This morning on CNBC: Bail out the airlines, bail out the cruise lines, bail out Amtrak, bail out the airports, bail out the oil drillers. Even Boeing is begging for money. As Peter Schiff has pointed out, Boeing borrowed billions to execute stock buybacks, and now its executives are begging for dollars so that the company doesn’t have to sell that stock at a loss. Boeing gambled foolishly, and it lost. Big Guv, however, will give Boeing a trophy. In Larry KudlowSpeak, none of this constitutes a bailout – it is “liquidity assistance.”
Words like “urgent”, “necessary”, and “bold move” are a staple of The Lexicon once again. A rinse-and-repeat of 2008-2009 with a catastrophic angle to buffer the shenanigans.
Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve cut rates to zero and commenced a $700 billion “quantitative easing” (asset purchases of $500M in Treasurys and $200M in agency-backed mortgage securities). The ensuing asset bubbles are going to be enormous.
And these wealth pirates have the cover of Coronavirus for the recession, and Americans will buy it. And those of us who study economics and/or pay close attention to financial markets know this recession has been a beast waiting in the wings since at least 2015.
7:12 am on March 17, 2020
