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Believe it or not, it\u2019s true. This Friday, 21 June 2013 Ecofin will discuss<\/a> the order in which the forthcoming bank seizure (there are no plans as yet to reveal the date on which the \u2018corralito\u2019 will take effect, but at least that\u2019s something\u2026) will affect the banks\u2019 loyal customers. On the one hand, there is the Spanish position, which has, unsurprisingly, written its letter to the Three Kings and is trying in vain to persuade the Netherlands and Germany to guarantee all deposits exceeding \u20ac100,000. But the stance of those in charge in Europe is to treat depositors (or subscribers to any financial product that places their money on the banks\u2019 balance sheets) on a par with senior debt bondholders.<\/p>\n In other words, deposits of one hundred thousand or more will take precedence over ordinary uninsured creditors and non-preferential creditors, but nothing more. The aim is simply to ensure that individual savers and SMEs have an extra layer of protection. In order of highest to lowest risk of confiscation or seizure, with any luck we will probably have: shares, hybrid securities such as preference shares (by this point everything has already been stolen), junior bonds (still half-stolen), depositors who are neither individuals nor SMEs and senior bondholders (pari passu), and deposits held by SMEs and individuals. In principle, deposits below 100,000 euros cannot be confiscated, but the European Parliament (which must endorse the final text) includes in its draft the possibility of making exceptions for deposits below that figure as well. The excuse will be something along the lines of \u00abprovided that these are systemic crises for which the banks are not directly responsible or which are beyond their control<\/em>\u00ab\u2026 In other words, translated, it would mean: \u00abwhenever there isn\u2019t enough money from the confiscations of all the fools of the moment who are on the front line\u00bb, as we\u2019ve already said in\u00a0The Corralito begins today<\/strong><\/a>:\u00a0The money needed will be found wherever it is and wherever there is enough of it<\/strong>. The idea is to climb enough steps when the tide comes in so that we don\u2019t get splashed.<\/p>\n So, what is happening in Europe is a matter for the magistrates\u2019 court, as the groundwork is being laid to confer legality and a veneer of pseudo-order upon the mass confiscation of billions from citizens on the European periphery, and especially from the Spanish, who have a zombie banking system into which far more money will have to be pumped to keep it afloat. Tens and tens (who knows, perhaps more than two hundred) of billions of public money via bailouts using funds from European mechanisms, the ultimate guarantor of which is the State (in other words, all of us), but bear in mind, there is also private money via the confiscation of deposits and haircuts on junior or senior debt and other products lurking within their balance sheets.<\/p>\n The heads of state and government of the EU countries have instructed their economy and finance ministers and the European Parliament to reach an agreement on this directive \u2013 which they have disguised under the name \u00abDirective on the Recovery and Resolution of Financial Institutions\u00bb \u2013 before the first half of 2013 (sic). But even if Ecofin reaches an agreement this Friday (which will not be easy), the process is set to be significantly delayed, as they must then agree on a common position with the European Parliament. This will delay the final adoption of the text until at least autumn 2013. And as it is a directive, it must be transposed by governments into their national legal frameworks, with the timetable setting 31 December 2014 as the deadline. All of this must take place within the established legal deadlines, as the initial aim was for the \u00abtools for creditor write-offs\u00bb (legalised theft) not to come into use until 2018. But countries such as Germany, the Netherlands and Finland are exerting considerable pressure to bring this forward to 2015, because they know that at any moment the risk premium could skyrocket again and then they would have to put out the fire with money from local \u2018corralitos\u2019, as there is no more public money available, and there cannot be any if the markets turn their backs on Spanish sovereign debt \u2013 or peripheral debt in general.<\/p>\n Anything goes \u2013 and anything will be done \u2013 to prevent the collapse of the Spanish banking system. That is the firm political decision taken unanimously by the last two Spanish governments. However, when it comes to the insolvency of the state itself, Europe will not act in the same way. No German, Dutch or French government is going to accept (just as they have not accepted so far) that taxpayers\u2019 money from their respective countries be injected, let alone that money from their banks be confiscated to pay for the insolvency of the Spanish, Portuguese or other states. Let each bear their own burden. Then, once domestic savers have been stripped of as much money as possible, all that will remain is a write-down, restructuring or default \u2013 whatever we choose to call it. But by the time that happens, the majority \u2013 those who are the least forward-thinking and the most trusting of their suit-and-tie bankers and politicians \u2013 will have been stripped of all their most accessible assets, that is to say, the least protected ones.<\/p>\n The million-dollar question is, of course, how to avoid this. And the answer lies in a logical concept that most people overlook: the more unsuspecting people there are in Spain, the safer and more effective the measures we take to prevent the active or passive confiscation of our assets will be:<\/p>\n Passive confiscation may stem, for example, from the idea that by buying property we can avoid active confiscation (by the banks). But as we have already explained in \u00ab\u00bfAre my savings safe from confiscation if I buy property?<\/a><\/strong>?\u00bb is a gross mistake, given that Germany itself is recommending that Spain impose crippling taxes of all kinds on property owners, as they are captive and cannot be moved out of Spain, unlike the money of the more astute (not to mention the double-digit annual losses in property value being suffered by those who have not yet chosen to sell their properties).<\/p>\n