In the light of the Cyprus heist, the UK, US, and Spain are considering depositor haircuts too. As The Slog predicted last week, the Germans have this in mind for everyone.
Apologies for this, but WordPress has managed to swallow up an earlier post I made. Instead, it posted something in draft, and trashed the other one.
So herewith a summary plus update.
The Spanish finance Minister has floated the idea of a 0.2% depositor levy there. The Bank of England and the FIDC have issued a joint paper suggesting something similar, only bigger, in the event of an emergency in the UK or US.
Clearly, the idea of embezzling depositor funds is catching on. But Germany – who else? – is taking things a step further by suggesting that somebody else’s depositors be raped. And for this little experiment, the Germans have chosen Italy. Refer if you like to an earlier Slogpost about Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung printing bollocks about personal wealth in Italy being higher than that in Germany.
Now Joerg Kraemer, chief economist of the German Commerzbank, has enlarged on this mendacity, and called for private savings accounts in Italy to be levied at 15%. “A tax rate of 15 percent on financial assets would probably be enough to push the Italian government debt to below the critical level of 100 percent of gross domestic product,” he told Handelsblatt yesterday.
Net financial assets of the Italians amounts to 173% of GDP. This was significantly more than the net financial assets of the Germans, which corresponds to 124% GDP, said Kramer Handelsblatt Online. “So it would make sense, in Italy a one-time property tax levy,” suggested the Bank economist. “A tax rate of 15 percent on financial assets would probably be enough to push the Italian government debt to below the critical level of 100 percent of gross domestic product.”
Do please read the piece at the link above – it’s repeated again at the link below. It shows how Berlin (aka Schäuble) is systematically building up a body of shibboleth crap in order to support the infinite German capacity for “I am not to blame, oh woe is poor me”.
Recently at The Slog: How Schäuble briefed against Draghi to make Italy look richer than Germany
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