Interbank Netting: The Pressure to Get to Zero

Having studied monetary policy for several years it was only natural that your podcaster spent considerable time contemplating the essential elements of fiction. Some experts say there are five components to it; others put the tally at six, even eight! But at the core it has always been the three elements: plot, setting and character. 

Plot was perfected, in the Western tradition at least, in the late 16th century by Shakespeare with the 5-act dramatic structure. Setting, given short-shrift for millennia, did not achieve co-equal status until the gothic novels of the mid-18th century. And character? Scholars point back 28 centuries to The Iliad: heroism, cowardice, pride, hubris - wrath. But the scholars are wrong. Character wasn't perfected first, but last. Not until the 1980s action drama The A-Team did this element of fiction reach its zenith.

The American television masterpiece synthesized what the Great Books dared not imagine into the now classic quartet: Colonel John "Hannibal" Smith as the brains; Lieutenant Templeton "Faceman" Peck as the looks; Sergeant Bosco Baracus the muscle; Captain H.M. Murdock the wildcard. The casting blueprint can be observed most everywhere; in the arts, at the office; even family the dinner table. Central banking is no exception. In the role of the brains is Ben "Hannibal" Bernanke. The looks? Lady Lagarde. The muscle? Jay "Mad Dog" Powell. The wildcard? The audience will naturally point to Haruhiko Kuroda and, before January 28th, the audience would have been correct.

On that day Isabel Schnabel, Member of the Executive Board of the European Central Bank, gave a speech extolling the virtues of the sovereign-bank-corporate nexus. That is technocrat-speak for the government-guaranteed private-bank loans to private enterprise. Schnabel endorsed these "crucial" national loan schemes and encouraged Europe's capitals to continue them, warning any premature end would be "destabilising". Put another way, the baton that represents the supervision of money creation, has been wrested away from Frankfurt and placed into the neatly manicured hands of politicians, seeking re-election.

The new wildcard is not Isabel Schnabel but the Euro Area member state. All 19 of them.

In this episode we touch upon 1980s television shows, like CHiPs and interbank clearing mechanisms, like CHIPS. Also, why are corporate elephants on the hunt for fast-moving gazelle enterprises? Why are these elephants being offered their own fiefdoms in Nevada? Lastly, a potpourri review of Jeff Snider's recent writing.

----------WHY----------
PART 01: Private banks fund global economic activity. But how do they move money among themselves?
PART 02: Nevada Governor Sisolak is proposing to offer corporations to set up their own local government structures.
PART 03: Cautionary sign posts that say this reflationary path may not be the road to recovery but a deflationary cul-de-sac.

----------WHERE----------
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----------WHAT----------
There's Much More Going On Than You've Been Led to Believe: https://bit.ly/3qhFnAq
The Endangered Inflationary Species: Gazelles: https://bit.ly/3dbuIDq
The Cautionary Tale of Undocumented Insanity: https://bit.ly/3deHyRI
Permanent Jobs, Permanent Job Losses: https://bit.ly/37fgD47
Old Numbers Show Us Why There Will be New Checks: https://bit.ly/3b41FPM

----------WHO----------
Jeff Snider, Head of Global Investment Research for Alhambra Investments with Emil Kalinowski, Tyrell Corporation full-time equivalent. Art by David Parkins. Podcast intro/outro is "City Lights, City Dreams" by Forever Sunset at Epidemic Sound.