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To: long-gone who wrote (17081)	8/31/1998 8:23:00 PM
From: bobby beara	Respond to of 116894

RH, I bought some ABX calls on Friday. My favoorite indicator DROOY was up today in a down market. I don't know if this is the final bottom, it looks close, but I feel we will have a rally from here. dollar is toast in a crashing market, what's left? -ggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg-

To: long-gone who wrote (17081)	8/31/1998 10:27:00 PM
From: Alex	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116894

G7 to Act.................... That falling feeling G7 leaders are finally taking the Russian crisis seriously. But they may be too late to prevent a bumpy landing for all of us By Alex Brummer Tuesday September 1, 1998 The inaction of the West as Russia's economic and political system has staggered through crisis since the devaluation of the rouble two weeks ago, may prove to be the costliest error of the post second world war era. The drift in Russia has delivered a dangerous message of indifference and vacillation to other emerging market economies from East Asia to Latin America, raising the spectre of a worldwide recession. Moreover, the uncertainty enveloping global markets is leading to extremely tight credit conditions in Western money markets which will make it far more difficult for corporations to borrow to invest and expand. It is only in the last 48 hours, as the global crisis threatens to engulf them on their return from vacation, that the leaders of the Group of Seven most powerful industrial countries - the US, Germany, France, Britain, Italy, Japan and Canada - have demonstrated any determination to become involved in the unfolding drama. Tony Blair, currently chairman of the G7, has taken a flurry of calls from his fellow heads of government, indicating a growing level of anxiety which will not be eased by the political standoff in Moscow, where Viktor Chernomyrdin has failed to be confirmed as prime minister, nor the latest roller-coaster on the Dow Jones in New York. One of the tricks of international financial diplomacy is to catch the markets by surprise, as was the case when the US intervened in the foreign exchanges to steady the Japanese yen in mid-June of this year. What is worrying about the current, very public posturing, is that it is just that. The best rule of international finance is that unilateral and decisive action to deal with emergencies, like that taken by President Clinton in December 1994 to rescue the yen, tend to be more effective than the collaborative steps proposed by the G7. This is partly because Germany and the Bundesbank, which live by financial orthodoxy, are much less willing than the US to spend money now and ask questions later. As an organisation the G7 has very little firepower of its own. It can intervene in foreign exchange markets, using the reserves of individual central banks, but such operations are essentially short-term. If it wants to use real ammunition, its main instrument is the International Monetary Fund where historically the US, as the biggest shareholder, is highly influential. However at present the US's position as the moral leader of the IMF is somewhat in jeopardy. A series of calls on the IMF's resources ranging from Russia (before the current crisis) to East Asia has dramatically emptied the fund's coffers. Efforts to increase resources by some 50 per cent have been stifled by the US Congress, which means that the fund effectively finds itself critically short of cash. Even if the G7 were to decide that a massive Russia bailout fund - larger than the $23 billion arranged before the rouble devaluation and debt moratorium - it might not be the right solution to Moscow's problems. Nevertheless there are mechanisms beyond the IMF, including an emergency fund - the $50 billion General Arrrangements to Borrow last used to provide assistance to Jim Callaghan and Denis Healey, when the pound fell through the floor in 1976, spelling the death knell of that Labour government. But to reach the point of activating such facilities would almost certainly mean convening an emergency session of G7 finance ministers who would demand that Russia does take the action to mend itself, most notably by ending the leakages of foreign currency to Zurich and other offshore centres (capital outflow had been running at $3.75 billion a month before the crisis) and similar steps to prevent the leakages of tax income at home. That demands strong governance in Moscow, a situation which currently looks unlikely. Given this difficulty, can Western governments help themselves to prevent Moscow's problems becoming those of the City and Wall Street? The bubble of confidence has almost certainly been pricked from Caracas to Frankfurt and New York, where the Russian problem has delivered a sharp pyschological blow of the kind which turns the economic cycle. A concerted cut in Western interest rates, led by the Federal Reserve (the US central bank) could ease the tensions in international markets, but the odds on a hard landing are increasing. reports.guardian.co.uk