greeks turn savings to gold and perth mint silver coin sales surge to record on haven demand so the financial times this article points out is reporting that greek citizens are emptying savings accounts and buying gold as they brace themselves for the possibility of a sovereign default and a run on the banks so sales of gold coins have soared in recent weeks and people are converting all their savings into gold that's not gold and silver and you know we were not and recently writing a new documentary down there and had a chance to speak before thousands of people have been on the national television since and translated into greek and the message to the greek people is clear to buy gold and silver to protect yourself against

the future of syria for some time. coming up with a program president dmitri medvedev thoughts on the conflicts in syria and libya from an interview he gave to the financial times been able to shed his thoughts on the second term as president but state says it's the people who have the final word he still hasn't announced whether he'll stand again but he did rule out the face with prime minister putin more than a bit later. grace workers of the state are good to see the company of going on a forty eight hour strike against the austerity measures the action comes as e.u. finance ministers decided to withhold the release of a twelve billion euro loan to the country until switching you austerity cuts supported by athens the e.u. decision reflects increasing concern that the greek parliament might top eight of the unpopular set of measures would see many of the state owned companies privatized and taxes increased. continuing fears of a greek default made nervous british banks hold back billions of euro from the euro zone lending market that's sort of behavior play there with these now we have dartmouth a member of the european parliament for the u.k. independ

in this particular situation it was a very long interview that the russian president gave to the financial times that of course many issues were raised throughout the course of it of course pertaining to russia's national and foreign policies many aspects that are interesting both to people living in russia and to those observing russia from abroad specifically of course questions relating to the goals that the russian president set out for himself during his term in office but it may say should that only option for snow interviews that is taken by western media source has gone by without the issue of that seat where she'll will join us being raised the russian president reiterated his position that that was his release that it happened will not in any way be a danger to society unlike any russian citizen who's currently serving time for that also. has the right to an appeal of course it wasn't just matters of domestic policy that were touched upon the russian president speaking quite harshly about the nato military intervention in libya saying that some of russia's partners basically chose to m

the future of syria for some time. coming up in the program president to meet with veterans thoughts on the conflicts in syria and libya from an interview with the financial times and he gave the also shared his thoughts as well the second term big question ever asking but he states that chad that he gave the paper there it's the people who have the final word still announce where they'll stand again but did rule out a face off with prime minister. a five day long nuclear security forums kicked off in vienna the japanese atomic crisis has prompted a comprehensive discussion about the future of nuclear power delegates from most of the hundred fifty member states of the international atomic watchdog the i.a.e.a. or at the gathering they aim to work out tighter universal safety regulations for reactors japan's expect to be criticized for its slow response to the fukushima disaster it's already submitted a report admitting it wasn't prepared for an accident of the scale of what it saw r.t. shaun thomas traveled to a city forest that's well outside the official exclusion zone but where nonetheless locals are still concerned over high radiation levels. the omin

some of the conflicts in syria and media among other masses in a wide ranging interview with the financial times. the united nations nuclear watchdog is holding a conference in vienna to find ways to improve international safety standards the fukushima power plant disaster following the quake and tsunami in japan has intensified international concerns over atomic energy and representatives from one hundred fifty member states of the international atomic energy agency are taking part in the five day long conference the participants are discussing strengthening nuclear safety regulations and new responsibilities when things go wrong in this forum as a response to the crisis in japan which has admitted it wasn't prepared for an accidental such a scale is far from sorting out the devastating consequences of his short told us reports now from the city official that the deadly legacy of the disaster has left . the ominous and constant ticking of geiger counter scientists working in fukushima city concerned on the woman i'm in charge of the group of radiation detection and survey from fukushima univers

with the people that's according to russian president dmitri maybe get it in an interview with the financial times he said it's too early to say if he will stand for reelection next year the basic clear that he and mr putin won't run against each other party's cutting services will. recently the question russian president to be there with a bit of gets asked the most is of course the one about his potential participation in the twenty four presidential elections but keeping true to his style russian president maintain the entry but is a do or a new leader especially one who walk upon as the president's seat has to be willing to run for reelection however it's not a question of whether he would make that decision for himself i suggest waiting a bit longer than keeping the intrigue you do you think that you're involved in approaching could run for presidency at the same time because if you. it's hard for me to imagine the mere putin and i both running for president of the same time for at least one reason to think we strictly speaking represent the same political force competition between us would b

bernanke he and his central banker and whole cost provokers well this one person interviewed in the financial times does say that he converted his entire savings to gold coins he said quote i keep them at home just like my grandmother did in the second world war so it is like in back to the global world war but speaking of whole the cost i guess the entire destruction of financial wealth we have that in this next headline here to which also proves that ben bernanke is lying about the impact of a greek default greek crisis could cost u.k. three hundred thirty six billion pounds british exposure significantly under estimated so the bank of england alleges that like ben bernanke the the u.k. banking system is just fine the exposure to greek debt is only eight billion pounds but it has emerged that britain could actually be hit with losses of three hundred sixty six billion pounds which is equal to twenty four percent of annual g.d.p. and this is based on complicated derivatives and insurance deals again mervyn king is ben bernanke he is counterpart in the u.k. he should be water boarded as well he is

bankers who reportedly wasted billions of dollars invested by libyan leader colonel gaddafi the financial times says giants like goldman sachs were dealing with the dictator's investments when it needed to plug a hole during the economic crisis and most of the money has been lost but with what's going on in libya any repayment seems unlikely daniel bushell has more now from berlin. western banks have been happy to. work with libyan dictator why would their feet and picking up huge sums in the process as you say francis. was. to make a billion dollar bets on its own shares it told to make a billion dollar bets on its own shares which then lost practically all their value by last year pocketing huge sons huge fees in the process american led the goldman sachs made a billion dollar investment for libya which then lost over ninety percent of its value and many of the western. may dissolve investments for libya's national investment fund and now the interesting thing is the these boats are claiming they would have to pay any of that money back because the west's war with libya means that gadhafi is

yes and now back to your regularly scheduled programming the financial times is reporting on a survey of over eighty central bank reserve managers showing most believe that the u.s. dollar will lose its status as the world's reserve currency in the next twenty five years as holders of u.s. that continue to diversify away from the federal reserve manipulated currency the survey concludes that the dollar is likely to be replaced by a portfolio of various currencies we could have seen that coming but never fear q e three has got to be right around the corner now even lindsay low hand gets it but apparently bernanke he went to school for the stuff really i would take this out loan recently tweeted the following and you guys seen food and gas prices lately u.s. dollars will soon be worthless if the fed keeps printing money ok not really well not not exactly the way this apparently works is that high value twitter accounts of celebrities and the like can be used to promote ads this particular ad was promoted by the national hyper inflation association which makes me wonder if we can get the

the same year "the financial times" labeled her the best finance minister in europe. she once ran a large american law firm and lawyer who runs a large american economy and christine lagarde who shepherded tough economic reforms was recently ranked france's sixth most pop figure. how does she manage it? a friend and fellow lawyer says it's a combination of personality and competence. >> one she listens to people, two she's very human, she's very just, high ethics which are important, because i think in the end it's always ethical people who really lead others. >> reporter: the author of a recent book about lagarde says many people don't know she's a devout catholic who tells herself constantly to keep smiling. it has carried her through some tough situations but cyril leshev says after a divorce and long separations between her two sons has regrets. >> she sacrificed a lot for her career and this is something when you speak with her she doesn't feel very good about this now when she looks back, she has the feeling that she missed something. >> reporter: but in her pub

the former bank employee may face serious prison time for releasing the confidential data. one of the journalists investigating theft the secret banking information is yen's brown bush of the financial times the first scandal of this kind broke in germany in two thousand and seven the german government had acquired a disk from anonymous individuals it contained information about germans hiding their money in foreign bank accounts to avoid paying taxes in germany. there were seven hundred or seven hundred seventy german names on it some of them had to go to court all of them had to pay money back in the year two thousand and eight the german state court because of this more than one billion of europe back such actions drew a mixed response in germany bankers didn't mince their words saying the german government's behavior was no better than that of steve's. i find it to shame and a scandal that german authority get away with is using the perception of stolen good you know how sharp in switzerland if you steal good and then you sell it you go to jail it's a kind switzerland's famous reputation for banking secrecy that come under attack a few months before that u.s. authorities had pre

the big story in the in the financial times today but maybe was just ridiculous. here's the here's the e.p.a. and it's actually saving lives in america and i don't understand how you can campaign against that against again saving lives that richard nixon started right well you know it's worth mentioning that it flies in the face of public opinion you know and our lot is own district one poll found that seventy percent of voters disapproved of his vote to get the e.p.a. and that included a majority of republicans so you know what percentage of the voters in the district you know that he put together you know what i have that's an important question but you know when they were asked whether they you know approved of his voting for had he from lebanon carbon dioxide pollution from the opening amounts of arsenic and mercury you know overwhelmingly people are in favor of these sorts of things that incredibly entitled position to hold it's if you think about is going to face a passionate backlash or is the bet that the republicans are making you know years an eternity in

industry and energy editor of "the financial times." and ed crooks, welcome. this is the very first time at least in decades that opec has gone to a meeting like this and failed to come out with some agreement. what happened? >> yeah, as you say it is a very, very dramatic meeting, very unusual development particularly in the sense that saudi arabia was defeated. saudi arabia clearly went into the meeting wanting an increase in production. saudi arabia said the price of oil is too high, at around $100 it would like to see it come down perhaps even to the $80 region and it wanted to increase production in order to make that happen. and usually what saudi arabia wants, it et goes. it's the biggest member of opec, the most powerful, the world's biggest oil exporter. and so usually they're able to swing the other countries behind them and get them to go along with what they want. not this time. as you were saying in your introduction, there was a coalition of countrieses, probably lead by iran but with a number of very other, a number of other countries very promin

equity capital markets reporter for the financial times. and he is here to talk to us about the impact of the greece and european debt crisis on u.s. financial markets and the economy as well as the state of u.s. markets overall. welcome to the "washington journal." guest: thanks for having me. host: what is the overall impact of the european debt problem on u.s. markets? guest: well, it's been sort of big picture risk that is have been weighing on u.s. investors' minds recently. obviously the primary concern is the u.s. economy, what's going to happen to it in the second half, what is fed policy going to be going forward. but europe represents what they call a tail risk. that is, that if greece were to default, if the crisis were to spread, that could clamp down on the availability of capital for banks which then spills directly over to companies and consumers as well. so there's definitely a sort of a present but sort of at the margins concern about what would happen to the u.s. economy if the european situation weren't stabilized. host: t