How does the island of Cyprus in the Mediterranean Sea get vaulted into international headlines in the past few weeks of March 2013. Moody’s downgrade was in January 2013. In November 2012, Germany intelligence warned about KGB money in Cyprus banks. June 2012? Why now? Why Cyprus?
Insolvency? Not in the same league as the largest insolvent member banks of the Federal Reserve Bank and European Central Bank. Money laundering? A United Kingdom fund manager, William Browder of Hermitage Capital warned Germany (Reuters, Mar 27, 2013) of KGB money laundering in Cyprus banks. The extent of laundering is unknown, but for reference, London’s HSBC – Europe’s largest bank – laundered $250 billion from 2001-2007 but is “sorry” for aiding drugs lords, rogue states and terrorists. Wells Fargo-Wachovia laundered $378.4 billion for cocaine drug lords from 2004-2007. Some others.
Cyprus resembles a trial run (attempted on lot of Russian money) of the new “bail in” bank bail-out scheme outlined in a joint paper by the FDIC and Bank of England in December 2012 titled, “Resolving Globally Active, Systemically Important, Financial Institutions”. Deposit insurance is becoming a thing of the past (FDIC insurer has been in a state of insufficient funds at least since 2010 with transfusions from the Federal Reserve printer), as bank depositors-savers are now considered unsecured creditors to banks. For instance, this means in the event of a bank failure, reported as of March 30, 2013 Bank of Cyprus big depositors (over 100,000 euros or US $130,000) could lose up to 60% of their money in an EU-IMF restructuring.
Cyprus. Greece. Italy. Spain. Portugal. Ireland,… RUN. Leave the euro. It is a trap.
There is not much that is made visible, except for Cyprus’s proximity to Syria and Turkey where NATO and Russia have been stockpiling missiles. It is almost as if one were spectator to Zbigniew Brzezinski and company’s (Henry Kissinger, Rockefeller – the Chase part of JP Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, etc.) Grand Chessboard moves on the European continent, that incidentally, is a block of real estate adjoining Russia and China.
For a moment, let’s look at the plight of Hermitage Capital’s William Browder who warned Germany. Russia banned Browder from entering the country since 2005 (WSJ Mar 18, 2006), but he is on trial in absentia on tax evasion charges. On March 5, 2013 (Bloomberg), Russia opened a case against Hermitage Capital for illegally purchasing 131.6 million shares in Russia’s Gazprom for about 2.1 billion rubles ($70 million) at a time when foreign ownership of the world’s biggest natural-gas producer was prohibited; Browder said buying Gazprom shares through “derivative structures” was “perfectly legal”. Back in 2008, the WSJ reported Kameya, an investment vehicle on Cyprus linked to Hermitage, figured in a “gray scheme” that allowed foreign investors to get around the restrictions.
In 2009, Browder wrote a tribute “They Killed My Lawyer [Sergei Magnitsky died in a Moscow prison]” decrying Russia’s lack of rule of law, which was published in Foreign Policy (Dec. 22), whose CEO and chief editor David Rothkopf is former managing director of Kissinger Associates. In 2006, the Washington Post reported (July 13) three U.S. Senators (J.McCain, B.Frist, C.Schumer) wrote a letter to 43rd President G.W. Bush to take Browder’s – a British citizen with ties to the President and Prime Minister Tony Blair – case to Moscow as some U.S. investors had $1 billion in Hermitage, to set an example for rule of law. (Khodorkovsky’s similar plight on his purchase of Russia’s Yukos Oil and Bush (41st) is in the upcoming Part II ideological subversion of the United States.)
Browder and Edmond Safra founded Hermitage Capital Management in 1996 (WSJ Jul 13, 2006) and to 2005 was among the biggest foreign investors in Russia. Safra founded the Republic National Bank of New York (known as a gold bullion house, currency dealer) and Safra Republic Holdings of Luxembourg. Safra sold both to London’s HSBC for nearly $10 billion before his death on December 3, 1999. Safra’s murder from an arson in his Monaco house remains shrouded in mystery that extended to much of his bank dealings. Henry Kissinger’s comments upon Safra’s death (WSJ Dec. 6, 1999) are rather interesting given they were personal friends for 20 years. Denials of Safra’s Republic Bank alleged links to drug money laundering, the Iran-contra affair, CIA operations accompany suggestions Republic laundered Russian money.
On March 13, 2013, Russian journalists reported Safra was planning to give testimony to the FBI when Safra was killed. The bureau was investigating the fate of the stabilization credit that the IMF extended to Russia in 1998, which vanished from accounts at Safra’s bank at a time when Browder’s Hermitage Capital turned up significant sums of money to buy Gazprom shares. On March 26, 2013, HSBC (Hermitage Capital’s trustee) shut down Hermitage Fund(link) as Browder is sued in London and Russian investigators threaten to seize documents from HSBC in Moscow.
[One of Republic’s largest customers was Martin Armstrong, accused of using his accounts, which represented 90% of Republic’s securities business, to defraud Japanese investors of $1 billion, described as Ponzi (USA Today Nov 21, 2001); HSBC settled. Questions remain about how much Republic knew. In a telemarketing scheme thousands of investors, many elderly, were persuaded into purchasing commodities (gold, platinum, etc.) with a 20% cash downpayment as SafraBank financed the remaining through a Texas subsidiary what came to be over 10,000 precious metals loans. Investors had no idea what they purchased in the 1980s was an OTC derivative and lost millions; in 1992, Republic settled some lawsuits.]
Leave the Euro
It is a trap. It is like telling people to go back inside a burning building. Cyprus. Greece. Spain. Italy. Portugal. Germany …and other nations in line to join the euro. Run. Walk away from it. Leave the euro with what is left of your nation’s wealth and sovereignty, if sovereignty is what you value. One can ponder the thought as a few months ago, the IMF sees the European banks face $4.5 trillion sell-off of assets (yours and the nation’s assets in exchange for printed money that was lent to you). In 2005 when the Dominican Republic suffered an economic collapse, the New York Observer (Dec 25, 2005) reported the IMF forced the country’s central bank to sell 2,000 acres of prime beachfront to a group of “20 American luminaries” – financiers, intellectuals – to “vacation, play golf and bask in the glow” of each other. The same has been done to the people in the United States. But consider a plan much bigger.
Consider that what was put forth to the people – the euro – as an integration of the European economy is subverted to control over the European Continue reading
