Santa's Sovereign Debt Crisis Fears Affect Global markets

Originally written in 2011

WASHINGTON  –Amid mounting pressure to join the European Union, Santa Claus took the unprecedented step of holding a press conference yesterday to explain why he has hitherto remained neutral.  Last Monday markets already under stress from continuing European uncertainty, were sent into a tail spin when Standard & Poor’s downgraded the North Pole’s credit rating.   In a statement released to the press, Standard &Poor’s sited Santa Claus’ lack of transparency for their decision.  “We do not know where the money comes from.  We do not know Santa Claus’ debt position, nor do we have any financial projections for the upcoming year or for the future as a whole.” 

As European debt spiralled out of control, calls began for the North Pole to join the European Union.  Although the United States objected on the grounds that the North Pole was the North Pole relative to the entire globe, and not just Europe, European leaders held firm on the grounds that the only known legitimate postal address for Santa Claus was a post office box in Finland.  When Standard &Poor’s issued its credit downgrade, president Obama released a statement in which he said the United States was withdrawing its objections to the North Pole joining Europe.

Santa Claus arrived at his press conference in his customary sleigh, though it was only drawn by Dasher and Dancer.  When asked about this by a TMZ reporter, Santa said that since the sleigh had no toys, he did not need eight reindeer to pull the sleigh.  Santa began his press conference by reading a prepared statement in which he explained that his money came from magic.  He had thought of simply printing money as the United States had done with its Quantitative Easing, but he had always used magic to produce money and saw no need to change his technology.  Santa insisted he did not borrow any money at all from any government or bank.  He went on to say, however, that because of the ever growing population and demand for ever more sophisticated presents, his wife thought he should invest in some government bonds in case his magic was not strong enough to keep up with the demand.  An audible gasp rippled through the assembled reporters when he made this admission.

He went on to say that the increasing demand for presents meant he was considering outsourcing present manufacturing.  While China and India were logical choices on the surface, Santa’s magic meant he really did not need to worry about manufacturing and distribution costs.  Thus, Santa is giving serious consideration to outsourcing his manufacturing to a first world country such as Australia or England which no longer has a manufacturing sector to speak of.  “I would like to provide some jobs to these poor countries,” Santa said.  “Today’s children aren’t satisfied with presents from me.  They expect more and more from parents and other family members.  Providing these presents requires non magical money which these jobs would provide.”  Immediately after this admission, markets in Australia and England rebounded sharply.

Also weighing on Santa is the ongoing lawsuit brought against him by the United States in 2008.  The lawsuit alleges that Santa Claus has stealth technology so superior to anyone else’s, that he poses a security threat to the United States.  Up until now, no one has been able to locate his North Pole domain, or his North Pole manufacturing plants, reindeer corrals or training facilities.  The lawsuit is in its third year and Santa has had to hire a prestigious law firm to help him fight the terrorism charges.  “Lawyers don’t like my magic money,” said Santa, “so I have had to sell some of my toys to the Chinese for less than their own manufacturing costs.”  This confirms a recent New York Times report which alleged China was purchasing toys from a mysterious source, then claiming they manufactured those toys and needed to recover the costs associated with their manufacture.

Finally, Santa addressed allegations of withholding vital environmental technology from the world.  In 2010, Former Vice President Al Gore released a controversial documentary claiming that Santa’s sleigh flew without emissions of any kind.  Why, he asked, is Santa Claus withholding this vital technology from the world?  If this technology could be incorporated into vehicles, air pollution would decrease by 85% in the first year of mass production, and would steadily decline in subsequent years.  In Santa’s statement he said:  “While I respect Al Gore, Mr. Gore must face some inconvenient truths of his own.  While it is true that my sleigh emits no particulate matter or carbon monoxide, the amount of methane my reindeer release into the atmosphere is staggering.  You have to realize the amount of energy it takes for those animals to fly around the world in 31 hours – taking into account the earth’s rotation – with the weight of all those presents.  Those reindeer and the ones who are in training consume huge amounts of bio matter and release a staggering amount of gas into our atmosphere.”

Santa then opened his press conference up to questions.  Santa was asked whether his magical production of money devalued his currency, Santa admitted this was a problem.  “The young elves want to see the world and they realize my currency is worthless in the rest of the world.  If I introduce it into world markets, the fact I can produce more whenever I want will cause unfathomable ripples in global markets.”  Santa then stunned his audience by admitting that he had a secret meeting with President Jimmy Carter in 1978 about this very thing.  President Carter begged him not to release his currency on to the markets because North Pole currency would replace the US dollar as the world standard allowing US dollars to be bought up by foreign countries for peanuts.  A virtually infinite amount of money would bring currency trading to a halt.  Santa went on to say that he was concerned about younger elves.  “they all want iPads,” he said “but Apple has the exclusive manufacturing rights to those.  Even my elves cannot make those because of almost certain litigation.” 

“What about Android tablets,” asked another reporter.  “What can I say.  They want iPads.  The younger elves are Apple fanatics.  They won’t hear of anything Android.” 

When asked how he could invest in government bonds with currency that no one recognizes, Santa Claus stated that he had already spoken to Greece, Italy and Iceland.  “To be honest,” said Santa “I think the Greeks will listen to any proposal at this stage and Italy is not far behind.”  As for Iceland, he ho-ho-hoed and said Iceland had some strange and interesting notions of Santa Claus and because of that, they thought his investment in Iceland would be amusing.  No sooner were those words out of Santa’s mouth, then English markets turned sharply down once more.  Investors appear to be afraid this is some part of an Icelandic plot to get some measure of revenge against England and other European countries whom they partially blame for the collapse of their banking system during the height of the GFC.

An Australian reporter asked whether Santa felt obligated to pay some sort of tax for all that methane his reindeer produced.  Santa responded that while he was concerned about the effect this might have on climate change, he was not entirely convinced of global warming on the grounds that he wore the same suit for hundreds of years without feeling the need to lessen the thickness of his clothes.  “Such a tax would mean less presents for everyone and this would not be good for the children of the world.  A tax of this kind would also mean a number of elves would lose their jobs.”  When told that Australia had introduced a carbon tax, Santa responded that he hoped some of the proceeds of the tax would go toward legitimate alternative energy research and that Australia should avoid research into flying reindeer.  Santa said that Australians seemed fascinated with flying pigs for reasons that were beyond him.  This made him afraid Australia would devote far too much carbon tax revenue into flying reindeer research.  “don’t get me wrong,” added Mr. Claus, “I love my reindeer, but on bad days, I have to wear a gas mask while on sleigh training flights.  Australia would be much better served by conventional alternatives to fossil fuels.” 

On this note, this unprecedented press conference came to an end.  With every camera trained on him, he stepped nimbly into his sleigh and flew off. The speed at which he did this was blinding.  Cameras were unable to track his position and it is believed some satellites in the Global Positioning Satellite system malfunctioned trying to track the sleigh’s position.

After his press conference, the government of Iceland issued a statement denying that talks with Santa were aimed against England or any other country.  English and European markets continued to tumble showing that investors did not believe Iceland.  The prospect of North Pole money pouring into Greece and Italy also weighs heavily on the markets.  European leaders called on the United States to print more money instead.  President Obama, resting at Camp David, said the United States would not respond to anyone who was on their terrorist watch list.  “Santa Claus remains a security threat to the United States,” Obama said.  “For all we know, Santa Claus made these admissions in the hope the United States would print more money.  The United States will not be wholly reactionary where Santa Claus is concerned.”

So it looks as though children will have their presents from Santa unless the US military shoots down Santa’s sleigh first.  Earlier today the Iranian government stunned the world when it said the US spy drone it captured after it malfunctioned had a thick coating of what appeared to be animal faeces covering its main navigational controls.  Perhaps Santa and his reindeer decided that even a nation like Iran deserved a Christmas present once in a while.