Turkish Elections: Ahead of Turkey's Crucial Election, Citizens Take Action to Protect Their Vote - by K. Akkoyunlu

Many things are at stake in Turkey's upcoming parliamentary poll on June 7: Will the Kurds overcome the world's highest election threshold of 10% to enter the parliament as a party for the first time? Or will the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP) win enough seats to change the constitution and introduce the system of strong presidentialism that President Tayyip Erdoğan has long wanted?

It is a historic moment where a single vote could possibly shape the course of Turkey's bloodiest conflict and its future regime type, with repercussions beyond the country's borders. With so much hanging on the outcome, this is also a crucial test for Turkey's embattled electoral system.

Turkey has never become an 'advanced' democracy: For decades, political contestation took place in the shadow of military tutelage, now being replaced with an illiberal populism under Erdoğan and the AKP. Its record on civil liberties and human rights has been bleak. Yet ever since the country held its first competitive multiparty election in 1950, the ballot box has taken on a quality as one of Turkey's few non-contested institutions to the point of becoming sacrosanct.

Politicians have routinely accepted defeat and handed over power peacefully. Turnout has been traditionally high, as well as popular trust in declared results. The fact that it has preserved this most basic democratic institution despite all other shortcomings has set Turkey apart from many of its neighbors, where elections have been thoroughly rigged or did not take place at all.

That core institution is now in jeopardy. A major survey has found that public trust in the electoral process has deteriorated sharply: only 48% believe that the upcoming poll will be conducted fairly (comparable to the level of trust for elections in Russia), down from 70% in 2007 (on par with the US). The OSCE has cited concerns about fairness and transparency and recommended appointing observers for the June election.

In part, this is a result of the country's deepening political polarization and party tribalism. It also reflects the rising number of fraud allegations at polling stations in recent elections. In an insecure political atmosphere driven by wild conspiracy theories, high level corruption scandals and judicial vendettas that can land the losers in prison, more voters appear convinced that office holders will do whatever necessary to hold on to power.

Read more: Ahead of Turkey's Crucial Election, Citizens Take Action to Protect Their Vote | Karabekir Akkoyunlu

International Banking Fraud: Six top banks fined for forex, Libor abuses

US and British regulators have slapped massive fines on six major global banks for rigging the foreign exchange market and Libor interest rates. They called the banks' frauds 'brazen schemes' to harm clients.

In a settlement announced by the US Justice Department on Wednesday, the banks agreed to pay close to $6 billion (5.3 billion euros) in fines for their manipulations.

The deal included guilty pleas from UK-based Barclays Bank and Royal Bank of Scotland, as well as US banks JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup. They admitted to conspiring to manipulate the massive currency market.

Switzerland's UBS also pleaded guilty - in its case for one count of wire fraud in connection with Libor interest rate manipulations. However, the Justice Department granted the Swiss bank conditional immunity for cooperating with the investigation.

Together, the five banks agreed to a record $2.5 billion in criminal penalties, the largest set of antitrust fines ever obtained by the Department of Justice.

In addition, these five banks, plus the Bank of America, will pay more than $1.8 billion in fines to the US Federal Reserve over "unsafe and unsound practices" in forex markets.

Note EU-Digest: If someone steals a bar of chocolate in a grocery store, he or she can go to prison for a week including paying a fine. These banker crooks just pay a fine out of the billions they already stole from you and me and continue their life.
 
Read more: Six top banks fined for forex, Libor abuses | Business | DW.DE | 20.05.2015

EU Economy: "Hanky-Panky" capitalism certainly is not an example that should be followed within the EU - by RM

Smart long term thinking when it comes to privatization unfortunately is not one of the US's strong points.

It has been proven over and over that without government regulations, greed usually takes over immediately when corporations start running privatized companies.

We don't need to make any bones about it, but today the direct result of this in America has been that 1% of the US population now controls just about all the private wealth there. At the same time corporate cartels regulate and control most of the pricing for goods and services: re the Financial Industry, Banking Industry, Food Industry, Pharmaceutical Industry, Medical Industry, Chemical Industry, Farming Industry, Communications Industry, Airline Industry, Weapons Industry, etc,, etc., This sad state of affairs in turn is supported by a corporate controlled press and worst of all corporate subsidized politicians.

While "privatization" is the magic word for many of these mainly conservative politicians, they tend to speak out of two sides of their mouth when it comes to subsidies.

On the one hand they advocate privatization of government or non-profit run corporations, while on the other hand they support subsidies to their favorite industries.

In the United States, credible estimates of annual fossil fuel subsidies range from $10 billion to 52 billion annually. Yet these figures don’t even include costs borne by taxpayers related to the climate, local environmental, and health impacts of the fossil fuel industry.

As of July 2014, Oil Change International estimates U.S. fossil fuel subsidies at $37.5 billion annually, including $21 billion in production and exploration subsidies.

Looking at the picture globally, another shocking revelation finds that the $5.3 trillion global fossil fuel subsidy estimate for 2015 is greater than the total health spending of all the world’s governments.

This can only be qualified as "hanky-panky" capitalism and certainly is not an example that should be followed by the EU.


EU-Digest 

Pollution - Energy Sector: Fossil fuels subsidized by € 8.97 m a minute, says IMF - by Damian Carrington

Fossil fuel companies are benefiting from global subsidies of $5.3tn ( € 4.7 tn) a year, equivalent to € 8.97m a minute every day, according to a startling new estimate by the International Monetary Fund.

The IMF calls the revelation “shocking” and says the figure is an “extremely robust” estimate of the true cost of fossil fuels. The $5.3tn subsidy estimated for 2015 is greater than the total health spending of all the world’s governments.

The vast sum is largely due to polluters not paying the costs imposed on governments by the burning of coal, oil and gas. These include the harm caused to local populations by air pollution as well as to people across the globe affected by the floods, droughts and storms being driven by climate change.

This ‘Shocking’ IMF revelation also finds $5.3tn ( € 4.7 tn) subsidy estimate for 2015 is greater than the total health spending of all the world’s governments 

Read more: Fossil fuels subsidised by $10m a minute, says IMF | Environment | The Guardian

European Insurance Industry: Low Interest Rates Pressuring European Insurers - by Juliet Samuel

Low interest rates are taking their toll on some European insurers as they prepare to implement more stringent capital regulations being introduced by the European Union.

Results from three of the continent’s largest insurance companies Wednesday showed how low or negative yields are having an uneven effect, forcing some companies to change their strategies.

Tidjane Thiam, the outgoing chief executive of Prudential PLC, who is leaving to run Credit Suisse Group AG, warned about the “headwinds” of low long-term rates and said that his priority since 2008 has been to reduce the company’s reliance on rates for its earnings.

“It was my deeply held belief that if we wanted to control our destiny we needed to reduce the [interest rate] income in our earnings,” the chief executive said. “We’ve done that successfully.”

Prudential on Wednesday said total new business profits fell 6% from a year earlier in the first quarter, to £496 million. Total annual premium equivalent, a common measure of sales for U.K. insurers—reached £1.25 billion, up 7% compared with the first quarter of last year.

Prudential’s shares fell 1% on Wednesday in London.

Insurers are particularly sensitive to low rates. One of the main ways they make money is by collecting payments made by policyholders and investing them in the market for higher returns, mostly in bonds because they are seen as lower risk than equities. When interest rates fall, insurers’ margins get squeezed.

Low market yields also force insurers to put aside more cash because they can’t rely on high market returns to generate enough cash to fulfill their obligations to policyholders.

“There is a lot of jiggery-pokery they can do to manage these numbers to at least show a good number,” said James Shuck, an analyst at UBS AG.

Read more: Low Interest Rates Pressuring European Insurers - WSJ

Britain's EU referendum could lead to Brexit in 2016 - by Lianna Brinded

Bye Bye Britain

Britain could leave the European Union as early as next year as Prime Minister David Cameron is said to be already putting plans in motion to bring forward an in/out referendum by a year.

If Britons vote to leave the EU, this means the country could technically start severing its ties by the end of 2016.

The Conservatives won Thursday's General Election with a 12-seat majority. The Tories will have to deliver a referendum by 2017 over whether Britain will stay part of the EU, as it was a linchpin pledge during the campaign.

According to The Guardian, which cited unnamed government sources, Cameron is keen to move the referendum forward to capitalise on Tory support and to avoid being caught up in the French and German elections in 2017.

"The mood now is definitely to accelerate the process and give us the option of holding the referendum in 2016," one of The Guardian's sources said. "We had always said that 2017 was a deadline rather than a fixed date."

Read more: Britain's EU referendum could lead to Brexit in 2016 - Business Insider

Turkey: Economy Depressed - Nearly 14,000 companies close in 4 months says TOBB

A total of 13,926 commercial enterprises closed down between January and April of this year, according to a statement released by the Turkish Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges (TOBB) on Friday.

TOBB also cited a decline in the number of new enterprises founded in April compared to the previous month. The number of firms closing down in April of this year increased 6.43 percent compared to April of last year.

During this period 24,094 firms and cooperatives were founded in Turkey. A total of 1,557 enterprises were founded by foreign nationals, with more than a quarter of these being Syrian citizens.

This week it was reported that major clothing chain Seven Hill was declared officially bankrupt, while the Elgin Group, a prominent citrus exporter, went under after accumulating TL 300 million in debt.

A number of high-profile firms have gone bankrupt this year, particularly those holding debt in foreign currency that has rapidly expanded as the lira weakened during the first four months of the year.

Read more: TOBB: Nearly 14,000 companies close in 4 months