1/4% Tax on all stock trades pushed in NY Times today

The government needs the money to regulate, investigate the market from abuse and market corruption.

The SEC only has a 500 million dollar per year budget and CANNOT investigate every complaints of fraud, frontrunnin and prosecute EVERY market violations. plus the legal fees.

The people who pay for enforcing market rules should be paid by market participants not from general revenues of the gov't.

There was lack of market oversight and regulation to allow such fraudulent products to slip by in the market fraudulent and market manipulation and insider trading and market abuse is so widespread there is not enough resources to enforce and 'prosecute'. Either the market is regulated by electronic means at this moment, the market structure is not enforceable with current market structures by manual and legal means. and cost too much.
 
I believe you are mistaken. government has a spending problem, not an income problem. With adequate resources they couldn't see the the largest scam artist in history under their nose.
 
Quote from moneyrules:

The government needs the money to regulate, investigate the market from abuse and market corruption.

The SEC only has a 500 million dollar per year budget and CANNOT investigate every complaints of fraud, frontrunnin and prosecute EVERY market violations. plus the legal fees.
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Not sure what planet you live on, but on this planet two of the largest cases of fraud in history - Madoff and Stanford - were brought to the attention of the SEC. And ignored by the SEC.

It isn't a question of money, it's a question of doing a job responsibly.

Giving more money to any federal agency is like giving crack to an addict. It isn't going to improve performance.
 
Quote from sheda:

http://euobserver.com/843/115734

http://kslr.org.uk/blogs/europeanla...eu-commissions-proposal-for-a-tobin-hood-tax/
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This sounds like a mess with this citizens petition deal. I really wish they would just hold a formal vote at the EU level and be done with this. There is still no way the EU or even the EZ is going to agree to a ftt IMHO. If individual countries want it then thats fine. Whats scary is that the folks signing this citizen's petition probably have no clue they would be the one's footing the bill instead of the banks.

-Guru
 
Sorry, I've been absent on this thread due to the tax-season deadline, reporting on the cost-basis reporting crisis, and then my vacation.

I am concerned with left-of-center parties winning in Europe. If Socialist Hollande wins in France tomorrow, it will further embolden the left parties in Europe. Like in Germany, with the left pushing harder on Merkel for including FTT in the fiscal compact - although that is still confused.

It's scary to see Labour win big in the UK a few days ago, too. If the UK turns back to being a FTT backer - as they were with Labour PM Gordon Brown - it may be a tipping point in favor of FTT. I hope Conservative PM Cameron can keep his coalition going until 2015. What could force elections much sooner?

Austerity measures won't fix Europe's problems and it will cause great pain for most voters, and loss of political capital from the right-of-center. In the end, left-of-center parties will probably win using a class warfare argument - similar to Obama in the U.S. - claiming its a trade-off of the working man and poor versus the rich. Voters will cave in to tax the rich more, and renew a more universal push for FTT. The right has lost recently in Italy, Spain, the Netherlands and more - all covered in the WSJ this week. Probably in France tomorrow, too.

Europe is not getting better, it's getting worse and it's final day of reckoning is nearer. The social-welfare-state apparatus will not give up power and benefits without a big fight and first booting right-of-center parties out of government.

If they make the fateful mistake of passing FTT, it will be their final nail in their coffin. We may see FTT, but hopefully it will be short lived and the right-of-center will come back into power. No one can ride that European debt horse for long. New taxes are hard to pass and even harder to repeal.

The scary wild card is the growing far-right Euro-skeptic parties. They won't want FTT or any taxes paid to Brussels for EU use. Who will take them into a government coalition? Hopefully, no one as was the case with the Basic Finns in Finland. Will right-of-center parties make a deal with this dangerous element?

FTT remains an official tax to be passed in the EU and blocking it remains a political game of brinksmanship. For these reasons, FTT remains a viable threat.
 
Quote from tortoise:


Also, just to let everyone know, Tom Davis has produced an outstanding, sober-minded, and exhaustively sourced treatment of the issue which I've posted at

http://financialtransactiontaxes.com/Financial-Transaction-Tax-FTT-Straight-Talk.html


I'm in the process of mastering(?) wordpress, and plan relaunch the website in entirely new form sometime later this week.
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Hey Tortoise, thanks for the kind words. To be fair, I got help from a couple of fellow traders who aren't ET members, plus help from a couple of ET folks, all of whom provided instructive feedback.

Thanks to everyone for posting so many great articles. Most of what I put together I got right here at this ET forum.

The FTT issue is going to heat up again in Europe. Also, the unions and other far-left groups will be turning up the FTT pressure as we head into our own 2012 elections.

I've heard that Tim Geithner and Lael Brainard are both leaving the US Treasury Department after the elections. Without Geithner and Brainard it's anybody's guess which way the FTT winds will blow in DC.

I doubt that Romney can beat Obama, so it's imperative that Republicans maintain control of the House of Representatives (and maybe take the Senate, too) in Novermber to offset the FTT pressure from the democrats and the unions.

Remain vigilent. The FTT battle is far from over.

Best,

Tom
 
Quote from seasideheights:

Official: E.U. to move forward on transaction tax

http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-mon...fficial-eu-to-move-forward-on-transaction-tax
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Great job tortoise, Tom Davis, seasideheights and others.

Let's post every link fast again now and then pile on our Comments on the articles to hammer home our side. I did for The Hill earlier and see others joined me.

Hollande gives every FTT pusher a green light to reinvigorate their FTT proposals and take another stab at it. So, we need to counter at every juncture.
 
Mr Hollande, who campaigned against austerity measures designed to save the euro, went on to threaten the UK with new Europe-wide taxes to neuter the City of London.

He signalled his support for an EU-wide transaction tax on financial deals and a fresh push for tax harmonisation – both of which are fiercely opposed by the British government.

In an interview with the French-language version of the Slate website, he condemned Britain’s approach to the euro crisis.
Mr Hollande made clear he resents Britain remaining outside the single currency because the Bank of England – unlike the European Central Bank – has been able to print money to keep the economy afloat.

He said: ‘In addition to relative indifference to the fate of the euro area, Britain is more protected because of speculation the central bank may intervene directly to finance the debt.’
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Its good to see mr hollande is acting from his financial acumen, I was worried for a moment we would end up with another clueless idiot driven by envy and misplaced anger, acting from no more than there irrelevant emotions.
 
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