Amanda
8th September 2023, 08:30 AM
Looks like a great book. I’m going to read it.
Great--let me know your thoughts when you are done. (I'm trying to figure out what the best strategy is going forward for my self, plus helping my elderly mother)
I read it, though more quickly at the end because I was tired.
Definitely seems to be saying that they will take book shares, so you need to get certificates, but I'm not even clear on whether you would even be safe doing that.
I also wasn't clear on whether this was just if you had stocks at brokerage accounts that were exposed to derivatives. So would stocks held at Fidelity, Vanguard, or some of the other brokerage places (interactive brokers) be safe if they are not caught up with derivatives?
I'm also not clear on if they would also take your cash held at brokerages (like Vanguard, Schwab, Fidelity). I moved cash there because they said that the smaller banks were going to go bankrupt. Someone on that Wealthion channel said to park it in money markets at brokerages.
I'm starting to wonder if the best thing is to follow Lynnette Zang's advice and just get completely out of the system- up until now, my strategy has been to be half in half out.
Also, here's a comment I just found on The Great Taking--not sure if her take is accurate or not:
How your bank deposits will be taken ( from https://thegreattaking.com/ )
In the U.S. only the Federal Reserve System is designed to survive and take over all assets and banking activities in the event of a banking collapse.
Some wealthy people may think they will hide from this (taking of bank deposits) by keeping their money with the “too big to fail” banks. Perhaps it will seem that they have succeeded in this through the early stages of the banking crisis.
However, this “regime shift” is designed to be all-encompassing.
The big banks are organized as holding companies with subsidiaries. The purpose of this structure is to legally separate risks. A subsidiary can be designed to take on liabilities, which cannot attach to assets in other subsidiaries or to the holding company.
The weakened subsidiary can be separately bankrupted.
Ordinarily, the deposit-taking subsidiaries should be quite secure. But a strategy has been set up so that the deposit taking subsidiaries of the “too big to fail banks” can be separately bankrupted when the time comes. How can we know that?
The Fed has the power to give exemptions to any bank to move derivatives into deposit-taking subsidiaries, and it has done so. It has been tested, and on a large scale. Apparently it is easily and unilaterally done by the Fed by granting exemptions to Section 23A of the Federal Reserve Act. They did it in 2011 with Bank of America. in 2011 Bank of America, hit by a credit downgrade, moved derivatives from its Merrill Lynch unit to a subsidiary flush with insured deposits….
Why has this been tested on such a large scale? It seems they are quite serious about something. Is the intent to make the deposit-taking subsidiaries safer? What is the real purpose?
Used at the appropriate time, this will assure the collapse of the deposit-taking subsidiaries of the “too big to fail” banks, allowing the taking of money comprehensively, including form depositors in these deposit-taking subsidiaries, leaving essentially no money anywhere, and no pockets of resilience or of potential resistance.
Bill Holter adds this:
https://billholter.com/
September 5, 2023
Bill’s commentary:
“For those of you who have read the post “The Great Taking”, here is your ultimate solution. This website I believe is a very insightful read on “the end days”. It is a logical (I believe correct) and well thought out view of finance, society, and the ultimate coming total collapse from a Christian and thus Biblical standpoint. You WILL need a savior, there is only one Savior, Jesus Christ!”
The purpose of this website is to provide a brief summary of end time Bible prophecy. You may be curious about the topic or searching for a context to make sense of dramatic global events. In either case, we hope to provide you with resources to further your understanding and ultimately point you to the source of all truth, the Word of God.
Read more…
(http://www.bibleprophecysummary.com/index.html)***************
Also, I'm not sure how this Great Taking plan fits with the BIS plan to tokenize all assets--I'll post a new thread later.
Amanda
12th September 2023, 06:51 AM
Good questions.
I just finished the book. It was a great book. I really lays out the roadmap. Most importantly, it tells us big picture what the fed is going to do going forward.
I believe we have 3 to 5 years before this plays out. I am basing that on the next Saturn-Pluto hard aspect which is in 2028.
For context, here are the previous such hard aspects for the last 100 years:
Saturn-Pluto hard aspects
1907 Apr 14 panic of 1907
1907 Sep 8 panic of 1907
1908 Jan 18 panic of 1907
1914 Oct 4 WWI
1914 Nov 1 WWI
1915 May 19 WWI
1922 Oct 8 Mussolini/Stalin
1931 Feb 17 Great depression
1931 Jul 8 Great depression
1931 Dec 13 Great depression
1940 Mar 25 WWII
1947 Aug 10 cold war/Mao
1955 Dec 27 vietnam war
1956 Jul 1 vietnam war
1956 Oct 7 vietnam war
1965 Apr 23 JFK assasination/coup
1965 Aug 17 JFK assasination/coup
1966 Feb 19 JFK assasination/coup
1973 Sep 14 oil crisis
1973 Oct 7 oil crisis
1974 May 28 oil crisis
1982 Nov 7 most severe recession since WWII
1993 Mar 19 bond crisis
1993 Oct 8 bond crisis
1994 Jan 1 bond crisis
2001 Aug 5 .com bubble
2001 Nov 1 .com bubble
2002 May 25 .com bubble
2009 Nov 15 Great financial crisis
2010 Jan 31 Great financial crisis
2010 Aug 21 Great financial crisis
2020 Jan 12 Covid
2028 Jun 23
2028 Nov 15
2029 Mar 29
2035 Oct 17
2036 Jan 1
2036 Jul 27
2044 Nov 4
2053 Jun 15
2053 Jul 10
2054 Feb 1
2061 Jul 6
As to answers to your questions, number one thing is to get out of debt and reduce your expenses. Try to physically hold hard assets. Spend all your free educational time on financial stuff. There are some good youtube channels out there, the economic ninja is one. I also enjoy David Hunter.
I will try to think of other pieces of advice.
Thanks for reading and sharing your thoughts. I hope you are right about 3-5 years--I need more time to prepare. I don't understand this "I am basing that on the next Saturn-Pluto hard aspect which is in 2028" but seems interesting.
I have no debt and regular expenses are not bad for now.
I'm thinking about being half in and half out of the system. I'm going to get more gold/silver.
Yes, I basically spend every spare minute watching financial videos. There's a lot of free info on Lyn Alden's site on investing. Yes, I've watched economic ninja. And I've seen David Hunter as a guest on different channels. I think he has good predictions for gold.
Do you still believe in Bitcoin/crypto??
I saw that Lyn Alden in her free newsletter has Bitcoin Grayscale Trust--do you know anything about that?
I'm thinking about subscribing to some of these investing/financial newsletters, just to learn more.
I have to do more work on prepping.
Here's Mario talking about The Great Taking--He seems to totally believe it.
How the Central Bankers Plan to Come After Your Assets.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4I6uqLuJfA
Here's an interesting question someone asked about this:
My question is can the Federal Reserve do this to the credit unions and state chartered banks? I don’t think they are regulated by the Federal Reserve?
So should all Americans immediately move their bank accounts to credit unions and state chartered banks?
fwiw- in this one below, Bill Holter, at some point says "if we make it to November"--so he thinks this system is hanging by a thread (but back in 2006,2007, 2008, I used to listen to Daryl Bradford Smith on iamthewitness radio and he kept thinking it was all going to come down back then, didn't know how they were holding it together. yet here we are in 2023 and no collapse yet.
BILL HOLTER SITS DOWN AND GIVES THE HORRIFIC REALITY OF THE COMING COLLAPSE - THINGS ARE NOT NORMAL
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXMS1Qz_rA4
Bill Holter: Complete Collapse & Meltdown - The Dollar Will be Destroyed
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDqymp1rYGU&t=488s
I hope that humanity will somehow rise up and hunt these people down.
vacuum
18th September 2023, 04:23 PM
Thanks for reading and sharing your thoughts. I hope you are right about 3-5 years--I need more time to prepare. I don't understand this "I am basing that on the next Saturn-Pluto hard aspect which is in 2028" but seems interesting.
It’s astrology. A hard aspect is either a conjunction, opposition, or square (0, 180, or 90 degree alignment). I provided the historical dates of such hard aspects so you can judge for yourself if it’s valuable. You can also look into Saturn mythology and representation if you are interested.
Saturn is the planet of debt and obligations for one thing. There are also cults based on it.
I have no debt and regular expenses are not bad for now.
I'm thinking about being half in and half out of the system. I'm going to get more gold/silver.
Yes, I basically spend every spare minute watching financial videos. There's a lot of free info on Lyn Alden's site on investing. Yes, I've watched economic ninja. And I've seen David Hunter as a guest on different channels. I think he has good predictions for gold.
This is all great to hear, and on the right path.
Do you still believe in Bitcoin/crypto??
I saw that Lyn Alden in her free newsletter has Bitcoin Grayscale Trust--do you know anything about that?
Yes, I am involved with it. The gains to be made are high, but it’s also risky. There are so many frauds. I think we are going to have a final blow off top and a lot of crypto will 10x from these levels. But you have to be prepared for losing money. As you get older that’s more difficult. But now is the time to be buying off interested imo. We could drop up to 40% from here worst case, but we might also not drop and be double in price in 3 months.
There are many gotchas such as self custody vs trusting someone to hold it for you.
I think you should get involved in it for the educational aspect. The main warning is that you’ll likely want to buy more and more of it as the price goes higher and higher until you get rugged (price drops) and you are left holding the bag. So buying some now and stomaching the volatility and risk might help you gain experience so you don’t go overboard later.
I'm thinking about subscribing to some of these investing/financial newsletters, just to learn more.
I’ve found that the right YouTube channels seem to be the best. Twitter is also good.
Amanda
21st September 2023, 03:57 PM
Just found this channel- this guy is really good, deserves more subscribers. Here he is talking about The Great Taking:
The Great Taking...The Plan To Hand Over YOUR Assets To The Banksters
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIoGu692a64
More here: https://www.youtube.com/@parallelsystems/videos
This guy is a Brit and in that video I posted, he talks about how the people in the UK don't actually own their own homes (I wonder if that's true here).
Comment:
Key Takeaways: - The book "The Great Taking" details how legislation has stealthily removed true ownership of financial assets like stocks and bonds, replacing it with "security entitlements". - This means assets can be treated as collateral by financial institutions without the account holder's consent or knowledge. - The system has been globally harmonized so assets can be quickly seized cross-border as collateral against bank failures in a crisis. - Pooled securities mean individuals have no rights to specific shares, only a pro-rata claim if anything is left after secured creditors take priority collateral. - This has been justified under the guise of preventing collateral shortages, but was artificially driven by regulators against market forces. - The objective is to legally allow seizure of public assets to prop up failing banks when the multi-quadrillion derivative complex implodes. - This will lead to the greatest theft of private wealth in history, as public shares, property and assets are legally stripped. It confirms financial systems are designed to sacrifice public wealth to protect elite interests when instability arises. - Truly owned hard assets without counterparty risk, and being self-sufficient, are amongst the only hedges against this engineered taking. In summary, legislation has been covertly altered to legally allow seizure of public wealth to protect banks in the coming financial collapse, leading to potentially the greatest theft in history.
Amanda
1st October 2023, 09:35 PM
Video with David Webb doing a presentation on his book The Great Taking.
https://rumble.com/v3krz2z-david-webb.html
A free download is available here: https://thegreattaking.com/
What is this book about?
It is about the taking of collateral (all of it), the end game of the current globally synchronous debt accumulation super cycle. This scheme is being executed by long-planned, intelligent design, the audacity and scope of which is difficult for the mind to encompass. Included are all financial assets and bank deposits, all stocks and bonds; and hence, all underlying property of all public corporations, including all inventories, plant and equipment; land, mineral deposits, inventions and intellectual property. Privately owned personal and real property financed with any amount of debt will likewise be taken, as will the assets of privately owned businesses which have been financed with debt. If even partially successful, this will be the greatest conquest and subjugation in world history. Private, closely held control of ALL central banks, and hence of all money creation, has allowed a very few people to control all political parties and governments; the intelligence agencies and their myriad front organizations; the armed forces and the police; the major corporations and, of course, the media. These very few people are the prime movers. Their plans are executed over decades. Their control is opaque. To be clear, it is these very few people, who are hidden from you, who are behind this scheme to confiscate all assets, who are waging a hybrid war against humanity.
David has deep experience with investigation and analysis within challenging and deceptive environments, including the mergers and acquisitions boom of the 80’s, venture investing, and the public financial markets. He managed hedge funds through the period spanning the extremes of the dot-com bubble and bust, producing a gross return of more than 320% while the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ indices had losses. His clients included some of the largest international institutional investors.
You may wish to see the following excellent discussion of the book: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIoGu692a64
Amanda
3rd October 2023, 06:58 AM
Fantastic, thank you.
Here's a shorter interview with the author:
THE GREAT TAKING: Who Really Owns YOUR Assets???
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QeP71CKRZNs&t=11s
Also, author and lawyer, Ellen Brown, read the book and thinks it's legit. She sent the warning below to another lawyer. She wrote an article on it but the jew at scheerpost will not post it. So she's going to have to post it at her site. But she says they will happen quickly without going to the court system, they will just hoover it all up.
Here's what she sent to another attorney: “Every form of collateral from deposits to stocks to bonds, is being pooled; and those players with super priority status in bankruptcy can take from the pool before the bankruptcy proceedings even start. I knew that about deposits-derivatives have super priority status in bankruptcy- but didn’t realize it about stocks and bonds. The derivatives bubble will inevitably pop, and it is larger than all the assets in the world, which have been pooled by international agreement as the author shows”
GlobalResearch posted it (makes sense since Peter Koenig, who publishes there, was on the call- Rumble video)
The One Quadrillion Dollars Derivatives Bubble: “The Great Taking”: How They Plan to Own It All
https://www.globalresearch.ca/great-taking-they-plan-own-all/5834686
The derivatives bubble is often estimated to exceed (https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/052715/how-big-derivatives-market.asp) one quadrillion dollars (a quadrillion is 1,000 trillion). The entire GDP of the world (https://www.visualcapitalist.com/visualizing-the-105-trillion-world-economy-in-one-chart/#:~:text=By%20the%20end%20of%202023%2C%20the%20wor ld%20economy,projections%20from%20its%202023%20Wor ld%20Economic%20Outlook%20report.) is estimated at $105 trillion, or 10% of one quadrillion; and the collective wealth of the world is an estimated $360 trillion. Clearly, there is not enough collateral anywhere to satisfy all the derivative claims. The majority of derivatives (https://www.occ.gov/publications-and-resources/publications/quarterly-report-on-bank-trading-and-derivatives-activities/files/q2-2023-derivatives-quarterly.html) now involve interest rate swaps, and interest rates have shot up. The bubble looks ready to pop. Who were the intrepid counterparties signing up to take the other side of these risky derivative bets? Initially, it seems, they were banks – led by four mega-banks (https://seekingalpha.com/article/4046338-derivatives-explode-like-bomb), JP Morgan Chase, Citibank, Goldman Sachs and Bank of America. But according to a 2023 book called The Great Taking (https://thegreattaking.com/) by veteran hedge fund manager David Rogers Webb, counterparty risk on all of these bets is ultimately assumed by an entity called the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC), through its nominee Cede & Co. (See also Greg Morse, “Who Owns America? Cede & DTCC (https://redpillreports.com/learn/who-owns-america-cede-dtcc/),” and A. Freed, “Who Really Owns Your Money? Part I, The DTCC (https://seekingalpha.com/article/98297-who-really-owns-your-money-part-i-the-dtcc)”). Cede & Co. is now the owner of record of all of our stocks, bonds, digitized securities, mortgages, and more; and it is seriously under-capitalized, holding capital of only $3.5 billion, clearly not enough to satisfy all the potential derivative claims. Webb thinks this is intentional. What happens if the DTCC goes bankrupt? Under The Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act (BAPCPA) (https://www.congress.gov/bill/109th-congress/house-bill/685) of 2005, derivatives have “super-priority” in bankruptcy. (The BAPCPA actually protects the banks and derivative claimants rather than consumers; it was the same act that eliminated bankruptcy protection for students.) Derivative claimants don’t even need to go through the bankruptcy court but can simply nab the collateral from the bankrupt estate, leaving nothing for the other secured creditors (including state and local governments) or the banks’ unsecured creditors (including us, the depositors). And in this case the “bankrupt estate” – the holdings of the DTCC/Cede & Co. – includes all of our stocks, bonds, digitized securities, mortgages, and more. It sounds like conspiracy theory, but it’s all laid out in the Uniform Commercial Code (UCC), tested in precedent, and validated by court rulings. The UCC is a privately-established set of standardized rules for transacting business (https://www.investopedia.com/terms/u/uniform-commercial-code.asp), which has been ratified by all 50 states and includes key provisions that have been “harmonized” with the laws of other countries in the Western orbit. The UCC makes boring reading and is anything but clear, but Webb has diligently picked through the obscure legalese and demonstrates that the amorphous “they” have it all locked up. They can take everything in one fell swoop, without even going to court. Ideally, we need to get Congress to modify some laws, beginning with the super-priority provisions of the Bankruptcy Law of 2005. Even billionaires, notes Webb (https://rumble.com/v3krz2z-david-webb.html), are at risk of losing their holdings; and they have the clout to take action.
About The Great Taking and Its Author
As detailed in the introduction, “David Rogers Webb has deep experience with investigation and analysis within challenging and deceptive environments, including the mergers and acquisitions boom of the 80’s, venture investing, and the public financial markets. He managed hedge funds through the period spanning the extremes of the dot-com bubble and bust, producing a gross return of more than 320% while the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ indices had losses. His clients included some of the largest international institutional investors.” A lengthy personal preface to the book not only establishes these bona fides but tells an interesting story concerning his family history and the rise and fall of his home city of Cleveland in the Great Depression. As for what the book is about, Webb summarizes in the introduction: It is about the taking of collateral (all of it), the end game of the current globally synchronous debt accumulation super cycle. This scheme is being executed by long-planned, intelligent design, the audacity and scope of which is difficult for the mind to encompass. Included are all financial assets and bank deposits, all stocks and bonds; and hence, all underlying property of all public corporations, including all inventories, plant and equipment; land, mineral deposits, inventions and intellectual property. Privately owned personal and real property financed with any amount of debt will likewise be taken, as will the assets of privately owned businesses which have been financed with debt. If even partially successful, this will be the greatest conquest and subjugation in world history. You might have to read the book to be convinced, but it is not long, is available free on the Net (https://thegreattaking.com/), and is heavily referenced and footnoted. I will try to summarize his main points, but first a look at the derivatives problem and how it got out of hand.
The Derivative Mushroom Cloud
A “financial derivative” is defined as (https://admiralmarkets.com/education/articles/general-trading/financial-derivatives#:~:text=To%20gain%20a%20complete%20und erstanding%20of,to%20understand%20how%20they%20cam e%20about.&text=To%20gain%20a%20complete,how%20they%20came%20 about.&text=a%20complete%20understanding%20of,to%20unders tand%20how%20they) “a security whose value depends on, or is derived from, an underlying asset or assets. The derivative represents a contract between two or more parties and its price fluctuates according to the value of the asset from which it is derived.”
Warren Buffett famously described derivatives as “weapons of financial mass destruction,” but they did not start out that way. Initially they were a form of insurance for farmers to guarantee the price of their forthcoming crops. In a typical futures contract, the miller would pay a fixed price for wheat not yet harvested. The miller assumed the risk that the crops would fail or market prices would fall, while the farmer assumed the risk that prices would rise, limiting his potential profit. In either case, the farmer actually delivered the product, or so much of it as he produced. The derivatives market exploded when speculators were allowed to bet on the rise or fall of prices, exchange rates, interest rates and other “underlying assets” without actually owning or delivering the “underlying.” Like at a race track, bets could be placed without owning the horse, so there was no limit to the potential number of bets. Speculators could “hedge their bets” by selling short — borrowing and selling stock or other assets they did not actually own. It was a form of counterfeiting that not only diluted the value of the “real” stock but drove down the stock’s price, in many cases driving the company into bankruptcy, so that the short sellers did not have to cover or “deliver” at all (called “naked shorting”). This form of gambling was allowed and encouraged due to a number of regulatory changes, including the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000 (https://www.congress.gov/bill/106th-congress/senate-bill/2697/text)(CFMA), repealing key portions of the Glass-Steagall Act separating commercial from investment banking; the Bankruptcy Law of 2005, guaranteeing recovery for derivative speculators; and the lifting of the uptick rule, which had allowed short selling only when a stock was going up.
Enter the DTC, the DTCC and Cede & Co.
In exchange-traded derivatives, a third party, called a clearinghouse, ensures that the bets are paid, a role played initially by the bank. And here’s where the UCC and the DTCC come in. The bank takes title in “street name” and pools it with other “fungible” shares. Under the UCC, the purchaser of the stock does not hold title; he has only a “security entitlement”, making him an unsecured creditor. He has a contractual claim to a portion of a pool of shares held in street name, assuming there are any shares left after the secured creditors have swept in. Webb writes: In the late 1960’s, something called the Banking and Securities Industry Committee (BASIC) had been formed to find a solution to the “paperwork crisis.” It seemed the burdens of handling physical stock certificates had suddenly become too great, so much so, that the New York Stock exchange had suspended trading some days. “Lawmakers” then urged the government to step into the process. The BASIC report recommended changing from processing physical stock certificates to “book-entry” transfers of ownership via computerized entries in a trust company that would hold the underlying certificates “immobilized.” Thus was established the Depository Trust Company (DTC) (https://www.dtcc.com/about/businesses-and-subsidiaries/dtc), which began operations in 1973, after President Nixon decoupled the dollar from gold internationally. The DTC decoupled stock ownership from paper stock certificates. The purchasers who had put up the money became only “beneficial owners” entitled to interest, dividends and voting rights, leaving title of record in the DTC. The Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation (https://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/dtcc.asp)(DTCC) was established in 1999 to combine the functions of the DTC and the National Securities Clearing Corporation (NSCC). The DTCC settles most securities transactions in the U.S. Title of record is with DTC’s nominee Cede & Co. Per Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cede_and_Company): Cede and Company (also known as Cede and Co. or Cede & Co.), shorthand for “certificate depository”, is a specialist United States financial institution that processes transfers of stock certificates on behalf of Depository Trust Company (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depository_Trust_Company), the central securities depository (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_securities_depository) used by the United States National Market System (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Market_System), which includes the New York Stock Exchange (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Stock_Exchange), and Nasdaq (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASDAQ). Cede technically owns most of the publicly issued stock in the United States. Thus, most investors do not themselves hold direct property rights in stock, but rather have contractual rights that are part of a chain of contractual rights involving Cede. Securities held at Depository Trust Company are registered in its nominee name, Cede & Co., and recorded on its books in the name of the brokerage firm through which they were purchased; on the brokerage firm’s books they are assigned to the accounts of their beneficial owners (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beneficial_owner). [Emphasis added.] Greg Morse notes that the dictionary definition of “cede” is to “relinquish title.” For more on “beneficial ownership,” see the DTCC website here (https://ellenbrown.com/Users/Ellen/Desktop/Web%20of%20Debt/articles/article%20drafts/How%20Issuers%20Work%20with%20DTC%20-%20Frequently%20Asked%20Questions%20|%20DTCC).
“Harmonizing” the Rules
The next step in the decoupling process was to establish “legal certainty” that the “anointed” creditors could take all, by amending the UCC in all 50 states. This was done quietly over many years, without an act of Congress. The key facts, notes Webb, are these:
Ownership of securities as property has been replaced with a new legal concept of a “security entitlement”, which is a contractual claim assuring a very weak position if the account provider becomes insolvent.
All securities are held in un-segregated pooled form. Securities used as collateral, and those restricted from such use, are held in the same pool.
All account holders, including those who have prohibited use of their securities as collateral, must, by law, receive only a pro-rata share of residual assets.
“Re-vindication,” i.e. the taking back of one’s own securities in the event of insolvency, is absolutely prohibited.
Account providers may legally borrow pooled securities to collateralize proprietary trading and financing.
“Safe Harbor” assures secured creditors priority claim to pooled securities ahead of account holders.
The absolute priority claim of secured creditors to pooled client securities has been upheld by the courts.
The next step was to “harmonize” the laws internationally so that there would be no escape, at least in the Western orbit. Webb learned this by personal experience, having moved to Sweden to escape, only to have Swedish law subsequently “harmonized” with the “legal certainty” provisions of the UCC.
[B]“Safe Harbor” in the Bankruptcy Code
The last step was to establish “safe harbor” in the 2005 Bankruptcy Code revisions – meaning “’safe harbor’ for secured creditors against the demands of customers to their own assets.” Webb quotes from law professor Stephen Lubben’s book The Bankruptcy Code Without Safe Harbors (https://www.bing.com/search?pglt=41&q=Stephen+Lubben%E2%80%99s+book+The+Bankruptcy+Cod e+Without+Safe+Harbors&cvid=a2589d0e59a14042a226d673545c9d73&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOdIBBzIwN2owajGoAgCwAg A&FORM=ANNTA1&PC=W099): Following the 2005 amendments to the Code, it is hard to envision a derivative that is not subject to special treatment. The safe harbors cover a wide range of contracts that might be considered derivatives, including securities contracts, commodities contracts, forward contracts, repurchase agreements, and, most importantly, swap agreements. … The safe harbors as currently enacted were promoted by the derivatives industry as necessary measures . . . The systemic risk argument for the safe harbors is based on the belief that the inability to close out a derivative position because of the automatic stay would cause a daisy chain of failure amongst financial institutions. The problem with this argument is that it fails to consider the risks created by the rush to close out positions and demand collateral from distressed firms. Not only does this contribute to the failure of an already weakened financial firm, by fostering a run on the firm, but it also has consequent effects on the markets generally . . . the Code will have to guard against attempts to grab massive amounts of collateral on the eve of a bankruptcy, in a way that is unrelated to the underlying value of the trades being collateralized. A number of researchers have found that super-priority in bankruptcy for derivatives actually increases rather than decreases risk. See e.g. a National Bureau of Economic Research paper called “Should Derivatives be Privileged in Bankruptcy? (https://www.nber.org/papers/w17599)” Among other hazards, super-priority has contributed to the explosion in speculative derivatives, threatening the stability of national and global markets. For more on this issue, see my earlier articles here (https://ellenbrown.com/2013/04/29/bail-out-is-out-bail-in-is-in-another-argument-for-publicly-owned-banks/) and here (https://ellenbrown.com/2013/09/17/the-the-armageddon-looting-machine-the-looming-mass-destruction-from-derivatives/).
What to Do?
Webb does not say much about solutions; his goal seems to be to sound the alarm. What can we do to protect our assets? “Probably nothing,” he quoted a knowledgeable expert in a recent webinar (https://rumble.com/v3krz2z-david-webb.html). “We just have to stop them.” But he did point out that even the assets of the wealthy are threatened. If the issue can be brought to the attention of Congress, hopefully they can be motivated to revise the laws. Congressional action could include modifying the Bankruptcy Act of 2005 and the UCC, taxing windfall profits, imposing a financial transaction tax, and enforcing the antitrust laws and Constitutional property rights. As for timing, Webb says just the movement in interest rates, from 0.25% to 5.5%, should have collapsed the market already. He thinks it is being held up artificially, while “they” get the necessary systems in place. Where to save your personal monies? Big derivative banks are risky, and Webb thinks credit unions and smaller banks will go down with the market if there is a general collapse, as happened in the Great Depression. Gold and silver are good but hard to spend on groceries. Keeping some emergency cash on hand is important, and so is growing your own food if you have space for a garden. Short-term Treasuries bought directly from the government at Treasury Direct (https://www.treasurydirect.gov/) might be the safest savings option, assuming the government doesn’t wind up in bankruptcy itself. Meanwhile, we need to design an alternative financial system that is equitable and sustainable. Promising components might include publicly-owned banks, product-backed community cryptocurrencies, a land value tax, and a financial transaction tax. A neoliberal, financialized economy of the sort we have today produces little and leaves the workers in debt. Goods and services are produced by the “real” economy; finance is just superstructure. Derivatives do not now produce even the security for which they were originally intended. A healthy, enduring economy must produce real things and exchange them fairly for the wages earned by labor. *
Note to readers: Please click the share button above. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our Telegram Channel. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles.
This article was originally published on the author’s blog site, Web of Debt Blog (https://ellenbrown.com/2023/10/03/the-great-taking-how-they-plan-to-own-it-all/).
Ellen Brown is an attorney, chair of the Public Banking Institute (http://publicbankinginstitute.org/), and author of thirteen books including Web of Debt (https://www.amazon.com/Web-Debt-Shocking-Truth-System/dp/0983330859/ref=pd_sbs_14_1/138-8937526-8543328?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0983330859&pd_rd_r=d9f9bedb-49df-45e2-8c1c-875628b8f6d0&pd_rd_w=HtRqv&pd_rd_wg=PBo0t&pf_rd_p=1c11b7ff-9ffb-4ba6-8036-be1b0afa79bb&pf_rd_r=11CYD8NTMENJFRSM4SHQ&psc=1&refRID=11CYD8NTMENJFRSM4SHQ), The Public Bank Solution (https://www.amazon.com/Public-Bank-Solution-Austerity-Prosperity/dp/0983330867/ref=pd_sbs_14_1/138-8937526-8543328?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0983330867&pd_rd_r=36afc977-5074-4880-a134-4b6fba683bf0&pd_rd_w=Sixj1&pd_rd_wg=pEOJx&pf_rd_p=1c11b7ff-9ffb-4ba6-8036-be1b0afa79bb&pf_rd_r=MER1AA83MRENA1J2ANFP&psc=1&refRID=MER1AA83MRENA1J2ANFP), and Banking on the People: Democratizing Money in the Digital Age (https://thenextsystem.org/BankingOnThePeople). She also co-hosts a radio program on PRN.FM (http://prn.fm/) called “It’s Our Money (http://itsourmoney.podbean.com/).” Her 400+ blog articles are posted at EllenBrown.com (https://ellenbrown.com/).
She is a regular contributor to Global Research.
Powered by vBulletin® Version 4.2.0 Copyright © 2025 vBulletin Solutions, Inc. All rights reserved.