GEAB N°23 (March 15, 2008) – Contents

{{Global systemic crisis – End of 2008: Pension funds go off the rails }}

By the end of 2008, a formidable debacle will affect pension funds all over the world, endangering the entire system of capital-based pensions. This financial calamity will bear a particularly dramatic human dimension because it will come at the precise moment when the first wave of baby-boomers phase out of the labour force in the US, EU and Japan… (page 2)

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{{Fed intervention on financial markets accelerates upcoming explosion of 500 trillion USD worth of derivatives }}

Ben Bernanke, apparently unaware of it, is dragging Wall Street deeper into the crisis… As he involuntarily pulls the banking “rug” off hedge funds’ feet, he triggers the explosion of a new derivatives “time ticking bomb” worth more than 500,000 billion USD… (page 5)

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{{Towards a nationalisation of parts of the US banking system}}

If the Fed continues to act as it has been doing, its next « great intervention » could be to nationalise part of the US banking system! Indeed it has already started taking upon her the bad balance sheets of a growing number of the country’s financial institutions… (page 7)

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{{The 5 European countries most exposed to the US financial crisis fallout }}

The situation of banks in some European countries is becoming very fragile, even if generally speaking the economy of the Eurozone still resists to the consequences of the US recession… (page 8)

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{{Pension funds: Three shocks at the end of 2008 }}

The global systemic crisis is about to entail a major debacle for the system based on pension funds. Indeed this system necessitates a steady growth of the main categories of assets where the huge amounts of money managed by pension funds have been invested. But the current crisis reconsiders all the operating requirements of the capital-based system of pensions… (page 10)

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{{Five western countries will be particularly affected by the collapse of the capital-based pension system}}

At the end of 2008, as the global systemic crisis unfolds in the economic and financial sphere, LEAP/E2020 estimates that half of those pension funds will be confronted to a drastic decrease in their revenues and to a shrinking value of their capital… (page 12)

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{{Five strategic and operational recommendations to save one’s pension in a pension fund debacle}} (page 13)

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{{Attack on Iran next summer 2008: Dollar collapse raises probabilities to 70 percent }}

The collapse of the US currency against all the other major currencies, and against oil and gold in particular, conveys a risk of attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities by Israel and the US before the end of next summer 2008. As a matter of fact, LEAP/E2020 estimates that the probability for such an attack to take place before the November 2008 US election, is 70 percent… (page 14)

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{{The GlobalEurometre – Results & Analyses }}

Concerning NATO’s military commitment in Afghanistan, the Europeans’ judgment is without appeal: 91 percent estimate that it is necessary to set a deadline for European troop withdrawal from the country… (page 23)

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