By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: June 2, 2017 The unthinkable is happening so fast to America that there is a serious, growing threat that U.S. citizens are becoming desensitized to the chilling reality of our nation’s precipitous decline in respect and credibility around the world. The reflex action is to either deny it’s happening or pull the covers over one’s head. Two weeks before President Donald Trump announced the U.S. withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accord, Der Spiegel, one of the most influential and widely read news magazines in Europe, published a breathtaking assessment of the sitting President of the United States. Written by its Executive Editor, Klaus Brinkbäumer, the editorial was brutal and came from a publication known for its investigative acumen. Brinkbäumer made the following observations: “Donald Trump has transformed the United States into a laughing stock and he is a danger to the world. He must … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: June 2, 2017 When it comes to demanding transparency in government, Wall Street On Parade typically takes the position that citizens have a constitutional right to their government’s records. We demand those records regularly at Federal agencies using the Freedom of Information Act and at state and local government agencies using the relevant sunshine laws.  This past Wednesday was the first time that we can recall when we read a publicly released report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO), the nonpartisan watchdog for Congress, that made us queasy that the information should never have been released. The report concerned the information technology systems of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). The GAO seemed to be handing potential cyber attackers a roadmap on how to exploit the FDIC’s many vulnerabilities. Federal deposit insurance was first created under the Glass-Steagall Act (also known as the Banking … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: June 1, 2017 Two of the most intuitive members of Congress, Senator Elizabeth Warren and Congressman Elijah Cummings, sent a letter to the Comptroller General of the Government Accountability Office (GAO) all the way back on November 23, 2016 demanding an investigation of President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team expenditures, business conflicts and communications with foreign leaders. If the duo had been peering into a crystal ball, they couldn’t have delivered a more prescient recital of today’s unprecedented train wreck in the White House. The GAO report is set for draft release to relevant Federal agencies this month. Expect leaks before its official public release. The GAO is the nonpartisan Congressional watchdog that investigates, at the beckoning of members of Congress, how the Federal government spends taxpayer dollars. GAO says its mission is to “provide Congress with timely information that is objective, fact-based, nonpartisan, nonideological, … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: May 30, 2017  The 2017 Memorial Day weekend will inevitably go down in history as the three-day span when remembrances of our military veterans took a media backseat to President Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and everything Russian. One of the key areas under multiple probes is a meeting Kushner held in December with Sergey Gorkov, the Chairman of Vnesheconombank (VEB), a Russian state-owned bank which has been under U.S. sanctions since July 2014 for Russia’s annexation of Crimea and aggression in Ukraine. What this meeting was about has yet to be officially determined. Reuters reported on Saturday that “FBI investigators are examining whether Russians suggested to Kushner or other Trump aides that relaxing economic sanctions would allow Russian banks to offer financing to people with ties to Trump, said the current U.S. law enforcement official.” Financial dealings with a Russian bank that remains under … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: May 29, 2017  As reporters in every major newsroom in the U.S. scramble to fill in the blanks in the bizarre tale of President Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, attempting to set up a secret back channel with Russia using Russian communication equipment almost two months before Trump had taken the reins as President, there’s another related story that has not been adequately fleshed out. Eight days before Washington Post reporters named Kushner as a key participant in this plan, reporters at Reuters had already reported on May 18 that “Michael Flynn and other advisers to Donald Trump’s campaign were in contact with Russian officials and others with Kremlin ties in at least 18 calls and emails during the last seven months of the 2016 presidential race…” The Reuters report then dropped the bombshell that Flynn and Sergei Kislyak, Russia’s ambassador to the United States, … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: May 26, 2017 The majority of American citizens have never heard of the U.S. Treasury agency known as FinCEN – short for Financial Crimes Enforcement Network. But for those who work for Wall Street brokerage firms or the mega Wall Street banks like JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup or German banking giant Deutsche Bank, just the mere mention of FinCEN can quickly produce beads of sweat dripping onto those expensive Canali suits. That’s because FinCEN is the Federal agency where suspicious financial activity that might turn out to be money laundering gets reported. All three banks, and numerous others, have had their share of scandalous run ins with money laundering. In recent weeks, the U.S. Senate Banking Committee, Senate Intelligence Committee and the House of Representatives Financial Services Committee have all shown an interest in what FinCEN might have in its database that would shed sunshine … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: May 25, 2017 President Donald Trump’s demands for loyalty from the individuals in his administration have been a hot topic for weeks in U.S. media. But what the media has yet to explain is how so many law partners from global corporate law firms that were outsized donors to Hillary Clinton’s presidential run last year, giving crumbs by comparison to Trump’s campaign, now hold seats of power throughout the Trump administration. Let’s start with the weirdest example of all: Jones Day.  Wall Street On Parade reported earlier this year that on January 20, 2017 – the very day of Trump’s inauguration – Jones Day announced that a whopping 12 of its law partners were moving into the Trump administration. Among the 12, key slots went to Donald F. McGahn II as White House Counsel; Noel Francisco, first named as Principal Deputy Solicitor General and … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: May 24, 2017 It became clear yesterday why President Donald Trump needed thousands of miles between himself and Washington D.C. when his administration dropped its budget proposal on the American people. It immediately drew sharply negative reactions from both sides of the aisle and outright ridicule from mainstream media. Max Ehrenfreund, writing for the Washington Post, said the promise that the Trump budget would balance federal finances in a decade was based on “vague savings and unspecified sources of new revenue” consisting of over $2 trillion in “mystery money.” Jonathan Chait at New York Magazine said Trump’s budget assumptions contain a “$2 trillion basic arithmetic error” that is just downright “embarrassing.” Anger among Democratic leaders over the budget’s attack on Americans that are least able to sustain more financial pain boiled over on Capitol Hill yesterday. Senator Bernie Sanders, the Ranking Member of the Senate … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: May 23, 2017 Citigroup, the Wall Street mega bank that taxpayers were forced to prop up in the largest bailout of a financial institution in U.S. history from 2008 to 2010, is also a recidivist lawbreaker that the U.S. Justice Department fails to tame regardless of who occupies the Oval Office. Under the Obama administration, Citigroup was repeatedly fined by its Federal regulators for serious abuses of the law and its customers but only once was a felony count leveled against the bank. On May 20, 2015, Citicorp, a unit of Citigroup, pleaded guilty to a felony charge in connection with the rigging of foreign currency trading. (Three other banks, JPMorgan Chase, Barclays PLC and the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) also pleaded guilty to felony charges in the same matter. UBS, at the same time, pleaded guilty to rigging the interest rate benchmark … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: May 22, 2017 Robert Mueller, the former FBI Director who has been appointed as Special Counsel to oversee the investigation of ties between the Trump campaign and Russia during the 2016 Presidential election may find out quickly that there is an obstacle course of roadblocks preventing him from doing his job. (Mueller served from September 4, 2001 to September 4, 2013 as FBI Director, under both Presidents George W. Bush and Obama. He is widely respected by both Congressional Democrats and Republicans in Washington.) On January 28, President Trump quietly and with little fanfare signed an Executive Order that bars an Executive Branch employee from participating “in any particular matter involving specific parties that is directly and substantially related to my former employer or former clients, including regulations and contracts.” This concept is further defined in the Executive Order to mean “matters in which … Continue reading →