Goldene Zeiten ?? Argentina braced for currency revolt - 500 Beiträge pro Seite

[ThaiGuru]

Ein weiterer Grund sich mit Gold oder Silber etwas abzusichern, für alle Eventualitäten!

Was den Argentiniern durch die Abwertung des Pesos jetzt verloren geht, ist ja schon unglaublich, und zeugt davon wie naiv und blind vertrauend die grosse Masse von Leuten *Ihren* Politikern glaubt, bis zum bitteren Ende.

Was sich in Argentienien jetzt abspielt, sollte alle Investoren aufrütteln sich zu fragen, ob sich sowas nicht auch in Japan,(Verschuldungsstand: 130% des Bruttosozialproduktes!), Amerika, oder sogar in Europa wiederholen könnte.

Der untenstehende Artikel ist leider in Englisch abgefasst, und da mir kein Uebersetzungsprogramm zur Verfügung steht, stelle ich ihn halt orginal rein.

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Argentina braced for currency revolt

Warning of French-style revolution on eve of peso devaluation

Uki Goni in Buenos Aires
Friday January 4, 2002
The Guardian

Argentine politicians are braced for a strong popular backlash that is likely to follow the announcement of a major devaluation of the peso currency today, a policy that most economists agree will force thousands of middle class households and small businesses into bankruptcy.
The package will be a last-ditch effort by the discredited political class - banded together to prop up the fifth emergency government in two weeks - to avert a total collapse of the financial system, which is burdened by a mass of bad loans and the flight abroad of more than $20bn (£14bn) last year.

"This is going to be a deeply traumatic devaluation," said Elisa Carrio, leader of the ARI independent party, a popular legislator whose straight-talking has catapulted her to the top of the opinion polls.

Yesterday Argentina defaulted on its huge public debt by missing a $28m payment on an Italian lira bond.

Today`s devaluation will be announced by Remes Lenicov, who was sworn in yesterday as the economy minister.

Observers are fearful of the reaction to the expected announcement that bank withdrawals - already limited to $1,000 a month - will continue to be virtually frozen, at least until June.

Renewed protests could bring down the caretaker Peronist president, Eduardo Duhalde, who was by congress elected for a two-year term earlier this week.

"Duhalde`s government is not going to be able to return people their money, and these are people who are getting used to throwing out a new president every week," Ms Carrio said. "This is almost like a new French Revolution."

Argentina`s economic woes are due partly to its over-valued peso, pegged at a one-to-one parity with the dollar 10 years ago: a remedy that ended years of hyperinflation.

But with 80% of mortgages and loans denominated in dollars, the abandonment of that parity could devastate home owners and big corporations alike.

If the devaluation turns out to be 30%, a $1,000 debt would become a 1,300-peso debt.

Among those who expect to be ruined by the devaluation and withdrawal limit are a 43-year-old Buenos Aires shop owner Alberto Guilbert and his wife Olivia.

They scraped by on the 600 pesos a month they earned from their small shop, and on a renewable fixed-term deposit in dollars of their life savings.

"Now, instead of $600, we will be making maybe 300 or less," Mr Guilbert said. "And they tell us our fixed-term deposit will remain frozen for at least another six months. We don`t know how we`re going to manage."

Fearful of adding fuel to the social unrest that has caused the downfall of four successive presidents since President Fernando de la Rua was deposed two weeks ago, Mr Duhalde has been trying to convince bankers to accept a scheme whereby loans taken out in dollars are converted to pesos but at reduced interest rates. This would soften the blow of the devaluation for borrowers.

The government is also seeking a way to lift the curb on withdrawals from bank accounts, at least partially, without wrecking the banks. Nominally, savings total $66bn, but liquid bank reserves are believed to be virtually non-existent.

"The banks have nothing left," the political analyst Rosendo Fraga said.

Warned in advance by government officials, most big investors pulled their money out of Argentina before the curbs were imposed in December.

"The big investors got their money out in time, it`s the middle class who had their accounts frozen," the mayor of Buenos Aires, Anibal Ibarra, said. But he warned: "I see no future for Argentina if this government fails."

Middle-class demonstrators demanding the resignation of the entire political class and immediate elections see matters differently. "Argentina still has a future, but there won`t be room for corporatist politicians such as Ibarra and Duhalde who appoint presidents without consulting the people," said Mariano Conte, one of the thousands who marched in protest against Mr Duhalde two days ago.

The rage at prominent politicians is such that a former Peronist justice minister and a former economics official in Mr De la Rua`s administration had to flee two Buenos Aires shopping malls, hounded by elegant men and women shouting "Thieves, Thieves!"

Ms Carrio said: "Successive hurricanes have been blowing across Argentina that are spelling the end of its political class as we know it. The next will probably blow away the Peronist party, and that will shake Argentina to the core."

·President Bush wrote to President Duhalde to express continued confidence in relations between their countries, the White House said. Mr Bush and his advisers were monitoring the political situation closely, it said.

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TG

[Blecheuro]

Du hast Recht Thai Guru!

Das siehst Du schon an meinem Namen! Aber die Menschen brauchen immer sehr lange, bis sie etwas begreifen. Und deshalb müssen sie leider immer wieder teuer bezahlen.

[ThaiGuru]

Etwas zum Nachdenken!

Oder warum physisches Gold besser sein kann, als Papiergeld auf dem Konto einer Bank.

ThaiGuru




March 30, 2002 New York Times
Argentines Feel Misled by U.S. Banks in Crisis
By LARRY ROHTER

BUENOS AIRES, March 27 —

As the Argentine economy lurched toward collapse late last year, María Carmen de los Santos was worried for her country but felt secure about her own prospects. After all, she had $225,000 in the bank — not in some fly-by-night local bank, but in dollar accounts in a rock-solid symbol of American capitalism, Citibank.

Over the last four months, though, Dr. de los Santos, 45, has watched helplessly as all four of her accounts were first frozen and then converted into pesos. They have lost more than two-thirds of their value, standing at less than $75,000. She still cannot withdraw her money, and for that she blames Citibank as much as the Argentine government.

"I feel that they deceived, betrayed and lied to me," Dr. de los Santos, an anesthesiologist, said in an interview. "Citibank made all kinds of promises to get me to deposit my money with them, but when the crisis hit, they didn`t keep their word. And their promises turned out to be false."

Now she has become a leader of a group of more than 500 Citibank account holders who demonstrate regularly outside the bank`s headquarters here. They maintain that Citibank, which has operated in Argentina since 1914, lured them into a financial trap through false advertising and deceptive practices. They are threatening legal action to get their dollars back.

With this nation of 37 million mired in the worst economic crisis in its history, feelings are running especially strong against United States banks and other foreign banks that aggressively expanded operations in the 1990`s, promoting their links to home offices in an effort to increase their share of what was then one of the world`s most lucrative and least regulated markets.

"Anytime you`d talk to them about not renewing a time deposit, they would always say, `You can`t compare Citibank to some small bank, because you have real security here,` " said José Baraschi, 53, whose deposits have fallen in value to less than $60,000 from $180,000. "I thought I had the same security as an American citizen in New York."

Mr. Baraschi`s case is typical. He built up his nest egg in 25 years at I.B.M. (news/quote) but was laid off six months ago. He and his wife and their two daughters, 18 and 20, had been living off the interest on the various Citibank accounts, "but now every cent we had is frozen," he said.

Many depositors here, some of whom are United States citizens, also have accounts at Citibank branches in the United States but said Citibank officials had discouraged them from shifting money there, saying they would earn higher interest rates here. To their surprise and exasperation, they now find that the new restrictions here also prevent them from transferring funds between accounts.

The Argentine government also has complaints about foreign banks. Citibank was already under attack as a result of a United States government report accusing it of participating in a money-laundering scheme involving associates of Carlos Saúl Menem, a former president of Argentina. Then, earlier this month, a judge here ordered senior executives from five banks, including Citibank and BankBoston, not to leave the country while he investigates accusations of illegal capital flight.

Citibank officials here declined to discuss any aspect of its activities and policies in Argentina. An official at the New York headquarters referred comment to the Latin American office in Miami, where a spokeswoman, Lula Rodriguez, said the privacy rights of depositors precluded any comment on the accusations of account holders here.

Lawyers and bankers here, however, argue that foreign banks, which account for 7 of Argentina`s 10 largest banks, are hamstrung by the same restrictions that apply to domestically owned banks. They point out that it was the government, not the banks, that froze accounts and ordered the conversion of dollar deposits into pesos.

Argentine depositors say foreign banks could easily recapitalize their operations here if they wanted to. But local analysts say that with the banking sector facing combined losses of more than $20 billion, such a step is extremely unlikely.

With no signs of a solution, the depositors say they are willing to file suit in the United States to recover their money. But legal experts say their chances are slim, given the way United States banking laws have been rewritten, precisely to avoid such suits.

After Communist governments took power in Cuba and Vietnam, some foreign depositors were able to recover their money after filing suit in the United States. But the banks involved were branches of United States banks and not wholly owned subsidiaries, as is the case for both Citibank N.A. and BankBoston N.A.

In addition, a bank is not required to repay a deposit originally made in a foreign branch if that branch is unable to do so because of a government action, which is what happened in Argentina.

"This statute was specifically designed to protect American banks from claims of this type," Rodgin Cohen, a banking law specialist at the New York law firm of Sullivan & Cromwell, said in a telephone interview.

But depositors here say they intend to argue their case on other grounds. Citibank and other United States banks, they maintain, made guarantees that they knew were impossible to keep, and that constitutes fraud.

"We were led to believe that depositing our money here was the same thing as having it there in the United States," said Marta Cortelezzi, 50, a biochemist and owner of a medical laboratory. "I even closed my account in New York and put all my money in accounts here because I trusted in the assurances I was given and thought it would be easier to have the money here."

If they hope to win, the depositors must cite more than the verbal assurances they say they received from local bank managers. But they say the banks are destroying the written evidence.

"All the documents that can be used as proof of deceit have suddenly been withdrawn from circulation," said Claudio Laborda, leader of a BankBoston depositors` group. "The brochures and pamphlets, posters and billboards, every bit of advertising promising that in a case of crisis the branch here would be backed by the home office — all of that has been taken away."

A spokeswoman for BankBoston here, Mariela Martínez, said that "for the moment, we are not making any comments" on any aspect of the bank`s activities or policies. Phone calls seeking comment from the bank`s parent in the United States, FleetBoston Financial (news/quote) Services, were not returned.

The accountholders say they know the odds are against them. But they say they intend to pursue the case as far as possible, if only as a warning to other depositors here and in other countries.

"Depositors need to know that if a bank doesn`t keep its word in one part of the world, then its word doesn`t mean anything anywhere else," Ms. Cortelezzi said. "Who is to say that the same thing that has happened to us here won`t happen someday to depositors in Uruguay, Mexico or Brazil?"

[howling wolf]

@Thai: ausdrucken und jeder CitiBank Filiale weltweit an die Tür nageln...