Canada’s multi-year efforts to buy the Turks and Caicos Islands in the Caribbean as a sunny and warm winter vacation destination for it citizens have been abandoned with the announcement today of the agreement to purchase 41.3% of the Hawaiian Islands and 100% of the U.S. Virgin Islands from the cash-strapped United States. Details of the sale follow.
In a story leaked earlier today Sympatico.ca says that the sale of portions of Hawaii and the Virgin Islands is only the first of several other major real estate distress sales the U.S. intends to conclude by the end of next year as a means of offsetting its projected mind-boggling record current account deficit of in excess of $31 Trillion.
The Hawaiian Purchase will exclude the 8 main islands of the state, i.e. Hawaii, Maui, Kahoolawe, Lanai, Molokai, Oahu, Kauai and Niihau, leaving 4,512 square miles or 41.3% that are being sold at a price of $731,383/sq. mi. or $3.3B USD in total.
The Virgins Purchase will include all 133.7 square miles of territory that was originally purchased from Denmark back in 1917. Its selling price works out to $747,943/sq. mi. which works out to $1.0B in total.
It is rumored that the United Kingdom, also in desperate financial shape, is in current negotiations to sell all of its 60 British Virgin Islands possessions (153,000 square miles) to Canada for approximately $1.25B USD ($816,993/sq. mi.). Such a purchase would be consolidated into the Virgins Purchase.
For those who are interested:
- the Louisiana Purchase was purchased in April 1803 from France for $15,000,000US or $18.12/sq. mi.
- The purchase consisted of 828,000 sq. mi. of the area from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains and from the Gulf of Mexico to British North America (now western Canada) which accounts for approximately 23% of the country’s present land mass.
- the Alaska Purchase was purchased on March 30, 1867 from Russia – some say the purchase was back-dated from April 1, 1867 so it would not be thought of as a cruel joke on the American people – for $7,200,000US or $12.28/sq. mi.
- The purchase consisted of 586,412 square miles.
John E. Canuck, Canada’s Chief Land Procurement Officer was excited to have two contracts signed, sealed and delivered. “This is a huge deal for us. Now that we have our own tropical locales we expect fewer Canadians will vacation in Florida or Arizona which should help with Canada’s balance of payments and bolster the depressed value of the Canadian dollar relative to the USD.”
Canuck would not comment on future such purchases (Alaska is rumored to be the next state that the U.S. would like to unload in its entirety) stating that such unbelievable good fortune would likely not be announced until April 1st, 2027 at the earliest.
(-: OK, OK, we got you: there’s no way this is actually going to happen! Happy April Fool’s Day.) 🙂
