Where should you put your money in case the debt ceiling is not raised

Straight cash homey.

 

Short Treasury bonds, or trade on credit-default swaps on America's sovereign debt.

you'll be contributing to the nascent sense of doom and your own country's downfall, but you might make a pretty penny or two.

Cantor is already on this. http://blogs.wsj.com/marketbeat/2011/06/28/eric-cantor-is-short-treasurys-sort-of/

He's hedging, you can be betting!

 

The first thing that comes to mind is CHF if you are looking for stability.

 

I dont think it's a good idea to short treasuries.

 

If we don't raise the debt ceiling, and there's a big treasury sell-off, I'd buy them then. We're not going to default. There might be a bunch of government workers sent home without pay, maybe even some military base closures, but we'll service the debt.

 

Absolutely. People are crazy if they think there is a chance the gov is going to stop paying the debt.

The idea of defaulting on our debt and not paying social security checks is being used to stir up fear about this date.

 

I bet you the nothing will happen to our rating when that date comes and goes if there isn't a deal as long as the debt is still being paid.

By the way, I'm not advocating them not making a deal.

 

You should bet all your money that Obama loses in 2012. That's the safest place.

 

What most people don't get though, is that you can still make money if America doesn't default, as long as the probability of default increases. If you think the debt ceiling will not be raised, that might lead to a credit downgrade, and definitely puts the probability of default in the minds of investors, something once unthinkable with the gold standard Treasury bonds. Shorting treasury bonds and embarking on CDS is a smart play if you believe the probability of default will increase in the minds of investors, which you do if you think the debt ceiling is not raised.

Look at Greece for example, CDS contracts are up, and if you had shorted Greek bonds, you'd have made a pretty penny...but there hasn't been a default, just rumors of an impending default.

If the debt ceiling is not raised, tbh, a commodity play is probably not bad either. Go for silver, and check that out, gold has been headline news the last 5 years.

 

Have you seen the Republican field?

Besides, most people do not view the current problems to be because of Obama.

 

The debt ceiling will be raised. Wall Street/ Big Biz will call Obama and Boehner and tell them to knock it off; enough is enough.

Is there some way to play the suckers who think Obama and Boehner or Cantor will be allowed to get out of hand?

 

I'm not so sure about that - Moody's and company have seemed to get antsy with Europe, and they are now proactively downgrading bonds just for the fun of it, it seems. What they did with some of those countries is just silly - even the ones that are successfully implementing austerity, they just decided that future protests will cause them to stop, and thus their debt might be suspect 3 or 4 years from now, so let's downgrade them now.

I think Moody's has backed itself into a corner with their "review notice" a few days ago. If they don't downgrade them without a deal, they'll be a laughingstock again, and they seem committed to never getting behind the curve anymore.

 

mary jane

 

Sorry. CHF=Swiss Franc. IIRC, you can open a Swiss account and convert online.

The only problem is that it seems that a whole bunch of people have already had this thought, and its become expensive in the last three or four months. That having been said, when gold jumped from like $350/oz to $450/oz, I sold off all my gold mining stocks thinking the market was overheating. Of course, gold spot prices are currently approaching $1600/oz, and I feel like such a dumb-ass that it is too painful to even try and figure exactly how much money I left on the table with that genus move.

 

CHFs are usually pretty good for stability...but there's a caveat with them right now.

Really, imo, nobody should place a lot of faith in any fiat paper currency, especially given that each state plays with the exchange rate given their own circumstances.

 

http://youtu.be/bj5pQMkQqKM