greenland is a prison with a golf course for Trump , Putin, Orban and Netanyahu and their minions in New York , Texas , Florida, Russia, Israel, Hungary and Canada. Woodie Guthrie wrote this land was made for you and me and the ballad of the Nazi Charlie Lindbergh and his Amerika first. "They say America First but they mean Amerikkka Next.
https://www.britannica.com/topic/America-First
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3cdqQ2BdgOA&list=RDBzLOTHciIKI&index=2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzLOTHciIKI&list=RDBzLOTHciIKI&start_radio=1
Please start with the tech oligarchs ; especially those whom flooded our politics with dark money and literally helped steal our election .
More importantly they have our personal data.
Turning off their propaganda machine is critical. Especially when a major international platform like TIK TOCK is poised to be scooped up by bad actors ( this time American ones) . You see they wanted their ridiculous tax breaks to continue. Average Americans are struggling financially so concurrently with taking down the corrupt leadership could you plan to send international aid for our 98 %.
Apparently there are billions to be given to bad people whom want to build internment camps here .
If you don’t stop these tech monopolies , we will never be free of their endless soulless extraction.
And while you’re at it could you please freeze all Trump family dollars as their wealth is not just ill gotten . It needs to be a primary accountability tool.
Thanks for this important piece. I do not believe in religion and do not pray....but I pray pray pray that the EU does not back done and moves forward with these actions. Our congress, our SCOTUS, both parties, and a painfully/depressingly large percentage of the American public have been content to sit by and let this authoritarian pig and his billionaire ass kissers and thuggish cabinet members progressively destroy American democracy.
WE should learn from the Europeans. We should emulate them and consider similar actions such as boycotting these corporations who support Trump. All they care about is the bottom line and what they can stash away so that is our weapon. If you have any doubts, look at Davos and how these billionaires/corporations are all there to kiss Trump''s ass.