James Chanos Quotes

There can be no such thing as a state's right to default on a national duty.

Not raising the debt ceiling is not an automatic trigger for a default.

Defaulting on the nation's debt would be cataclysmic. The U.S. Treasury's Aaa rating is the one constant in the world's financial system. When times are bad anywhere on the planet, global investors flock to Treasury bonds because they know they will get their money back.

Credit is a system whereby a person who can not pay gets another person who can not pay to guarantee that he can pay.

It is very difficult to predict when a bond crisis could happen.

The unique danger today is the possibility that we may face longer-term stagnation as a consequence of relying too heavily on borrowed money.

I invested all my money in debt.

After everyone has had a chance to bluster, posture, and pontificate, we are left with one basic question: under any foreseeable circumstance, would it be in our national interest to default on our debt? The answer is unequivocally no.

Nobody wants to put the creditworthiness of the United States in jeopardy. Nobody wants to see the United States default. So we've got to seize this moment, and we have to seize it soon.

After the $700 billion bailout, the trillion-dollar stimulus, and the massive budget bill with over 9,000 earmarks, many of you implored Washington to please stop spending money we don't have. But, instead of cutting, we saw an unprecedented explosion of government spending and debt, unlike anything we have seen in the history of our country.

Well what would happen is that if Greece defaulted and couldn't pay its debts, all the Greek bonds that are held in other banking systems across Western Europe would suddenly have no value. You could as a knock-on effect create a banking crisis in Western Europe.

When a company gets into trouble, it should basically have to be resolved, in other words, stockholders lose their money, unsecured bondholders lose their money.

At the heart of banking is a suicidal strategy. Banks take money from the public or each other on call, skim it for their own reward and then lock the rest up in volatile, insecure and illiquid loans that at times they cannot redeem without public aid.

The Greek debt issue, for example, is such a threat because if that country ever defaulted, it might cause some bank that's 'too big to fail' to actually fail.

No nation can miss interest or principle payments without some negative impact on its credit standing.

When national debts have once been accumulated to a certain degree, there is scarce, I believe, a single instance of their having been fairly and completely paid. The liberation of the public revenue, if it has ever been brought about at all, has always been brought about by bankruptcy; sometimes by an avowed one, but always by a real one, though frequently by a pretend payment.

The Greeks do not have the option of borrowing because nobody will lend to them.

Defaulting on our [national] debt is defaulting on America.

In my mind, there is arguably a greater risk of a default on the debt of a U.S. state than there is on the debt of a euro-area member. I consider it unthinkable that a euro-area country would default.

The United States has never prioritized or failed to pay any obligation when due during a debt limit impasse. Despite the institutional risks and the lack of clear legal authority, we assume that Treasury will attempt to prioritize payments in a last-ditch effort to avoid default.

When you're dealing with a bankrupt sovereign - like the U.S. government - you're dealing with a very powerful wounded bear. You have to be very careful because you can't know what the beast is going to do.

I'm especially baffled by the idea of taking insurance against a U.S. default. If America defaults, we're talking about a chaotic world - Mad Max, more or less - in which case, who imagines that insurance claims will be honored?

There's not a doubt in my mind that you will see a spate of municipal-bond defaults.

Borrowed money, even when owing to a nation by another nation, should be repaid. They hired the money, didn't they? Let them pay it.

We have trouble, my friends, in the country, because we have too much money owing, the greatest indebtedness that has every been given to civilization … Two hundred and seventy-two thousand millions of dollars of debts are owed by the various people of this country today. Why, my friends, that cannot be paid. It is not possible for that kind of debt to be paid.