Here's a really useful website from which you can learn all about this. The subject is divided into four main headings each of which offer different modules that you can read through at your own pace - it's free btw:

http://www.financial-guide.ch/

also recommend this when stuck with a definition:

http://www.investopedia.com/rotate.aspx?invsection=home&backurl=http%3a%2f%2fwww.investopedia.com%2f

Aragon wrote:

Here's a really useful website from which you can learn all about this. The subject is divided into four main headings each of which offer different modules that you can read through at your own pace - it's free btw:

http://www.financial-guide.ch/

I was very impressed with your grasp of Naked Shorting yesterday Aragon. I am a beginner in comparison.

It was all bluff, CF - picked up from that Bill Burrell/greatest crime of the century interview about five minutes beforehand:oops: Every time I think Ive got a handle on the subject, I see another incomprehensible article full of alien terminology and realise I ain't scratched the surface.

Is anyone interested in starting a study group here - we could work our way through the modules on the website in the order in which they appear.

Aragon what's your view on quadrillions worth of credit default swaps? At that scale it's not just GDPs of countries your talking about but the future production of economic blocs for years and years if not generations.

Continental-wide slavery ahoy, youngdan conspicuously absent.

There are 10^11 stars in the galaxy. That used to be a huge number. But it's only a hundred billion. It's less than the national deficit! We used to call them astronomical numbers. Now we should call them economical numbers. -Richard Feynman, physicist, Nobel laureate (1918-1988)

Auditor #9 wrote:

Aragon what's your view on quadrillions worth of credit default swaps? At that scale it's not just GDPs of countries your talking about but the future production of economic blocs for years and years if not generations.

Continental-wide slavery ahoy, youngdan conspicuously absent.

I was wondering that myself. No sign of him at the moment. I need him here if I get asked a really difficult question on the CDS timebomb.


He may be unwinding a reverse long-Collar short-Floor CDS-over-Interest Rate Swaption inverse butterfly which, if that's the case, indicates that he might be a while.

Has youngdan been seen over on the other one ?

He popped in last night here. Not sure if he posted. He was busy on P.ie a couple of weeks ago but not so much recently I don't think.

I'm planning on starting a heavy-duty Ron Paul thread, which I think is well overdue. Perhaps that will draw him out, but somehow I think maybe not.

An old story, I guess:

+++

It was autumn, and the Red Indians asked their new Chief if the winter was going to be cold or mild. Since he was a Red Indian chief in a modern society, he couldn't tell what the weather was going to be.

Nevertheless, to be on the safe side, he replied to his tribe that the winter was indeed going to be cold and that the members of the village should collect wood to be prepared.

But also being a practical leader, after several days he got an idea. He went to the phone booth, called the National Weather Service and asked 'Is the coming winter going to be cold?'

'It looks like this winter is going to be quite cold indeed,' the weather man responded.

So the Chief went back to his people and told them to collect even more wood. A week later, he called the National Weather Service again. 'Is it going to be a very cold winter?'

'Yes,' the man at National Weather Service again replied, 'it's definitely going to be a very cold winter.'

The Chief again went back to his people and ordered them to collect every scrap of wood they could find. Two weeks later, he called the National Weather Service again. 'Are you absolutely sure that the winter is going to be very cold?'

'Absolutely,' the man replied. 'It's going to be one of the coldest winters ever.'

'How can you be so sure?' the Chief asked.

The weather man replied, 'The Red Indians are collecting wood like crazy.'


This is how stock markets work.

I like that one Soubresauts. That's one for my kids...

Capitalism undoes itself -

Credit crises, credit bubbles, machines and technology - The Falling Rate of Profit Part I
http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=9oXEgH4HzYk

Part II
http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=x7RjbEq_yxU&feature=related

This guy argues that machines and technological improvements are used by capitalists to get an advantage over competitors by driving down the price but ultimately those machine inputs affect the rate of profit in a negative way, causing credit bubbles, dole queues, shelves of unsold goods ...

He doesn't say what should happen after that.

Auditor #9 wrote:

Capitalism undoes itself -

Credit crises, credit bubbles, machines and technology - The Falling Rate of Profit Part I
http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=9oXEgH4HzYk

Part II
http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=x7RjbEq_yxU&feature=related

This guy argues that machines and technological improvements are used by capitalists to get an advantage over competitors by driving down the price but ultimately those machine inputs affect the rate of profit in a negative way, causing credit bubbles, dole queues, shelves of unsold goods ...

He doesn't say what should happen after that.

We're going to have to work that out. Brilliant Auditor - however did you find that.

cactus I found it through themodernmystic who seems to be getting a bit more activistic himself .. he's talking about "A Map" in this one
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88aRqm5YRok&feature=user

I haven't watched the Alex Jones one yet he refers to. In one this morning he muses on "The Tragedy of the Commons" and how we somehow always seem to defer decisions to a committee, body or government which is essentially deferring our 'empathy' he says. Could we feel that empathy more directly for each other? Should we? How can we be de-programmed out of this tendency to defer to government? I don't have that problem (but I do have the issue of activism in the real world - although I think you can be an activist in thousands of ways now). Is he coming around to Anarchism and self-sufficiency and all that?

The other fella, brendan mcooney is brilliant alright - have a look at his other stuff - What is capitalism? etc.

http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=Duxkrv4fSe4&feature=user

He has surprisingly few viewers but I suppose he's only there a month or so. We'll find more like him I'm sure.

>>>> Moved to Economic Theory and History >>>>

This is a useful short explanation of things live the commodities and derivatives market, the euro dollar and so on, by Paul Bowman and first published in Red and Black Revolution.

http://www.wsm.ie/news_viewer/3613

Any comments or alternative views?