Since 2008, I have followed many online news
sources such as Zerohedge, Max Keiser and
Liberty Blitzkrieg, among others. As I've said
before, none of these sites has all the answers.
And sometimes, these guys are dead wrong,
either in their ideas, or in their predictions. But,
if you cross-reference these sources, you will
get a better sense of the truth.
In this case, Max Keiser used to have a guy
named Jim Rickards on his show. He had
some interesting revelations about US gov
inner workings. He was an economist (?) and
he was even called in by the Pentagon to
do an economic war game simulation. And I
thought, "wow, this alt guy was actually on the
inside."
As I discovered later, Keiser was trying to
squeeze Rickards on issues around the
11 of the 9th month events in 2001, and
Rickards was stonewalling. As I slowly
came to see, Rickards was, though
interesting, pretty much a statist and a big
fan of US power.
When it came time for the US to chase
Snowden, I was following Rickards on
twitter. He wrote something like "we shoulda
shot his plane out of the sky" which, for
somebody who was a "researcher" is
bold, and stupid. Before having any
evidence about Snowden, the US was
supposed to shoot a plane out of the sky?
As it turns out, a dull German (real) alt-journalist
named Lars Schall (who has also been on Keiser
and does his own interviews)
tried to figure out what
and does his own interviews)
tried to figure out what
happened with the finances around that 11th
of the 9th that I had mentioned. It seems
that many government people and assorted
hangers-on had bet heavily on a terrorist
strike during that time. Rickards had produced
what was supposed to be the definitive alt-journalism
book on the topic. But he was fuzzy on the
inside part of this job, as regards the financial
betting. Well, Lars cooked Rickards' goose and
served it to him cold.
Lars could cure insomniacs, but he has
shown Rickards up.
[here is the proof]
“Informed 9/11 Terror Trading” – Lars Schall Responds To Jim Rickards’ Limited Hangout
Posted on January 2, 2015 by Lars Schall
In a lecture that he gave in Copenhagen, Denmark, German financial journalist Lars Schall shows that the claim put forward by Wall Street player / bestselling author Jim Rickards that he has been “rigorous and scientific about the evidence” re 9/11 insider trading is merely a lousy joke.
Here you can watch the lecture on “Informed 9/11 Terror Trading”.
Moreover, in addition to my presentation, here’s what Paul Zarembka, Professor for Economics at the State University of New York, has told me about Jim Rickards’ “limited hangout”:
Hi, Lars,
I have now read Rickards’ chapter that you were kind enough to forward. I don’t see it as even a ‘limited hangout’ of the trading issue unless we reduce that phrase to recognition of good work done by Poteshman and Chesney et al.
Even for those two works, the references are strange. Poteshman’s is stated to be published by the U. of Chicago, but that is not the way academic publication is cited. The proper reference is the J. of Business which happens to be published by U. of Chicago for decades. And Chesney et al’s work is cited without their names and as if the Institute produced it, rather than independent academics employed there. The author works so closely to intelligence agencies that he is characterizing academic work as if it were administratively like those agencies, i.e., any work is the responsibility of the publisher/agency, not individual scholars.
Anyway, what I think can be learned is that the intelligence agencies are taking insider trading seriously, unlike the Commission Report (who Rickards applauds … except — pp. 25-27 — on insider trading). On the bottom of p. 23 Rickards indicates that the Commission knew of Poteshman’s work — so why not cite it as “forthcoming” (in appeared in the same year, I believe within one quarter of each other) and deal with it? (The Commission, of course, also ignored many reports of hijackers being alive after 9-11.)
He raises the issue of signal amplification. I am not convinced, but if correct, it would imply much less money earned by nefarious characters than would otherwise be the case: much of the earnings would go to those follow like sheep. In any case, Rickards does not even cite the background, unpublished, work behind the Commission Report which claimed that many of the purchasers of AA options were interviewed and stated that they followed the newsletter that was cited; i.e., whoever they were that were NOT the sheep of alleged signal amplification.
An interesting claim is his assertion that the his system MARKINT flashed “red” on August 7, 2006 for American Airlines. Unfortunately, Chesney’s work on AA goes only to April 2006 (if I have not missed subsequent work) so we cannot cross-check this.
No where in the chapter is there any evidence provided of WHO were the insider traders. This absence is hardly surprising but needs to be recognized.
Postscriptum @Max Keiser: thank you for asking pretty awkward questions!
Read more at http://www.maxkeiser.com/2015/01/informed-911-terror-trading-lars-schall-responds-to-jim-rickards-limited-hangout/#lrqEkyXFPfyCU0b4.99
