"The Entire System Has Been Utterly Destroyed By The MF Global Collapse"

Originally posted at Barnhardt Capital Management. I caught it at zerohedge and market-ticker . I've heard the ladies name before, but am not that familiar with her. The rant she lays out is well worth the read.

Dear Clients, Industry Colleagues and Friends of Barnhardt Capital Management, It is with regret and unflinching moral certainty that I announce that Barnhardt Capital Management has ceased operations. After six years of operating as an independent introducing brokerage, and eight years of employment as a broker before that, I found myself, this morning, for the first time since I was 20 years old, watching the futures and options markets open not as a participant, but as a mere spectator.
The reason for my decision to pull the plug was excruciatingly simple: I could no longer tell my clients that their monies and positions were safe in the futures and options markets – because they are not. And this goes not just for my clients, but for every futures and options account in the United States. The entire system has been utterly destroyed by the MF Global collapse. Given this sad reality, I could not in good conscience take one more step as a commodity broker, soliciting trades that I knew were unsafe or holding funds that I knew to be in jeopardy.

Everything changed just a few short weeks ago. A firm, led by a crony of the Obama regime, stole all of the non-margined cash held by customers of his firm. Let’s not sugar-coat this or make this crime seem “complex” and “abstract” by drowning ourselves in six-dollar words and uber-technical jargon. Jon Corzine STOLE the customer cash at MF Global.

I have learned over the last week that MF Global is almost certainly the mere tip of the iceberg. There is massive industry-wide exposure to European sovereign junk debt.

And so, to the very unpleasant crux of the matter. The futures and options markets are no longer viable. It is my recommendation that ALL customers withdraw from all of the markets as soon as possible so that they have the best chance of protecting themselves and their equity. The system is no longer functioning with integrity and is suicidally risk-laden. The rule of law is non-existent, instead replaced with godless, criminal political cronyism.

Excellent analysis of the MF Global situation from someone who is in the business. Another person you might have heard of who has gone public with being stolen from by MF Global is Gerald Celente.

Trends Research Institute founder and director, Gerald Celente, told Russia Today (RT) in a Nov. 14 interview that the fall of MF Global took his futures account down with it. Celente cannot access his account nor get answers to his inquiries from representatives of Lind-Waldock, the firm with whom he opened an account. “They took my money; they took out of my account . . . it wasn’t being traded by anyone . . . this is like having money in a bank account,” Celente forcefully said. “They took my money out of my account, six figures, and they have it. They closed out two of my positions, and I cannot get any answers, and I can’t get my money.”

beaconequity.com

Things are not well in the world economy despite the cheer leading you see in the Main Stream Financial Media. The time bought from the bailouts in '08-09 has all but expired. How far down do we go this time? Will the structures of government and finance survive? Do they deserve to? The failure of governments and the people to force accountability for the crimes that have destroyed the world economy will I fear eventually lead to bloodshed, either through revolt or some contrived war.

reply to post by jefwane


The royals are now visibly under siege and have begun to eat their own. What a glorious day. The more wealthy who crumble under the weight of their own moral and ethical depletion, the brighter the sunshine and the more pure the air for the rest of us.

I have very little to contribute to this...
mostly because I agree wholeheartedly with the OP. This has been coming for a long time... and what we're seeing now is just ripples breaking on the shore. The tsunami, however... is on its way.

Global Economic collapse is inevitable.
We can only hope that a better phoenix rises from the ashes.

Star + Flag.

That's funny.

Not destroyed. More like exposed to those who were still asleep at the wheel. Which it seems this guy was.

The system was born to fail, it was inevitable. Constant consumption based on a limited planet is a silly notion, the greed of corporations and the fact our politicians have no knowledge in solutions to these problems but rather maintaining the state, surely means the world financial system will collapse.

what does "MF" collapse mean?

reply to post by jondave


I was kind of wondering the same thing??

It really is a MF ing Global Collapse lol !!


www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

MF Global

Three threads here and the wiki entry. I'm really surprised the MSM, OWS and the GOP have approached this scandal with kids gloves.

The OP title came from zerohedge, had to use it.

reply to post by jondave
nvm


ETA If it keeps up like this, Anon won't need to take NYSE off the internet (which didn't happen/prolly wasn't even a real Anon thing anyway). Sorry I couldn't resist. Good find OP

reply to post by jondave


Really? Don't you people read the news? A 5 second Google search would have answered your question too. I always worry when I learn people commenting are grossly uninformed?

MF Global was (well, still is) a trading house. It is a company. It is not a futures market or any other market.

www.reuters.com...

At issue is MF Global's "segregated accounts" -- client money meant to be kept strictly separate from the broker's own funds, but which regulators say is now $600 million short.

That pot of money shrank by $1.5 billion in August alone, government data showed. Another $1.8 billion fled over the following two months, according to preliminary estimates.

In total, customers pulled out more than a third of their accounts in the three months leading up to MF Global's downfall, much of that in the frenzied final days, traders reckon.

For instance, privately held Koch Industries -- whose businesses make it a leading commodities trader -- sent a letter to trading partners on October 3 saying it was switching eight accounts from MF Global to Mizuho Securities USA.

Koch Industries did not comment on the reason for its move.

Well looks like Koch Brothers got there money out ok.

www.huffingtonpost.com...

But perhaps the most stunning piece of news we're getting in the wake of the MF Global collapse is in the clients of the firm who managed to get away scot-free, with no freezing of accounts or capital -- particularly the accounts of the mega-cap independent oil company Koch Industries, run by the politically active Koch brothers.

A recent report in Reuters has described the billions of dollars of client accounts that were withdrawn from MF Global in the last few weeks before their collapse, including 8 accounts from Koch industries engaged in oil trade that were transferred to Mizuho Securities after years of a steady and profitable relationship with MF. The Reuters piece concentrates on the possibilities of legal "clawback" of client money if the bankruptcy does not allow remaining client accounts to be made whole.

The Reuters piece misses the point.

Maybe not?

Oh No, check this out;
theextinctionprotocol.wordpress.com...

reply to post by JBA2848


Interesting allegations there. Ironic too; I need to go read the whole huffpost article. I say it's ironic because you have a left of center online publication reporting that a political boogeyman on the right got preferential treatment in getting assets out of a company run into the ground by the former DEMOCRATIC governor of New Jersey who happens to be intimately tied to the current administration particularly in fund raising and economic policy. Jon Corzine was widely regarded as a possible replacement for Giethner in either an Obama second term or when he finally has to throw Timmay under the bus.

Thank you for posting the huffpost link, I'm about to take the time to read the whole thing and try to practice some discernment. My thoughts before reading it from just what you linked are.

1) At best huffpost is trying to show that both Dem/Rep liberal/conservative politicians are hopelessly corrupt.
2) The author is ignorant of how intimately tied to Democrats and the current administration MF Global is.
3) Huffpost is trying to deflect attention from ties to the Admin by invoking the Koch Brothers boogeyman.

I personally feel ambivilant to moderately hostile about the Koch brothers, but the industries they are in have the most legitimate use for commodities and futures markets. They produce the commodities so need a market to sell them in. And since they are producers they have a legitimate need for commodity futures trading. Since they are producers, when they make a futures trade they have the ability to deliver said commodity instead of cash like a trader would.


Read the entire Huffington Post article. I'm pretty neutral on it. I think the author did a disservice by mentioning the Koch brother enterprises without mentioning Corzine's political leanings. In the comments however after being challenged on both the type of contracts involved (and linking to something so financially arcane it appeared as rational as voodoo to me) and the diverse political leanings of Corzine and the Kochs he admitted it was about MONEY. I guess I'd say after reading the article it turns out the article has weak elements of one and three.

Is the OP anything indicative of something significant in development? I ask because some of the comments state that this is just a small firm or something?

Yeah, fairly small firm. The goodbye letter was hyperbolic enough that I thought it deserved linking to. She's got some great points. Celente and others that have money tied up in MF Global are much better known. I thought it would be a good way to get some attention back on MF Global that hasn't really garnered the attention I feel it deserves. The fallout from MF Global is by no means over.

Originally posted by Tea4One
The system was born to fail, it was inevitable. Constant consumption based on a limited planet is a silly notion

As well as perpetual growth in a statically-sized planet.

investing in commodities is not a gamble if you perceive them as an industrial material, but with consideration to the ideology of monetization or a return to a gold standard, this kind of reality will only be possible in a scenario favoring scorched earth outcomes.In the event of an extreme technocratic regime, as appears to be the case, failure to conform to the new regulations and virtual currency will be met with swift disapproval and penalization of which some of you are familiar in Biblical Terms.

With all the recent outcry about REDUCING REGULATIONS..... all I can say is, we NEED REGULATIONS and, frankly, ACTUAL ENFORCEMENT of Regulations!!!!!!! Why do we need regulations? To PROTECT the public from the darker side of human nature. Greed, in this case. Combined with theft, larceny, lies, malfeasance...
Part of the problem has been us letting the Foxes run the Chicken Coop! Who overseas the Fed and Wall Street? Former Wall Street big wigs. Who deregulates? The Politicians who's campaigns are paid for by the corporations that the Supreme Court recently said could donate unlimited funds to political action committees and allowing the thieves and con-men to run rampant! This is supposed to be a Representative Government! But the public is not represented! It's the wealthy that are being represented!
Crimes are made legal by changing laws. We Need Practical and Enforced Regulations to Protect our System. And who has been looting the system? Why, the already wealthy. When is enough enough? How many yachts does one need? How many homes, cars, servants.....
If humanity was all good, we wouldn't need laws and regulations. But the weak need protection because sometimes the strong.... strong arm the weak. United we Stand, Divided We Fall. And right now, the wealthy and the rest of us are Very Divided!

Originally posted by jondave
what does "MF" collapse mean?

MF Global was/is a company.

MF Global
MF Global Wiki Page

I say "was/is" because I have no idea what is going on with this firm. I recently heard of them from a Geral Celente interview. Apparently, he is now one of their victims.


I have a lot of catching up and research to do on this subject so I do not want to babble on while having no clue what I am talking about, but I mainly posted because of one thing in the OP that stuck out to me. I actually found it VERY shocking to see in print.

From the OP

but there was no possible way to continue given the inevitability of the collapse of the global financial markets, the overthrow of our government, and the resulting collapse in the rule of law.

Is it me, or is did she just say in print that there is a chance that there will be an Overthrow of the Government? And if so, which Government?

Trends Research Institute founder and director, Gerald Celente, told Russia Today (RT) in a Nov. 14 interview that the fall of MF Global took his futures account down with it. Celente cannot access his account nor get answers to his inquiries from representatives of Lind-Waldock, the firm with whom he opened an account. “They took my money; they took out of my account . . . it wasn’t being traded by anyone . . . this is like having money in a bank account,” Celente forcefully said. “They took my money out of my account, six figures, and they have it. They closed out two of my positions, and I cannot get any answers, and I can’t get my money.”

Sorry, but this is the funniest thing I've read all day! Gerald Celente, the professional future trends forecaster who for many years has made a living by spreading doom-and-gloom forecasts and end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it predictions, who has been coaching people for years to dump all their investments, empty their bank accounts and buy gold, apparently didn't bother to follow his own advice and now claims to have lost his six figure investment account. Well BOO HOO Gerald