Topic: Weidmann warns of currency war risk (Read 2411 times)

http://www.businessinsider.com/bill-gates-the-global-currency-war-is-whats-causing-companies-to-sit-on-their-massive-piles-of-cash-2013-2#ixzz2JxHYAMfA

A well-informed individual can be much more effective than a crowd. An informed funding market -- well, what is that? In the end, the person who makes the decision is a vital part of just that market, and his power to make the decision lies in money. How rare a good decision-maker is, as well as how often he gets to the position to use this knowledge, determines his value in such a market. That's not so different from what an investment banker does.




Again, I find it important to distinguish those who mess with money supply or use other underhanded tricks! Someone who does investment in a large, liquid market should have very little control over money supply. The problems come up when "too big to fail" aka monopolies, governments and corruption comes into play.

We live on a planet with over 7.000.000.000 people on it. Someone has to make big, and sometimes experimental, decisions. I would very much prefer if that's not only governments and their stupid games.




Those are clear examples of playing dirty. We should jail the people who do such things; the last thing we need is continued dishonesty by those who set the benchmarks. Though, in the case of bailed-out bond speculations, the politicians should be locked up first. They're the cause, tempting and pushing the banks to play along. Banks who don't play get a disadvantage against those who do; a horrible incentive system that breeds lies and corruption.

I'm just as angry at Libor, the bail-outs, the money printing, the central banks' bond buying and all those other ways of defrauding the general public. But I believe that the root of the problem stems from politics, rather than from the structure of the banking system. (Except for the central banks -- but I guess that's a given since we're on Bitcointalk. )

the 99% are not asking for free handouts.  they're just asking for a level playing field aka sound money.  that's all i'm asking for and i'm part of the 1%; just not in the corrupt banking industry and thus i've earned my status thru plain old hard work.

as to the part about what Vandroiy claims are transparent auctions?  talk to me about Libor manipulation.  it's a base rate that affects ALL other bond auctions and interest rates.  this corruption is what allows ALL bankers, honest or not, to make outrageous amounts of money on IB deals and whatnot.  

as i said before, no one else in society can attain those levels of income b/c they aren't inside this fraudulent system that allows them to borrow at 0% or get their bad highly speculative bond deals bailed out thru monetization.

is that all there is gonna be?

+21,000,000

the problem with your answer is that it has made you and every honest banker out there believe that billion dollar deals are "normal" and that 100 million dollar paydays are "normal" for an investment banker deal.  that's ridiculous.  b/c of the systemic corruption from the fact that the banking industry in general has gotten hold of the printing presses in every country doesn't make huge payoffs for even the honest bankers sustainable or fair compared to the menial salaries for say what a doctor or lawyer make in comparison.  it used to be the other way around and i would argue those 2 professions create just as much or more value for their patients or clients as an investment banker.

this control of the money supply is precisely why a millionaire is no big deal anymore; a billionaire is the new "normal"; at least for a bankster.  even the honest ones.  those types of payoffs are unreachable for anyone else in society.

While your example might have applied in the past (and this is in itself a morally charged debate), where is the value creation today in the age of crowdfunding & open everything?  What does he do that the crowd and an efficiently informed funding market cannot?

This is not responding to the point of my post.

There exist bankers who do produce enormous amounts of value. Take an investment banker who makes the correct decision as to where to allocate a billion dollars. Say the company he allocated it to has a production efficiency 30% above average, and any commonly available system would have selected a company with "just" normal efficiency.

The banker in effect created productivity equivalent to the value of 300.000.000 dollars! Even if he gets paid a hundred million for it, that's still a damn good deal for everyone.

We can go into detail as to why such things can happen and how often they should happen, but that's statistics and should not affect how we see the moral issue. It's also not something for anyone to judge on a whim; we'd need a rigorous model which nobody might have yet.

Again: please distinguish between bankers who just do their jobs and those who actually cheat their way to other peoples' money! Earning a lot of money does NOT equal being an evil person or being harmful to society, because trade and investment are NOT zero-sum games. People who don't make that distinction just aim for stealing from the wealthy and sharing the loot. That's immoral, and very damaging to society.

Just go hit on the central bankers who print too much money and even buy government debt with it. And on those who got ties to politics and take "bail-outs" tailored for their poor little special bank. THAT is immoral.

Given the amount of money they "earn" vs the amount of value they produce, it's ridiculous they havent been strung up in the streets decades ago. Ignorance of the masses is the only thing stopping this occurring today.

Why is it that everyone correctly talks about the wrongs of money printing and central banks, but then accuses all bankers in general?

Some of them are hard-working people doing a productive job. I'd prefer it if we keep the angry comments aimed at the ones who cheat by printing money, spreading misleading information or engaging in corruption. It might not be good to take a stance like "we are the 99%, so now we demand money from whoever has more of it than we do". I agree many rich people got their money through questionable means like constructing monopolies or lobbying with politics. Yet there are those who did no such things. They have a right to do whatever they want with whatever absurd sums they control -- because they earned that money in fair trade and that's that. (Also, history shows that punishing people for performing extraordinarily is no good strategy.)

The money supply is handled through transparent auctions in most places, so it's fair to say that "normal" bankers can predict inflation no better than any other trader. I don't see a fundamental flaw apart from the central banks' insane bond buying and excessive tendency toward inflation. The other problems stem from corruption and bureaucracy, so that's part of the more general problem of defunct politics.

And I don't get the inter-country inflation competition. How does that solve anything? People can export more to get devalued money in return? Great plan.

anyone remember when Zimbabwe stock market was the best performing market on the planet   

Independence means power, and with that huge power comes corruption, no one can do anything about the corruptions with bankers. The inflation target is a joke, CPI never count the things the bankers buy, they first feed themselves with printed money and then control the CPI through other means

By this way, a food chain with the central banks stay at the top established, as long as they do not abuse this power, they stay in control. They enslave people, and people trying hard to invent machines to counter this slavery. But the day will come eventually that people realize that bankers are the biggest parasite of the society

Good to hear, US is running the show still.

I, fancy_pants, trolled the financial times currency wars article with the following: 

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fancy_pants | January 22 2:52am
Bitcoin solves the inflation problem described in this article but with a market cap/float/whatever-you-call-it just under 200 million USD, most professionals probably can't use it for anything other than a personal safe haven currency.
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I would very much like to sound more professional the next time.  Anyone care to rewrite this?  I think the only good part is "safe haven currency".

Lol, that should be a cake party, not a dinner!

Central baker's... now that's an idea I could support.  Free cake for everybody!

It doesn't necessarily need to be tax free.  As mentioned above the tax deduction can be paid in fiat with the remainder paid in Bitcoin.  Not the long-term solution but it protects the employees from half of the double-whammy income tax and inflation.

Excellent reading on this subject: Currency Wars by James Rickards

Radical? Sensible, you mean!

Sadly, I doubt we will be seeing too many employers paying out hard-money tax-free salaries any time soon. But you never know, they could secretly be doing it already.

Genius, thank you!