Expats to be 'rescued' from Spain and Portugal!!!!

Scout - link follows

http://www.zeit.de/2012/02/Ruestung-Griechenland

David

Thanks David, fascinating.

Contracts for Germans and jobs for the Greeks, but insane when hospitals are scratching about for basic medication. 

 oh dear and there i am in desparate need of an asprin

 Very similar to the old British  early 19th. century factory shop con, where the mill workers had to spend their wages in the factory owners shop if they  wanted to keep their jobs!!!

,, Very similar to the old British  early 19th. century factory shop con, where the mill workers had to spend their wages in the factory owners shop if they  wanted to keep their jobs!!!''

Not similar at all. New jobs were created, old jobs secured. A bit of a difference, don't you agree? It's a bit like the,, Give a man a fish'' thingy.

The LOONYS must be in charge !

The German publication " Die Zelt " report that Greece have just orderd 60 Eurofighters

at a cost of 3.9 billion e. With all their problems these guys must have shyt for brains.

What the hell is happening ? Someone muet be in for the bung.

Wrong. What the Zeit has written is:

The wishlist of the Greek Ministry for Defence is embedded in the man's head: up to 60 Eurofighters for maybe around 3.9 billion....etc.

Wishlist..........................loooong way to go................................................................................................................reality.

I would not put to much weight into an article that is full of spokespeople and men in cafes and specialists but short on named sources. That Greece is buying arms from Germany and other countries is not exactly a state secret and the ,, man in the cafe'' is quoted as saying

,, there is a real chance of orders once the bail out package comes through. If only a billion is left we might be able to order the first Eurofighters or Fregattes.''

A ,,real chance'' does not make it a fact. And ,,if money is left'' means if money is left.

Regarding Berlin Taxidrivers checking Euro notes for provenance, and that for month, that is just non-sensical.

Scout, you probably heard the latest batch of "rumours, hearsay, scaremongering" on Channel 4 news last night with talk of discrimination in the Euro dependant on it's origin.  In the Spectator today is the following article :

<<
When one euro is worth more than another by James Forsyth

Faisal Islam has a very interesting report from Davos on how at least one bank no longer believes that a euro from Ireland, say, is worth the same as one from Holland or Germany. He writes that:

‘A leading European bank has begun to account for euros differentially, by nation state. That is to say, they are differentiating a risk to euros that originate in a potentially defaulting country from that of a euro-cert. They, in effect, have invented the concept of a German, Greek and Irish euro.

Now we accept that government debts from these nations are different. The idea that a bank treats cash differentially, is an incredible development. I understand that this would allow this bank to account for an “internal exchange rate”, within the euro, between a strong country and a weak one. And the bank in question suspects they are not the only one.’

As Faisal stresses, this is at the moment just a contingency measure as banks try to be as prepared as they can be for a Eurozone exit. But it does show how the disparities within the Eurozone are becoming ever more entrenched.>>

James Forsyth is the Political Editor of the Spectator.  But I'm sure if you write to him and enlighten him your story of the rambling Berlin taxi driver he'll immediately see the error of his ways.  How dare this young pipsqueak publish material that differs with your views. 
 

 with so much panic should we not call captain mainwaring

The one bank. which one is it acer?

Yes Acer we watched that also.  Different values in one currency.  But I missed the beginning and from what i gathered this is conjecture.  When you think about it it just wouldnt work anyway.  Imagine travelling in the eurozone and not being able to spend a euro from another zone because its value is different.  More complicated that the original currencies!  I think we will simply see a collapse of the entire eurozone and back to original currencies.  Interesting to watch this one though.

Lostagain, perhaps you should drop a line to James Forsyth telling him about your "Oranges & Lemons" comment - he might understand it, I didn't.

Scout, I know no more than I heard on Channel 4 news and in the article I posted.  I'm not saying it makes complete sense.  But like or not a lot of people think the Euro will collapse and if that happens there will be panic and presumably holding German or Dutch Euros is marginally better than PIGS Euros.

acer, James Forsyth was just quoting Faisal Islam. And what Faisal Islam actually said was:

"In theory each euro note is marked with a letter, showing its country of origin. Euro notes tend to migrate south from Germany Holland, to Spain and Italy (where they are spent). The ECB convincingly rubbishes stories that individuals were accepting or not accepting euros with different letter markings. My information about this bank is about electronic money."

If I scour the internet for long enough I can find compelling evidence to suggest the Moon landings didn´t happen, that the CIA were behind 9/11. Faisal Islam doesn´t mention the bank and he specifically says that this isn´t about paper money.

My offer still stands, I´ll buy your Greek notes for 75% of their face value.

Calm down and carry on.

I have searched and there is no mention of which Bank made the statement "A leading european bank has begun to account for euros differentially...."

In a sense we are all democratic fatalists now. One of the most striking things about this crisis is that the basic divide it has revealed is not between fundamentally different political views of the future, but simply between optimists and pessimists. Looking back on all the hundreds of articles and commentaries I have read, this is the theme that dominates. Either we’re f*****d or we aren’t. Either we’re almost out of time or we’ve always got more time. The optimists believe that democracy will be all right because it has always been all right. Indeed, in every crisis of the past hundred years the people who have written off established democracies have been made to look like fools: the doom-mongers always overstate their case because they mistake short-term difficulties for long-term weaknesses. The pessimists believe that this time it’s different: European democracies have finally got themselves into a bind from which there is no obvious means of escape. American democracy is not far behind on the road to ruin. But the pessimists aren’t proposing any alternatives to democracy, they simply want us to know that its luck may finally have run out.

 acer this thread makes no sense whatsoever, seems my comment follows the trend

There might be an element of logic in this alleged discrimination in the Euro value. 

If the Euro went belly up presumably people would go to their banks and have them converted into the new Paseta, Drachma, Deutsche mark etc.  The rates of exchange would be fixed by the central bank of the these countries - they would "buy back" the notes they issued, based on the county codes mentioned earlier.

It seems to be almost taken as read that the Spanish Paseta will be effectively devalued from it's Euro equivalent.  But if you held "German" Euros these would likely to be exchanged at a far better equivalent rate.

So possibly there is method in their apparent madness.  But in reality if the Euro crashed the difference in exchange rates would be the least of our worries.

That's right acer, that's exactly what would happen. And if you were a shopkeeper holding notes from Belgium, Portugal, Greece, Cyprus, Finland, Malta and Slovenia, you would be expected to take a tour of Europe at your own expense to exchange the money.

It would be a tremendous boost to the tourism industry which has been struggling of late.

Do you even read what you write?

You tell us to contact James Forsyth to say we don't agree with him. But actually, he was just quoting Faisal Islam. Faisal Islam says he is convinced that the stories about people not accepting euros because of serial numbers are rubbish. Yet you disagree with both him and the ECB.

Faisal Islam is the economics editor of Channel 4 News. Perhaps you should write to him and put him straight on the Y serial numbered notes. Faced with the German taxi driver tale and the Greek peasant who wouldn't accept a large denominated note he´s surely going to see the error of his ways. Who is that little pipsqueak to be holding an opinion that makes some sense? 

Scout, I don't understand your comment, possibly we are speaking at cross purposes.  But a while ago you were stating in a rather absolutist manner that there was no logic in people holding German Euros in preference to those issued by Spain etc.  All I am saying is that there might be.

OK acer. Good luck with that theory.

I'm not going to waste a minute more of my life thinking about it.

Thanks Scout,does that mean you are going to stop your thoughts appearing on this thread,or just not going to even think of an alternative

Personally I hope it is the prior

an alternative what?

 i must admit i was not convinced by this thread but i have just been to the supermarket and couldnt pay because they were checking the numbers and mine had the dreaded Y number