Plunge Protection Team / Working Group on Financial Markets

The Working Group on Financial Markets is also known as the President's Working Group on Financial Markets. Or, let us use the shortened title of just plain Working Group, which has become known as the Plunge Protection Team.

Executive Order 12631 deemed that the Working Group would consist of the Secretary of the Treasury as Chairman, The Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, the Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, as well as the Chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Each was allowed to appoint a designee, in essence to take the place of each original designate.

The defined purpose of the group, the Plunge Protection Team, was to oversee the markets and insist that they remain efficient and competitive, while making clear the need for continued, consistent investor confidence. In other words, they were to try to keep the American Market in particular from plunging again.

The big question was how might they do this? Some have charged the Plunge Protection Team with manipulating, or propping up the markets by buying up stock with government (taxpayer) money and then conversely selling those same stocks when necessary. This, of course, is an illegal act. Others accuse the Plunge Protection Team of moral manipulation in their efforts to persuade banks to buy median stock futures. The accusation that the Feds are buying stock futures with taxpayer funds in order to control market outcomes was adhered to by some and was seen as a well-defined conspiracy theory by others not willing to open their eyes.

There are rumors but no facts. They meet informally, behind closed doors, at times in the dark of night, convening at moments of potential financial crisis. They help to make decisions concerning such things as the stimulus package and the governmental purchase of various businesses. Most of these types of moves are not necessarily "hidden" from the taxpaying public and that is really the scariest part of it all.

The public becomes the one manipulated with some amount of falsehood sprinkled with some truth. This technique is referred to as "talking out of both sides of the mouth." The governing power elite does not see the general populace as very intelligent and continue to weave their own brand of "magic" based upon this premise. The Plunge Protection Team is definitely a contributory factor in the manipulation of monies, markets and future governmental reigning bodies in their manner of operation.

The Plunge Protection Team exists. Its mandate – brief – is to manipulate markets, apparently with a special emphasis on the stock market and maintaining the public's confidence so the fiat-money wealth redistribution game can continue to limber along. Can there be any question anymore as to whether America has free markets?