Sunday, July 22, 2012

Libor-rating the people


Libor-rating the people
(Satire) By Stephen J. Gray

A speech to the Bankers Banquet by respected banker Mr. Moneybags Mac Scam.

Dear Friends,
Once again we are in the forefront of negative publicity. All because it is claimed we “rigged” the Libor rate. Some are even equating us to gangsters and loan sharking. Which of course is ridiculous, we don’t have people bumped off for not paying their debts. Nor do we participate in illegal banking. All our business ventures are out in the open and sanctioned by governments. If we were involved in any illegality we would all be in jail. Yet, none of us have gone to jail therefore the system must be satisfied with our performances in the world of money. I know some of us have been fined huge amounts of money over money laundering and “financing terrorism” as well as banking drug money for organized crime, but none of us admitted any malfeasance, and we did apologize. Then we just paid up and carried on business like respected bankers do. Our burden is heavy looking after the peoples’ money, yet we get criticized just because we keep the banking system stable. Still, we soldier on despite all the negative publicity and do our work faithfully and honestly to the best of our abilities even though we are being victimised.

Still, I must say it was nice to see one financial columnist say one of our banks was a “victim” in the Libor affair even though it agreed to pay a huge fine.   But hey, money makes the world go around as the saying goes and the central banks always come to our rescue by printing more money should we need it. And let us not forget the backbone of society is the taxpayers. They are always available to bail us out when we need it. Then we lend the taxpayers money from their own money. Is that not “free enterprise” at its finest? So, really it is not good for us to berate ourselves over the so-called Libor “conspiracy.” I prefer to call it good planning. If we did not plan to fix the bank rates properly, who else could do it? Who else has the expertise? Who else advises governments on monetary policy? Who else prints money for governments? Who else keeps the system afloat when it’s taking on rough seas? We do.

Therefore I say to all of you gathered here today at the Bankers Banquet. We feed off the people and the people feed off us. Cheer up. Think positive and carry on as you have always been doing. The system cannot survive without our hands in the money system. The people are in our debt and that’s why I call it Libor-rating them.

Stephen J. Gray
July 22, 20012.

 Some interesting articles at link below:
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/19/the-federal-reserve-and-the-libor-scandal/