Arjay has a few good points, and when our banks get into trouble, as I
am sure they will, we should let all of them go bankrupt and the
government nationalise the Commonwealth Bank.
I think that would be more acceptable to those who are not aware of
what is happening.
That is basically what they did in Cyprus. There the deposit accounts
were taken over by the IMF's Financial Stability Board and enough deposits
seized to pay out the Greek Bonds and left the government bank in operation.

However this situation will not be driven by financial fiddlers but by
sometime after 2017 when the US realises that tight oil has started
its decline. That will put Wall St into a panic as they see their
economy shudder to a near stop.

The major oil compamies, Shell, BP, Mobil, Total etc have been
spending $Trillions in search and development of conventional oil to
very little result and their sales have been falling.
They have been getting out of the tight oil production over the last
couple of years as they know it is a dead end.

Our economy will be in a very risky condition.
By the time it hits the fan we will be importing 100% of our petrol
and diesel. Google NRMA Fuel Security report.
Tapis oil will be around $150 a barrel and there may well be a small
physical shortage. We will be reliant on others surrendering some of
their supply so that we can keep emergency services running.

If you think the above is just my ranting then you need to read a bit
more widely.
The above is what we have been warned about by the NRMA, the Bureau
of Infrastructure, Transport and Resources #117.
This is the report that was suppressed by the government.
The CSIRO expects $8 a litre by decade end. I think they might be right.

Bazz, there is no shortage of energy. No need for $8.00 per litre fuel. We have a super abundance of coal and during WW2 cars had coal fired burners running on the smell of coal. With new technology they could make the burning of coal far cheaper and cleaner but big oil don't own most of the coal. We have 300 yrs of coal reserves.

If we can produce milk on the shelf for a $1.00 a litre why not fuel for a car at similar costs? Present cars are only 20% fuel efficient and new technologies can make energy a whole lot cheaper much to the ire of our elites.

The Fossil fuel market is worth $ 200 trillion so there is much self interest in supressing new technology.

Arjay, you are about 40 years out of date.
The oil companies problem is not suppressing alternative fuels but how
to get them working. They know that all the low hanging fruit has been
picked and they cannot find enough feedstock to keep their businesses going.
If you have the alternate answers, I suggest that you trot along to the
oil companies and offer them your information.
Why do you think they are closing oil refineries ?
They are selling assets just to pay dividends. They know once the
market realises that the tight oil boom is over their share price will
start its downward slope. They are the end of the marketing chain and
they know only too well that once the tight oil declines they will be
in big trouble.
Forget coal, why do you think Germany shut down their Topisch plant
as soon as the war was over. South Africa built their plant because
of apartheid bans. Again the ERoEI is too poor.

Bio fuels have not succeeded and there are good reasons why they will
never be successful as transport fuels. For starters their ERoEI is
just not good enough, before even taking into account food production.
Algae is a possibility but not yet.

Coal will be reserved for steel making and steaming. Hey, we might
even start building steam locomotives again, wouldn't that be great ?

Arjay,
As I jave mentioned previously I am reading Joseph Trainter's
book The Collapse of Complex Societies.
Someone with your interest will find it very interesting.
The first half is real hard work where he goes through all the
different types of societies and then other authors theories on collapse.
However I am now into the second half where he discusses how as
societies get more complex their marginal production declines as their
society becomes more complex.
Quite interesting, and I can now see how our collapse is almost inevitable.

The rate of new job creation in the USA is not even keeping pace with the rise in working age population.

Quantitative Easing was the US Reserve system replacing poor quality bonds with government backed securities -something of real value for old rags!

What the USA needed after 2007/8 was for the USA Federal Government to start a massive repair program for its worn out infrastructure. That would have generated employment is the material supply industries, with flow on and multiplier effects, with the consequent increase in employment and profits leading to additional taxation income for the government. The total government debt is a self imposed load because it is, in effect, the Reserve bank paying interest on private bank reserves. That is one of the reasons private banks make such extortionate profits in Australia.

Almost all money is private accounts with credit balances in private banks. When the Federal Government makes a payment of any sort it instructs the private bank in which the creditor has an account to increase the balance in that account by the specific amount. The private bank receives an equal demand on the Reserve Bank which it knows is backed by the Federal Government. The internal value of any sovereign currency is maintained by citizens needing the currency to pay all government fees and taxes which are denominated in that currency.

China's reserves are of no use to China except to the extent that they can buy goods, or assets, from anyone who is willing to accept payment in $US. Unfortunately, because our governments always have short time aims, Australia has sacrificed its ability to manufacture. China did not do that. Had our government and Reserve Bank aimed to keep our dollar at or below 60c we would probably owe a lot less to better managed economies. We should have been exchanging the assets we are selling (coal and mineral ores etc) for assets in overseas countries.

Thanks Bazz for the ref. Foyle an apt description of what has unfolded.

Just saw Greg Hunter interview Andy Hoffman. Hoffman says the precious metal mines are doing it tough because the prices have been forced so low. When they take in all costs to make mining viable, gold should be a minimum of $1500 US oz. So prices and production are falling while demand increases.

There is no way we are going to get out of this without a major correction. So take control of your super and savings. They have announced negative interest rates for Europe and this is admitting the QE has not worked.

I was watching Peter Switzer last night and he sounds a bit worried referring to the 2008 collapse and whether currency activity could be the Canary in the coal mine.

We cannot make accurate comparisons with the past because we've never globally had so few in control of so much and never before had so much invested derivative gambling, money printing etc with no Glass Steagall Act to temper their excesses. Also here we have not got good leaders on either side of politics that inspire confidence. They are all held captive by the Central Bankers who created this mess. Gerald Celente says this will be bigger than the Great Depression.

We are basically on our own.