Okay Obama fans, first the good news:
GOOD NEWS: you more than proved you can act as a united force to unify your support and get out and spread the word and vote. Look what happened, you helped make history. But the bad news...
BAD NEWS: that was the easy part!
I'm not really sure (and certainly if I were Obama, I'd not be relishing January 20th) he's still partying it up about the victory you led him to. Take a peek at the facts of what he's walking into:
THE FACTS:
1. We are faced with the biggest global economic catastrophe in history
2. The Feds don't seem to have any real solutions. "Let's cut the rate - again!" just won't cut it any more.
3. Bankruptcies are up 28% and still rising
4. Unemployment is at an all-time high - and I predict will definately hit 10%
5. Consumer confidence is down 40%
6. I'm not even going to mention the housing market!
Trust me, I'm an extremely optimistic person and always try to look on the bright side, but this is like standing on the high board of a pool without knowing how to swim looking down at a bunch of very hungry sharks! What really worries me is that most people don't seem to be as scared as me, or even scared at all. Am I hallucinating this impending depression, or is everybody else drinking some LSD-loaded KoolAid?
My business is barter, via my company Merchants Barter Exchange, and as such I deal with sales people and business owners all day long. Almost everybody is putting a 'brave face' on things. Believe me, Obama is not going to wave a magic wand on January 20th and make all these bad dreams go away! But there is some good news:
GOOD NEWS: if Obama and his supporters are prepared to put in the same (or more) effort it took to get him elected, we may be able to speed the recovery process. This isn't intended as a sales pitch, however I cannot help but be a little biased due to all the great work Merchants Barter Exchange has been doing for over eight years preparing and supporting businesses for just this situation.
YOU can help the problem by becoming part of the solution. Just getting out and voting was a good start, but that is all it was. If that is all your participation is going to be and you are going to flop back down on your 'welfare' or 'entitlement' couch and watch as everybody else does the work, then you really didn't do justice to the campaign you voted for.
OBAMA needed your help then and he needs it now and will continue to need it on a daily basis until we are out of this economic catastrophe. So, what can you do...? Well, for starters you can badger your politicians and get them to see that the stimulous package actual stimulates something useful. You can also spread the word (twitter, email, blog, call, whatever - do everything you can) to everybody and anybody that will listen - just like you did during the campaign - that we all need to work as a team. Tell your local business owners to call Merchants Barter Exchange to help them save cash on things they need. Tell local entrepreneurs about MBE and get them involved. Now more than ever before we need a strong, serious back-up economy.
2009 needs to see the power of the people stand behind Obama-nomics, and Obama-nomics has to include MBE-barter as part of his success strategy otherwise we are on a very slippery slope to a bottomless pit. As he says, "It's gonna get worse before it gets better." Be prepared for a tough battle, but the end result can be very positive.
Let's pull together as a nation and show the rest of the world where our true strength lies, in the UNITED States of the American People.
Thanks for reading, now get twittering... texting... emailing... and lay the foundations for Obama to make some serious progress in January 2009.
Showing posts with label bail out. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bail out. Show all posts
Sunday, January 4, 2009
Sunday, December 14, 2008
What Happens when Countries Go Bankrupt?
First it was mortgage lenders. Then large banks began to wobble. Now, entire countries, including Ukraine and Pakistan, are facing financial ruin. The International Monetary Fund is there to help, but its pockets are only so deep.
No, Alexander Lukyanchenko told reporters at a hastily convened press conference last Tuesday, there is "no reason whatsoever to spread panic." Anyone who was caught trying to throw people out into the street, he warned, would have the authorities to deal with.
Lukyanchenko is the mayor of Donetsk, a city in eastern Ukraine with a population of a little more than one million. For generations, the residents of Donetsk have earned a living in the surrounding coalmines and steel mills, a rather profitable industry in the recent past. Donetsksta, a local steel producer, earned €1.3 billion ($1.65 billion) in revenues last year.
But last Tuesday the mayor, returning from a meeting with business leaders, had bad news: two-thousand metalworkers would have to be furloughed. Lukyanchenko doesn't use the word furlough, instead noting that the workers will be doing "other, similar work." But every other blast furnace has already been shut down, and one of the city's largest holding companies is apparently gearing up for mass layoffs.
Under these conditions, how could panic not be rampant in Donetsk, the capital of Ukraine's industrial heartland? In Mariupol, a steelworking city, a third of the workers have already been let go. The chemical industry, Ukraine's second-largest source of export revenue, is also ailing. In the capital Kiev, booming until recently, construction cranes are at a standstill while crowds jostle in front of currency exchange offices, eager to convert their assets into US dollars.
Donetsk is in eastern Ukraine, 8,100 kilometers (5,030 miles) from New York's Wall Street and 2,700 kilometers (1,677 miles) from Canary Wharf, London's financial center. But such distances are now relative. The world financial crisis has reached a new level. No longer limited to banks and companies, it is now spreading like wildfire and engulfing entire economies. It has reached Asia and Latin America, Eastern Europe, Iceland the Seychelles, the Balkan nation of Serbia and Africa's southernmost country, South Africa.
It is a development that has investors and speculators alike holding their breath. Some are pulling their money out of troubled countries, while others are betting on a continued decline -- and in doing so are only accelerating the downturn. Central banks are desperately trying to halt the downward trend, but in many cases the plunge seems unstoppable.
At first, it seemed as if the crash could be limited to Iceland. But now countries like Ukraine, Pakistan and Argentina are proving to be almost as vulnerable as the small island nation in the North Atlantic. It seems as though another country is added to the growing list of nations on the verge of collapse almost daily.
FROM THE MAGAZINE
Find out how you can reprint this DER SPIEGEL article in your publication. A national bankruptcy isn't just some theoretical construct. Argentina experienced it in 2001 and Russia three years earlier. Germany has gone bankrupt twice in its more recent history, once in 1923 and the second time after 1945. A country has reached this final stage if, as a result of war or blatant mismanagement, it has gambled away all trust, can no longer service its debt or convince anyone to lend it any money, no matter how high an interest rate it promises to pay.
This is what is currently happening to Iceland. The central bank in the capital Reykjavik increased its prime rate by six points to 18 percent last week. Venezuela, where inflation is also high, is now offering 20 percent to stimulate interest in its government bonds. At the moment, however, investors are shying away from all risk.
In the end, the rating agencies will have no choice but to downgrade the problem countries to their lowest level of creditworthiness. When that happens, lenders will have no choice but to write off much of their money. For citizens, national bankruptcy would probably lead to massive inflation.
The threshold countries, described until recently as "emerging" economies, are in for an especially rough ride. "The dream that they would be spared seems to have come to an end," says Rolf Langhammer, vice-president of the Kiel Institute for the World Economy.
Countries like Russia and Brazil owe their recent success in large part to the boom in commodities the world has experienced in recent years. But now prices for oil, copper, wheat and corn have plunged and a giant spiral of debt has begun to turn. The companies and banks that borrowed vast amounts of money abroad for their investments can no longer service their debt, and investors are pulling out their capital. As foreign currency becomes scarce and imports unaffordable, the currencies of these countries are losing value, which only increases the mountain of debt.
According to Stephen Jen, a currency specialist with the US bank Morgan Stanley, the flow of capital to threshold countries could drop by more than half -- from the current level of €575 billion ($730 billion) to €230-270 billion ($292-343 billion) -- if world economic growth drops to only 1 percent in 2009. The demise of these countries, says Jen, represents the new "epicenter of the global crisis."
The looming crisis has the countries in most dire need lining up for emergency loans from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). But all they are doing is buying time -- a few weeks, or perhaps even months -- and hoping that the general situation will soon improve.
The Ghost of Buenos Aires
The signs of looming national bankruptcy are plentiful, and bankers in the Uruguayan capital of Montevideo know them well. In late 2001, they were the first to see the coming crash in Argentina. Men traveled across the Rio de la Plata, from Buenos Aires to Montevideo, carrying suitcases filled with US dollars. They stood in long lines at the city's banks, depositing the contents of their suitcases into accounts and safe deposit boxes there. Uruguay is South America's Switzerland, a safe haven for money in times of crisis. No one asks about where the millions come from.
DER SPIEGEL
Argentina in crisis.
Once the Argentine businessmen had transferred their dollars abroad, the second phase of the collapse began. The Argentine government froze all bank accounts, capping the maximum amount an accountholder could withdraw at only $250 (€198) a week. Small investors, those who had left their money in the banks, were the hardest hit. Tens of thousands of desperate citizens stormed the banks, and many spent nights sleeping in front of the automated teller machines.
The last phase of the downturn began in the Buenos Aires suburbs. After consumption had dropped by 60 percent, young men began looting supermarkets. In December 2001, 40,000 people gathered on Plaza de Mayo in front of the Casa Rosada, the presidential palace. There, they banged pots and pans together day and night, until an unnerved President Fernando de la Rúa fled by helicopter.
The image of the fleeing president has burned itself into the collective memory of Argentineans. It marks the worst financial crisis of the last 100 years. De la Rúa's successor allowed the peso to float free on the world currency-exchange markets after it had been pegged to the US dollar at a ratio of 1:1. Tens of thousands of small business owners, who had incurred debt when the peso was still pegged to the dollar, filed for bankruptcy.that Argentina would not be able to repay its $145 billion (€115 billion) in foreign debt.
Is history repeating itself today?
Economic experts have been warning for months that Argentina is again heading toward national bankruptcy. Men are traveling to Uruguay once again with suitcases filled with cash. In the space of only three weeks, more than $700 million (€553 million) was withdrawn from Argentine bank accounts. Government bonds have lost more than half of their value. ATMs are no longer giving out more than 300 pesos, and inflation is running rampant
No, Alexander Lukyanchenko told reporters at a hastily convened press conference last Tuesday, there is "no reason whatsoever to spread panic." Anyone who was caught trying to throw people out into the street, he warned, would have the authorities to deal with.
Lukyanchenko is the mayor of Donetsk, a city in eastern Ukraine with a population of a little more than one million. For generations, the residents of Donetsk have earned a living in the surrounding coalmines and steel mills, a rather profitable industry in the recent past. Donetsksta, a local steel producer, earned €1.3 billion ($1.65 billion) in revenues last year.
But last Tuesday the mayor, returning from a meeting with business leaders, had bad news: two-thousand metalworkers would have to be furloughed. Lukyanchenko doesn't use the word furlough, instead noting that the workers will be doing "other, similar work." But every other blast furnace has already been shut down, and one of the city's largest holding companies is apparently gearing up for mass layoffs.
Under these conditions, how could panic not be rampant in Donetsk, the capital of Ukraine's industrial heartland? In Mariupol, a steelworking city, a third of the workers have already been let go. The chemical industry, Ukraine's second-largest source of export revenue, is also ailing. In the capital Kiev, booming until recently, construction cranes are at a standstill while crowds jostle in front of currency exchange offices, eager to convert their assets into US dollars.
Donetsk is in eastern Ukraine, 8,100 kilometers (5,030 miles) from New York's Wall Street and 2,700 kilometers (1,677 miles) from Canary Wharf, London's financial center. But such distances are now relative. The world financial crisis has reached a new level. No longer limited to banks and companies, it is now spreading like wildfire and engulfing entire economies. It has reached Asia and Latin America, Eastern Europe, Iceland the Seychelles, the Balkan nation of Serbia and Africa's southernmost country, South Africa.
It is a development that has investors and speculators alike holding their breath. Some are pulling their money out of troubled countries, while others are betting on a continued decline -- and in doing so are only accelerating the downturn. Central banks are desperately trying to halt the downward trend, but in many cases the plunge seems unstoppable.
At first, it seemed as if the crash could be limited to Iceland. But now countries like Ukraine, Pakistan and Argentina are proving to be almost as vulnerable as the small island nation in the North Atlantic. It seems as though another country is added to the growing list of nations on the verge of collapse almost daily.
FROM THE MAGAZINE
Find out how you can reprint this DER SPIEGEL article in your publication. A national bankruptcy isn't just some theoretical construct. Argentina experienced it in 2001 and Russia three years earlier. Germany has gone bankrupt twice in its more recent history, once in 1923 and the second time after 1945. A country has reached this final stage if, as a result of war or blatant mismanagement, it has gambled away all trust, can no longer service its debt or convince anyone to lend it any money, no matter how high an interest rate it promises to pay.
This is what is currently happening to Iceland. The central bank in the capital Reykjavik increased its prime rate by six points to 18 percent last week. Venezuela, where inflation is also high, is now offering 20 percent to stimulate interest in its government bonds. At the moment, however, investors are shying away from all risk.
In the end, the rating agencies will have no choice but to downgrade the problem countries to their lowest level of creditworthiness. When that happens, lenders will have no choice but to write off much of their money. For citizens, national bankruptcy would probably lead to massive inflation.
The threshold countries, described until recently as "emerging" economies, are in for an especially rough ride. "The dream that they would be spared seems to have come to an end," says Rolf Langhammer, vice-president of the Kiel Institute for the World Economy.
Countries like Russia and Brazil owe their recent success in large part to the boom in commodities the world has experienced in recent years. But now prices for oil, copper, wheat and corn have plunged and a giant spiral of debt has begun to turn. The companies and banks that borrowed vast amounts of money abroad for their investments can no longer service their debt, and investors are pulling out their capital. As foreign currency becomes scarce and imports unaffordable, the currencies of these countries are losing value, which only increases the mountain of debt.
According to Stephen Jen, a currency specialist with the US bank Morgan Stanley, the flow of capital to threshold countries could drop by more than half -- from the current level of €575 billion ($730 billion) to €230-270 billion ($292-343 billion) -- if world economic growth drops to only 1 percent in 2009. The demise of these countries, says Jen, represents the new "epicenter of the global crisis."
The looming crisis has the countries in most dire need lining up for emergency loans from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). But all they are doing is buying time -- a few weeks, or perhaps even months -- and hoping that the general situation will soon improve.
The Ghost of Buenos Aires
The signs of looming national bankruptcy are plentiful, and bankers in the Uruguayan capital of Montevideo know them well. In late 2001, they were the first to see the coming crash in Argentina. Men traveled across the Rio de la Plata, from Buenos Aires to Montevideo, carrying suitcases filled with US dollars. They stood in long lines at the city's banks, depositing the contents of their suitcases into accounts and safe deposit boxes there. Uruguay is South America's Switzerland, a safe haven for money in times of crisis. No one asks about where the millions come from.
DER SPIEGEL
Argentina in crisis.
Once the Argentine businessmen had transferred their dollars abroad, the second phase of the collapse began. The Argentine government froze all bank accounts, capping the maximum amount an accountholder could withdraw at only $250 (€198) a week. Small investors, those who had left their money in the banks, were the hardest hit. Tens of thousands of desperate citizens stormed the banks, and many spent nights sleeping in front of the automated teller machines.
The last phase of the downturn began in the Buenos Aires suburbs. After consumption had dropped by 60 percent, young men began looting supermarkets. In December 2001, 40,000 people gathered on Plaza de Mayo in front of the Casa Rosada, the presidential palace. There, they banged pots and pans together day and night, until an unnerved President Fernando de la Rúa fled by helicopter.
The image of the fleeing president has burned itself into the collective memory of Argentineans. It marks the worst financial crisis of the last 100 years. De la Rúa's successor allowed the peso to float free on the world currency-exchange markets after it had been pegged to the US dollar at a ratio of 1:1. Tens of thousands of small business owners, who had incurred debt when the peso was still pegged to the dollar, filed for bankruptcy.that Argentina would not be able to repay its $145 billion (€115 billion) in foreign debt.
Is history repeating itself today?
Economic experts have been warning for months that Argentina is again heading toward national bankruptcy. Men are traveling to Uruguay once again with suitcases filled with cash. In the space of only three weeks, more than $700 million (€553 million) was withdrawn from Argentine bank accounts. Government bonds have lost more than half of their value. ATMs are no longer giving out more than 300 pesos, and inflation is running rampant
Negotiating your way around a tough economy
Anybody that’s a fan of bartering is a fan of mine.
Barter is the bedrock of ALL economics… it’s the “bedrock trampoline” a crashing economy smashes into before it eventually bounces back.
If you’re in business and you don’t barter directly with other business owners, or use an ethical, regulated barter company such as Merchants Barter Exchange (MBE), you’re seriously missing out on multiple benefits. That goes for the good economic time AND the bad economic times.
Just imagine how much business you’d lose if you didn’t accept credit cards…? How much business are you losing by not using the MBE barter system…?
Let’s hope people don’t let this country go the way Argentina did back in 2002 and HAD TO use barter because the country went BANKRUPT.
Barter is the bedrock of ALL economics… it’s the “bedrock trampoline” a crashing economy smashes into before it eventually bounces back.
If you’re in business and you don’t barter directly with other business owners, or use an ethical, regulated barter company such as Merchants Barter Exchange (MBE), you’re seriously missing out on multiple benefits. That goes for the good economic time AND the bad economic times.
Just imagine how much business you’d lose if you didn’t accept credit cards…? How much business are you losing by not using the MBE barter system…?
Let’s hope people don’t let this country go the way Argentina did back in 2002 and HAD TO use barter because the country went BANKRUPT.
New Economic Revolution Needed...?
Quoting Einstein, "Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."
That said, $700 BILLION... the lunacy (I can't think of another word for proposing such a ridiculous short term solution to a problem that was allowed to happen for so many years) that is happening in the economy right now, really is insane.
I am feeling rather smug, with that "I told you so" look on my face, though. Why?
For three years people have been telling me I was crazy for working so diligently for Merchants Barter Exchange - a new (launched eight years ago) company to help businesses trade for things at the same price as cash using the barter system - it even cost me my marriage, but I knew the economy was headed for a fall like this.
We are now being lauded as "futurists". Call us futurists if you want to, but for us the writing has been on the wall for many years: our economy is down the toilet and is not going to be solved by "bubble-gum politics". The only way to save the US economy is Merchants Barter Exchange.
The people "pulling the strings" now have their dirty little fingers on the flusher handle.
Barter, as an economic system, has outlived Kings and Queens, Empires, World Wars, Governments, recessions... It is the bedrock trampoline every economy hits when it crashes.
Thankfully Merchants Barter Exchange had the foresight to create their highly effective method of bartering 100%, same as cash, 100% of the time.
If there's anybody out there that really thinks $700 billion is really going to fix this problem, you probably also believed that the Titanic could have been saved with a large enough piece of bubble gum. Folks, please stop drinking the Kool Aid... and I tell you what, you can buy a lot of Kool Aid with $700 billion dollars.
Rant over, just had to get that little thing off my chest. Phew!
That said, $700 BILLION... the lunacy (I can't think of another word for proposing such a ridiculous short term solution to a problem that was allowed to happen for so many years) that is happening in the economy right now, really is insane.
I am feeling rather smug, with that "I told you so" look on my face, though. Why?
For three years people have been telling me I was crazy for working so diligently for Merchants Barter Exchange - a new (launched eight years ago) company to help businesses trade for things at the same price as cash using the barter system - it even cost me my marriage, but I knew the economy was headed for a fall like this.
We are now being lauded as "futurists". Call us futurists if you want to, but for us the writing has been on the wall for many years: our economy is down the toilet and is not going to be solved by "bubble-gum politics". The only way to save the US economy is Merchants Barter Exchange.
The people "pulling the strings" now have their dirty little fingers on the flusher handle.
Barter, as an economic system, has outlived Kings and Queens, Empires, World Wars, Governments, recessions... It is the bedrock trampoline every economy hits when it crashes.
Thankfully Merchants Barter Exchange had the foresight to create their highly effective method of bartering 100%, same as cash, 100% of the time.
If there's anybody out there that really thinks $700 billion is really going to fix this problem, you probably also believed that the Titanic could have been saved with a large enough piece of bubble gum. Folks, please stop drinking the Kool Aid... and I tell you what, you can buy a lot of Kool Aid with $700 billion dollars.
Rant over, just had to get that little thing off my chest. Phew!
A New Breed of Barter Exchange Brings Hope to American Business
Anybody reading the headlines these days knows the world teeters on the biggest worldwide recession in modern history and our leaders are scrambling for solutions. It is very timely that I recently had the opportunity of interviewing Mr Steve Bolles, founder and President of Merchants Barter Exchange, one of America’s great innovators of economic change and stability right now. Bolles is far from reclusive, but rarely entertains interviews, however due to the seriousness of the current global crisis he extended this offer.
For those unfamiliar with barter, what is Merchants Barter Exchange and what does it do?
Historically barter is the one-on-one exchange of similar or like-valued goods or services instead of using cash or currency. Merchants Barter Exchange is an ever-growing national network of diversified business owners that utilize the simplicity, ease and efficiency of our MBE-barter system to trade for multiple hard goods and services at the same price as cash with other members of our network. In short we have created an alternative payment mechanism for business owners to turn what they have too much of (time, inventory, or capacity - in essence their inefficiency) into positive revenue, increased cash flow, better marketing, and save a bunch of cash as they do so.
What was your inspiration behind Merchants Barter Exchange?
Back in the 90s I had another business and was a member of an older and very different kind of barter company. The more I used their antiquated mechanism, the more I noticed many flaws and huge areas of improvement. They had no systems in place to prevent people inflating the price of their goods or services, or price gouging, they also charged when a client bought and when they sold, they didn’t seem to have much control over how people traded and with whom, and even allowed members to pay part in cash and part in trade, which didn’t seem to make any sense to me. Most of the other members I dealt with were very unhappy with the overall system. That’s when I started to look for a better barter company, but after extensive research I discovered that every single barter company had the same flaws and challenges.
So what did you do to make Merchants Barter Exchange so different?
Firstly, we centralized the control and the membership list. This allowed us to ensure we only sent members brand new business and were not converting cash clients to trade clients. It also ensured we had secure systems in place to stop people charging more than they would for a cash transaction. It didn’t make any sense to pay more because it was barter, as you lost all the economical benefits. Since we have the control, we are able to expel any member that should try to break the rules that keep our system running effectively. Secondly, with control of the integrity and value of the MBE-barter dollar, it allowed us to do large and small trades for our members. I believe we are the only national barter company that can brag the ability to do $100,000 printing jobs 100% on trade with no cash element. Thirdly, since our system worked so well, we expanded very rapidly and needed to develop a solid and ongoing direct sales division to ensure we were able to meet as many of our members needs as we could. To date I think we have the best fulfillment rate and the greatest client retention rate (95%) of any barter company in the US.
What are you currently doing to ease the crisis in the US economy?
Even though we have grown steadily since we began in 2000, we are nowhere nearly as large as I would have liked us to be by now to help the millions of small business owners around the US, and around the world that can benefit from the MBE-barter system. Right now we are working on rolling out our corporate licensing program as fast as we can to reach as many new businesses and as many new cities around the US as we can. The major challenge has been screening the right entrepreneurial candidates that not only have the investment capital to buy in, but have the right morals, ethics, and responsibility for us to allow the priviledge to own and operate a local sales region. We are helping all those we can right now and improving the lives of our members and people in their communities, in time we will help increasingly more individuals.
Looking to the future, do you have any plans to expand beyond the US?
Absolutely! Our primary focus obviously is to assist the American business owners right now, however we created our business model to be a global monetary alternative. We already have interest from other countries around the world eager to implement our system into their economies. When the time is right we’ll definately expand internationally. Everything in good time.
I also heard you’re working on a book, is this true?
Yes. I’ve been co-collaborating on a book about the industry and the major differences and functions of the MBE-barter system with a close colleague in the industry. Right now we have more pressing issues to deal with and the book project has taken a slight back seat. We’ll finish it in due course, but it’s been an interesting project to work on.
For those unfamiliar with barter, what is Merchants Barter Exchange and what does it do?
Historically barter is the one-on-one exchange of similar or like-valued goods or services instead of using cash or currency. Merchants Barter Exchange is an ever-growing national network of diversified business owners that utilize the simplicity, ease and efficiency of our MBE-barter system to trade for multiple hard goods and services at the same price as cash with other members of our network. In short we have created an alternative payment mechanism for business owners to turn what they have too much of (time, inventory, or capacity - in essence their inefficiency) into positive revenue, increased cash flow, better marketing, and save a bunch of cash as they do so.
What was your inspiration behind Merchants Barter Exchange?
Back in the 90s I had another business and was a member of an older and very different kind of barter company. The more I used their antiquated mechanism, the more I noticed many flaws and huge areas of improvement. They had no systems in place to prevent people inflating the price of their goods or services, or price gouging, they also charged when a client bought and when they sold, they didn’t seem to have much control over how people traded and with whom, and even allowed members to pay part in cash and part in trade, which didn’t seem to make any sense to me. Most of the other members I dealt with were very unhappy with the overall system. That’s when I started to look for a better barter company, but after extensive research I discovered that every single barter company had the same flaws and challenges.
So what did you do to make Merchants Barter Exchange so different?
Firstly, we centralized the control and the membership list. This allowed us to ensure we only sent members brand new business and were not converting cash clients to trade clients. It also ensured we had secure systems in place to stop people charging more than they would for a cash transaction. It didn’t make any sense to pay more because it was barter, as you lost all the economical benefits. Since we have the control, we are able to expel any member that should try to break the rules that keep our system running effectively. Secondly, with control of the integrity and value of the MBE-barter dollar, it allowed us to do large and small trades for our members. I believe we are the only national barter company that can brag the ability to do $100,000 printing jobs 100% on trade with no cash element. Thirdly, since our system worked so well, we expanded very rapidly and needed to develop a solid and ongoing direct sales division to ensure we were able to meet as many of our members needs as we could. To date I think we have the best fulfillment rate and the greatest client retention rate (95%) of any barter company in the US.
What are you currently doing to ease the crisis in the US economy?
Even though we have grown steadily since we began in 2000, we are nowhere nearly as large as I would have liked us to be by now to help the millions of small business owners around the US, and around the world that can benefit from the MBE-barter system. Right now we are working on rolling out our corporate licensing program as fast as we can to reach as many new businesses and as many new cities around the US as we can. The major challenge has been screening the right entrepreneurial candidates that not only have the investment capital to buy in, but have the right morals, ethics, and responsibility for us to allow the priviledge to own and operate a local sales region. We are helping all those we can right now and improving the lives of our members and people in their communities, in time we will help increasingly more individuals.
Looking to the future, do you have any plans to expand beyond the US?
Absolutely! Our primary focus obviously is to assist the American business owners right now, however we created our business model to be a global monetary alternative. We already have interest from other countries around the world eager to implement our system into their economies. When the time is right we’ll definately expand internationally. Everything in good time.
I also heard you’re working on a book, is this true?
Yes. I’ve been co-collaborating on a book about the industry and the major differences and functions of the MBE-barter system with a close colleague in the industry. Right now we have more pressing issues to deal with and the book project has taken a slight back seat. We’ll finish it in due course, but it’s been an interesting project to work on.
Saturday, December 13, 2008
MBE-Barter: Serious CPR For An Economic Meltdown
As the American economy teeters on the brink of the biggest financial meltdown in history, and the proposed $700bn bail-out plan looks set to go down as well as David Blaine's stunt, there is still a small glimmer of hope.
Our ancestors created some incredibly simple things that are essential to our survival: the wheel (which became cogs, spindles, etc.), the aquaduct (which became pipes and plumbing), and barter (which later became economies.) Take away the teeth from a cog and it's still just a wheel. Take the covering off a pipe and it's still a simple aquaduct. Take the insanity out of our modern economy and you have the bedrock, the solid foundation of bartering.
Back in 2000, Merchants Barter Exchange (MBE) revolutionized how barter was traditionally implemented, taking it out of the Stone Age and into the 21st Century. The "Caveman Bank", as it is affectionately known, was created for just such a time as we are currently experiencing. Ridiculed and laughed at for being behind the times, they diligently stuck to their core beliefs and ethics of "100% trade, 100% of the time", same pricing as cash, and no cash-barter blends.
Nobody's laughing now.
Founder and President, Steve Bolles, had the foresight back when everybody else was being duped by the Y2K scare to go back to the drawing board and reinvent barter into the highly effective business tool that is now the MBE trading system. "Everybody told me I was crazy," states Bolles. "They told me it was impossible to trade anything bigger than pizzas for haircuts."
Today, nobody thinks Bolles is crazy. In fact, he is now being lauded as a visionary, possibly the man that can offer the only real solution to the long term survival of our liberties and free way of life. "We simply put secure systems in place to create fair trading at fair prices."
MBE-barter benefits everybody. Business members gain from moving their surplus (time, inventory, or capacity) in exchange for needed hard goods and services they would have paid cash for. They also get the most valuable commodity of all: new clients and word-of-mouth advertising. The consumer benefits also by better service, happier staff, and a more efficient business. And Uncle Sam is happy too, as MBE keeps everything above-board by send out 1099B forms to all members.
Obviously MBE is growing and benefitting as a result of the current economic climate, but as Bolles says, "We can't grow nearly fast enough to help all the people we'd like to." MBE is currently looking for sales professionals and managers, entrepreneurs that wish to own and operate their own local MBE-economies, and news and media professionals seeking more information.
For more information about MBE or barter in general contact: barter4life@gmail.com
Our ancestors created some incredibly simple things that are essential to our survival: the wheel (which became cogs, spindles, etc.), the aquaduct (which became pipes and plumbing), and barter (which later became economies.) Take away the teeth from a cog and it's still just a wheel. Take the covering off a pipe and it's still a simple aquaduct. Take the insanity out of our modern economy and you have the bedrock, the solid foundation of bartering.
Back in 2000, Merchants Barter Exchange (MBE) revolutionized how barter was traditionally implemented, taking it out of the Stone Age and into the 21st Century. The "Caveman Bank", as it is affectionately known, was created for just such a time as we are currently experiencing. Ridiculed and laughed at for being behind the times, they diligently stuck to their core beliefs and ethics of "100% trade, 100% of the time", same pricing as cash, and no cash-barter blends.
Nobody's laughing now.
Founder and President, Steve Bolles, had the foresight back when everybody else was being duped by the Y2K scare to go back to the drawing board and reinvent barter into the highly effective business tool that is now the MBE trading system. "Everybody told me I was crazy," states Bolles. "They told me it was impossible to trade anything bigger than pizzas for haircuts."
Today, nobody thinks Bolles is crazy. In fact, he is now being lauded as a visionary, possibly the man that can offer the only real solution to the long term survival of our liberties and free way of life. "We simply put secure systems in place to create fair trading at fair prices."
MBE-barter benefits everybody. Business members gain from moving their surplus (time, inventory, or capacity) in exchange for needed hard goods and services they would have paid cash for. They also get the most valuable commodity of all: new clients and word-of-mouth advertising. The consumer benefits also by better service, happier staff, and a more efficient business. And Uncle Sam is happy too, as MBE keeps everything above-board by send out 1099B forms to all members.
Obviously MBE is growing and benefitting as a result of the current economic climate, but as Bolles says, "We can't grow nearly fast enough to help all the people we'd like to." MBE is currently looking for sales professionals and managers, entrepreneurs that wish to own and operate their own local MBE-economies, and news and media professionals seeking more information.
For more information about MBE or barter in general contact: barter4life@gmail.com
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