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Bush's Fault?

Mike

Well-known member
Taking money from depositors savings accounts sounds drastic, and is. In fact, the idea of seizing of 401k's has been floated here.

Poor Bush, he has caused chaos throughout the world?

(Reuters) - Cyprus's parliament has postponed until Monday an emergency session to vote on a levy on bank deposits after signs that lawmakers might block the surprise move agreed in Brussels to help fund a bailout and avert national bankruptcy.

In a radical departure from previous aid packages, euro zone finance ministers want Cyprus savers to forfeit up to 9.9 percent of their deposits in return for a 10 billion euro ($13 billion) bailout to the island, which has been financially crippled by its exposure to neighboring Greece.

The decision, announced on Saturday morning, stunned Cypriots and caused a run on cashpoints, most of which were depleted within hours. Electronic transfers were stopped.
 

Mike

Well-known member
(Reuters) - Europeans' faith in the safety of their savings has been shaken by a levy on Cypriot bank deposits to pay for a bailout, even though there was no sign of a rush to withdraw cash in Madrid or Dublin.

People told Reuters they were angered but unsurprised that politicians should dip into citizens' deposits. And as bankers expressed concern the proposed terms of Cyprus's bailout could unnerve savers elsewhere, some leftist leaders voiced outrage.

Euro zone finance ministers want Cypriots to pay up to 9.9 percent of their deposits in return for a 10 billion euro ($13 billion) aid package. If approved by the island's parliament on Monday, it will be the first time savers have had to foot part of the bill for a European bailout.

"What they did to the Cypriots was a disgrace," said Maria Spyrou, 57-year-old Athens housewife who says she must support a daughter, a nurse, who hasn't been paid for nine months.

"We won't pull our money from the bank here," she said. "In Greece, they have found other ways to rob us, more ingenious and sly ways -- with fuel taxes, property poll taxes, you name it."

The chief of Greece's main opposition, anti-bailout Syriza party, leftist Alexis Tsipras, blamed the move on German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

"We must all together raise a shield to protect the peoples (of Europe) from Ms Merkel's criminal strategy," said Tsipras, who wants a pan-European debt conference to forgive debt.

In Lisbon, Joao Semedo, leader of Left Bloc, one of the country's smaller left-wing parties, warned Portuguese deposits would be at risk if European creditors insist on more austerity.

"The Portuguese government will not hesitate in resorting to bank deposits," said Semedo.

Greece and Portugal, like Ireland and Spain, have received European aid to shore up their economies, in return for painful cuts to spending and tax hikes.

In northern European countries, concerned at how much they might have to pay for bailing out indebted states, there was little sign of anxiety on Sunday. Finnish Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen said the levy was fair.

European officials have been at pains to stress that Cyprus is a special case - with terms not applicable to other bailouts because of the size of Cyprus's banking sector and its large foreign deposits.

NO SAVINGS TO WITHDRAW

But in Madrid, Ana Garcia, a 62-year-old worker at a mental health centre who was attending a protest against the privatization of the health service on Sunday, thought Spaniards could also face a hit on their savings.

"European countries are very calm thinking it could never happen to them. But we'll all get involved sooner or later," said Garcia, who added she had no savings to take out of the bank even if she wanted to.

News of Cyprus's bailout added anxiety to St Patrick's Day celebrations in Dublin.

"It's outrageous" said Carmel Madden, an Irish 54-year-old former businesswoman. The news from Cyprus made her worry about holding proceeds from a house sale on deposit in a local bank.

"I'm more concerned now than I was eight months ago when I sold the house. I just don't know where my money would be safe."

She said she was not planning any withdrawal in the short term, mainly because she had not found a less risky alternative.

Despite the assurances that Cyprus is an exception, the tax on bank deposits risks unnerving savers elsewhere in Europe, according to the chief executive of one Greek bank.

"It's an extreme move, Cyprus may be a tiny state but this will injure the fragile sentiment in the euro zone's south," said the banker, who declined to be named.

Another senior Greek banker said: "What timing, just when the crisis seemed to be stabilizing. How can savers not worry that this may happen again elsewhere as part of bailouts?"

In Italy, where media and political parties are focused on the quagmire following last month's deadlocked election and support for an anti-establishment party has soared, many turned to social media to express their concerns.

"After Cyprus I suggest we find a way to protect our savings from possible forced levies ... the solutions exist!!," read a tweet by Giovanni Cuniberti, independent financial analyst and lecturer at the University of Turin.
 

Mike

Well-known member
Europe is going to start crumbling one country at a time...............

The great EU bank robbery: British taxpayers to bail out victims of outrageous raid
British Government will reimburse military victims of EU's Cyprus cash grab
But 60,000 other Britons still face losing money after bail out
Chaos as banks empty cashpoints and ban online transfers
Bank tax could have repercussions across Eurozone and beyond
By JAMES CHAPMAN and KEITH GLADDIS
PUBLISHED: 18:00 EST, 17 March 2013 | UPDATED: 18:49 EST, 17 March 2013
Comments (167)
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UK taxpayers will have to compensate thousands of Britons hit by a shock raid on bank accounts in Cyprus.
The debt-stricken island, which is home to around 3,000 British military personnel and civil servants, is being given an £8.7billion EU rescue package.
But – in a move condemned as ‘robbery’ – Germany says it will not fund the emergency deal unless every saver with a deposit account contributes via a bank tax.
Account holders will lose 9.9 per cent of all deposits over 100,000 euros (£85,000), with a 6.75 per cent levy on smaller amounts.

Exposure: German Chancellor Angela Merkel says Cypriot banks must help pay for the bail out, but Britons have an estimated £1.7billion in Cyprus's banks, exposing them to a potential levy of at least £115million
George Osborne said last night the Treasury will help out military staff and officials. But it is thought 60,000 other Britons, including holiday homeowners and expats, will lose out.
They are thought to have about £1.7billion in Cyprus’s banks – exposing them to a potential levy of at least £115million – or an average of £1,900 each. In yet another eurozone crisis:
Cypriot banks banned online transfers and emptied cashpoints to stop withdrawals;
The levy could be automatically taken from accounts as early as Wednesday;
British tourists were told to ensure they had multiple sources of money;
The chief minister of the euro area refused to rule out similar levies elsewhere;
Analysts said the raid could fall foul of the European Convention on Human Rights;
Traders are braced for turbulence on international stock markets today.
In response to cries of outrage, Cypriot president Nicos Anastasiades was last night trying to amend the bailout tax to limit the pain for small depositors.
But Angela Merkel insisted it was right that all depositors in Cypriot banks should share the responsibility of bailing out the state.

More...
Osborne vows to protect Britain's armed forces in Cyprus as cash machines are EMPTIED and 60,000 British savers face losing millions in 10% bank account tax
SIMON WATKINS: Taking money from ordinary Cyprus savers is madness - euro chiefs will rue this outrage
Savers to take a hit on their deposits as Cypus becomes fifth country to receive eurozone bailout
Addressing an election rally, the German chancellor insisted: ‘Anyone having their money in Cypriot banks must contribute in the Cypriot bailout. That way those responsible will contribute in it, not only the taxpayers of other countries, and that is what’s right.’

Pressure: Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades is trying to rally support, but if he can't the country may crash out of the single currency
But economists warned the move would fatally undermine confidence in the safety of money being held in banks in other countries, risking bank runs across the eurozone.
And there was uproar in Cyprus, where furious residents attempted to smash into banks closed for a long bank holiday weekend using JCBs.
Fiona Mullen, a British economist living on Cyprus, said: ‘We knew there was a possibility they would take the deposits above the insured threshold – so above 100,000 euros – but nobody thought they would take it down to someone with five euros in the bank.
'TAKE MULTIPLE MONEY SOURCES'
Tourists travelling to Cyprus have been told to ensure they have access to multiple sources of money.
The Foreign Office last night changed the travel advice section on its website in light of the financial chaos.
Britons are advised not to rely on credit or debit cards alone, as locals queue at cashpoints to empty their accounts, but also to take cash in combinations of euros and sterling.
One million British tourists visited Cyprus last year – half of all foreign visitors.
Tourist spending from Britons alone makes up 5 per cent of the Cypriot gross domestic product.
‘I was trying to take money out of the ATM but I couldn’t.’
David Symonds, another expat, predicted violence when banks reopened: ‘Tempers could get frayed. Those frayed tempers could well lead to violence.’
Amid mounting chaos, the Cypriot parliament postponed a vote approving the deal and was reported to have announced a further bank holiday on Tuesday – and possibly another on Wednesday – to keep banks closed.
Mr Anastasiades needs to get the legislation ratifying the deal through parliament before banks reopen or face a run on accounts.
But the scale of revolt against among MPs has thrown his efforts into disarray. If the government cannot win support for the package, the country is expected to crash out of the single currency.
Archbishop Chrysostomos, the country’s religious leader and a former government supporter, was reported to have called for calm, but insisted Cypriots would never forget Europe’s behaviour. In his Sunday sermon, he thundered: ‘This is a villainy of Europeans. Cyprus must as soon as possible leave the eurozone.’
Mr Osborne said that because David Cameron had extracted Britain from an EU fund agreed by Labour, British taxpayers would be spared a huge bill.
But the Chancellor said the UK Treasury would reimburse military and government personnel with money in Cyprus banks.
Britain has military bases on the island with a sizeable presence, and the bill to taxpayers will run into hundreds of thousands of pounds.
‘Anyone doing their duty for our country in Cyprus will be protected from this bank tax,’ Mr Osborne said.
But the rest of the 60,000 British citizens with money there will lose out.

A gathering storm: Banker Sebastien Galy said the move could be the 'trigger' for a new eurozone crisis
‘That is an example in Cyprus of what happens if you don’t show the world that you can pay your way.
'That is why in Britain we’ve got to retain the confidence of world markets,’ the Chancellor said.
‘It is an extraordinary situation, but frankly – and I remember talking about Greece – and since then we had Ireland and Portugal, problems in Spain, problems in Italy, now in Cyprus.
‘Anyone who thinks that Britain is alone in having these challenges should look on their TV screens, look at tonight’s news, realise that it’s a very tough economic situation out there.
‘And unless we in Britain front up to our own problems – the problems in our banking system, the problems that we’re borrowing so much money, the problems that actually our businesses need more help to create jobs - if we don’t do those things then the difficult economic situation in Britain will get very much worse.’
UKIP leader Nigel Farage said British taxpayers were being asked to pay for a ‘disgraceful euro-larceny’. ‘Outrage is a word overused in political debate, but hardly covers this,’ he added.
THIS COULD CAUSE A MONETARY TSUNAMI... WILL ITALY OR SPAIN BE NEXT?
Alex Brummer's ANALYSIS
Until now it was felt that however bad the crisis in the euro area became, governments would move heaven and earth to protect ordinary bank depositors.
Over the weekend that Rubicon was crossed, as policymakers imposed an immediate tax on all deposits held in Cyprus, as part of a rescue package for the island’s failing economy.
This brutal decision by euroland finance ministers and the International Monetary Fund threatened a run on the whole financial system as depositors rushed to try to get their money out.
And the reverberations could reach beyond further Cyprus to hard-pressed euroland countries including Italy and Spain.


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2294971/The-great-EU-bank-robbery-British-taxpayers-bail-victims-outrageous-raid.html#ixzz2Nqt84VdK
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
 

Steve

Well-known member
maybe the title should have been... Cyprus outraged by shortage of depends, as depends costs escalate the poor storm banks..


the implications of this will not hit US directly at first... but it may topple the EU.. this story may not effect US today.. but it will be interesting to watch

with most of the funds being from Russia.. the tax the rich foreigner seemed to tempting for the emerging socialist EU.. :?

It will be funny to see how capitalist leaning Russia slaps the commie tactics of the EU... :p
 

Traveler

Well-known member
If we end up under total Democrat control in the next few years, I totally expect a run at 401s to fund unfunded/underfunded union pensions....with a promise of an IOU.
 

Steve

Well-known member
Traveler said:
If we end up under total Democrat control in the next few years, I totally expect a run at 401s to fund unfunded/underfunded union pensions....with a promise of an IOU.

I doubt there will be an IOU,.. just a tax,.. and a claim of how it is someone else's fault..
 

Steve

Well-known member
hypocritexposer said:
You guys and your NWO conspiracy theories. :?

yep,.. and OT is rolling in the cash now that depends are getting sold in the black markets in Cyprus.. cause those citizens (and rich Russians) are wettin em big time now... :? :p :shock:




hopefully he has his ill gotten proceeds from that stock stashed under a mattress, so the EU doesn't take it as well..
 

hypocritexposer

Well-known member
Steve said:
hypocritexposer said:
You guys and your NWO conspiracy theories. :?

yep,.. and OT is rolling in the cash now that depends are getting sold in the black markets in Cyprus.. cause those citizens (and rich Russians) are wettin em big time now... :? :p :shock:




hopefully he has his ill gotten proceeds from that stock stashed under a mattress, so the EU doesn't take it as well..


It's only the "rich" that the socialist elites are after :lol: :lol:
 

Steve

Well-known member
hypocritexposer said:
Steve said:
hypocritexposer said:
You guys and your NWO conspiracy theories. :?

yep,.. and OT is rolling in the cash now that depends are getting sold in the black markets in Cyprus.. cause those citizens (and rich Russians) are wettin em big time now... :? :p :shock:




hopefully he has his ill gotten proceeds from that stock stashed under a mattress, so the EU doesn't take it as well..


It's only the "rich" that the socialist elites are after :lol: :lol:

no,.. they just want more from the rich,.. but are taking some from all who have any savings.
 
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