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Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

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  • Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

    http://goldandsilverlinings.com/?p=1793

    I have received a few emails asking if I was still content with my decision to shut down my brokerage. Not only am I content, but after seeing the news that broke over the weekend, I am of the considered opinion that the entire financial blogging community should formally call for a general financial market strike. And I’m not kidding. A couple of things have happened regarding the MF Global mess that I don’t think got the attention they should have because they broke over the weekend. So let me fill you all in.

    First, all notions of personal property rights were essentially destroyed when the MF Global “trustee” began seizing customers’ gold and silver bullion held in storage if that bullion was purchased through contracts brokered by MF Global. In case you’re not following, let me restate. MF Global customers who traded in precious metals and actually took delivery and OWNED bullion, as in outright, free and clear OWNERSHIP, complete with a warehouse receipt (aka title) with SERIAL NUMBERS designating exactly which physical bars they OWNED, and were PAYING RENT to STORE their own property in a “secure” VAULT, complete with statements indicating that these storage fees were paid in full, are having THEIR PROPERTY THAT THEY OWN AND ARE PAYING RENT TO STORE CONFISCATED by the MF Global trustee in order to feed the gaping maw that is the MF Global “estate”.

    This would be EXACTLY like if you rented a little storage space at one of the thousands of storage facilities that dot this nation, and stored a car there. I used to do exactly this when I had multiple cars. Imagine the owner of the storage facility went bankrupt. Now imagine that a “trustee” SEIZED YOUR CAR, sold it, and used YOUR PROPERTY to feed the storage franchise owner’s BK. Nevermind that you had an explicit RENTAL AGREEMENT and that you had receipts proving that you were paying monthly rent on said storage space, and that you could produce clear title to the car showing that you owned it, and that the VIN numbers matched.

    Do you understand what is happening now? This is outright confiscation of personal property. After having their money stolen out of their accounts and being locked out of their accounts, unable to trade or even liquidate WHILE THE MARKETS CONTINUED TO TRADE, these people are now having their PERSONAL PHYSICAL PROPERTY stolen and redistributed to the MF Global estate, in order to feed Corzine’s gambling debts – MADE ILLEGALLY WITH FUNDS STOLEN OUT OF THE CUSTOMER ACCOUNTS – to repay counterparties with J.P. Morgan at the fore.

    So guess what? This is now establishing the precedent that ANY property held by a third party can be seized and confiscated to feed a bankruptcy of said third party. This includes BANK DEPOSITS. Now, please consider that all of the major banks in the United States are insolvent, and insolvent MULTIPLE TIMES OVER. Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Citi, all of them. When these banks collapse – and they WILL collapse – any deposits they are holding WILL BE CONFISCATED and redistributed to their counterparties. Citation URL here at Market-Ticker.org:

    http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=199356

    Oh, but there’s more.

    Also announced over the weekend was the jaw-dropping, yet illuminating fact that the MF Global bankruptcy was fraudulently, nefariously and illegally drawn up as a Chapter 7 BK for a SECURITIES DEALER and NOT a commodity brokerage as it should have been. Look, MF Global was the second-largest non-bank FCM in the United States next to NewEdge which is the old FIMAT. If MF Global wasn’t an FCM, then there are no FCMs. Of course it was an FCM. It had $7.2 billion in customer seg funds as of August 31, 2011. And yet MF Global was immediately, from the get-go, put into Chapter 7 BK as a SECURITIES FIRM. This is fraud. MF Global’s BK should have OBVIOUSLY been established under Subchapter IV of the Chapter 7 code as a COMMODITY BROKERAGE.

    Why wasn’t this done? Because in a Subchapter IV liquidation of a commodity brokerage firm, guess who is absolutely and unequivocally at the front of the line? You guessed it: the CUSTOMERS. In the Chapter 7 liquidation of a securities firm, guess who goes to the front of the line? Uh-huh. The “creditors”, aka the counterparties on the firm’s proprietary positions. As in . . . J.P. Morgan, et al.

    Now we know why this unprecedented action of raping the customers has happened. It was set up that way. Now are you telling me that NO ONE at the CFTC appreciated the difference between the BK subchapters? Are you honestly telling me that Terry Duffy and NO ONE at the CME understood the difference between a securities firm liquidation and a Subchapter IV commodities firm liquidation and the massive consequences to the customers? Not a single one of them understood this massive difference? Bullshit. Of course they knew. They set it up that way from day one. And they continue to know. And this fricking charade just keeps going and going, and the rape and confiscation of the customers’ property continues apace. The fix was in on the customers and J.P. Morgan was put at the front of the line willfully, intentionally and with extreme malice aforethought by all those parties concerned. Citation Hotlink here:

    Click Here to read the ZeroHedge reportage.

    And this is why I am now formally calling for the financial industry blogging community to officially push for and declare a general market strike. I call for all decent people of good will to withdraw ALL FUNDS from the financial markets and cease to trade in solidarity with the MF Global rape victims until such time as the MF Global BK is properly filed as a Subchapter IV commodity brokerage liquidation and their private property is FULLY RESTORED.

    If this is how they’re going to play, I say let’s shut the whole damn thing down. Let’s show these rat bastards how we do things in the Civilized World. Molon Labe.
    Personally I felt the same way when they stole from the bondholders of GM & Chrysler. What was that ... 3 years ago now? Never mind.

  • #2
    Re: Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

    never underestimate the at-first imperceptible building of momentum...
    from a mile or two off the coast, a tsunami looks like any other wave
    and typically, its not the first rumble that causes the smoke,
    but that last loud/close clap of thunder
    thats sparks the blaze.

    patience, my good fellow, patience...
    the longest journey begins with the first step....

    Comment


    • #3
      Re: Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

      Originally posted by lektrode View Post
      never underestimate the at-first imperceptible building of momentum...
      from a mile or two off the coast, a tsunami looks like any other wave
      and typically, its not the first rumble that causes the smoke,
      but that last loud/close clap of thunder
      thats sparks the blaze.

      patience, my good fellow, patience...
      the longest journey begins with the first step....
      The MF Global thing is mindblowing. I think the public just suffers from learned helplessness. An inability to understand exactly what happened, and a feeling of not being able to do anything about it if they did.

      This study was published earlier this year:

      http://news.rpi.edu/update.do?artcenterkey=2902

      Scientists at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have found that when just 10 percent of the population holds an unshakable belief, their belief will always be adopted by the majority of the society.
      If a 10% coalition can emerge form the 99%, maybe we can see some changes. I know it is now a dirty word now, but I do have... hope.

      Comment


      • #4
        Re: Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

        Folks,


        Does anyone know if EJ has commented on this MF Global incident (not sure if you have already in another link)?

        In his link below, he highlighted a cycle and distilled vitality of "the American Entrepreneurial Growth Engine".

        One of the aspects is "property rights".

        http://www.itulip.com/forums/showthr...17599#poststop


        As Anne says, MF Global appears to be a violation of "property rights".




        Do we take MF Global this as "one bad apple" incident or a systemic problem?


        thanks,

        Comment


        • #5
          Re: Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

          Ann may be rushing to judgment. As I understand it, the subject property may have been owned by MF's customers but if these customers were using their property as collateral in the futures market then their customer agreements gave MF the explicit right to hypothecate this collateral to finance MF's proprietary trading. Perhaps Ann never read or understood the fine print. Or perhaps JP Morgan, as a counterparty to MF, has simply taken quick action on the fine print figuring that possession is 99% of the law. Either way, I am certain that while there is much we don't know, it will eventually be sorted out in court, if only because the affected customers are wealthy enough to litigate ever issue.

          Comment


          • #6
            Re: Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

            Originally posted by goodrich4bk View Post
            Ann may be rushing to judgment. As I understand it, the subject property may have been owned by MF's customers but if these customers were using their property as collateral in the futures market then their customer agreements gave MF the explicit right to hypothecate this collateral to finance MF's proprietary trading. Perhaps Ann never read or understood the fine print. Or perhaps JP Morgan, as a counterparty to MF, has simply taken quick action on the fine print figuring that possession is 99% of the law. Either way, I am certain that while there is much we don't know, it will eventually be sorted out in court, if only because the affected customers are wealthy enough to litigate every issue.
            Ah, yes. And guess who'll end up with half of their money?

            Comment


            • #7
              Re: Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

              Ann Barnhardt re: PFGBest (MFGlobal redux) at http://barnhardt.biz/

              It's gettin' sporty out there ...

              I HAVE INFO FOR ANYONE WHO WANTS TO SUE THE NFA
              POSTED BY ANN BARNHARDT - JULY 10, AD 2012 4:59 PM MST

              The National Futures Association needs to be sued into the ground by all of the PFGBest customers, as well as many of the NFA employees PERSONALLY.In 2010 I was audited by the NFA, which is a bi-annual (every two years) occurrence for Independent Introducing Brokers. The NFA tried to tell me that a commercial hedge broker could not execute more than one round-turn per client per cash inventory cycle.

              Yes, I kid you not. They actually tried to make that argument. As in a feedlot or rancher who is hedged with short futures and has a big open profit on the hedge MAY NOT exit that short futures and buy puts in order to manage that position. Or, if a hedger has an option position that has a big open profit, the hedger may NOT roll that option position into a different strike price in order to capture equity and protect against time value erosion.

              The NFA actually tried to argue that it is against the law for a hedge broker to transact more than one round-turn per cash commodity inventory cycle. Again, I can't make this crap up. I have all of their stunningly ignorant letters to prove all of this.
              But here is the point, and anyone out there who is a PFGBest customer or an attorney representing a PFGBest customer needs to listen up:

              The same "Senior Compliance Manager" who signed off on the PFGBest affadavit and who is listed on the NFA website as both the "Director of Audits/Investigations" and the "Director of FOREX Compliance", Lauren Brinati, is the same woman whom I and my attorneys dealt with two years ago.

              Now, hold on to your pantyhose.

              One of my attorneys in the Schuyler Roche Crisham firm in Chicago, as livid as I was by the NFA's galactically stupid contention about hedgers being limited to one round-turn per cash inventory cycle, called Lauren Brinati to discuss the NFA's position. Lauren Brinati said that she couldn't discuss the matter with my attorney directly because:

              "I don't actually understand any of this stuff. I just sign whatever comes across my desk."
              Lauren Brinati, June 2010

              Lauren Brinati said that to my attorney in June of 2010.

              This woman is DIRECTOR OF AUDITS AND INVESTIGATIONS, and openly stated that not only did she have no understanding of the futures and options industry, but also admitted freely that she was a de facto robosigner who signed off on ANYTHING that came down from above.

              The NFA had full, direct auditing oversight of PFGBest because PFGBest was a non-clearing FCM. The Director of NFA Audits and Investigations, Lauren Brinati, admitted freely to my attorney that she lacked even rudimentary understanding of the industry, could not discuss even the simplest concepts, and signed whatever came across her desk from on high without understanding it.

              Anyone who is interested in pursuing this as evidence of gross negligence and breach of fiduciary duty by the NFA, and Lauren Brinati personally, should have their attorney contact me.

              UPDATE: The NFA was mailing bank account confirmations to an UNVERIFIED PO BOX in CEDAR FALLS, IOWA that was actually rented by Russell Wasendorf, Sr. That's how he was faking the balance confirms. That's right, Lauren Brinati and the NFA auditing crew snail mailed account balance confirms, confirming HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS in customer funds to an UNVERIFIED PO BOX in CEDAR FALLS, IOWA.

              You simply cannot make this shit up.

              Here is the Reuters citation.

              UPDATE 2: Just in case you didn't catch it, Russell Wasendorf, Sr. currently sits on the NFA's FCM Advisory Board. Go ahead and screen capture the following URL before they scrub it.

              http://www.nfa.futures.org/NFA-about...committee.HTML

              Comment


              • #8
                Re: Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

                scrubbed by 5:05 pm on 7/11

                "UPDATE 2: Just in case you didn't catch it, Russell Wasendorf, Sr. currently sits on the NFA's FCM Advisory Board. Go ahead and screen capture the following URL before they scrub it.

                http://www.nfa.futures.org/NFA-about...committee.HTML"
                If necessity is the mother of invention, desperation is the father...

                Comment


                • #9
                  Re: Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

                  Originally posted by goodrich4bk View Post
                  Ann may be rushing to judgment. As I understand it, the subject property may have been owned by MF's customers but if these customers were using their property as collateral in the futures market then their customer agreements gave MF the explicit right to hypothecate this collateral to finance MF's proprietary trading. Perhaps Ann never read or understood the fine print. Or perhaps JP Morgan, as a counterparty to MF, has simply taken quick action on the fine print figuring that possession is 99% of the law. Either way, I am certain that while there is much we don't know, it will eventually be sorted out in court, if only because the affected customers are wealthy enough to litigate ever issue.
                  Not only does Ann have a horse in this race but isn't telling us the whole story. I'll amplify that and say Ann may not be admitting the truth of her situation to herself.

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Re: Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

                    Originally posted by Sidewinder View Post
                    scrubbed by 5:05 pm on 7/11

                    "UPDATE 2: Just in case you didn't catch it, Russell Wasendorf, Sr. currently sits on the NFA's FCM Advisory Board. Go ahead and screen capture the following URL before they scrub it.

                    http://www.nfa.futures.org/NFA-about...committee.HTML"
                    Around heah, us ol' yankees usetta say that Pepperidge Farm remembahs. Now'a'days that sounds a bit ol' fashioned. So, ah, without fah-thah ado, ouah new phrase is:

                    "Google Cache remembahs."

                    Ayup.

                    \


                    (and if that ain't enough, there's always archive.org).

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Re: Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

                      Originally posted by dcarrigg View Post
                      Around heah, us ol' yankees usetta say that Pepperidge Farm remembahs. Now'a'days that sounds a bit ol' fashioned. So, ah, without fah-thah ado, ouah new phrase is:

                      "Google Cache remembahs."

                      Ayup.

                      \


                      (and if that ain't enough, there's always archive.org).


                      Thanks DC, had to smile with that one. These are very good tools to point out!

                      Oldtimer's disease is catching up, but here just making a rather oblique observation on how quickly information can be changed these days.

                      Hope all is well in southern "Far East" .

                      SW
                      Last edited by Sidewinder; July 11, 2012, 08:21 PM. Reason: Clarification, Expansion, uh...
                      If necessity is the mother of invention, desperation is the father...

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Re: Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

                        My own experience is that by far the majority never even try to read any legal papers; instead leaving them to those of us that do. You shouldn't be in business if you cannot read and understand the fine print.

                        Reminds me of an insurance broker who sold policies with a single sentance so fine, you needed a microscope to read it.

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          Re: Ann Barnhardt - A blogger's call to arms

                          I'd be more receptive to Barnhart's views if she was less vocal in her call for a "junta" or civil war. As difficult as our situation seems at times, I can't understand how anyone would wish for civil war and a military dictatorship. She might go back and re-read our history to get a sense of how much suffering our people experienced during the last civil war and the military dictatorship (Reconstruction) that followed it.

                          Comment

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