Juggling Dynamite

The oil shock is having a destabilizing effect on the status quo in many countries. Yesterday’s majority government win by the NDP in Alberta ended the Progressive Conservative Party’s 44-year reign in the oil-centric province.  It also offers a sense of the headwinds facing Stephen Harper’s federal government in the national election this fall.

It will take more than just a party change however, to address fiscal challenges that will persist with lower oil prices. See: Energy sector braces for change with NDP win.

“Energy royalties are on the table, corporate income taxes will increase, and bitumen pipelines will lose at least some direct government support”.

This chart offers some clarity on why sensible reforms to the runaway financial sector have so far been thwarted. See: Why Elizabeth Warren makes bankers nervous, and so quiet.

Also see this story about Warren’s recent focus on agent sales incentives in the wild west of annuity sales:

“U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren has a new target: the biggest sellers of annuities and the diamond-encrusted rings, iPads, stock options and cruises she says they’re using to entice brokers to sell their investments.

Warren, the Massachusetts Democrat and prominent critic of Wall Street, sent letters Tuesday to the U.S.’s 15 largest annuity providers, her office said. She wants to know whether perks they provide encourage brokers to put personal interests ahead of the retirement goals of clients.”

And: Probe by Elizabeth Warren into annuity incentives long overdue

Senator Warren keeps swinging at the bankers, and they keep hiding behind their defensive line of bought politicians and regulators. Without breaking this unholy alliance, we the people, will continue to pay devastating financial costs.  See: Why Elizabeth Warren makes bankers so uneasy, and so quiet.

“Let’s assume that when he woke up on the morning of Dec. 12, Michael Corbat, CEO of Citigroup, was feeling pretty good. The day before, the House of Representatives had passed a bill that would save his bank and others lots of money and headaches.

The trouble was, Elizabeth Warren, the senior senator from Massachusetts, was getting ready to speak on the Senate floor. She had his bank on her mind…”

Here is Warren delivering this speech in December.  Here is a direct video link.

“There is a lot of talk coming from Citigroup about how Dodd-Frank isn’t perfect,” Warren continued. “So let me say this to anyone who is listening at Citi. I agree with you, Dodd-Frank isn’t perfect.” She paused, then spoke very slowly and emphatically: “It should have broken you into pieces.”

And here she was again speaking on the “Unfinished Business of Financial Reform” at the Levy Economics Institute of Bard College’s 24th Annual Hyman P. Minsky Conference, on April 15, 2015. Here is a direct video link.