Source: Bloomberg

Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria SA, Spain’s second-biggest bank, took over Guaranty Financial Group Inc. of Texas, the first foreign company to buy a failed U.S. bank this year as the toll of seized lenders climbed to 81.

Branches of Guaranty in Texas and California tomorrow will become offices of Birmingham, Alabama-based BBVA Compass, the U.S. affiliate of the Spanish bank, in a transaction brokered by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., the regulator said today. State and federal regulators also seized two banks in Georgia and a 10-branch lender in Alabama with $927 million in assets.

Guaranty had $13.5 billion in assets and $12 billion in deposits and “was in an unsafe and unsound condition because of the deteriorating quality of its loan portfolio, critically deficient earnings, capital insolvency and strained liquidity position,” the Office of Thrift Supervision, the lender’s regulator, said in a statement. Continue reading →

14% could be a manipulated number, depending on how you add it up.

Source: Warren Buffet

IN nature, every action has consequences, a phenomenon called the butterfly effect. These consequences, moreover, are not necessarily proportional. For example, doubling the carbon dioxide we belch into the atmosphere may far more than double the subsequent problems for society. Realizing this, the world properly worries about greenhouse emissions.

The butterfly effect reaches into the financial world as well. Here, the United States is spewing a potentially damaging substance into our economy — greenback emissions.

To be sure, we’ve been doing this for a reason I resoundingly applaud. Last fall, our financial system stood on the brink of a collapse that threatened a depression. The crisis required our government to display wisdom, courage and decisiveness. Fortunately, the Federal Reserve and key economic officials in both the Bush and Obama administrations responded more than ably to the need. Continue reading →

Source: 101healthsteps.com

Our society has us all convinced to eat what benefits the big corporations and helps them continue making money, this current mainstream diet works very well for all the different corporate industries: pharmaceutical, meat, dairy, and all the restaurants and the list goes on.

There is too much at stake for these companies and the mighty dollar is what is keeping this knowledge under the rug. All these sectors together carry too much weight to let the true human diet to get out – this is logical, watch the documentary ‘The Corporation’ to understand the true meaning of a corporation.

As long as we have a money based system versus a resource based system, the mighty dollar will be the top of everyone’s list and progression will remain as slow as it currently is because of greed.

It is in no great interest of the meat, dairy, or restaurant industry to tell you the facts about food; and the reason that the truth is not learned in schools, may have something to do with them being funded by the private sector in most part, one way or another.

Source: The DAily Bell.com

The editors of The Daily Bell are pleased to present this exclusive interview conducted by Scott Smith with hard-money expert Bob Chapman.

Introduction: Bob Chapman has been writing and analyzing the precious metals field for decades. As one of the largest gold brokers of the 1970s, Bob experienced the ins and outs of the industry at the highest levels and this experience has stood him in good stead. As the composer of the International Forecaster, Bob provides a savvy and often controversial take on how the industry works today and where precious metals are headed.

Daily Bell: Thanks for the interview.

Chapman: Glad to do it.

Daily Bell: You are well known for writing a good deal about a concerted, organized effort by the elite to control the global economy. What interactions have you had that provided you with this conclusion?

Chapman: I’ve been studying the elitists for 50 years, and I’ve been writing about them since 1967. None of this is new and now because of the Internet much of it is very visible. It begins with central banking and there is nothing to be said that can constitute a defense of central banking. A small group of men get together around a table and set interest rates, basically the price of money. They do so without supervision or the consent of those who use their money product and they do so pretty much in secret. There is no accountability and lately, again thanks to the Internet and YouTube, people can pretty well see how nonsensical the system is. Continue reading →