Preparedness for when

GreyQueen

Frugalsod wrote: »

I heard that the reason for the sale was that a London bullion bank had massive losses on bullion trades and this was the reason for the sale of said bullion to bail the bank out. So nothing to do with mismanagement by the government.

It is not the responsibility of the government to bail out a private bullion bank using part of the national gold reserves. They are temporarily the custodians of those reserves, not their owners. And, if you want to get a good price for something, you do not announce ahead of time that you are going to be selling X amount of it; they crashed the market to very low levels, what has been dubbed the 'Brown bottom'.

They could have released the gold into the market slowly but steadily without depressing the price. Bad enough that they've flogged a chunk of the nation's assets, but that they did it so badly and sold so low, is only explicable if they were corrupt as well as incompetant. Hence I consider a charge of treason reasonable.

Not that it'll ever happen.

Frugalsod

GreyQueen wrote: »

It is not the responsibility of the government to bail out a private bullion bank using part of the national gold reserves. They are temporarily the custodians of those reserves, not their owners. And, if you want to get a good price for something, you do not announce ahead of time that you are going to be selling X amount of it; they crashed the market to very low levels, what has been dubbed the 'Brown bottom'.

They could have released the gold into the market slowly but steadily without depressing the price. Bad enough that they've flogged a chunk of the nation's assets, but that they did it so badly and sold so low, is only explicable if they were corrupt as well as incompetant. Hence I consider a charge of treason reasonable.

Not that it'll ever happen.

The reason they bailed them out was that it would have damaged London's reputation as a financial centre. Also the gold was already sold and the bullion bank were unable to deliver. Dumping the gold that way would have allowed the bank to buy in the open market at cover their position.

GreyQueen

So the den of thieves which is London's financial sector has to have their reputaion shored up, instead of some of them taking a fall? The bullion bank shouldn't have been dealing in things they could not deliver. If you, I, or A.N.Other Ltd try to sell things we don't own, we're committing fraud. If we try to sell things we've already sold to other people, that's fraud. If we try to sell the same things to several different people at the same time, that's fraud.

Can't for the life of me see why it's the business of a nation's government to flog of part of a nation's assets to stop a private institution being caught in fraudulent activiites, and to protect the reputation of other private institutions trading in its capitol city.

1Tonsil

As far as I know the rule about being able to take deposits for a bail in at the banks only applies to countries in the euro now.

1Tonsil

Frugalsod wrote: »

It will be just Greece, each nation will have its own rules. The fact that there is a deposit guarantee limit does not mean that it will be adhered to in a crisis or especially a bail in. Though to be honest I doubt that the politicians have even thought this through when they signed it into law. They probably do not think it will actually happen in their country.

Most of the countries in the EURO had to sign this or face the consequences of no more money from the EU.....I believe France, Spain and others have had to sign it as well as Greece. They were given an ultimatum and a deadline to agree and sign it.

ALIBOBSY

The thing is that legally when you put your cash into a bank it becomes their money and you are deemed a creditor. So law or no law they have the legal position to take part of all of the funds deposited with them unfortunately. What stops them is if they did this with one bank there would be a run on all banks. BUT if another big crash appears what's to stop them closing the banks and doing it across the board.

Been reading up about other crypto spiridium infections around the world and it would appear in some countries it took months to clear up (3 months in one area of Canada). So decided we needed to get one of those filter bottles (if things get sorted quicker we had one on the amazon wishlist as a prepper item anyway).

Some big drops on the London stock market this morning, although things are creeping back up. Still way down on the close yesterday. Wonder if zero hedge will go into meltdown once the US starts trading.

Ali x

Frugalsod

1Tonsil wrote: »

As far as I know the rule about being able to take deposits for a bail in at the banks only applies to countries in the euro now.

It applies in most western nations now, the only differences is what date it applies. In Greece it comes in on 1st January 2016, in others it is already law or soon will be.

ivyleaf

MITSTM Glad you can get your State pension soon a huge relief! I'm 61, had to leave work at 51 due to ill health and now have my Civil Service pension, which is only small as I had to work part time for most of the time.

I can claim my State pension at about sixty-four-and-three-quarters - earlier than a lot of people on here, I know.

Last year a good friend died, and it spurred me on to start a Funeral plan; the one I'm using is about £77 per month over five years (the cheapest I found), which is a huge chunk of my income but at least once it's all paid up that'll be the end of it. I was managing okay until the lovely cat which adopted us a few years ago developed thyroid problems and will have to have expensive medicine every day for the rest of his life :eek:

Mr ivyleaf pays for it on the months when I'm paying the quarterly payment for the TV licence, but I often have to pay for it using my credit card, which has a high rate of interest. I can't get a card with a lower rate because my income is so low.

I could get the medicine cheaper over the internet, but the fee for the prescription means that the price difference is negligible.

Anyway, finished whingeing now, sorry. I can just really relate to MITSTM's relief that she can see her State pension on the horizon, while at the same time being very aware that I'm now quite lucky to be going to get mine before 65 (in theory, of course).

threellamas

There is just so much information on these pages - thanks to everyone who has contributed. I have been reading intently for months, and finally able to use my left over income this month to prep. I want to create 2 x 2 week supply boxes (1 for 2 people and 1 for 4 people), particularly for this winter, with a plan to increase stocks as soon as I have somewhere to store them. I'm thinking a stuck in the house emergency with no elec/gas. Is there a master plan list somewhere or one you would recommend I couldn't find one in the many many many pages of this thread I have read.

ALIBOBSY

Completely aside was reading about jury nullification in the US and found it also is seemingly law in this country.

http://www.ukcolumn.org/article/jury-nullification-power-people

Basically if a jury feels that the evidence has proved the accused has broken the law, BUT they feel the law is unjust/immoral etc they can vote not guilty. No wonder that's not talked about much lol.

Ali x