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Friday, December 19, 2014

Hamas delegation to Iran "opened a new chapter" in relations


Ali Baraka, H
amas's representative in Lebanon, said Friday that a recent visit by a Hamas delegation to Iran had "opened a new chapter" in relations between Tehran and the terror group.

"[Tehran] has pledged to continue supporting the [Palestinian] resistance," Baraka told the Turkish Anadolu Agency.

"Hamas welcomes the support of any Arab or Muslim state," Baraka added. "But unfortunately, the Arabs are just spectators... to the systematic Judaization of Jerusalem by Israel and the expansion of illegal settlements."

"We have not received responses from a number of Arab countries that we had asked to support us and our people [against Israeli aggression]," he charged, adding, "This has forced us to seek support from other [Muslim] nations such as Iran."

Nevertheless, Baraka stressed that Hamas was keen on maintaining good relations with Arab countries along with Turkey and Iran – "in order to safeguard the resistance".

Iran was once a stronger supporter of Hamas, but the two have been at odds over the uprising against Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad. As a result of Hamas’ refusal to support Assad in the uprising, an angry Iran reportedly stopped supplying the terror group with weapons.

Nevertheless, the two sides have been getting closer in recent months. The speaker of the Iranian parliament, Ali Larijani, recently boasted that Iran provided Hamas with the technology it has used to rain down rockets on Israel from Gaza, and Hamas later thanked Iran for providing the group with the rockets.

Following the Hamas’s delegation visit to Tehran, some Palestinian media outlets had reported that Saudi Arabia had called certain Hamas officials to voice its displeasure with the visit.
Credit to Arutz Sheva

China Tests ICBM With Multiple Warheads





China carried out a long-range missile flight test on Saturday using multiple, independently targetable reentry vehicles, or MIRVs, according to U.S. defense officials.

The flight test Saturday of a new DF-41 missile, China’s longest-range intercontinental ballistic missile, marks the first test of multiple warhead capabilities for China, officials told the Washington Free Beacon.

China has been known to be developing multiple-warhead technology, which it obtained from the United States illegally in the 1990s.

However, the Dec. 13 DF-41 flight test, using an unknown number of inert maneuvering warheads, is being viewed by U.S. intelligence agencies as a significant advance for China’s strategic nuclear forces and part of a build-up that is likely to affect the strategic balance of forces.

China’s nuclear arsenal is estimated to include around 240 very large warheads. That number is expected to increase sharply as the Chinese deploy new multiple-warhead missiles.

The current deployed U.S. strategic warhead arsenal includes 1,642 warheads. All 450 Minuteman III missiles have been modified to no longer carry MIRVs. However, Trident II submarine-launched missiles can carry up to 14 MIRVs per missile.

Additionally, the development of China’s multiple warhead technology was assisted by illegal transfers of technology from U.S. companies during the Clinton administration, according to documents and officials familiar with the issue.

Details of the flight test and the number of dummy warheads used during it could not be learned.

However, the DF-41 has been assessed by the National Air and Space Intelligence Center (NASIC), the intelligence community’s primary missile spy center, as capable of carrying up to 10 warheads.

Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Jeff Pool declined to comment on the DF-41 test. “We encourage greater PRC transparency regarding their defense investments and objectives to avoid miscalculation,” Pool said in response to questions about the Chinese missile launch.

China’s government has made no mention of the test, which was carried out at an unknown missile test facility. Past tests of the DF-41 have been carried out at the Wuzhai Missile and Space Testing facility, located about 250 miles southwest of Beijing.

A report made public earlier this month by a congressional China commission stated that the DF-41 will be able to carry up to 10 warheads and is expected to be deployed next year.

“The DF-41, which could be deployed as early as 2015, may carry up to 10 MIRVs, and have a maximum range as far as 7,456 miles, allowing it to target the entire continental United States,” the report said. “In addition, some sources claim China has modified the DF–5 and the DF–31A to be able to carry MIRVs.”

China also conducted a flight test in late September of another long-range missile, called the DF-31B that also could be outfitted to carry MIRVs.

“China could use MIRVs to deliver nuclear warheads on major U.S. cities and military facilities as a means of overwhelming U.S. ballistic missile defenses,” the report by the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission said.

NASIC intelligence analyst Lee Fuell told the commission that China’s mobile MIRV-modified missiles provide greater targeting with fewer missiles and allow for a larger reserve of missiles during a conflict.

“China is likely to employ a blend of these three as MIRVs become available, simultaneously increasing their ability to engage desired targets while holding a greater number of weapons in reserve,” Fuell was quoted as saying in the report.

A classified NASIC report dated Dec. 10, 1996 stated that China developed a “smart dispenser” for launching multiple satellites using technology developed under a contract with Motorola to launch Iridium communications satellites. The technology transfer was approved by the administration of President Bill Clinton.

“An initial NAIC study determined that a minimally-modified [smart dispenser] stage could be used on a ballistic missile as a multiple-reentry vehicle post-boost vehicle” that could be used for multiple warheads “with relatively minor changes.”

In 2000, the State Department fined Lockheed Martin Corp. $13 million for improperly exporting weapons data on the rocket technology used in multiple-warhead missiles

The U.S. data was provided to China’s state-run Great Wall Industries, a missile manufacturer, through a Hong Kong company called Asiasat and used in systems called expendable perigee kick motors—a key element used in MIRV guidance.

The kick motors are used to position a multiple warhead “bus” or stage as part of the targeting process.

The transfers were made under loosened export controls by the Clinton administration beginning in 1993.

Larry Wortzel, a former military intelligence official who specialized on China, said the Chinese military has been working on a MIRV-modified DF-41 for a number of years.

Wortzel said Chinese military research literature has documented work on the DF-41 but the Pentagon “has been reluctant to discuss or confirm these developments.”

“The United States is now threatened with a more deadly and survivable nuclear force that makes our weak ballistic missile defenses less effective,” Wortzel said. “We need to improve our own defenses and modernize our own deterrent force as the Chinese are doing.”

Rick Fisher, a specialist on the Chinese military, said the advent of China’s MIRV capability should mark the end of U.S. efforts to reduce the number of nuclear warheads.

“The Chinese have not and likely will not disclose their nuclear warhead buildup plans, Russia is modernizing its nuclear forces across the board and violating the INF treaty with new classes of missiles, so it would be suicidal for the Washington to pursue a new round of nuclear reductions as is this administration’s preference.”

Fisher, with the International Assessment and Strategy Center, said China may deploy a combination of single-warhead and multiple warhead DF-41s, with the single warhead version carrying a huge “city buster” multi-megaton bombs.

“The beginning of China’s move toward multiple warhead-armed nuclear missiles is proof that today, arms control is failing to increase the security of Americans,” Fisher said. “Instead, it is time to be rebuilding U.S. nuclear warfighting capabilities, to include new mobile ICBMs, new medium range missiles and new tactical nuclear missile systems.”

Georgetown University Professor Phillip Karber has studied China’s nuclear forces and believes its arsenal is far larger than the U.S. intelligence estimate of 240.

“The Chinese development of the DF-41 has been a long term, methodical process,” Karber said. “However, if as we suspect they are going to put a MIRVed version of the missile on both rail and road-mobile launchers, the number of reentry vehicles could grow quite rapidly depending on the number of warheads they end up putting on the missiles.”

The DF-41 was revealed inadvertently by the Chinese government last summer when details, including the fact that it will be a multi-warhead missile, appeared on a provincial government website before being quickly censored and removed.

The Shaanxi provincial government announced June 13 in a progress report on its Environmental Monitoring Center Station that the DF-41 missile was among its projects.

“On-site monitoring for Phase Two of the project’s final environmental assessment and approval of support conditions for the development of the DF-41 strategic missile by the 43rd Institute of the 4th Academy of Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC) was initiated,” the notice said. AVIC is China’s state-owned aerospace and defense conglomerate.

A state-run Global Times report, also later censored and taken offline, quoted a Chinese expert as saying the missile will carry multiple warheads.

The flight test Saturday was the third such test for the new DF-41. The Free Beacon first reported the second flight test of the missile in December 2013. The first flight test was carried out July 24, 2012

After several years of silence on the DF-41, the Pentagon disclosed the existence of the new missile in its latest annual report on the Chinese military, made public in June.

“China also is developing a new road-mobile ICBM known as the Dong Feng-41 (DF-41), possibly capable of carrying multiple independently targetable re-entry vehicles (MIRV),” the report says.

Credit to http://freebeacon.com

Obama Just Signed Into Law eternal bailouts for the banks

YOUR GUNS ARE WORTHLESS AGAINST THE NEW SUPER WEAPONS OF THE GLOBALISTS


darpa gun behind grass Yamamoto-Japanese-Admiral
Americans have an estimated 300 million privately owned hand guns and some people present this fact as the reason why no foreign power, or even our government, could ever subjugate the people. I am compelled to disagree with this notion. Once upon a time that may have been true as World War II era Japanese Admiral  Yamamoto refused to invade the United States following his attack upon Pearl Harbor because there would be “an American with a gun behind every blade of grass”. However, if our government ever became abusive enough that the people felt the need to rebel, there is a new generation of super weapons being developed and deployed as I write these words, which would doom any rebellion that did not have the full support of the military.
The new generation of super weapons has made America vulnerable to enemies, both foreign and domestic. As a result, the window to resist martial law occupation and even an invasion is virtually closed.
Recently, I made the point that Americans were being surveilled in “Police State” Americawith a new generation of spy devices that were totally unimaginable. Today, America is on the verge of being suppressed by an equally sophisticated generation of weapons that the general public would only believe that these weapons exist in the science fiction dramas of the future. Only these weapons are right here and right now!

Advanced Anti-Guerrilla Warfare Tactics of the Globalists

UN KILLER ROBOTS
The rules of Guerrilla warfare have changed. The Red Dawn scenario in which average people, like the Viet Cong, can resist an invader belong to era in the past.
Afghanistan is proving to be the beta testing ground for many of these weapons as was Iraq. The following breakthroughs in military technology have very little value on the battlefield in a conventional war. In other words, the weapons discussed in this article are designed for war against Russia. They are designed for war against the American people! These weapons systems are anti-guerrilla orientated and they are designed for Americans who will soon try to put a stop to the unfolding tyranny of the bankers who have hijacked our government. We are entering into a new type of guerrilla warfare with extreme counter-measures designed and created by DARPA which is the top secret research arm for the Department of Defense.
DARPA’s sole purpose is built around the goal of developing more efficient and greater means of killing. For those of you who have not figured out, we are about to enter American hunting season and you are the game, you should know that when these weapons systems are deployed in sufficient numbers, the game is over.

Robot Soldiers

UN KILLER ROBOTS 2
Many analysts feel that the greatest threat to, not only Americans, but humanity as a whole, is tied to the development of  artificial intelligence in the name of Robot soldiers. These “robot soldiers are capable of autonomous decision making in terms of carrying out their mission. They come equipped with facial recognition software and when the subjugation and subsequent roundups of American citizens begin in earnest, these “soldiers” will be the main enforcement agents.
The physical prowess of these robots is stunning as they can reach speeds up to 30 mph. In times of civil unrest or combat, imagine your neighborhood was forcibly evacuated, these robots would make excellent clean up troops. Armed with facial recognition, rebel forces leaders could be targeted and eliminated.  There will nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.


Watching Every Move You Make

Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide.
Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide.
 DARPAs-Large-Area-Coverage-Optical-Search-while-Track-and-Engage (1)In a nowhere to run and nowhere to hide scenario, DARPA, has developed technology which allows the military to spy on entire cities with its Large Area Coverage Optical Search-while-Track and Engage (LACOSTE). LACOSTE is a program of imaging technology that will allow for “single sensor, day or night, ongoing tactical surveillance of all moving vehicles in an urban area. LACOSTE will eventually be able to identify individual humans in the same manner with the next generation of facial recognition software. This surveillance system is being integrated into department store video surveillance, the street light turned spy Intellistreets as well as all traffic cameras. If the globalists want to find you, you better have a “cloaking” device to hide behind. More importantly, most guerrilla activities are designed to occur under the cover of darkness. The cover of darkness is no longer an ally for future American rebels. This system is fully operational.

Meet the New “Boss”

Meet the new Boss, The Battlefield Surveillance System

Many gun owners mistakenly believe that they are going to be able to carry out acts of guerrilla warfare and/or terrorism against an illegitimate government as they begin to lock-down the country under a martial law takeover. Thwarting most ideas of a successful revolutionary effort can be found inthe Battlefield Optical Surveillance System (BOSS),which is a device that can be mounted on a truck that scans and deciphers the landscape with lasers and sensors. When it sees the almost imperceptible glint of a rifle scope, or more amazingly it also recognizes you through your retinas as the detection device “paints” you with a laser beam, just prior to your demise.

Boomerang


Boomerang
And even in the unlikely event that you can slip into firing range of your intended target, theBoomerang countermeasure system uses an array of microphones which will be able to instantly decipher the speed and direction of your shot, based on the muzzle report and the shock wave of the bullet as it zips past. Immediately, Boomerang knows where the shot came from, and even what kind of weapon was utilized. This system will reduce all future sniper missions to a Kamikaze endeavor. Therefore, it is a safe bet that prior to moving globalist controlled forces into an area to conduct a roundup of American citizens, BOSS and Boomerang will be employed to detect any possible resistance and eliminate the resistance by calling in a drone strike. Unfortunately, this technology is currently available.

Raise the Shields

This technology has come to so far that even if someone in your neighborhood struck a deal with al Qaeda and obtained a couple of RPG’s that the late Lybian Ambassador Stevens sold to the terrorists before he was murdered, it would not matter. The new DHS armored personnel carriers are being outfitted with the following technology which make them impervious to  harm.


Micro Air Vehicles

Maybe someone in your neighborhood struck a deal with al-Qaeda and obtained a couple of RPG’s that the late Ambassador from Libya sold to the terrorists before he was murdered by the administration to make the trail go cold and cover up the fact that our government, through the CIA was supplying weapons to terrorists in order to promote regime change. If you had an RPG, you might actually feel that you had a chance against the armored personnel carriers which will be used by DHS in a time of civil insurrection. Or, maybe you could shoot down a Predator B drone.
Do you remember the 2700 armored personnel carriers obtained by DHS? In the not too distant future, we will witness the fact that these vehicles will be virtually indestructible.
Mico-aerial vehicles (MAVS) is a game changing event. There is no way that a civilian insurgent force has the capacity to counter this technology. We know about the drones and they are deadly enough, but the MAV’s are more deadly. According to my sources, this technology is being beta tested in Afghanistan, which means that full deployment cannot be far behind.

Conclusion

What happens when these MAV’s incorporate the existing autonomous decision software? Well, that day is here. The autonomous decision-making in robots is so sophisticated and so integrated in the DARPA based military systems, that the University of Edinburgh actually teaches a class related to this technology.
Battlefield robots are already fully autonomous. How long will it be until these devices begin to become so self-aware that they will begin to see humanity as a threat? Certainly the movie industry has picked up on this idea. The technology presented in this article is primitive compared to where this is all headed and this will be the topic of the next article on “weapons of enslavement” which could potentially be used on the American people.
Credit to Common Sense

RATS 'TAKING OVER' NEW WORLD TRADE CENTER TOWER ANOTHER HARBINGER



1 World Trade Center welcomed its first major tenant, Conde Nast, in November along with some unwelcomed guests.

The New York tabloids are abuzz with the news.

Rats are taking over 1 World Trade Center, the glitzy new office tower built at Ground Zero. They’re chewing through carpet, snacking on crumbs of food left on computer keyboards and generally terrorizing the building’s anchor tenant – publishing house Condé Nast.

Stories have chronicled the reactions of editors and writers with Vogue, Vanity Fair, Glamour, Allure, Teen, Self, GQ, Bon Appétit and New Yorker magazines, all of which have recently moved into or at least toured their new digs at what was supposed to be the city’s poshest new address.

Some might find humor in the thought of Vogue Editor Anna Wintour having to fight off a burly rodent to get to her morning coffee. Cream, sugar and a little vermin on the side, Anna?

But others have a decidedly more sober take on the stories coming out of the New York Post, New York Observer, the Daily News and other publications.

In fact, this news may be a signal, another “harbinger” of America’s decline as a result of turning its back on God and Judeo-Christian values, says Messianic Jewish Rabbi Jonathan Cahn.

Cahn, author of the New York Times-bestsellers “The Harbinger” and “The Mystery of the Shemitah,” says that since his first book was released in 2011, the harbingers he revealed have not stopped.

“They have continued to manifest and unfold,” he said.
“The harbingers are warnings of coming judgment,” Cahn said. “Their continued manifestations are signs that America has not stopped in its departure from God but is continuing on a progression toward judgment.”

The pattern of national judgment spelled out in “The Harbinger” was set years before the nation’s destruction. In it, an attack takes place on the land, and a breach of the nation’s security is carried out by the nation’s enemies. It happened to ancient Israel in 732 B.C. It happened in America on Sept. 11, 2001.

The next stage is that instead of turning to God in repentance, the nation responds with defiance and a vow to come back stronger than before – without God. The vow Israel made is recorded in Isaiah 9:10: “The bricks have fallen, but we will rebuild with hewn stone. The sycamores have been cut down. But we will plant cedars in their place.”

The vow, the defiance and the nation’s attempt to come back stronger without God leads to judgment and destruction, Cahn believes.

All nine harbingers that appeared in ancient Israel have now manifested in America. The fourth harbinger is the rebuilding of the Tower of Ground Zero, also called 1 World Trade Center.


Rabbi Jonathan Cahn

When the ancient rabbis translated Isaiah 9:10 into Greek in the Septuagint, they rendered it as this: “The bricks have fallen, come let us build for ourselves a tower.”

In other words, a tower would rise up from the ruins of the destruction.

“That’s exactly what happened at Ground Zero,” Cahn said. “The Tower is a symbol of a nation’s defiance of God. It was conceived in the ruins of 9/11 as a symbol of America’s defiance and of its promise that it would rise up stronger than before – without God. The rabbis were using the words from Babel to translate Isaiah 9:10. Eerily, there was a scripture hidden in the ruins of Ground Zero. The scripture was ‘Come let us build for ourselves … a tower.’”

Four of the nine harbingers concern the first warning of judgment. Five of them are signs of the nation’s defiance: the tower, the “stone of judgment,” the “erez” or cedar tree, the utterance and the prophecy.

“The strange thing is that it’s as if every one of the harbingers that stand for America’s defiance are under a curse,” Cahn said.

Fifth Harbinger – The stone of judgment, which formed the cornerstone of the tower, was removed from Ground Zero and put into disuse.

Seventh Harbinger – The erez tree, or biblical cedar, which was planted at the corner of Ground Zero to replace the fallen sycamore, and called the “Tree of Hope,” a symbol of America combing back stronger, has decayed, withered away and, just recently, died.

Eighth Harbinger – The American leader who uttered the ancient vow of defiance of Isaiah 9:10, former Democrat Sen. John Edwards, fell from grace as a result of scandal.

Ninth Harbinger – The other American leader who prophetically pronounced judgment on America in the form of the ancient vow, from the floor of the Capitol, the day after 9/11, was former Democrat Sen. Tom Daschle. He also fell from grace and from national life.

So what does all this have to do with rats overrunning the new tower at Ground Zero?

“The Fourth Harbinger, the tower, the symbol of the America’s defiance, America’s glory and, with a height of 1,776 feet, of America itself – is now overrun with rats,” Cahn said. “It’s not that everything that happens at Ground Zero must be significant – but for such a building, such a symbolic building, to be overrun with rats, is striking.”
Cahn said rats are a universal symbol of “uncleanness, decay, devouring, plague, disease, pestilence and destruction.”
According to an article in Women’s Wear Daily, the “rat problem” at One World Trade Center has gotten better after a few visits from pest control.

But the rat plague is only getting worse, according to a report by the Real Deal, a trusted source of real estate news in New York City.

In November, Vogue staffers – including the magazine’s matriarch, Anna Wintour – said they were avoiding their new offices due to a “rat infestation.” Now sources tell the New York Daily News that the rats have “taken over.” Employees have been told not to eat food at their desks, and a complaint has been filed with the city’s health department.



Vogue editor and fashion guru Anna Wintour

“A bunch ate through the ceiling of a sports editor’s office and crawled all over his desk and left poops on his keyboard,” one source told the Daily News. “They ate through his rug to fit under his door.”

When asked if he was disgusted by the rat problem, Vanity Fair Editor Graydon Carter said: “They’re rats! What do you think?”

Condé Nast is a subsidiary of Advance Publications, owned by S.I. “Si” Newhouse Jr. and his brother Donald. Si Newhouse has a net worth of $9.5 billion and is the 10th richest resident of New York City and the 52nd richest person in the United States, according to Forbes.




Credit to WND
Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2014/12/rats-taking-over-new-world-trade-center-tower/#4UjT5PQ16MIc9gfl.99

IMF Now Ready To Slam The Door On The U.S. And The Dollar



As I write this, the news is saturated with stories of a hostage situation possibly involving Islamic militants in Sydney, Australia. Like many, I am concerned about the shockwave such an event will create through our sociopolitical structures. However, while most of the world will be distracted by the outcome of this crisis (for good or bad) for at least the week, I find I must concern myself with a far more important and dangerous situation.
Up to 40 people may be held by a supposed extremist in Sydney, but the entire world is currently being held hostage economically by international banks. This is the crisis no one in the mainstream is talking about, so alternative analysts must.
As I predicted last month in “We Have Just Witnessed The Last Gasp Of The Global Economy,”severe volatility is now returning to global markets after the pre-game 10 percent drop in equities in October hinted at what was to come.
We expected such destabilization after the wrap-up of the Fed taper, and the markets have not disappointed so far. My position has always been that the taper of QE3 made very little sense in terms of maintaining the manipulated illusion of economic health — unless, of course, the Federal Reserve was implementing the taper in preparation for a renewed financial catastrophe. That is to say, the central bankers have established the lie of American fiscal recovery and then separated themselves from blame for the implosion they KNOW is coming. If the markets were to collapse while stimulus is officially active, the tragedy would be forever a millstone on the necks of the banksters. And we can’t have that now, can we?
This is not to say that individual central banks and even currencies are not expendable in the grand scheme of things. In fact, the long-term goal of globalists has been to consolidate all currency systems and central banks under the outward control of the International Monetary Fund and the Bank Of International Settlements, as I outlined in “The Economic Endgame Explained.”
That particular article was only a summary of a dangerous trend I have been concerned about for years; namely the strategy by international financiers to create a dollar-collapse scenario that will be blamed on prepositioned scapegoats. I have no idea what form these scapegoats will take – there are simply too many possible triggers for fiscal calamity. What I do know, though, is the goal of the endgame: to remove the dollar’s world reserve status and to pressure the American people into conforming or even begging for centralized administration of our economy by the IMF.
The delusion perpetuated in the mainstream is that the IMF is a U.S.-dominated institution. I have outlined on many occasions why this is false. The IMF like all central banks is dominated by the international corporate banking cartel. Central banks are merely front organizations for globalists, and I am often reminded of the following quote from elitist insider Carroll Quigley when I hear people suggest that central banks are somehow independent from one another or that the Federal Reserve is itself the singular “source” of the world’s economic ills:
It must not be felt that these heads of the world’s chief central banks were themselves substantive powers in world finance. They were not. Rather, they were the technicians and agents of the dominant investment bankers of their own countries, who had raised them up and were perfectly capable of throwing them down.
The substantive financial powers of the world were in the hands of these investment bankers (also called “international” or “merchant” bankers) who remained largely behind the scenes in their own unincorporated private banks. These formed a system of international cooperation and national dominance which was more private, more powerful and more secret than that of their agents in the central banks.
No one can now argue against this reality after we have witnessed hard evidence of Goldman Sachs dictating Federal Reserve policy, as outlined here.
And, most recently, we now know that international bankers control political legislation as well, as Congress passed with little resistance a bill that negates the Frank-Dodd restrictions on derivatives and places the U.S. taxpayers and account holders on the hook for more than $303 trillion in toxic debt instruments. The bill is, for all intents and purposes, a “bail-in” measure in disguise. And it was pushed through with the direct influence of JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon.
The Federal Reserve, the U.S. government and the dollar are as expendable to the elites as any other economic or political appendage. And it can be replaced at will with yet another illusory structure if this furthers their goal of total centralization. This has been done for centuries, and I fail to see why anyone would assume that globalists would change their tactics now to preserve the dollar system. They call it the “New World Order,” but it is really the same old-world monetary order out of chaos that has always been exploited. Enter the IMF’s old/new world vision.
While the investment universe has been mesmerized by the deterioration of the Russian Ruble and oil prices, the IMF has been a busy little bee hive…
In articles over the past year, I have warned that the plan to dethrone the dollar and replace it with the special drawing rights basket currency system would be accelerated after it became clear that the U.S. Congress would refuse to pass the IMF reforms of 2010 proclaiming “inclusiveness” for developing economies, including the BRICS nations. The latest spending bill removed any mention of IMF reforms. The IMF, under Christine Lagarde, has insisted that if the U.S. did not approve its part of the reforms, the IMF would be forced to pursue a “Plan B” scenario. The details on this “plan B” have not been forthcoming, until now.
Credit to Common Sense

Where The Stock Market Is Heading In 2015



Do you want to know if the stock market is going to crash next year?  Just keep an eye on junk bonds.  Prior to the horrific collapse of stocks in 2008, high yield debt collapsed first.  And as you will see below, high yield debt is starting to crash again.  The primary reason for this is the price of oil.  The energy sector accounts for approximately 15 to 20 percent of the entire junk bond market, and those energy bonds are taking a tremendous beating right now.  This panic in energy bonds is infecting the broader high yield debt market, and investors have been pulling money out at a frightening pace.  And as I have written about previously, almost every single time junk bonds decline substantially, stocks end up following suit.  So don’t be fooled by the fact that some comforting words from Janet Yellen caused stock prices to jump over the past couple of days.  If you really want to know where the stock market is heading in 2015, keep a close eye on the market for high yield debt.
If you are not familiar with junk bonds, the concept is actually very simple.  Corporations that do not have high credit ratings typically have to pay higher interest rates to borrow money.  The following is how USA Today describes these bonds…
High-yield bonds are long-term IOUs issued by companies with shaky credit ratings. Just like credit card users, companies with poor credit must pay higher interest rates on loans than those with gold-plated credit histories.
But in recent years, interest rates on junk bonds have gone down to ridiculously low levels.  This is another bubble that was created by Federal Reserve policies, and it is a colossal disaster waiting to happen.  And unfortunately, there are already signs that this bubble is now beginning to burst
Back in June, the average junk bond yield was 3.90 percentage points higher than Treasury securities. The average energy junk bond yielded 3.91 percentage points higher than Treasuries, Lonski says.
That spread has widened to 5.08 percentage points for junk bonds vs. 7.86 percentage points for energy bonds — an indication of how worried investors are about default, particularly for small, highly indebted companies in the fracking business.
The reason why so many analysts are becoming extremely concerned about this shift in junk bonds is because we also saw this happen just before the great stock market crash of 2008.  In the chart below, you can see how yields on junk bonds started to absolutely skyrocket in September of that year…
High Yield Debt 2008
Of course we have not seen a move of that magnitude quite yet this year, but without a doubt yields have been spiking.  The next chart that I want to share is of this year.  As you can see, the movement over the past month or so has been quite substantial…
High Yield Debt 2014
And of course I am far from the only one that is watching this.  In fact, there are some sharks on Wall Street that plan to make an absolute boatload of cash as high yield bonds crash.
One of them is Josh Birnbaum.  He correctly made a giant bet against subprime mortgages in 2007, and now he is making a giant bet against junk bonds
When Josh Birnbaum was at Goldman Sachs in 2007, he made a huge bet against subprime mortgages.
Now he’s betting against something else: high-yield bonds.
Joshua Birnbaum, the ex-Goldman Sachs Group Inc. trader who made bets against subprime mortgages during the financial crisis, now has more than $2 billion in wagers against high-yield bonds at his Tilden Park Capital Management LP hedge-fund firm, according to investor documents.
Could you imagine betting 2 billion dollars on anything?
If he is right, he is going to make an incredible amount of money.
And I have a feeling that he will be.  As a recent New American article detailed, there is already panic in the air…
It’s a mania, said Tim Gramatovich of Peritus Asset Management who oversees a bond portfolio of $800 million: “Anything that becomes a mania — ends badly. And this is a mania.”
Bill Gross, who used to run PIMCO’s gigantic bond portfolio and now advises the Janus Capital Group, explained that “there’s very little liquidity” in junk bonds. This is the language a bond fund manager uses to tell people that no one is buying, everyone is selling. Gross added: “Everyone is trying to squeeze through a very small door.”
Bonds issued by individual energy developers have gotten hammered. For instance, Energy XXI, an oil and gas producer, issued more than $2 billion in bonds just in the last four years and, up until a couple of weeks ago, they were selling at 100 cents on the dollar. On Friday buyers were offering just 64 cents. Midstates Petroleum’s $700 million in bonds — rated “junk” by both Moody’s and Standard and Poor’s — are selling at 54 cents on the dollar, if buyers can be found.
So is there anything that could stop junk bonds from crashing?
Yes, if the price of oil goes back up to 80 dollars or more a barrel that would go a long way to settling things back down.
Unfortunately, many analysts are convinced that the price of oil is going to head even lower instead…
“We’re continuing to search for a bottom, and might even see another significant drop before the year-end,” said Gene McGillian, an analyst at Tradition Energy in Stamford, Connecticut.
As I write this, the price of U.S. oil has fallen $1.69 today to $54.78.
If the price of oil stays this low, junk bonds are going to keep crashing.
If junk bonds keep crashing, the stock market is almost certainly going to follow.
For additional reading on this, please see my previous article entitled “‘Near Perfect’ Indicator That Precedes Almost Every Stock Market Correction Is Flashing A Warning Signal“.
But just like in the years leading up to the crash of 2008, there are all kinds of naysayers proclaiming that a collapse will never happen.
Even though our financial problems and our underlying economic fundamentals have gotten much worse since the last crisis, they are absolutely convinced that things are somehow going to be different this time.
In the end, a lot of those skeptics are going to lose an enormous amount of money when the dominoes start falling.
Credit to Economic Collapse

The UK Oil Industry Is "Close To Collapse"



It seems like only yesterday when back on October 11, we first explained - and previewed - the collapse of oil courtesy of the secret deal between the US and Saudi Arabia. However, it seems like only this morning when we subsequently wrote that "If The Oil Plunge Continues, "Now May Be A Time To Panic" For US Shale Companies." In retrospect, it was, and with the price of crude far below mid-October levels, the pain for both Russia and shale is now quite unbearable (even as Saudi Arabia explained earlier today that the reason for collapsing oil has nothing to do with supply andeverything to do with plunging demand, and after seeingthis chart we believe it).
All of this was perfectly obvious months ago to anyone who cared. To wit:
... while we understand if Saudi Arabia is employing a dumping strategy to punish the Kremlin as per the "deal" with Obama's White House, very soon there will be a very vocal, very insolvent and very domestic shale community demanding answers from the Obama administration, as once again the "costs" meant to punish Russia end up crippling the only truly viable industry under the current presidency.
So with great delight we present the latest blowback from Obama's "brilliant" strategy to cripple Putin: in addition to the default wave about to crush America's own shale industry, America's biggest foreign ally and military partner when it comes to "ideologically pure missions of liberation" - the UK, and specifically its North Sea oil industry which according to the BBC is in a "crisis" and according to Robin Allan, chairman of the independent explorers' association Brindex, the industry was "close to collapse". 
The story is the same as in the shale patch, only in the far colder and stormier North Sea: "Almost no new projects in the North Sea are profitable with oil below $60 a barrel, he claims. 'Everyone is retreating'"
"It's almost impossible to make money at these oil prices", Mr Allan, who is a director of Premier Oil in addition to chairing Brindex, told the BBC. "It's a huge crisis. This has happened before, and the industry adapts, but the adaptation is one of slashing people, slashing projects and reducing costs wherever possible, and that's painful for our staff, painful for companies and painful for the country."
"It's close to collapse. In terms of new investments - there will be none, everyone is retreating, people are being laid off at most companies this week and in the coming weeks. Budgets for 2015 are being cut by everyone."
And to think it was just yesterday that the WSJ telling anyone who believes propaganda that "Christmas has come early for British consumers.
Tumbling oil prices, rising wages and declining borrowing costs are lifting households’ spending power, sending a powerful signal that consumers are set to keep Britain’s economy growing in the New Year.

BOE officials in December concluded the decline in the oil price in particular should act as a mini-stimulus for the U.K. and its major trading partners, even as Russia and other energy producers reel from crude’s recent slide. The BOE estimates the oil price has fallen 35% in sterling terms since June.
Which once again shows that when it comes to being utterly clueless about the real world, central bankers truly have no peers. Well, side from their media cheerleaders of course.
But hold on: wasn't only Putin supposed to be getting crushed as a result of the oil collapse? Suddenly the "secret" Saudi agreement isn't looking all that hot.
As for the truly "best" news: the collapse in the oil field will remain hidden from official government data. Mr Allan said many of the job cuts across the industry would not have been publicly announced. Oil workers are often employed as contractors, which are easier for employers to cut.
His remarks echo comments made by the veteran oil man and government adviser Sir Ian Wood, who last week predicted a wave of job losses in the North Sea over the next 18 months.
BOE bullshit aside, this is what is really going to happen:
The US-based oil giant ConocoPhillips is cutting 230 out of 1,650 jobs in the UK. This month it announced a 20% reduction in its worldwide capital expenditure budget, in response to falling oil prices.

Other big oil firms are expected to make similar cuts to their drilling and exploration budgets. Research from the investment bank Goldman Sachs predicted that they would need to cut capital expenditure by 30% to restore their profitability at current prices.

Service providers to the industry have also been hit. Texas-based oilfield services company Schlumberger cut back its UK-based fleet of geological survey ships in December, taking an $800m loss and cutting an unspecified number of jobs.

On Wednesday Aberdeen-based Wood Groupannounced a pay freeze for staff, and cut rates for its contractors.

Apache, one of the North Sea's biggest producers, has followed suit and will impose a 10 percent reduction on its contractors' wages from January 1st.
So what happens to the UK oil and energy industry? "The industry was hoping to see continued high levels of investment, stemming the inevitable decline of production as North Sea's resources are used up. But falling oil prices have put that in doubt."
However, the Department of Energy and Climate Change said: "The recent sharp reductions in oil prices are very challenging for companies active in the North Sea. We have seen very little evidence of new projects being cancelled or deferred in reaction to lower oil prices."
Which means the real pain is only just starting, first in the UK and soon everywhere else.
Credit to Zero Hedge