Outlook 2008, The Upcoming US Depression

[rpaco]

Ok there is a lot of information here and I haven't read all of it. Forgive me if I re-ask this.

I am a Britsh ex-pat living in America. I am solvent but no pension, I have savings but not enough for 20% down on a first house.

I will have to purchase a house very soon and then once again be in necessary debt.

Given Rob's predictions and acceptance of a recesion on the way:
What is the best way for me to survive this? How can I lessen the negative effects, keep my house (assuming I keep my job)?

Buy uranium and hide it under the bed? Hoard gasoline? (I kid, chaps).

Seriously, what is the best course of action for those in America, given this 'writing on the wall'?

Best Wishes,
Matt

Visions of a high bed on a tank made of uranium and filled with gasoline.oh: Mad Max looms beyond the thunder dome.

However I understand that the water crisis has already hit parts of the US, with rationing and some towns now getting their water daily by tanker. No I realise it isn't widespread, but did you expect it in the US.?

We shall have similar problems in the UK requiring a major pipeline from the North where it is always raining.

So apart from the one Rob mentioned who makes big water pipes and pumps? (Preferably listed on the LSE)

Oh just to chuck in a googlie (thats a wonky ball in cricket) I read last year that China had absolutely mega major reserves of Gold. So they can afford to tear up lots of dollars bills, if they wanted they could sell the USD so short it would be worth a couple of cents in a few weeks.

 

[zarni]

Visions of a high bed on a tank made of uranium and filled with gasoline.oh: Mad Max looms beyond the thunder dome.

However I understand that the water crisis has already hit parts of the US, with rationing and some towns now getting their water daily by tanker. No I realise it isn't widespread, but did you expect it in the US.?

We shall have similar problems in the UK requiring a major pipeline from the North where it is always raining.

So apart from the one Rob mentioned who makes big water pipes and pumps? (Preferably listed on the LSE)

Oh just to chuck in a googlie (thats a wonky ball in cricket) I read last year that China had absolutely mega major reserves of Gold. So they can afford to tear up lots of dollars bills, if they wanted they could sell the USD so short it would be worth a couple of cents in a few weeks.

If they wanted to they could of course. I doubt anybody in their right mind would deny that. However, that would not be in their interest. As it stands right now China is buying about a billion dollars a day.

 

[rpaco]

Buying Billion USD a day sounds like a fair amount. What are they buying it with?
I cant find the ~USD/Yuan or the USD/Rimimbi (no not a clue how to spell that) on my list of FX pairs. Are they paying in gold? Or via intermediate currencies? or how does it work?

Re the water situation in the ~US I read that the water industry has said that $1.2 Trn needs to be spent immediately in replacing the crumbling infrastructure many cities. In particular the high pressure system you have, which I have seen described both as a water and a steam mains pipeline. That figure goes up if it was not spent immediately, which obviously it wont be, like here it will be left until a major crisis or sheer embarrassment forces the water companies into using their profits to lay new infrastructure.
In the UK the private water companies are making huge profits but moaning about the amount they have to spend on repairs to stem the leaks which loose up to 35% of all water consumption per day.

 

[Pharaoh]

Buying Billion USD a day sounds like a fair amount. What are they buying it with?
I cant find the ~USD/Yuan or the USD/Rimimbi (no not a clue how to spell that) on my list of FX pairs. Are they paying in gold? Or via intermediate currencies? or how does it work?

Due to the US-China trade imbalance, huge amounts of USD enter China every day. I'm not sure if they are buying it or just collecting what comes in. They also have trade imbalances with the EU and others, so have quite a pile of foreign currencies stashed under the mattress.

The official foreign exchange symbol for the Yuan/Renminbi (I double-checked the spelling) would be CNY. The Chinese government controls the glacially slow movement of the exchange rate, so it's not publicly traded (a pity - it's seriously undervalued).

On the other hand, the Hong Kong Dollar is publicly traded and some forex brokers do carry HKD pairs. I'm not sure if the currency used in Macao is publicly traded or not. When Taiwan finally gives up and moves to Semi-Autonomous Region status, they'll probably also keep their currency.

Tying this back to a previous item mentioned a few pages back, if China can't even get all of it's parts using one currency, I'm not going to lose any sleep over a pan-Asian currency happening anytime too soon.

 

[abbassi]

We will have to wait and see what happens. But the signs are not good.

If Opec goes to a basket of currencies, oil could shoot up to $10 a gallon as it is in the UK. What effects will that have on the US economy.

The US has a friend in Saudi Arabia, which is trying to keep the USD as the oil benchmark. Perhaps going to Iraq is directly connected to this scenario of OPEC switching currencies. Easy for the US to control oil prices in their favor.

We have lost most of our manufacturing, so we have very little to stand on except, for the Military Might. This gov. has just started to use it. It will get uglier before it gets better.

I think that all these things and much more are closely tied together. We shall see what the US has up it's sleeve in the coming 10 years.

 

[rpaco]

We will have to wait and see what happens. But the signs are not good.

If Opec goes to a basket of currencies, oil could shoot up to $10 a gallon as it is in the UK. What effects will that have on the US economy.

The US has a friend in Saudi Arabia, which is trying to keep the USD as the oil benchmark. Perhaps going to Iraq is directly connected to this scenario of OPEC switching currencies. Easy for the US to control oil prices in their favor.

We have lost most of our manufacturing, so we have very little to stand on except, for the Military Might. This gov. has just started to use it. It will get uglier before it gets better.

I think that all these things and much more are closely tied together. We shall see what the US has up it's sleeve in the coming 10 years.

Just worked it out on today's petrol (gas) price in north london suburbs at $12.06 per UK gallon but I seem to remember that the US gallon is smaller. Will have to look that up. Personally I have a diesel car which I run on modified, re-cycled veg oil. The UK government removed the duty from this at the last budget (for usage of 2500 Lit or less per year, you have to keep a log just in case HMRC checks up).
Anyway don't worry mate you're going to run out of water long before oil. oh: