Piracy FAIL

[unixronin]

More on those Somalian pirates:

After sticky negotiations, which several people involved likened to bazaar-style haggling, a deal seemed to be close in which the pirates would be paid millions of dollars and the ship would be freed.

The pirates on the Ukrainian ship have said that after the money is paid — in American dollars and preferably in $100 bills, they will release the ship, its cargo and the 20 sailors on board.

From an initial demand of $35 million down to $8 million, and they stipulate US dollars.  SMART pirates would have demanded their ransom in a currency that isn't tanking....

(Still, I suppose it's better than the Zimbabwean dollar, currently inflating at 231 million percent.  No, that wasn't a typo.  The Zimbabwean dollar was revalued 1000:1 on August 1 2006, then again by ten billion to one on August 1 2008.  Prior to that second revaluation, a single egg cost 50 billion ZWD, and the ATM withdrawal limit was 100 billion.  From 2000-2002, the Zimbabwean dollar — now referred to as the "first dollar" — traded for about 55 to the US dollar; two revaluations later, one US dollar would now buy roughly 2x10¹⁹ Zimbabwean "first dollars", or two billion "third dollars".)

Comments

[smandal.livejournal.com]

I imagine US dollars are still easier to fence/launder than Euros, but that may change in the near future.

[perspicuity.livejournal.com]

so with 2x10^19 paper monies per dollar... you could use that as blow in insulation fairly cheaply :)

think of the origami!

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[unixronin.livejournal.com]

so with 2x10^19 paper monies per dollar... you could use that as blow in insulation fairly cheaply :)

Not so much, when it was in hundred-billion ZWD notes before the billion-to-one revaluation...

[ithildae.livejournal.com]

The dollar is higher now than it was over the summer. I thought I saw that it is higher than it was a year back, or maybe about the same.

$8 Million is hardly a fail. It sounds like a hefty profit.

Author Christopher Stasheff writes about a government that created a nearly indestructible currency, and the government went bust. The currency survived, and was being used as a foundation of transaction while current governments were in turmoil. There is a reason that North Korea counterfeits so many US Franklin portraits.

[rbos.livejournal.com]

Sounds like "gold" to me. :)

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

8 Million is hardly a fail. It sounds like a hefty profit.

Well, yeah. I had my tongue crammed firmly in my cheek. :)


Of course, then they'll have the problem of getting it home alive and living to spend it .....

[skellington.livejournal.com]

Speaking of Zimbabwean money, they apparently take checks, but require a surcharge to account for the inflation between the time the check is accepted, and when it will be credited to the receivers bank account. Here's an amusing photo:

http://bigpicture.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/09/03/zimbo.jpg

(Apparently it is to a long-established car dealership for approximately $20kUSD that day.)

And the dollar has actually bounced back, because it is still safer than other currencies. The Yen is crashing because of the "carry trade" unwinding. (Interest rates were low in Japan, so people were borrowing money there, converting it into other currencies, and speculating elsewhere.) There's even some speculation that the Euro may not survive this financial crisis.