The wife and I were in a Target today (used to be the largest Target on earth when it was built 6-8 years ago) in Sacramento doing some last minute Christmas shopping. It scared the shit out of me!
The traffic in the store was no greater then the foot traffic you'd "normally" (circa 2004) see on a summer's Saturday. Those of us where were in the store mostly had empty carts. They had 15 or so check stands open, none with more then 2 customers in each. We walked right up to a checkstand at about 4:30pm on this December 22. As it was, we decided to wait on a few items as they were "only" 50% off and we want to see what they are after Christmas ($12.99 picture frames on sale at $6.48 and we're still waiting). I told the wife in the store that the traffic flat out scared me.
Though origionally a California lad, we've been living in Australia since 2003 and ony been back for trips (this Christmas we're up for 5 weeks). I've been reading and talking to loved ones about the traffic here in SacTown, but man seeing it for myself...
Since you asked. Its come to my attention (after 5 martinis) that i should do a gold blog. There is too much interest in Au. I know the stuff.. backwards and forwards.
anyone in? It can be small to start. I just need maybe two posters. One with exceptional humor. We could all meet up sleucing in Ve for kicks.
Every single mortgage broker knew it was going to happen. dr munch | 12.23.08 - 12:38 am | #
Not so. HBB collected way too many stories of mortgage brokers drinking their own koolaid, paying top dollar for ridiculous properties, using toxic financing to leverage multiple "investment" properties, and so on.
Citizen Clyde: Are you the poster who mentioned a long time ago that you did pricing and economic modeling of mortgage pools? If yes, how have the assumptions changed over the last year? What new variables are being included in the current models?
I was also in a Target today in Dallas and it was packed with shoppers more than I've seen all year. Ditto: parking lot..NorthPark Mall's parking lot was so full I changed my plan to go to Macy's. The streets were full as well. Last minute shopping in Texas has always been a mad rush.
OT went shopping in Oakbrook Il with wife today. Stores very slow. Plenty of discounts. At Nieman jewelery counter, was told tag price was actual price, then when we wavered about buying, clerk wispered that there was a 10% break that could be given. Then I saw a guy debating over a $1300 necklace, and the clerk didn't budge a dime. He just walked away.
poster formerly known as nitpi writes:
k. canuk,
Would be interested.
I think the perfect thing would be to force a check box, 'up' or 'down' BEFORE you posted a comment. It would indicate the price movement pressure your comment is intended to make.
Went to both a Target and a B&N over the weekend...neither was especially crowded, which made me happy, 'cause I HATE crowds, normal X-mas shopping, etc.
________________________ Kondratieff canuk: I would be interested, it it didn't degerate into an fruitless argument about whether or not gold was "real" money.
That would truly be special...most of the innertube writings I've seen appear to have been authored by wack-jobs. It would be nice to see learned, reasoned discourse on the topic.
On December 9, unbeknownst to mp and Conjure, Bloomberg's Mike Schneider interviewed NYU bankruptcy expert Edward Altman. At 14:54 in the interview Altman said, "I don't think Chrysler will exist" in 6 months.
There are three possibilities: first, Cerberus sells Chrysler; second, GM merges with Chrysler; third, Chrysler liquidates.
When Cerberus bought Chrysler, Conjure said the deal wouldn't work. He thought Cerberus would sell Chrysler to the Chinese after raping it. That could still happen, but possibility three, liquidation, is beginning to look more likely.
Anyway, we're now even more serious about planning a mid-year trip to Detroit.
I was also in a Target today in Dallas and it was packed with shoppers more than I've seen all year. Ditto: parking lot..NorthPark Mall's parking lot was so full I changed my plan to go to Macy's. The streets were full as well. Last minute shopping in Texas has always been a mad rush. FFDIC | 12.23.08 - 12:41 am | #
FFDIC, oh the parking lots were jam-packed in front of Target (not so much around the mall across the street), but you really need to look at the bags people are carrying. We were at the "nicer" mall yesterday and although the parking lot looked "full" we pulled into a spot 2 lines from Macy's at 11:30am. Wandered around for about 1.5 hours while noting the limited bags people were carying (if at all). We ended up with 1 $25 bag ou of Macy's (pan that was over 50% off) and a dude did wait 2 minutes for our parking spot @ 1pm.
But still, I've seen respectable foot traffic (for a non-Xmas time anyway) but few bags, and very few big/full bags. 'Course, we're talking Sacramento, with 10% employed directly by the state where Arnie just passed the 2 day furlow dealie (for an effectiv 10% reduction of all state employees take home) with another 10-20% reduction in state rolls... According to the suster, Texas is still more or less OK (course, her hubby lost his position with Countrywide, er, BofA last month, so all's not rosy).
Maybe I'm looking too hard, or it's a regional thing. But I was "expecting" this, and yet I've been surprised by the bredth I've seen on the ground.
Kondratieff canuk: I would be interested, it it didn't degerate into an fruitless argument about whether or not gold was "real" money.
Agreed. A poster here made the point for gold to become currency, we are reduced to small localized trade, implying breakdown of the larger trade infrastructure. At that point its not currency as we know it. Plus the supply is infinitely too small, minuscule.
Banks brace for an ugly 2009 - Dec. 22, 2008
Banking on another bad year in '09
Rising loan losses, the threat of more regulation and tougher competition adds up to another year of poor profits for banks.
Rising loan losses, the threat of more regulation and tougher competition adds up to another year of poor profits for banks. FFDIC | 12.23.08 - 1:04 am | #
Shoot Dick Bove has been saying for the last 6 months to buy bank stocks on the coming v-shaped profit recovery. Don't tell me another banking analyst got it wrong.
... Interest rates are, for the moment, excruciatingly low. But a subsidy to the banking system, once put into place, will be quite hard to dislodge. So, let's imagine that the Fed will pay interest on bank reserves in perpetuity, that it will pay such interest at or near the risk-free short-term interest rate, and that the expansion of the Fed's balance sheet is more or less permanent. How large a subsidy to the banking system do the interest payments on reserves represent? Some problems are arithmetically challenging, but not this one. The present value of a perpetual stream of market-rate interest payments is precisely the amount of the principal. Therefore, the present value of the Fed's de facto commitment to pay interest to banks on $800B of freshly created reserves is $800B. We fought and wailed and gnashed our teeth over potentially overpaying for TARP assets. Meanwhile, we are quietly allowing the Fed give away, as a direct, literal subsidy, more than the entire $700B that Paulson was allowed to play with. Note there is no question about this being an "investment": The interest payments that the Fed is now making to banks on its suddenly expanded balance sheet are not loans. The banks owe taxpayers absolutely nothing in return for this windfall. ...
not true at all. of all of the strawmen against a gold standard, this is one of the stupidest, though one of the most likely for the bankers to use as an excuse to keep the xerocrats in power. the other point - "we are reduced to small localized trade" - is also the product of a remarkably slow intellect.
Man I feel like one of those circus girls where they throw knives at her spinning wheel. Bakersfield, LA, OC, Riverside. It isn't often that Ventura loses to those areas.
Error Page
UK Bailiffs get power to use force on debtors
Under the regulations, bailiffs for private firms would for the first time be given permission to restrain or pin down householders. They would also be able to force their way into homes to seize property to pay off debts, such as unpaid credit card bills and loans.
Right on, FFDIC - They will have to pry my 2009 Schnauzer Puppies calendar from my COLD..DEAD...HANDS!
Shnaps | Homepage | 12.23.08 - 1:13 am | #
Are those the same puppies on CNBC everybody is ga ga over?
I agree with the list for the most part, though I really think it is generally rearview-mirror forecasting. I also think Sacto may have already taken its worst lumps. The current median #s also seem a bit off in terms of OC and DC as well.
I also think Sacto may have already taken its worst lumps. bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:14 am | # Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.23.08 - 1:16 am | #
I had a co-worker who moved there in 2006. I begged him not to buy a home. They looked cheap compared to SF and his wife really wanted a home. I hope he listened to me.
"With State government only now starting to cut back?"
I see the bear case, and am familiar with the general area. Sacto will still spend well over 100 billion a year, even after the threatened axe falls or doesn't fall.
greater Sacto has fairly high incomes compared to most other inland areas.
"Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) writes:
I also think Sacto may have already taken its worst lumps.
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:14 am | #
With State government only now starting to cut back? I'd beg to differ.
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.23.08 - 1:16 am | # [kill]"
Just got the biweekly "don't panic" email from the vice chancellor at our UC campus that nothing bad will happen -- until February at the earliest. So yeah, the sh*t won't hit this fan for some time, and so no, Sac's worst times aren't necessarily behind it.
"So you think there's enough gold supply to form a currency base."
of course. there's about 5 trillion bucks of it on the planet, and, of course, scrip could theoretically circulate if redemption was credible.
it wasn't abandoned in the early 30s due to a lack of supply. nor was it abandoned because of the volatility in gold supply spikes causing disruptions to the economy - a more subtle strawman but one nonetheless.
Chrysler: all the dashboard wiring people took early retirement. There is no one left to make this product. I say they're going down, and soon. The "temporary" factory closedown is just to get money back for Quayle's people at Cerberus.
almost certainly true, though that doesn't necessarily mean it will lead the (s)hit parade in downward price velocity. especially if you include some of the nicer places in the foothills and davis in the region.
greater Sacto has fairly high incomes compared to most other inland areas. bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:18 am | #
I thought we had dispensed with the "immunity" arguments long ago.
This depression is only now getting started, and government is one of the biggest remaining bubbles we have. I expect the streets of every capitol to run red before this is over. [Metaphor, folks, metaphor.]
So you think there's enough gold supply to form a currency base. Kondratieff canuk | 12.23.08 - 1:18 am | #
In an electronic world, I think there is. It is silly to think that in a functioning society with today's technological sophistication that we would actually exchange gold coins in trade. The key is simply gold backing of the currency and that would be very easy at the correct price.
I also think Sacto may have already taken its worst lumps. - bgates
Snigger. Sorry, but it is hard to hold back. Sacramento has at least two more legs down. Next leg down is state cutbacks. We are talking gross population decreases and per capita income contractions not seen since that other time we don't mention. And that's just the first leg. Second leg is worse. Tax refugees fleeing the State. This latter I saw in Massachusetts. It is an unbelievable drain to be writing checks every month for decades in Sacramento that get cashed and spent in Austin, Montgomery and Nashville.
the tenacity of the machine bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:26 am | #
No underestimation there; same in government everywhere. Heck, the unions are challenging Arnold's power to do anything to them -- layoff, furlough, cut, whatever. Plus the public servant unions are the Dem legislature's key to maintaining power.
Regardless, it's the irresistible force (ever expanding government) meeting the immovable object (no money). The vehicle of state is about to run into a brick wall.
you guys miss my point. Sacto may well be due for a truly miserable decade, with big drops in housing value over time. But 95660 is already under 100K as of this month. a relatively nice place like auburn will still attract bay area refugees with prices in the low 200s, and, guess what - they're already about there.
if you're looking for markets which are due for a relative crash, try Irvine, Newport Beach, Santa Monica, Burbank, Palo Alto, Los Altos, etc.
If gold were the standard it would be priced so high That I would quit my job and take a pan out to Crown King (with a few guns) and prospect.
As good as it sounds, it doesn't pencil out.
if you're looking for markets which are due for a relative crash, try Irvine, Newport Beach, Santa Monica, Burbank, Palo Alto, Los Altos, etc. bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:34 am | #
Oh yeah. Got my popcorn, soda, and a front row seat for that show.
In an electronic world, I think there is. It is silly to think that in a functioning society with today's technological sophistication that we would actually exchange gold coins in trade. The key is simply gold backing of the currency and that would be very easy at the correct price.
China right now is the largest producer. Some two hundred world central banks would somehow have to load up on bullion and agree on a reserve ratio. The supply side is about 1/10,000 of what it would require.
insofar as the bankers will never let it happen, and they currently totally control every aspect of our regime, sure. otherwise, it would "pencil out" just fine.
"insofar as the bankers will never let it happen, and they currently totally control every aspect of our regime, sure. otherwise, it would "pencil out" just fine.
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:38 am | #
current production isn't that relevant. the vast majority of the world's gold (almost 80%, I believe) has been mined, unless one indulges in fantasies of mining seawater (which significantly changes that 80% number, of course).
the idea that a currency somehow needs expansion to "stimulate" economic growth is truly surreal.
bgates writes:
"China right now is the largest producer"
current production isn't that relevant. the vast majority of the world's gold (almost 80%, I believe) has been mined, unless one indulges in fantasies of mining seawater (which significantly changes that 80% number, of course).
bgates, your talking thru your hat. Meaning you haven't a clue what you're talking about. Anyway...time to bail on this. Have nice evening, what's left of it.
"if you prefer the economic regime of the past 35 years to the first 135 of our nation, you are certainly entitled to your opinion.
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:41 am | # "
I'm not partial to it myself, and I'd like the intrinsic restraint that gold provides. I just don't believe that it will work in an economy as large as the the world we have without serious distorting effects.
I'd quit my job and pan gold with the prices we would see.
"We're expecting to be in Michigan sometime during mid-2009 to attend a major equipment selloff."
Hey, mp! If you pass through the Tri-Cities region please check if Art Narlocks Showbar on Washington Avenue, Bay City is still standing. I have many fond memories from the 60s when I was a rockn roll sax player there.
Shopping around 4 p.m. on the south side of Milwaukee - the solidly middle class mall (Southridge) no more busy than an average Saturday in 2004. Of course, it was 1 degree F, but still, the 23rd of December! Normally on 12/23, there would be no parking to be had, the lot was 1/3 full. I was there to return an item, hardly any waiting at the registers.
OTOH, the liquor store halfway across town was a madhouse of shoppers, cars lined around the block to park, people ringing up $100 of quality beer/liquor/wine. But it's cold and its Wisconsin, and the Pack played MNF tonight, which could explain much of that buying anyways.
That had to be fraud. Had to be. Even at the height of the madness, I have a hard time believing anyone would come near seven figures in Antioch, for anything.
And now it's down almost 60 percent, within 100K of what it sold for in '02.
Yeah, saw that too. I don't get it. What is going to cause this mythical 2nd half of 2009 recovery ... f'n mustards seeds? Even's mp's Kasriel report (which was great btw) seemed optimistic to me.
2009 is DOA. But hey, I hope I'm wrong. I would like to stay employed.
It seems to me that things are actually spiraling out of control and accelerating. Plus, would there not be a considerable lag effect with all of that fiscal stimulus. I seem to remember that at best, you can only get the architect's and planners paid, the actual big chunks of "infrastructure spending" takes longer to actually get going.
My fear is that in Q1, all companies shit the bed and then the lay-offs accelerate again, when companies realize their 2009 Net Income projections are impossible to hit with the cuts they already made.
@Anon
Anonymous writes:
Late next year the economy should begin to stabilize, and Im fairly optimistic about 2010.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/2...krugman.html? em
This man is optimistic. I think he's dead wrong, but what do i know, am no Nobel winning economist.
Anonymous | 12.23.08 - 1:38 am | #
In my city, in '06 and '07 even some drug dealers were moving into the mortgage fraud business, getting inept folks on disability to sign for mortgages worth double (or more) the real market value - $100,000 for some dump in the 'hood barely worth $40K at best.
At least the drug-dealing ones have gone to jail. The guys running the same scam who always wore suits get away with it, it seems.
"Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) writes:
Yes and thy name is Sacramento.
Rob Dawg | Homepage | 12.23.08 - 1:43 am | #
Love it! Would that city even show on a map if it wasn't the capitol?"
Probably; it was the jump-off point to the gold fields, and some of that money stuck around. It's also the furthest-inland seaport, which made it a convenient shipping point for ag goods in the old days.
But without the state gov't, it'd just be another Fresno: ag-dominated and lower-income, more social problems -- not that Sacramento doesn't have them. South Sac is not a good place to be.
The Pack is in better shape talent-wise than most; the defense just wasn't functioning like it should have, though.
I'm a Broncos fan -- yes, we've got plenty of issues of our own -- but you've got a sharp QB, a pretty damn good RB, and perhaps the best receiving corp in the league. If the defense plays up to it's capability you'll be back in the post-season next year.
I believe for there to be any sort of recovery in '09, the reflation(inflation) would have to work.
And the recovery would be in 'statistical data' only.
I think the surprise here is everyone expected Rodgers to be full of fail, and now that he hasn't, that didn't translate into wins due to the defense. I certainly didn't expect the D to fall apart somewhere around game 5, to never really return.
"i hate the heat and am not in the business of laundering money, so, no particular reason to do such. why?
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:53 am"
Not to worry, most of the gold is in the mountains, nice and cool. Even these days it's a bit of a free for all. Not involved myself, but I would be at $70K - $80K/Oz
Agreed. 2009 is a total write-off, and 2010 is likely more of the same. Can't see things even flattening out until 2012 or so, and we'll be lucky if things turn up for quite a few years after that... especially given all the more damage DC is inflicting upon us in the name of "bailouts" and "stimulus".
Gotcha. I don't think credit unfreezes at the rate needed to make that happen.
Anonymous writes:
RhodesianGreenbackinAZ:
I believe for there to be any sort of recovery in '09, the reflation(inflation) would have to work.
And the recovery would be in 'statistical data' only.
Anonymous | 12.23.08 - 1:58 am | #
Hmmm... maybe we can rectify that when we split Cali into Northern & Southern halves.
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear)
No! Trust me. By area, 80% of California wants nothing to do with the 20% that has 80% of the political power. In two directions I'm a mere 30 miles from Los Angeles but want nothing to do with it. The rest of the US is in no way ready to accept 5-8 new States with 10-16 new Senators and an additional 14 Representatives. Yes, that's how underrepresented California is in the Federal government.
bgates writes:
"neither half has a legit claim on the colorado if it comes down to it. nor does SF have much of a claim on hetch hetchy etc just going by the map."
The Colorado is being drawn down by AZ; and what SoCal gets is dwindling. Not very good water at that. Hetch Hetch is part of Bay Area water supply. Hetch Hetchy Water System
What matters is snow melt in Sierras, and it has to be pumped up hill to make it all the way south.
I agree, although I don't follow college ball much so didn't know much about Rodgers until he was Brett's understudy. But it was obvious last summer with all the drama that it was time to move on.
we'll be lucky if things turn up for quite a few years after that... especially given all the more damage DC is inflicting upon us in the name of "bailouts" and "stimulus". Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.23.08 - 2:01 am | #
Don't forget the demographics. Baby boomers should be past their peak lifecycle consumption phase starting about now. That will add another headwind for the economy.
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) writes:
"When the hell is someone going to come up with cost-effective desalinisation? Geez, we live right next to the Pacific."
More politics. City of Carlsbad and Polaris have been fighting over desalination plant for years; still no plan.
" in particular in the US and UK, and in all the countries depending on their economy, were the duration could approximate a decade. In fact these countries should not expect any real return to growth before 2018"
That's the most pessimistic number I've seen so far.
Sigh. I hope it's wrong but they're probably modelling it as something like the Japanese crash.
Don't forget the demographics. NorkaWest | 12.23.08 - 2:08 am | #
Yeah, I never forget about that. Supposedly the demographics don't turn favorable until 2020 at the earliest, but that's only if we don't engage ourselves in more wars.
Dawg,
That was a taunt, plain and simple. Thanks for taking the bait -- you don't disappoint.
BTW, I totally agree.
Comrade Bear
You say that like it is a bad thing. Heck, I just press F9 to paste the prewritten text. Seriously, I know provocation when I see it. This just happens to be topical and polite.
the equities markets' returns have followed the baby boomers' earnings pretty faithfully for 20 years now (or at least the expected earnings by age for someone born at the median boomer birthday). no reason to expect a decoupling.
Yeah, restructuring the entire banking system on the fly and adjusting to our banishment to the "austerity era" while kicking and screaming may take awhile.
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) writes:
RGinAZ,
Agreed. 2009 is a total write-off, and 2010 is likely more of the same. Can't see things even flattening out until 2012 or so, and we'll be lucky if things turn up for quite a few years after that... especially given all the more damage DC is inflicting upon us in the name of "bailouts" and "stimulus".
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.23.08 - 2:01 am | #
Your memory is impeccable, but I traded my last mortgages a year and a half ago. Did my best to warn, now an informed speculator.
Rating agencies projected prime mortgages at roughly a one percent lifetime loss rate, with a 35% loss severity when the property was resold. Obviously, severities are north of 50% and losses will be multiples of what was projected. A clean Wells Fargo prime pool would have 2.5% subordination to get a AAA rating in 2006.
If the private label market got unstuck all of sudden after being frozen for 16 months, the credit enhancement for the same pool would 3 to 4 times that 2.5% level.
I'm certainly no fan of the Administration. The inaction over the August 2001 PDB was unconscionable.
The widespread greed, incompetence, and apathy is truly stunning. The Administration is one dimension. Acceptance of valuations well above historic metrics; and crazy bad underwriting. Greenspan calling the bottom in Q4/2006; and paid generous sums to speak. A new high for the S&P in October 2007; one month before the start of a recession.
The masses were on the Kool-Aid big time. Most still are.
Dr. Jim Paulsen, chief investment strategist of Wells Capital Management. âIt's like you're at a cookout and you're trying and trying to get your charcoal going and you keep squirting on lighter fluid and all of a sudden it goes âpoof!'
Heh, I just ripped into a guy in the comments on Mr. Mortgage's blog. I just have to share:
Javagold Said:
December 23rd, 2008 2:09 am
Housing Realist,
I have no idea what you are talking about .i bought my house put 20% down and a 30 year fixed ..how does that make me an idiot ? .and no i do not blame myself for a ponzi scheme of housing prices that has collapsed an made the value of my house blow thru my equity thru not one ounce of fault of my own .i realy dont care what you think, so no need to reply, but know one, thing i will get my money back the EASY way (balance reductions for all) or the HARD way (stop paying and living rent free for many many YEARS), but i will get it back , that i promise you
@Javagold
Your situation is unfortunate, but your attitude stinks. In a nutshell you are everything wrong with our country. Not that I would blame you for walking away. But I find fault in your misguided sense of entitlement, and the fact that you cant take responsibility for your actions.
Given that you put 20% down and got a 30 year mortgage, you can clearly afford the house youre in. It is your choice to walk away, or not. It is a financial decision. But taxpayers should have no responsibility to make you whole for what turned out to be a bad decision and a terrible investment.
While you purchased your house, I made the decision to rent. I took my down payment and shorted the living hell out of financial institutions via put options all last year. Rest assured that even if you get your money back from other taxpayers like myself, youll come out far behind those of us who saw this coming and planned accordingly.
And ironically, if you do get your money back it is likely to be worthless within a year, due to a currency collapse by an insolvent nation, because our government similarly chose the path of moral hazard. But I suspect this irony would be lost on you.
Broward,
Im watching your DefCon 15 - T234 - Click Fraud Detection with Practical Memetrics. Hope you eventually got your laptop back. Fraud Detection interesting, as was an article in the Weekend Australian with The Wall Street Journal titled SEC let Madoff get away with it. It tells of Harry Markopolos who once worked for a Madoff rival and his struggle over a number of years to prove that Madoff had to be running a Ponzi or similar scam. He turned to Daniel DiBartolomeo, a top financial mathematician in Boston. Mr DiBartolomeo says he spent hours poring through Mr Markopoloss data, and ultimately agreed: The strategy Mr Madoff said he used could not have achieved the returns he boasted of.
GH,
You need to use a simpler example. He's like the guy who had to buy a Honda Civic. Let's call the "street price" $15k. Over the years the "street price" starts to get bid up; and eventually it is $30k. Those who bought at $15k can unload them now for $30k (and others who bought on the way up can make similar profit, if they find a seller). No matter how someone financed it, whether with 10% down, 0% down, or 30% down; its a ridiculous price to pay for a Honda Civic, yet people are still trying to buy these Civics for $30k because they believe someone will be willing to buy them for $40k or $50k!
mp,
I imagine all those forecasting quick turnarounds know they will be fired if the turnaround was not so quick.
Forecaster: No turnaround until 2Q 2010.
Guy who pays forecaster: Damn, great answer... I'll call you a couple months before then and you can give me an updated forecast. Your fired!
Forecaster: Wait, did I say 2010... I meant 2009! I just ran some new and improved models!
Sigh... someone remind me why I'm laundering my son's carseat at close to 1 o clock at night? Oh yeah: a) I love my wife, b) She's been asking me to adjust his car-seat for months, and c) I love my wife.
It was nice that Evenflo made the "adjustable" harnesses damn near impossible to adjust. I mean, so what if the only way I can move them up or down is by bending plastic with a pair of needle-nose pliers! Just as long as I bend the plastic back, everything should be a-ok! Bastards...
Britax (I forget the exact spelling) had this lovely feature, whereby you could NOT remove the seat cover without slicing it open. Post puke or worse cleanup, discovering this the hard (stinky) way, was not one of the highlights of having infants.
On the plus side, they are damnably cute, those little ones. Be kinda funny to ship a container full of kiddie poop to the current administration as a special going away present.
At one time it was Young Lurker Sometimes Poster. Of course I think that was 2+ years ago? My posting frequency has increased... am I part of the signal or the noise... I tend to think mostly noise.
Perhaps it's this... we just got a gift from someone, a Korean playmat. Here is the recommendation for the mat When you first open your baby playmat, there will be a new mat smell from the prints, production, and packing. To minimise this please leave the mat in a ventilated area and this will disappear after a few days.
bgates- There doesn't seem to be enough gold without fractional reserve, and if there is now, and by your argument of 80% already being mined doesn't make it a good choice either. I would hope there is another source.
I was under the impression that we mined 2k mt/yr for the last decade. Looked like consumption equalled production (like it has to). Only 20% of the consumption was tied up in difficult to extract goods (electronics & teeth), while half the rest was jewelry. One presumes that a lot of that was Indian dowrys so perhaps half of it could show back up on the world stage, but I wouldn't expect it to happen quickly. Only 40% of gold is reasonably tradeable. I haven't heard the claim that we've mined 80% of the easilyt extractable (ie where mining returns a reasonable ammount at current price ~1$k) before. The $5T is 150kTonnes which is almost all the gold ever mined and is still only an ounce per person (~5Boz). It doesn't seem like this enough world currency unless your fractional reserve system is even more permissive than we currently allow with fiat.
If I use the standard Hubbart logistic curve, which makes some symetry assumptions, then we've perhaps just peaked and have ~half of the gold left. As an engineer it seems unlikely that we have really peaked except in low cost South Africa. There's always asteroids ;^)
basically desalinization is energy so I don't see it becoming more cost competitive with time. recycling and reuse is much more efficient... as long as you can monitor and remove the contaminants. at perfect conversion you're looking at 4 gallons/penny (realistically 1-2), and people don't want to think about watering their lawns costing $s per day.
the interesting thing is that if you can turn a desalinazation plant around and efficiently manufacture power from the chemical potential of osmotic pressure then there is much money to be made. everywhere that there is a river meeting the ocean (and a large population) you can convert that potential into power. The equivalent useful pressure head is ~60m, which is enormous at typical river flow rates. For a big river like the American or Missippi which is 100kfs the power is measured in Gwatts or comparable to a very large nuke plant.
If gold were the standard it would be priced so high That I would quit my job and take a pan out to Crown King (with a few guns) and prospect.
As good as it sounds, it doesn't pencil out.
bob mologna | 12.23.08 - 1:37 am | #
She was caught two months later and is serving a sentence (she robbed a SDPD officer, among others). I got a $75 check from her prison labor that I never cashed.
The woman who robbed me in Miami got away with $700 and left me with about $3K in legal bills & problems.
It tells of Harry Markopolos who once worked for a Madoff rival and his struggle over a number of years to prove that Madoff had to be running a Ponzi or similar scam
Spotting fraud and proving it legally are two different things. And as I've learned in the last few years, there's a huge gray area.
Intent means a lot. One of my current puzzles is, given some action, how could you tell if it was motivated by curiosity or greed?
There is no way on dog's green earth that there will be a turnaround in 09. Even '10 looks brutal, from what I hear from bondies and syndicators, there's going to be another vicious round of second and third order effects in the cost of capital, extreme competition for new and rollover funds across a slew of markets, and business failure, job losses, and foreclosures are going to further scrwe the revenue base. Munis nationwide are sinking into the la brea tarpits of solvency doom. Any coy relying on lower than AAA paper to fund routine operations is at risk, and consumer retrenchment will feed on itself.
A lot of people who own Proshares funds are waking up this a.m. to find their shares worth a lot less.
That's because this is ex-date for Proshares income and capital gains distributions and some of them are truly gargantuan. For example, TWM (ultrashort Russell 2000) made a short-term gain distribution of $25.007.
The share price dropped by that much this morning. If you don't own it in a retirement plan, you have to pay tax this year on that amount. If you want to keep the same amount in the market, you will have to reinvest the distribution. But the payable date isn't until 12/30.
Over time, monarchy corrupts the monarch, theocracy corrupts the high priests, and democracy corrupts the demos! NO EXCEPTIONS THAT I KNOW OF. That is why regime changes have been constants thru history.
The primary tool of Americas ruling economic elite, to hold on to power and wealth, has been to breed dopes and corrupt the population by muddling morality. Democracy happens to be the ideal tool for corrupting the population. Democratic politicians appeal to the worst in men.
America and India would remain a breeding grounds for immoral behavior, at all levels, until the system is overthrown violently. Until then more and more Americans would be turned into rats fed by the government.
Does anyone have a better idea as to how the firm grip of Crooks and evildoers on power, in the two largest democracies, will end? Yes, when it comes to bad democracies the size matters.
No, voting doesn't do it because it hasn't for the past many elections. One set of gangsters are replaced by another set of gangsters. That is NOT a change.
Desalination. LOL. You guys make me laugh. Used to develop real estate in California....try making a desal plant work on beachfront land at $7 million an acre at 2003 prices (last time I looked at it). Plus environment review. Would much prefer a root canal to working on that land deeal.
--
What is the Relationship Between the Crooks and the American People?
The American People exist to serve the Crooks just as the farm animals exist to serve the farm-owner.
Not much has changed over millennia when it comes to civilizations. Yes, they all have some period that can be characterized as the golden period. For America the golden period ended decades ago. My best guess for the peak of the American golden period is 1950s.
How do the American People feel being used by the Crooks?
You should have worked there like I did. You don't know what weird is until you work in the banking regulatory inside in multiple locations and states for two decades. The public would run sreaming to their banks demanding to pull all of their funds out.
FFDIC | 12.23.08 - 12:00 am |
FFDIC....
MAN, I would love to hear your tales. Perhaps CR can start another tip jar, proceeds of which would go towards the purchase of FFDIC's favorite beverage. After imbibing, he/she could spill the insiders guide to banking hi-jinx.
Wonder if this would be tax deductible?
Now is a Great time to..... | 12.23.08 - 8:32 am |
Is it a crime to send dirty diapers thru the mail?
I'm considering sending paulson-bernanke & co. a few gifts from my toddler as a thank you for bankrupting his future.
I want a T-shirt with this cartoon-- especially the 'We miss you, Tanta' comment... It would match the mortgage pig well...
Following the general off topic trends, Kondratieff canuk, if you're willing to expose yourself to the abuse of the goldbuggers (and possibly draw a few of them away from this blog) I promise to read out of gratitude, if nothing else. You'd have to run it on the CR model, tho'-- charts and explanations-- and either ignoring the ignorant or a patient and courteous repetition of the facts.
Back on topic...God I miss Tanta. She was able to take me far beyond my simple, common sense understanding of what was going on (no, housing doesn't 'always go up', and no, it doesn't make sense to buy a house at 5 times your annual income) into regular 'aha' moments of genuine enlightenment. Unfortunately I'm just smart enough to be able to follow and appreciate her reasoning, not nearly bright enough to be able to figure it out for myself. What a loss.
Just a bit more information about how a non-OPEC member is helping out with production reductions -
'Petroleos Mexicanos, the state-owned oil company, said crude oil output fell 6.5 percent in November from the year-earlier period as production at its Cantarell field declined at a faster-than-expected rate.
Production dropped to 2.711 million barrels a day, from 2.901 million barrels a day a year earlier, the company known as Pemex said today on its Web site. In an e-mail, Pemex cited Cantarell, its largest field, as the reason for the drop.'
Oops - seems like those reductions may not have been voluntary.
Let's see how those models of Mexican oil production turned out -
'Cantarells output fell 33 percent, more than twice as fast as government estimates, to 862,060 barrels a day from a year earlier. Declining pressure at Cantarell has made it more expensive and harder to continue pumping oil from the offshore deposit.
I think policy should be data based, and not model based. But like the UK, it seems as if the models calling for increased production simply were overwhelmed by the fact that less oil was pumped. Another case of needing the models to hit the numbers, otherwise, well, things are just too grim to contemplate.
Lucky that Americans seem to be using less oil, as Mexico's 'Oil exports fell 20 percent to 1.511 million barrels a day, according to a chart on Pemexs Web site.
Mexico is the third-largest supplier of crude to the U.S. Canada and Saudi Arabia are the first- and second-largest suppliers.'
See - plenty of oil around. Especially as prices spiked to the highest level in history as Mexico's oil production was declining. It is just a local Mexican problem, I'm sure. Just like Norway. Or the UK. Or the U.S. Or Romania. But the world is a big place, and I am sure that the oil fairy will be around real soon.
Because the world has one less 1 million barrel a day oil fields than before - Cantarell dropped out of that league in just one year. And notice that little bit about Cantarell - declining pressures leading to higher expenses. I wonder how much oil Pemex will continue to pump from Cantarell in the next couple of months? I'm sure they are focussing all their efforts are getting it back up to its old production rate - of just last year.
It is the elephant graveyard - only three more to go. From July 2004 -
Ghawar, which produces 4.5 million barrels per day, Cantarell in Mexico, which produces nearly 2 million barrels per day, Burgan in Kuwait which produces 1.7 million barrels per day and Da Qing in China which produces 1 million barrels per day.'
Lucky that reserves keep growing, because otherwise, how would we make up the loss of over 1 mmbp production from Cantarell alone.
Remember, keep your eyes on the waving hands, and avoid actually looking at how oil fields 'mature.' For example, in 2004, Cantarell alone was the source of as much oil as all the oil now produced by Pemex. Don't do the math - just repeat the mantra 'oil will never run out, oil will never out, house prices only go up' - ooops, got a little off track there.
Entries by Karl Denninger - The Market Ticker
50% GDP contraction, mass unemployment, social service centers near all major cities for the hobo-turned-grifter future for the young?
--
"50% GDP contraction, mass unemployment, social service centers near all major cities for the hobo-turned-grifter future for the young?"
Ben Frank'll Tank Bernanke,
As I said, more and more of the American People would be turned into rats fed by the gubermint. More and more America would be turned into the worst inner cities that exist now.
Under evil leaders bad behavior and bad areas expand. All that B&BAD can do is to watch from the sidelines and bitch. What a system!
RTO, fully agree, world wide economic slowdown dropping demand for oil and masking near term peak oil. Low prices will delay projects which could hold the plateau longer, ie offshore Brazil, Alberta tar sands. Will make it very hard to dig out of this mess, as soon as the world economy sees any life, oil prices will zoom higher and choke off the recovery. For now, the force of lower demand is grreater than the natural fall off in supply, will not always be the case.
(I know this is late) perhaps you need to read chap. 8 of section II of Rothbard's book "What has Government done to Our Money?"
From the book -
An increase in the money supply, then, only dilutes the effectiveness of each gold ounce; on the other hand, a fall in the supply of money raises the power of each gold ounce to do its work. We come to the startling truth that it doesn't matter what the supply of money is. Any supply will do as well as any other supply. The free market will simply adjust by changing the purchasing power, or effectiveness of the gold-unit. There is no need to tamper with the market in order to alter the money supply that it determines.
rgates is right - the supply of gold is meaningless. More or less supply simply changes prices.
It's amazing how few people understand money or economics.
"It is no crime to be ignorant of economics, which is, after all, a specialized discipline and one that most people consider to be a 'dismal science.' But it is totally irresponsible to have a loud and vociferous opinion on economic subjects while remaining in this state of ignorance." - Murray Rothbard
He is pimping for Obama. Wait and see, Obama will get in and all his fans in the media will try to sway public opinion about the economy. Tell us how the worst is over and a new day of change and hope has arrived.
Many people will start buying into it and a bounce will occur. Then the mass layoffs will continue, frugality will be the new "in" and the economy will worsen.
Obama will make only one impact, stopping the unwashed masses from rioting...... for a time.
Almost all of the fortunes made over the past decade were founded on fraud and deception.
Internet fortunes
Telecom fortunes
Housing wealth
Commercial real estate wealth
Private equity fortunes
Hedge fund riches
Insurance wealth
Investment banking bonuses
Money management fortunes
CEO compensation
Lobbying fees
And now, after the financial ponzi scheme starts to collapse, the fed & treasury come riding to the rescue and shower guarantees left and right to preserve all the fictitious wealth.
Is Madoff's unlikely "confession" bogus, a mere scheme to protect investors against loss and prosecution?
"[...]the confession does not look right at all.
It is possible to accept the idea of a Ponzi scheme be played on members of the public, who are ignorant of how such schemes are worked, in fact the schemes are targetted specifica lly at such people. Yet Madoff would have us believe that he managed to convince professional investment companies to put their funds with him without any due diligence being performed. This is clearly nonsense.
I have acted as a professional consultant to major EC and US financial institutions on corporate and institutional credit risk and the idea that anyone in HSBC or Santander could authorise large investment without the internal checks and controls being employed is almost impossible. To try and believe that EVERY institution that invested in Madoff circumvented their internal control procedures IS impossible.
[...] So why plead guilty? The answer is simple. Look on the net and you will see that because this case is being labelled a fraud, it would appear that investors are going to be able to claim their investment back under the US government's financial fraud protection scheme. A judge has already given his approval in principle for compensation, w ithout any evidence having been presented and financial fraud being demonstrated in a court of law. And it would appear that there will never be such a demonstration in a court of law. Why? It would appear that all the funds financial records are mostly "missing" (rather like Dov Zakheim's US$1.4tn) and those few records that do survive are in a terrible mess.
However, since the guy has pleaded guilty we do not need to demonstrate the fraud, because he says he is guilty.
And look further on the net and you will see that these "victims" have also been told by the US tax authorities that they will probably also be entitled to claim back some taxes on these defrauded sums."
Is Madoff's unlikely "confession" bogus, a mere scheme to protect investors against loss and prosecution? Zeev Krankenfuss | Homepage | 12.23.08 - 9:19 am | #
--
"shit, you're talking about the forever in living memory unbeatable aussie cricketers who just lost to the jaapies hocooodienooode?"
kiewi,
I haven't watched cricket for decades but aussie are very good at sports. They are among the best among the majority white nations. Americans are quite bad, relative speaking. The title of pathetic goes to India.
The topic of the thread is a cartoon about the great Hooooocodanode wail of the White House, the current administration, the one in office right NOW.
And you are whining about Obama.
Of course, most people aren't owning up the to the source of this debacle--you find as many "it's everyone's fault!" postings as you do from those correctly naming this planned and abetted deregulation disaster. But the koolaid is being burped up just the same.
If you hold that this Con Republican administration really didn't see this coming, I argue that is an excellent reason to never let another Conservative darken the doorstep of political power again.
Evil or incompetent, either way the Conservatives screwed up the world yet again. And they have done it so many times.
Young business fella' who was an ex-skater. I saw the corruption, fraud, and greed firsthand. It has awakened my anti-governmental roots. I am an American but a patriot and cannot fathom our leadership leading us straight to damnation. You cannot just follow your leader because they "SAY" they know what they are doing. How many friends or neighbors have you spoken to that did not realize that the big banks just exist to outright screw their customers? Sheeple are People too......
Don't you think that 10 times that sum might persuade Government Sachs that TARP is the way to go? Zeev Krankenfuss | Homepage | 12.23.08 - 9:30 am | #
Nope. I think those investors are all going to be S.O.L.
Certainly in cricket, you are way behind the times, Jas. In the last 3 months they beat Australia 2-0 and England 1-0 at Test cricket, they also beat Australia in the 1-day cricket, and whitewashed England in the best of 7 series ( they were winning 5-0, when the Mumbai attack intervened.
Australia have been the best for about 5 years now - India is now right up there with them - if they keep up this winning streak, they'll be regarded as the best in a years time.
The former are uniquely doped-for-life, e.g., Warren Buffett, due to America's unique position since the end of the WW II. With the Baby Doomers the serious job of BREEDING DOPES began in America and later it spread to many parts of the globe. East-Indians are the tops among AD.
American system will not outlive the last of the Doomers! They were specifically raised to lead to Americas doom by instilling debilitating moral values, e.g., Clintons, Bush, Jr., Bernanke, Obama...
WASHINGTON -- The U.S. government left its estimate for economic deterioration last summer unchanged, according to data Tuesday that exceeded the expectations of Wall Street analysts.
They pushed back recognizing the size of the catastrophe! Market up.
"I don't know what S.O.L. stands for, but if that means investors loosing it all, I hope you are right."
Shit outta luck. SO yeah, what you said.
"SDS off $12.00? How is that right?"
Got the following message on Think or Swim this morning:
Please note the following if you trade ProShares ETFs: There are dividend distributions for 52 of their 76 ETFs. Distributions have reduced the net assets of each of the affected ETFs as of the close of business yesterday and the ETFs will trade ex-dividend today. Each portfolios exposure to its benchmark index will be adjusted today.
The confusion caused by those PRoShares distributions has been fun to watch. There was even a small opportunity for about 5 minutes when, the one I watch, SRS, traded way below the ex-dividend value for about 2 minutes (-6, rather than -4 )..
Munis are the next landmine to blow up. Most municipalities can't meet their promises to their workers for pensions and health care without tax increases. The first tax payer revolts will come at that level. The only way that they are going to be able to get out of some these labor contracts is through BK.
I think they get federal backing. On the WiMP principle, how can FDIC back Goldman's debt, the Fed buy GE ABCP, etc, and pitch state governments under a bus?
When the Fed finishes blowing through this last 260 bp in the long bond, I think the trade will be short treasuries/long munis.
Crazy - was just thinking about this comment on munis. Remember when they were a predictable, boring, mostly stable asset class - more or less a safe haven for conservative investors?
This entire economic sham has manifested itself into every nook, leaving nothing "safe". The mental stress it is heaping on average investors is really starting to show it's effect. Defaults in the munis are a given in the next year. This is a slippery, dangerous slope - one that no amount of bailout dollars can fix. Mass muni defaults...gov't services locking up - this will make the current situation look like a Sunday picnic.
Frankly, I'm getting sick of the revisionist history on this subject. The Bush administration saw what was coming and proposed a solution over five year ago. Don't take my word for it, it's in the NT Times from September 11, 2003: New Agency Proposed to Oversee Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae
"The Bush administration today recommended the most significant regulatory overhaul in the housing finance industry since the savings and loan crisis a decade ago.
Under the plan, disclosed at a Congressional hearing today, a new agency would be created within the Treasury Department to assume supervision of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored companies that are the two largest players in the mortgage lending industry.
The new agency would have the authority, which now rests with Congress, to set one of the two capital-reserve requirements for the companies. It would exercise authority over any new lines of business. And it would determine whether the two are adequately managing the risks of their ballooning portfolios. "
The democrats in congress - Barney Frank and Chris Dodd, to be specific - scuttled the effort.
Does this guy do cartoons about any other blogs?
me?
Ditto to the "Miss You Tanta!". (sniff)
Ahhh a fresh thread to go with my idea...
Large White Pima Cotton Polo Shirt with simple mortgage pig arrived today. It's a beaut.
Nemo, Eric is becoming more popular, so I'm sure he will be in demand elsewhere!
best wishes.
The Bush Depression? Hoocoodanode!
The wife and I were in a Target today (used to be the largest Target on earth when it was built 6-8 years ago) in Sacramento doing some last minute Christmas shopping. It scared the shit out of me!
The traffic in the store was no greater then the foot traffic you'd "normally" (circa 2004) see on a summer's Saturday. Those of us where were in the store mostly had empty carts. They had 15 or so check stands open, none with more then 2 customers in each. We walked right up to a checkstand at about 4:30pm on this December 22. As it was, we decided to wait on a few items as they were "only" 50% off and we want to see what they are after Christmas ($12.99 picture frames on sale at $6.48 and we're still waiting). I told the wife in the store that the traffic flat out scared me.
Though origionally a California lad, we've been living in Australia since 2003 and ony been back for trips (this Christmas we're up for 5 weeks). I've been reading and talking to loved ones about the traffic here in SacTown, but man seeing it for myself...
C
You go Eric!
Fortune - 10 worst RE markets for 2009
10 worst real-estate markets for 2009 - Los Angeles (1) - FORTUNE
Since you asked. Its come to my attention (after 5 martinis) that i should do a gold blog. There is too much interest in Au. I know the stuff.. backwards and forwards.
anyone in? It can be small to start. I just need maybe two posters. One with exceptional humor. We could all meet up sleucing in Ve for kicks.
31.1
CR - when you analyze the data causing the recession, do you factor in fraud or corruption?
I'm not sure if it is something that can be quantified, but I think the fraud piece of this story (e.g., OTS, Madoff) could slow down the recovery.
kc,
I'll drop in for moral support!
Every single mortgage broker knew it was going to happen. And they were illiterate knobs.
SEC missed Ponzi Schemes? Hoocoodanode.
I still hate you Henry Paulson.
k. canuk,
Would be interested..
Every single mortgage broker knew it was going to happen.
dr munch | 12.23.08 - 12:38 am | #
Not so. HBB collected way too many stories of mortgage brokers drinking their own koolaid, paying top dollar for ridiculous properties, using toxic financing to leverage multiple "investment" properties, and so on.
Citizen Clyde: Are you the poster who mentioned a long time ago that you did pricing and economic modeling of mortgage pools? If yes, how have the assumptions changed over the last year? What new variables are being included in the current models?
Cn
Anonymous | 12.23.08 - 12:36 am | #
I was also in a Target today in Dallas and it was packed with shoppers more than I've seen all year. Ditto: parking lot..NorthPark Mall's parking lot was so full I changed my plan to go to Macy's. The streets were full as well. Last minute shopping in Texas has always been a mad rush.
OT went shopping in Oakbrook Il with wife today. Stores very slow. Plenty of discounts. At Nieman jewelery counter, was told tag price was actual price, then when we wavered about buying, clerk wispered that there was a 10% break that could be given. Then I saw a guy debating over a $1300 necklace, and the clerk didn't budge a dime. He just walked away.
poster formerly known as nitpi writes:
k. canuk,
Would be interested.
I think the perfect thing would be to force a check box, 'up' or 'down' BEFORE you posted a comment. It would indicate the price movement pressure your comment is intended to make.
Went to both a Target and a B&N over the weekend...neither was especially crowded, which made me happy, 'cause I HATE crowds, normal X-mas shopping, etc.
CostCo in Westlake Village tonight. Normally it is not too bad during MNF games. Tonight it was packed.
Mentioned it to the cashier and she said they were pretty slow and empty during the day but this is their busy time.
Target and B&N in Chicago
kc,
^...ok?
ON TOPIC... so, what excuses will they use when all of their bailout & stimulus plans fail? Hoocoodanode??? Not likely.
Imagine a gold blog that was as intelligent as CR's blog. It would eventually impact on the price of gold.
________________________
Kondratieff canuk: I would be interested, it it didn't degerate into an fruitless argument about whether or not gold was "real" money.
k. cauck,
That would truly be special...most of the innertube writings I've seen appear to have been authored by wack-jobs. It would be nice to see learned, reasoned discourse on the topic.
Kontratief canuck, what does the job of poster with exceptional humor pay?
Benefits, or tips?
NorkaWest,
That's inevitable, as there's too many that have been conditioned to believe that paper is money. Gotta educate the masses somehow.
[Damn, drug me off topic again.]
Large White Pima Cotton Polo Shirt with simple mortgage pig arrived today. It's a beaut.
Uncle Billy Snorts | Homepage | 12.23.08 - 12:32 am | #
Got the white & the gray - wonder if my fellow 'cogs' will even have a clue as to how subversive it is.
On Saturday, December 20 mp wrote:
"We're expecting to be in Michigan sometime during mid-2009 to attend a major equipment selloff."
HaloScan.com - Comments
On December 9, unbeknownst to mp and Conjure, Bloomberg's Mike Schneider interviewed NYU bankruptcy expert Edward Altman. At 14:54 in the interview Altman said, "I don't think Chrysler will exist" in 6 months.
Bloomberg News
There are three possibilities: first, Cerberus sells Chrysler; second, GM merges with Chrysler; third, Chrysler liquidates.
When Cerberus bought Chrysler, Conjure said the deal wouldn't work. He thought Cerberus would sell Chrysler to the Chinese after raping it. That could still happen, but possibility three, liquidation, is beginning to look more likely.
Anyway, we're now even more serious about planning a mid-year trip to Detroit.
FFDIC(Excellent) writes:
\tCn
Anonymous | 12.23.08 - 12:36 am | #
I was also in a Target today in Dallas and it was packed with shoppers more than I've seen all year. Ditto: parking lot..NorthPark Mall's parking lot was so full I changed my plan to go to Macy's. The streets were full as well. Last minute shopping in Texas has always been a mad rush.
FFDIC | 12.23.08 - 12:41 am | #
FFDIC, oh the parking lots were jam-packed in front of Target (not so much around the mall across the street), but you really need to look at the bags people are carrying. We were at the "nicer" mall yesterday and although the parking lot looked "full" we pulled into a spot 2 lines from Macy's at 11:30am. Wandered around for about 1.5 hours while noting the limited bags people were carying (if at all). We ended up with 1 $25 bag ou of Macy's (pan that was over 50% off) and a dude did wait 2 minutes for our parking spot @ 1pm.
But still, I've seen respectable foot traffic (for a non-Xmas time anyway) but few bags, and very few big/full bags. 'Course, we're talking Sacramento, with 10% employed directly by the state where Arnie just passed the 2 day furlow dealie (for an effectiv 10% reduction of all state employees take home) with another 10-20% reduction in state rolls... According to the suster, Texas is still more or less OK (course, her hubby lost his position with Countrywide, er, BofA last month, so all's not rosy).
Maybe I'm looking too hard, or it's a regional thing. But I was "expecting" this, and yet I've been surprised by the bredth I've seen on the ground.
C
Nemo, I was thinking the same thing. But so many other blogs suck. Speaking of blogs, look who started blogging - Angelo Mozilo's nephew.
So far, I can't complain, he gave the Moulo/Padilla (Padilla is a known FoCR) book a general thumbs up. Man, I loved that book.
dryfly,
Its better than a "secret handshake"
[Damn, drug me off topic again.]
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.23.08 - 12:54 am | #
Yeah, I'm good at tangents.
Damn, mp, that was worth repeating.
Lefty, at Fry's on Finley near Butterfield around 8 pm. More cashiers than people in line.
Fortune - 10 worst RE markets for 2009
FFDIC | 12.23.08 - 12:37 am | #
Looks like somebody at Fortune had a hard on for Cali.
Is Angelo Mozillo's newphew orange too?
Bloomberg's Mike Schneider interviewed NYU bankruptcy expert Edward Altman
mp | 12.23.08 - 12:55 am | #
The Z-score man. My hero.
He's not orange. He's bald - and damn proud of it. Sorry abt the bum link- here is his blog (in all it's two-post glory):
The Bald Mortgage Banker
G'Night All - need to get sleep - meetings tomorrow.
NorkaWest writes:
Kondratieff canuk: I would be interested, it it didn't degerate into an fruitless argument about whether or not gold was "real" money.
Agreed. A poster here made the point for gold to become currency, we are reduced to small localized trade, implying breakdown of the larger trade infrastructure. At that point its not currency as we know it. Plus the supply is infinitely too small, minuscule.
Banks brace for an ugly 2009 - Dec. 22, 2008
Banking on another bad year in '09
Rising loan losses, the threat of more regulation and tougher competition adds up to another year of poor profits for banks.
What are the odds the Queen will demand some gold from Canada?
Not true, kc, not true. Read Janszen's chapter in "America's Bubble Economy".
Rising loan losses, the threat of more regulation and tougher competition adds up to another year of poor profits for banks.
FFDIC | 12.23.08 - 1:04 am | #
Shoot Dick Bove has been saying for the last 6 months to buy bank stocks on the coming v-shaped profit recovery. Don't tell me another banking analyst got it wrong.
From excellent Interfluidity blog:
... Interest rates are, for the moment, excruciatingly low. But a subsidy to the banking system, once put into place, will be quite hard to dislodge. So, let's imagine that the Fed will pay interest on bank reserves in perpetuity, that it will pay such interest at or near the risk-free short-term interest rate, and that the expansion of the Fed's balance sheet is more or less permanent. How large a subsidy to the banking system do the interest payments on reserves represent? Some problems are arithmetically challenging, but not this one. The present value of a perpetual stream of market-rate interest payments is precisely the amount of the principal. Therefore, the present value of the Fed's de facto commitment to pay interest to banks on $800B of freshly created reserves is $800B. We fought and wailed and gnashed our teeth over potentially overpaying for TARP assets. Meanwhile, we are quietly allowing the Fed give away, as a direct, literal subsidy, more than the entire $700B that Paulson was allowed to play with. Note there is no question about this being an "investment": The interest payments that the Fed is now making to banks on its suddenly expanded balance sheet are not loans. The banks owe taxpayers absolutely nothing in return for this windfall. ...
"Plus the supply is infinitely too small"
not true at all. of all of the strawmen against a gold standard, this is one of the stupidest, though one of the most likely for the bankers to use as an excuse to keep the xerocrats in power. the other point - "we are reduced to small localized trade" - is also the product of a remarkably slow intellect.
nothing personal intended, of course.
Re: Forbes' worst markets.
Man I feel like one of those circus girls where they throw knives at her spinning wheel. Bakersfield, LA, OC, Riverside. It isn't often that Ventura loses to those areas.
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UK Bailiffs get power to use force on debtors
Under the regulations, bailiffs for private firms would for the first time be given permission to restrain or pin down householders. They would also be able to force their way into homes to seize property to pay off debts, such as unpaid credit card bills and loans.
(Not my Hannah Montana 2009 calendar!)
Right on, FFDIC - They will have to pry my 2009 Schnauzer Puppies calendar from my COLD..DEAD...HANDS!
Right on, FFDIC - They will have to pry my 2009 Schnauzer Puppies calendar from my COLD..DEAD...HANDS!
Shnaps | Homepage | 12.23.08 - 1:13 am | #
Are those the same puppies on CNBC everybody is ga ga over?
"Re: Forbes' worst markets"
I agree with the list for the most part, though I really think it is generally rearview-mirror forecasting. I also think Sacto may have already taken its worst lumps. The current median #s also seem a bit off in terms of OC and DC as well.
I also think Sacto may have already taken its worst lumps.
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:14 am | #
With State government only now starting to cut back? I'd beg to differ.
I also think Sacto may have already taken its worst lumps.
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:14 am | #
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.23.08 - 1:16 am | #
I had a co-worker who moved there in 2006. I begged him not to buy a home. They looked cheap compared to SF and his wife really wanted a home. I hope he listened to me.
bgates writes:
"Plus the supply is infinitely too small"
not true at all. of all of the strawmen against a gold standard, this is one of the stupidest,
So you think there's enough gold supply to form a currency base.
"With State government only now starting to cut back?"
I see the bear case, and am familiar with the general area. Sacto will still spend well over 100 billion a year, even after the threatened axe falls or doesn't fall.
greater Sacto has fairly high incomes compared to most other inland areas.
"Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) writes:
I also think Sacto may have already taken its worst lumps.
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:14 am | #
With State government only now starting to cut back? I'd beg to differ.
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.23.08 - 1:16 am | # [kill]"
Just got the biweekly "don't panic" email from the vice chancellor at our UC campus that nothing bad will happen -- until February at the earliest. So yeah, the sh*t won't hit this fan for some time, and so no, Sac's worst times aren't necessarily behind it.
o, I am referring to puppies that are REAL.
Those CNBC puppies are FAKE.
"So you think there's enough gold supply to form a currency base."
of course. there's about 5 trillion bucks of it on the planet, and, of course, scrip could theoretically circulate if redemption was credible.
it wasn't abandoned in the early 30s due to a lack of supply. nor was it abandoned because of the volatility in gold supply spikes causing disruptions to the economy - a more subtle strawman but one nonetheless.
Chrysler: all the dashboard wiring people took early retirement. There is no one left to make this product. I say they're going down, and soon. The "temporary" factory closedown is just to get money back for Quayle's people at Cerberus.
"Sac's worst times aren't necessarily behind it."
almost certainly true, though that doesn't necessarily mean it will lead the (s)hit parade in downward price velocity. especially if you include some of the nicer places in the foothills and davis in the region.
greater Sacto has fairly high incomes compared to most other inland areas.
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:18 am | #
I thought we had dispensed with the "immunity" arguments long ago.
This depression is only now getting started, and government is one of the biggest remaining bubbles we have. I expect the streets of every capitol to run red before this is over. [Metaphor, folks, metaphor.]
- NY Times
LETTERS TO THE NYT EDITOR:
The Roots of the Housing Crisis
""immunity" arguments"
certainly not calling it 'immune' - just that other areas have higher bases from which to fall, or have much less of a job base.
also, underestimating the tenacity of the machine in sacramento is a sucker's bet.
was also in a Target...was packed with shoppers more than I've seen all year
This was true of the Boise Town mall tonight. More shoppers than I expected but less than in Dec, 2006.
Gonna be a lot of empty commercial space in 30 days, too. Several places already had "for lease" signs up.
So you think there's enough gold supply to form a currency base.
Kondratieff canuk | 12.23.08 - 1:18 am | #
In an electronic world, I think there is. It is silly to think that in a functioning society with today's technological sophistication that we would actually exchange gold coins in trade. The key is simply gold backing of the currency and that would be very easy at the correct price.
I also think Sacto may have already taken its worst lumps. - bgates
Snigger. Sorry, but it is hard to hold back. Sacramento has at least two more legs down. Next leg down is state cutbacks. We are talking gross population decreases and per capita income contractions not seen since that other time we don't mention. And that's just the first leg. Second leg is worse. Tax refugees fleeing the State. This latter I saw in Massachusetts. It is an unbelievable drain to be writing checks every month for decades in Sacramento that get cashed and spent in Austin, Montgomery and Nashville.
the tenacity of the machine
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:26 am | #
No underestimation there; same in government everywhere. Heck, the unions are challenging Arnold's power to do anything to them -- layoff, furlough, cut, whatever. Plus the public servant unions are the Dem legislature's key to maintaining power.
Regardless, it's the irresistible force (ever expanding government) meeting the immovable object (no money). The vehicle of state is about to run into a brick wall.
"Sacramento has at least two more legs down."
you guys miss my point. Sacto may well be due for a truly miserable decade, with big drops in housing value over time. But 95660 is already under 100K as of this month. a relatively nice place like auburn will still attract bay area refugees with prices in the low 200s, and, guess what - they're already about there.
if you're looking for markets which are due for a relative crash, try Irvine, Newport Beach, Santa Monica, Burbank, Palo Alto, Los Altos, etc.
RE,
That's exactly Janszen's point in the book, too.
it wasn't abandoned in the early 30s due to a lack of supply. nor was it abandoned because of the volatility in gold supply spikes
Few people question the official claims enough to do source research.
If gold were the standard it would be priced so high That I would quit my job and take a pan out to Crown King (with a few guns) and prospect.
As good as it sounds, it doesn't pencil out.
if you're looking for markets which are due for a relative crash, try Irvine, Newport Beach, Santa Monica, Burbank, Palo Alto, Los Altos, etc.
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:34 am | #
Oh yeah. Got my popcorn, soda, and a front row seat for that show.
RE writes:
In an electronic world, I think there is. It is silly to think that in a functioning society with today's technological sophistication that we would actually exchange gold coins in trade. The key is simply gold backing of the currency and that would be very easy at the correct price.
China right now is the largest producer. Some two hundred world central banks would somehow have to load up on bullion and agree on a reserve ratio. The supply side is about 1/10,000 of what it would require.
Late next year the economy should begin to stabilize, and Im fairly optimistic about 2010.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/22/opinion/22krugman.html?em
This man is optimistic. I think he's dead wrong, but what do i know, am no Nobel winning economist.
"As good as it sounds, it doesn't pencil out."
insofar as the bankers will never let it happen, and they currently totally control every aspect of our regime, sure. otherwise, it would "pencil out" just fine.
The supply side is about 1/10,000 of what it would require.
Kondratieff canuk | 12.23.08 - 1:37 am | #
Nah, they've just printed 10,000x more cash than they should have. That's okay, deflation can fix that.
insofar as the bankers will never let it happen
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:38 am | #
And yet somehow fiat currencies still come and go.
"insofar as the bankers will never let it happen, and they currently totally control every aspect of our regime, sure. otherwise, it would "pencil out" just fine.
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:38 am | #
Can we say "mis-allocation of resources?
"China right now is the largest producer"
current production isn't that relevant. the vast majority of the world's gold (almost 80%, I believe) has been mined, unless one indulges in fantasies of mining seawater (which significantly changes that 80% number, of course).
the idea that a currency somehow needs expansion to "stimulate" economic growth is truly surreal.
...auburn will still attract bay area refugees with prices in the low 200s, and, guess what - they're already about there.
if you're looking for markets which are due for a relative crash, try Irvine, Newport Beach, Santa Monica, Burbank, Palo Alto, Los Altos, etc.
bgates
Ahhh yes... the horror of Santa Monica in August.
Sorry again bgates but Sacto and Palo Alto in the same sentence is "Apples" and "apple pickers" if you'll pardon the pun.
"Can we say "mis-allocation of resources?"
if you prefer the economic regime of the past 35 years to the first 135 of our nation, you are certainly entitled to your opinion.
FFDIC,
Thanks for the link to the NYT ed. They just won't let go of the CRA conspiracy theory will they? Sad.
"Can we say "mis-allocation of resources?"
bgates
Yes and thy name is Sacramento.
" the horror of Santa Monica in August. "
now THAT is the immunity argument.
1-10 ratios in housing vs incomes is an interesting investment approach.
incidentally, the area around santa monica college is one of the least attractive areas in all of coastal california.
For a sign of the times in Contra Costa real estate:
1648 Observation Ct, Antioch, CA 94531
5 bedrooms, 3 baths, pool... previous owner paid $960,000!
bgates writes:
"China right now is the largest producer"
current production isn't that relevant. the vast majority of the world's gold (almost 80%, I believe) has been mined, unless one indulges in fantasies of mining seawater (which significantly changes that 80% number, of course).
bgates, your talking thru your hat. Meaning you haven't a clue what you're talking about. Anyway...time to bail on this. Have nice evening, what's left of it.
"if you prefer the economic regime of the past 35 years to the first 135 of our nation, you are certainly entitled to your opinion.
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:41 am | # "
I'm not partial to it myself, and I'd like the intrinsic restraint that gold provides. I just don't believe that it will work in an economy as large as the the world we have without serious distorting effects.
I'd quit my job and pan gold with the prices we would see.
"Meaning you haven't a clue what you're talking about. "
do you care to present any findings to the contrary?
i am truly sorry if the smug pretensions of the banking world don't come off in the wash quite as easily as the delusions.
mp writes:
On Saturday, December 20 mp wrote:
"We're expecting to be in Michigan sometime during mid-2009 to attend a major equipment selloff."
Hey, mp! If you pass through the Tri-Cities region please check if Art Narlocks Showbar on Washington Avenue, Bay City is still standing. I have many fond memories from the 60s when I was a rockn roll sax player there.
"I'd quit my job and pan gold with the prices we would see."
good luck buying a claim. were you in greater bakersfield with a shovel last may at 140/bbl?
Shopping around 4 p.m. on the south side of Milwaukee - the solidly middle class mall (Southridge) no more busy than an average Saturday in 2004. Of course, it was 1 degree F, but still, the 23rd of December! Normally on 12/23, there would be no parking to be had, the lot was 1/3 full. I was there to return an item, hardly any waiting at the registers.
OTOH, the liquor store halfway across town was a madhouse of shoppers, cars lined around the block to park, people ringing up $100 of quality beer/liquor/wine. But it's cold and its Wisconsin, and the Pack played MNF tonight, which could explain much of that buying anyways.
Yes and thy name is Sacramento.
Rob Dawg | Homepage | 12.23.08 - 1:43 am | #
Love it! Would that city even show on a map if it wasn't the capitol?
Hmmm... maybe we can rectify that when we split Cali into Northern & Southern halves.
"which could explain much of that"
only a fix would explain that last FG attempt
"when we split"
coastal vs inland makes much more political sense
"good luck buying a claim. were you in greater bakersfield with a shovel last may at 140/bbl?
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:48 am"
You haven't been to Arizona lately have you?
bgates -
No matter how much I repeat the "it's a rebuilding year" mantra, I can't help but be disappointed by defense caving at the end of the game.
I'll say the fix is in if there is a pity loss to Detroit at Lambeau.
"
czar picosec writes:
For a sign of the times in Contra Costa real estate:
We're sorry, we can't process your request | Redfin 1872654
5 bedrooms, 3 baths, pool... previous owner paid $960,000!
czar picosec | 12.23.08 - 1:44 am | # [kill][hide comment]"
That had to be fraud. Had to be. Even at the height of the madness, I have a hard time believing anyone would come near seven figures in Antioch, for anything.
And now it's down almost 60 percent, within 100K of what it sold for in '02.
Yeah, saw that too. I don't get it. What is going to cause this mythical 2nd half of 2009 recovery ... f'n mustards seeds? Even's mp's Kasriel report (which was great btw) seemed optimistic to me.
2009 is DOA. But hey, I hope I'm wrong. I would like to stay employed.
It seems to me that things are actually spiraling out of control and accelerating. Plus, would there not be a considerable lag effect with all of that fiscal stimulus. I seem to remember that at best, you can only get the architect's and planners paid, the actual big chunks of "infrastructure spending" takes longer to actually get going.
My fear is that in Q1, all companies shit the bed and then the lay-offs accelerate again, when companies realize their 2009 Net Income projections are impossible to hit with the cuts they already made.
@Anon
Anonymous writes:
Late next year the economy should begin to stabilize, and Im fairly optimistic about 2010.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/2...krugman.html? em
This man is optimistic. I think he's dead wrong, but what do i know, am no Nobel winning economist.
Anonymous | 12.23.08 - 1:38 am | #
"You haven't been to Arizona lately have you?"
i hate the heat and am not in the business of laundering money, so, no particular reason to do such. why?
" if there is a pity loss "
a fix probably wouldn't entail a loss - just a win by less than 12 points or so. gotta wonder just what those P.I. calls cost.
I'm sure it is fraud!
In my city, in '06 and '07 even some drug dealers were moving into the mortgage fraud business, getting inept folks on disability to sign for mortgages worth double (or more) the real market value - $100,000 for some dump in the 'hood barely worth $40K at best.
At least the drug-dealing ones have gone to jail. The guys running the same scam who always wore suits get away with it, it seems.
bgates writes:
"coastal vs inland makes much more political sense"
Except northern has the H2O. The next fight.
coastal vs inland makes much more political sense
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:50 am | #
Bbbbbuuuutttt ttttthhhhheeeennnn they would get our water.
"Except northern has the H2O"
neither half has a legit claim on the colorado if it comes down to it. nor does SF have much of a claim on hetch hetchy etc just going by the map.
"Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) writes:
Yes and thy name is Sacramento.
Rob Dawg | Homepage | 12.23.08 - 1:43 am | #
Love it! Would that city even show on a map if it wasn't the capitol?"
Probably; it was the jump-off point to the gold fields, and some of that money stuck around. It's also the furthest-inland seaport, which made it a convenient shipping point for ag goods in the old days.
But without the state gov't, it'd just be another Fresno: ag-dominated and lower-income, more social problems -- not that Sacramento doesn't have them. South Sac is not a good place to be.
Hang in there grrl,
The Pack is in better shape talent-wise than most; the defense just wasn't functioning like it should have, though.
I'm a Broncos fan -- yes, we've got plenty of issues of our own -- but you've got a sharp QB, a pretty damn good RB, and perhaps the best receiving corp in the league. If the defense plays up to it's capability you'll be back in the post-season next year.
"$100,000 for some dump in the 'hood barely worth $40K at best."
multiply that by 4 and you have santa ana
RhodesianGreenbackinAZ:
I believe for there to be any sort of recovery in '09, the reflation(inflation) would have to work.
And the recovery would be in 'statistical data' only.
czar picosec writes:
For a sign of the times in Contra Costa real estate:
Bob Dobbs | Homepage | 12.23.08 - 1:52 am | #
Isn't Antioch a suburb of Pinole?
"I'm a Broncos fan"
amazed that SD can clinch at home after being down 2 scores with minutes left in KC.
I think the surprise here is everyone expected Rodgers to be full of fail, and now that he hasn't, that didn't translate into wins due to the defense. I certainly didn't expect the D to fall apart somewhere around game 5, to never really return.
Next year...
"i hate the heat and am not in the business of laundering money, so, no particular reason to do such. why?
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:53 am"
Not to worry, most of the gold is in the mountains, nice and cool. Even these days it's a bit of a free for all. Not involved myself, but I would be at $70K - $80K/Oz
Just saying...
Sorry to interject football. The only recovery I see in '09 is for GB in the NFL, certainly not in any other sectors of the economy!
Comrade V
Comrade V | 12.23.08 - 1:55 am | #
You beat me to it.
RGinAZ,
Agreed. 2009 is a total write-off, and 2010 is likely more of the same. Can't see things even flattening out until 2012 or so, and we'll be lucky if things turn up for quite a few years after that... especially given all the more damage DC is inflicting upon us in the name of "bailouts" and "stimulus".
Gotcha. I don't think credit unfreezes at the rate needed to make that happen.
Anonymous writes:
RhodesianGreenbackinAZ:
I believe for there to be any sort of recovery in '09, the reflation(inflation) would have to work.
And the recovery would be in 'statistical data' only.
Anonymous | 12.23.08 - 1:58 am | #
amazed that SD can clinch at home after being down 2 scores with minutes left in KC.
bgates | 12.23.08 - 1:59 am | #
No shit. Can't believe that Bowe, the best hands on the team outside of Gonzales, muffed that.
"outside of Gonzales"
that guy really is the barry sanders of our era, buried on a crap team
Hmmm... maybe we can rectify that when we split Cali into Northern & Southern halves.
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear)
No! Trust me. By area, 80% of California wants nothing to do with the 20% that has 80% of the political power. In two directions I'm a mere 30 miles from Los Angeles but want nothing to do with it. The rest of the US is in no way ready to accept 5-8 new States with 10-16 new Senators and an additional 14 Representatives. Yes, that's how underrepresented California is in the Federal government.
Grrl,
I was sold on Rodgers when he scared the hell out of USC. I love Brett, but that was a good move IMHO.
bgates writes:
"neither half has a legit claim on the colorado if it comes down to it. nor does SF have much of a claim on hetch hetchy etc just going by the map."
The Colorado is being drawn down by AZ; and what SoCal gets is dwindling. Not very good water at that. Hetch Hetch is part of Bay Area water supply. Hetch Hetchy Water System
What matters is snow melt in Sierras, and it has to be pumped up hill to make it all the way south.
After ag gets it share, SoCal is on losing end.
The Shadow knew,HAHAHAHAHAHA.Whoa,gotta stop raiding shrubs stash.
Comrade Bear -
I agree, although I don't follow college ball much so didn't know much about Rodgers until he was Brett's understudy. But it was obvious last summer with all the drama that it was time to move on.
Dawg,
That was a taunt, plain and simple. Thanks for taking the bait -- you don't disappoint.
BTW, I totally agree.
that's how underrepresented California is in the Federal government
Yes, far better to sell CA off to Mexico, we could use the money and the deal is half-way done anyway.
"After ag gets it share"
speaking of socialism...
we'll be lucky if things turn up for quite a few years after that... especially given all the more damage DC is inflicting upon us in the name of "bailouts" and "stimulus".
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.23.08 - 2:01 am | #
Don't forget the demographics. Baby boomers should be past their peak lifecycle consumption phase starting about now. That will add another headwind for the economy.
Required reading for history of West and water supplies, and future of SoCal
Amazon.com: Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water, Revised Edition (9780140178241): Marc Reisner: Books
Also, excellent PBS documentary based on book. A must for all historians.
"far better to sell CA off to Mexico"
only after selling manhattan to the PRC
When the hell is someone going to come up with cost-effective desalinisation? Geez, we live right next to the Pacific.
Collegiate football, how sad....
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) writes:
"When the hell is someone going to come up with cost-effective desalinisation? Geez, we live right next to the Pacific."
More politics. City of Carlsbad and Polaris have been fighting over desalination plant for years; still no plan.
My alma mater had no football team, so why bother?
"When the hell is someone going to come up with cost-effective desalinisation?"
Free electricity? Fantastic!
we'll be lucky if things turn up for quite a few years after that
Leap2020 predicts we're screwed until 2018.
http://www.leap2020.eu/GEAB-N-30-is-available!-Global-systemic-crisis-New-tipping-point-in-March-2009-When-the-world-becomes-aware-that-this_a2567.html
" in particular in the US and UK, and in all the countries depending on their economy, were the duration could approximate a decade. In fact these countries should not expect any real return to growth before 2018"
That's the most pessimistic number I've seen so far.
Sigh. I hope it's wrong but they're probably modelling it as something like the Japanese crash.
"how sad...."
if you're signing June Jones' paycheck, sure
Don't forget the demographics.
NorkaWest | 12.23.08 - 2:08 am | #
Yeah, I never forget about that. Supposedly the demographics don't turn favorable until 2020 at the earliest, but that's only if we don't engage ourselves in more wars.
Dawg,
That was a taunt, plain and simple. Thanks for taking the bait -- you don't disappoint.
BTW, I totally agree.
Comrade Bear
You say that like it is a bad thing. Heck, I just press F9 to paste the prewritten text. Seriously, I know provocation when I see it. This just happens to be topical and polite.
Oh how I wish we were turning Japanese. I feel like Jas these days...
I hope it's wrong but they're probably modelling it as something like the Japanese crash.
Broward Horne | Homepage | 12.23.08 - 2:13 am | #
If only we were that lucky.
"as something like the Japanese"
the equities markets' returns have followed the baby boomers' earnings pretty faithfully for 20 years now (or at least the expected earnings by age for someone born at the median boomer birthday). no reason to expect a decoupling.
Yeah, restructuring the entire banking system on the fly and adjusting to our banishment to the "austerity era" while kicking and screaming may take awhile.
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) writes:
RGinAZ,
Agreed. 2009 is a total write-off, and 2010 is likely more of the same. Can't see things even flattening out until 2012 or so, and we'll be lucky if things turn up for quite a few years after that... especially given all the more damage DC is inflicting upon us in the name of "bailouts" and "stimulus".
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.23.08 - 2:01 am | #
Re: Uncle Billy Snorts writes:
Large White Pima Cotton Polo Shirt with simple mortgage pig arrived today. It's a beaut.
UB, I thought you would get the family pax; your daughter could wear one while playing that damn'd loud guitar!
Seems like Asian markets are tumbling. Can't they even hold it until after Christmas? Geez.. this is going to be one ugly Christmas.
NorkaWest,
Your memory is impeccable, but I traded my last mortgages a year and a half ago. Did my best to warn, now an informed speculator.
Rating agencies projected prime mortgages at roughly a one percent lifetime loss rate, with a 35% loss severity when the property was resold. Obviously, severities are north of 50% and losses will be multiples of what was projected. A clean Wells Fargo prime pool would have 2.5% subordination to get a AAA rating in 2006.
If the private label market got unstuck all of sudden after being frozen for 16 months, the credit enhancement for the same pool would 3 to 4 times that 2.5% level.
I'm certainly no fan of the Administration. The inaction over the August 2001 PDB was unconscionable.
The widespread greed, incompetence, and apathy is truly stunning. The Administration is one dimension. Acceptance of valuations well above historic metrics; and crazy bad underwriting. Greenspan calling the bottom in Q4/2006; and paid generous sums to speak. A new high for the S&P in October 2007; one month before the start of a recession.
The masses were on the Kool-Aid big time. Most still are.
Thomas Jefferson is reading these comments with interest. Why stop at splitting or just selling off California? The Republic of the Pacific! Ah, Cascadia! Your time has come. Maybe.
Cascadia (independence movement) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Ah, Cascadia! Your time has come. Maybe
Kind of hope so. I'm not seeing better alternatives to the current roadmap.
I've never understood the knee-jerk reactions to it. I wouldn't care if New Jersey seceded.
I don't just miss Tanta. I'm PINING for her...
A little humor from Wells Capital Mgmt, via Originator Times - Recession to end in 2009
Dr. Jim Paulsen, chief investment strategist of Wells Capital Management. âIt's like you're at a cookout and you're trying and trying to get your charcoal going and you keep squirting on lighter fluid and all of a sudden it goes âpoof!'
Except northern has the H2O. The next fight.
Comrade V | 12.23.08 - 1:55 am | #
And the geysers.
Heh, I just ripped into a guy in the comments on Mr. Mortgage's blog. I just have to share:
Javagold Said:
December 23rd, 2008 2:09 am
Housing Realist,
I have no idea what you are talking about .i bought my house put 20% down and a 30 year fixed ..how does that make me an idiot ? .and no i do not blame myself for a ponzi scheme of housing prices that has collapsed an made the value of my house blow thru my equity thru not one ounce of fault of my own .i realy dont care what you think, so no need to reply, but know one, thing i will get my money back the EASY way (balance reductions for all) or the HARD way (stop paying and living rent free for many many YEARS), but i will get it back , that i promise you
@Javagold
Your situation is unfortunate, but your attitude stinks. In a nutshell you are everything wrong with our country. Not that I would blame you for walking away. But I find fault in your misguided sense of entitlement, and the fact that you cant take responsibility for your actions.
Given that you put 20% down and got a 30 year mortgage, you can clearly afford the house youre in. It is your choice to walk away, or not. It is a financial decision. But taxpayers should have no responsibility to make you whole for what turned out to be a bad decision and a terrible investment.
While you purchased your house, I made the decision to rent. I took my down payment and shorted the living hell out of financial institutions via put options all last year. Rest assured that even if you get your money back from other taxpayers like myself, youll come out far behind those of us who saw this coming and planned accordingly.
And ironically, if you do get your money back it is likely to be worthless within a year, due to a currency collapse by an insolvent nation, because our government similarly chose the path of moral hazard. But I suspect this irony would be lost on you.
Cheers,
GH
The cartoon and the "Who's to blame?" under it certainly go together.
Broward,
Im watching your DefCon 15 - T234 - Click Fraud Detection with Practical Memetrics. Hope you eventually got your laptop back. Fraud Detection interesting, as was an article in the Weekend Australian with The Wall Street Journal titled SEC let Madoff get away with it. It tells of Harry Markopolos who once worked for a Madoff rival and his struggle over a number of years to prove that Madoff had to be running a Ponzi or similar scam. He turned to Daniel DiBartolomeo, a top financial mathematician in Boston. Mr DiBartolomeo says he spent hours poring through Mr Markopoloss data, and ultimately agreed: The strategy Mr Madoff said he used could not have achieved the returns he boasted of.
Saturn undergoes a metamorphosis:
NASA - Saturn's Crazy Christmas Tilt
Exit- "A little humor from Wells Capital Mgmt..."
Equally hilarious, their forecast of a mid-2009 housing turnaround.
I'd ask what they're smoking at Wells Fargo, but that would be "unprofessional."
mp - maybe they contracted Lahde and CSC to do a report, and those two (one?) figured - hey, let's play!
2nd half of 2009 for a recovery - of what, more TARP funds?
GH,
You need to use a simpler example. He's like the guy who had to buy a Honda Civic. Let's call the "street price" $15k. Over the years the "street price" starts to get bid up; and eventually it is $30k. Those who bought at $15k can unload them now for $30k (and others who bought on the way up can make similar profit, if they find a seller). No matter how someone financed it, whether with 10% down, 0% down, or 30% down; its a ridiculous price to pay for a Honda Civic, yet people are still trying to buy these Civics for $30k because they believe someone will be willing to buy them for $40k or $50k!
mp,
I imagine all those forecasting quick turnarounds know they will be fired if the turnaround was not so quick.
Forecaster: No turnaround until 2Q 2010.
Guy who pays forecaster: Damn, great answer... I'll call you a couple months before then and you can give me an updated forecast. Your fired!
Forecaster: Wait, did I say 2010... I meant 2009! I just ran some new and improved models!
Sigh... someone remind me why I'm laundering my son's carseat at close to 1 o clock at night? Oh yeah: a) I love my wife, b) She's been asking me to adjust his car-seat for months, and c) I love my wife.
It was nice that Evenflo made the "adjustable" harnesses damn near impossible to adjust. I mean, so what if the only way I can move them up or down is by bending plastic with a pair of needle-nose pliers! Just as long as I bend the plastic back, everything should be a-ok! Bastards...
YSLP
LOL.
Britax (I forget the exact spelling) had this lovely feature, whereby you could NOT remove the seat cover without slicing it open. Post puke or worse cleanup, discovering this the hard (stinky) way, was not one of the highlights of having infants.
On the plus side, they are damnably cute, those little ones. Be kinda funny to ship a container full of kiddie poop to the current administration as a special going away present.
Oops - sorry for mangling your handle YLSP. I think YSLP stands for Why Sleep? Which in your case sounds about right.
At one time it was Young Lurker Sometimes Poster. Of course I think that was 2+ years ago? My posting frequency has increased... am I part of the signal or the noise... I tend to think mostly noise.
Perhaps it's this... we just got a gift from someone, a Korean playmat. Here is the recommendation for the mat When you first open your baby playmat, there will be a new mat smell from the prints, production, and packing. To minimise this please leave the mat in a ventilated area and this will disappear after a few days.
Niiiiiiiiice....
bgates-
There doesn't seem to be enough gold without fractional reserve, and if there is now, and by your argument of 80% already being mined doesn't make it a good choice either. I would hope there is another source.
I was under the impression that we mined 2k mt/yr for the last decade. Looked like consumption equalled production (like it has to). Only 20% of the consumption was tied up in difficult to extract goods (electronics & teeth), while half the rest was jewelry. One presumes that a lot of that was Indian dowrys so perhaps half of it could show back up on the world stage, but I wouldn't expect it to happen quickly. Only 40% of gold is reasonably tradeable. I haven't heard the claim that we've mined 80% of the easilyt extractable (ie where mining returns a reasonable ammount at current price ~1$k) before. The $5T is 150kTonnes which is almost all the gold ever mined and is still only an ounce per person (~5Boz). It doesn't seem like this enough world currency unless your fractional reserve system is even more permissive than we currently allow with fiat.
If I use the standard Hubbart logistic curve, which makes some symetry assumptions, then we've perhaps just peaked and have ~half of the gold left. As an engineer it seems unlikely that we have really peaked except in low cost South Africa. There's always asteroids ;^)
bob mologna-
basically desalinization is energy so I don't see it becoming more cost competitive with time. recycling and reuse is much more efficient... as long as you can monitor and remove the contaminants. at perfect conversion you're looking at 4 gallons/penny (realistically 1-2), and people don't want to think about watering their lawns costing $s per day.
the interesting thing is that if you can turn a desalinazation plant around and efficiently manufacture power from the chemical potential of osmotic pressure then there is much money to be made.
everywhere that there is a river meeting the ocean (and a large population) you can convert that potential into power. The equivalent useful pressure head is ~60m, which is enormous at typical river flow rates. For a big river like the American or Missippi which is 100kfs the power is measured in Gwatts or comparable to a very large nuke plant.
Some history...,
The Death of Deep Throat and the Crisis of Journalism :: The Market Oracle :: Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting Free Website
If gold were the standard it would be priced so high That I would quit my job and take a pan out to Crown King (with a few guns) and prospect.
As good as it sounds, it doesn't pencil out.
bob mologna | 12.23.08 - 1:37 am | #
that would solve the unemployment problem
Hope you eventually got your laptop back
She was caught two months later and is serving a sentence (she robbed a SDPD officer, among others). I got a $75 check from her prison labor that I never cashed.
The woman who robbed me in Miami got away with $700 and left me with about $3K in legal bills & problems.
It tells of Harry Markopolos who once worked for a Madoff rival and his struggle over a number of years to prove that Madoff had to be running a Ponzi or similar scam
Spotting fraud and proving it legally are two different things. And as I've learned in the last few years, there's a huge gray area.
Intent means a lot. One of my current puzzles is, given some action, how could you tell if it was motivated by curiosity or greed?
There is no way on dog's green earth that there will be a turnaround in 09. Even '10 looks brutal, from what I hear from bondies and syndicators, there's going to be another vicious round of second and third order effects in the cost of capital, extreme competition for new and rollover funds across a slew of markets, and business failure, job losses, and foreclosures are going to further scrwe the revenue base. Munis nationwide are sinking into the la brea tarpits of solvency doom. Any coy relying on lower than AAA paper to fund routine operations is at risk, and consumer retrenchment will feed on itself.
Here's the updated state picture:
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
The main story from CBPP is not the lead, but the budget priorities link to 43 states facing deficit and the commentary.
On munis, probably Bondtangent has the best coverage, from our favourite bond commenter.
Aside from that, good moorrrrrning Maryland!!! Christmas cheer for all!!!
C
--
Merry Crisis and Happy New Fear!
From the mouth of a babe, Linda Behringer, German reporter for CNBC.
Jas
--
"I feel like Jas these days..."
bob mologna,
I have a big tent!
Jas
--
"Does this guy do cartoons about any other blogs?"
Why would CR do cartoons for any other blog? CR is quite talented outside of economic forecasting.
Jas
I have a big tent!
This is not the place to advertise your organs, Jas!
.
Someone with a Madoff loss is making a claim against the SEC! Let the games begin.
Yahoo! 404 - Page Not Found
A lot of people who own Proshares funds are waking up this a.m. to find their shares worth a lot less.
That's because this is ex-date for Proshares income and capital gains distributions and some of them are truly gargantuan. For example, TWM (ultrashort Russell 2000) made a short-term gain distribution of $25.007.
The share price dropped by that much this morning. If you don't own it in a retirement plan, you have to pay tax this year on that amount. If you want to keep the same amount in the market, you will have to reinvest the distribution. But the payable date isn't until 12/30.
ProShares ETFs: News Center - ProShares ETFs Declare Capital Gain Distributions
Don't freak out when you see a lot less in your account today.
WTF, only 11 visitors online?
Too many eggnogs last night EST crowd? Hmmm?
C
Counterpointer writes:
WTF, only 11 visitors online?
I see you there, Counterpointer.
WTF, only 11 visitors online?
Counterpointer | 12.23.08 - 8:01 am | #
Eh, we've bottomed.... haven't you heard?
FT.com / Companies / Banks - Mortgage activity surges at US banks
"Press not this thorn of crowns upon me, America shall not be crucified upon a crown of gold"
WJ Brya
--
Pondering America's and India's future...
Over time, monarchy corrupts the monarch, theocracy corrupts the high priests, and democracy corrupts the demos! NO EXCEPTIONS THAT I KNOW OF. That is why regime changes have been constants thru history.
The primary tool of Americas ruling economic elite, to hold on to power and wealth, has been to breed dopes and corrupt the population by muddling morality. Democracy happens to be the ideal tool for corrupting the population. Democratic politicians appeal to the worst in men.
America and India would remain a breeding grounds for immoral behavior, at all levels, until the system is overthrown violently. Until then more and more Americans would be turned into rats fed by the government.
Does anyone have a better idea as to how the firm grip of Crooks and evildoers on power, in the two largest democracies, will end? Yes, when it comes to bad democracies the size matters.
No, voting doesn't do it because it hasn't for the past many elections. One set of gangsters are replaced by another set of gangsters. That is NOT a change.
Jas
--
"Someone with a Madoff loss is making a claim against the SEC! Let the games begin."
My 1999 conclusion:
SEC = Securing Entitlements for CROOKS!
American econ-political system is:
A system of the Crooks, by the Crooks, and FOR the Crooks.
Got it?
Jas
So you think there's enough gold supply to form a currency base.
It'd just be worth a lot. You'd transact in milligrams rather than ounces. Or, realistically, in asset-backed notes.
Some rough scratchings based on the amount of gold ever mined and worldwide GDP in 2005 yielded a figure around $13,000/oz.
Imagine the capital flight if a consortium of SWFs established an asset-backed alternative to the $USD.
Desalination. LOL. You guys make me laugh. Used to develop real estate in California....try making a desal plant work on beachfront land at $7 million an acre at 2003 prices (last time I looked at it). Plus environment review. Would much prefer a root canal to working on that land deeal.
I miss Tanta, every single day. It hasn't gotten any better.
Early Xmas Present for CIT
How did I see it coming in early 2006, yet the White House did not? (Answer: they live in a different world.)
I remember telling my neighbor that it was going to get much worse, and it did.
--
What is the Relationship Between the Crooks and the American People?
The American People exist to serve the Crooks just as the farm animals exist to serve the farm-owner.
Not much has changed over millennia when it comes to civilizations. Yes, they all have some period that can be characterized as the golden period. For America the golden period ended decades ago. My best guess for the peak of the American golden period is 1950s.
How do the American People feel being used by the Crooks?
Denial? Again??
Jas
From last thread..
You should have worked there like I did. You don't know what weird is until you work in the banking regulatory inside in multiple locations and states for two decades. The public would run sreaming to their banks demanding to pull all of their funds out.
FFDIC | 12.23.08 - 12:00 am |
FFDIC....
MAN, I would love to hear your tales. Perhaps CR can start another tip jar, proceeds of which would go towards the purchase of FFDIC's favorite beverage. After imbibing, he/she could spill the insiders guide to banking hi-jinx.
Wonder if this would be tax deductible?
Now is a Great time to..... | 12.23.08 - 8:32 am |
Is it a crime to send dirty diapers thru the mail?
I'm considering sending paulson-bernanke & co. a few gifts from my toddler as a thank you for bankrupting his future.
ylsp..Geesss..
Notice the same thing on bath shower curtains. Very toxic if not aired for hours.
These were made in China and
purchased at Walsnark.
I'm CST but it was the eggnog for me...Ugh, have to work this morning.
I want a T-shirt with this cartoon-- especially the 'We miss you, Tanta' comment... It would match the mortgage pig well...
Following the general off topic trends, Kondratieff canuk, if you're willing to expose yourself to the abuse of the goldbuggers (and possibly draw a few of them away from this blog) I promise to read out of gratitude, if nothing else. You'd have to run it on the CR model, tho'-- charts and explanations-- and either ignoring the ignorant or a patient and courteous repetition of the facts.
Back on topic...God I miss Tanta. She was able to take me far beyond my simple, common sense understanding of what was going on (no, housing doesn't 'always go up', and no, it doesn't make sense to buy a house at 5 times your annual income) into regular 'aha' moments of genuine enlightenment. Unfortunately I'm just smart enough to be able to follow and appreciate her reasoning, not nearly bright enough to be able to figure it out for myself. What a loss.
Just a bit more information about how a non-OPEC member is helping out with production reductions -
'Petroleos Mexicanos, the state-owned oil company, said crude oil output fell 6.5 percent in November from the year-earlier period as production at its Cantarell field declined at a faster-than-expected rate.
Production dropped to 2.711 million barrels a day, from 2.901 million barrels a day a year earlier, the company known as Pemex said today on its Web site. In an e-mail, Pemex cited Cantarell, its largest field, as the reason for the drop.'
Oops - seems like those reductions may not have been voluntary.
Let's see how those models of Mexican oil production turned out -
'Cantarells output fell 33 percent, more than twice as fast as government estimates, to 862,060 barrels a day from a year earlier. Declining pressure at Cantarell has made it more expensive and harder to continue pumping oil from the offshore deposit.
Cantarell accounted for 32 percent of Pemexs total output, half of the 65 percent it once represented at its peak.'
Pemex Oil Production Drops 6.5% on Cantarell Field (Update2) - Bloomberg.com
I think policy should be data based, and not model based. But like the UK, it seems as if the models calling for increased production simply were overwhelmed by the fact that less oil was pumped. Another case of needing the models to hit the numbers, otherwise, well, things are just too grim to contemplate.
Lucky that Americans seem to be using less oil, as Mexico's 'Oil exports fell 20 percent to 1.511 million barrels a day, according to a chart on Pemexs Web site.
Mexico is the third-largest supplier of crude to the U.S. Canada and Saudi Arabia are the first- and second-largest suppliers.'
See - plenty of oil around. Especially as prices spiked to the highest level in history as Mexico's oil production was declining. It is just a local Mexican problem, I'm sure. Just like Norway. Or the UK. Or the U.S. Or Romania. But the world is a big place, and I am sure that the oil fairy will be around real soon.
Because the world has one less 1 million barrel a day oil fields than before - Cantarell dropped out of that league in just one year. And notice that little bit about Cantarell - declining pressures leading to higher expenses. I wonder how much oil Pemex will continue to pump from Cantarell in the next couple of months? I'm sure they are focussing all their efforts are getting it back up to its old production rate - of just last year.
It is the elephant graveyard - only three more to go. From July 2004 -
Ghawar, which produces 4.5 million barrels per day, Cantarell in Mexico, which produces nearly 2 million barrels per day, Burgan in Kuwait which produces 1.7 million barrels per day and Da Qing in China which produces 1 million barrels per day.'
Lucky that reserves keep growing, because otherwise, how would we make up the loss of over 1 mmbp production from Cantarell alone.
Remember, keep your eyes on the waving hands, and avoid actually looking at how oil fields 'mature.' For example, in 2004, Cantarell alone was the source of as much oil as all the oil now produced by Pemex. Don't do the math - just repeat the mantra 'oil will never run out, oil will never out, house prices only go up' - ooops, got a little off track there.
In response to Counterpointer's state budget post --
(direct link -- btw
9-8-08sfp.htm) — Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
This is a good article -- well worth the reading time.
--
"Is it a crime to send dirty diapers thru the mail?"
Anonymous,
Is that your way to deal with evildoers in power?
They are beyond your reach and at your expense!
Jas
Oops, unescaped char at end of link.
Recession Continues to Batter State Budgets; State Responses Could Slow Recovery — Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
Ooops again -
'...in 2004, Cantarell alone was the source of as much oil as all the oil now produced...'
For produced, read 'exported'.
Entries by Karl Denninger - The Market Ticker
50% GDP contraction, mass unemployment, social service centers near all major cities for the hobo-turned-grifter future for the young?
Jas- it's all I've got. It's funny but I'm beginning to consider Ted Kaczynsky a bit of an American folk hero.
--
"50% GDP contraction, mass unemployment, social service centers near all major cities for the hobo-turned-grifter future for the young?"
Ben Frank'll Tank Bernanke,
As I said, more and more of the American People would be turned into rats fed by the gubermint. More and more America would be turned into the worst inner cities that exist now.
Under evil leaders bad behavior and bad areas expand. All that B&BAD can do is to watch from the sidelines and bitch. What a system!
Jas
RTO, fully agree, world wide economic slowdown dropping demand for oil and masking near term peak oil. Low prices will delay projects which could hold the plateau longer, ie offshore Brazil, Alberta tar sands. Will make it very hard to dig out of this mess, as soon as the world economy sees any life, oil prices will zoom higher and choke off the recovery. For now, the force of lower demand is grreater than the natural fall off in supply, will not always be the case.
k canuck
(I know this is late) perhaps you need to read chap. 8 of section II of Rothbard's book "What has Government done to Our Money?"
From the book -
An increase in the money supply, then, only dilutes the effectiveness of each gold ounce; on the other hand, a fall in the supply of money raises the power of each gold ounce to do its work. We come to the startling truth that it doesn't matter what the supply of money is. Any supply will do as well as any other supply. The free market will simply adjust by changing the purchasing power, or effectiveness of the gold-unit. There is no need to tamper with the market in order to alter the money supply that it determines.
rgates is right - the supply of gold is meaningless. More or less supply simply changes prices.
It's amazing how few people understand money or economics.
"It is no crime to be ignorant of economics, which is, after all, a specialized discipline and one that most people consider to be a 'dismal science.' But it is totally irresponsible to have a loud and vociferous opinion on economic subjects while remaining in this state of ignorance." - Murray Rothbard
Consumer spending shrank 3.8% in 3rd Qtr. Most since 1980
Economy, consumer spending shrank in Q3 - Economy at a Crossroads- msnbc.com
S.E.C. Elects to Keep Mark-to-Market Rules - NY Times 2......krugman.html
He is pimping for Obama. Wait and see, Obama will get in and all his fans in the media will try to sway public opinion about the economy. Tell us how the worst is over and a new day of change and hope has arrived.
Many people will start buying into it and a bounce will occur. Then the mass layoffs will continue, frugality will be the new "in" and the economy will worsen.
Obama will make only one impact, stopping the unwashed masses from rioting...... for a time.
Consumer spending shrank 3.8% in 3rd Qtr. Most since 1980
MaurS | 12.23.08 - 9:01 am | #
But didn't go to zero!!!!!!!!!!
TAKE THE MARKET ON THAT
Almost all of the fortunes made over the past decade were founded on fraud and deception.
Internet fortunes
Telecom fortunes
Housing wealth
Commercial real estate wealth
Private equity fortunes
Hedge fund riches
Insurance wealth
Investment banking bonuses
Money management fortunes
CEO compensation
Lobbying fees
And now, after the financial ponzi scheme starts to collapse, the fed & treasury come riding to the rescue and shower guarantees left and right to preserve all the fictitious wealth.
What a sham!
Anybody here have any insight into 'negative basis trade' accounting?
I understand that some banks were entering into such trades and PVing the spread between CDS and cash spreads into earnings immediately.
I'm trying to figure out which accounting standard or guidance these things could be PV'd under.
Let's assume the obvious that they did know. What does this then imply?
Perhaps that is under 'HFV' or 'Hypothetical Future Value'...
--
"Almost all of the fortunes made over the past decade were founded on fraud and deception... What a sham!"
Angry Saver,
Copycat!
A system of the Crook... and FOR the Crooks?
I would hate to be a B&BAD who got screwed by the Crooks over the past 10-15 years in the Scam Market.
There are consequences to be a B&BAD. Where are the consequences for the Crook?
Jas
it implies the obvious.. your leaders dont care...
or
they care to cement there rule with a Dictatorship and a good old war to reduce the overpopulation...
Is Madoff's unlikely "confession" bogus, a mere scheme to protect investors against loss and prosecution?
"[...]the confession does not look right at all.
It is possible to accept the idea of a Ponzi scheme be played on members of the public, who are ignorant of how such schemes are worked, in fact the schemes are targetted specifica lly at such people. Yet Madoff would have us believe that he managed to convince professional investment companies to put their funds with him without any due diligence being performed. This is clearly nonsense.
I have acted as a professional consultant to major EC and US financial institutions on corporate and institutional credit risk and the idea that anyone in HSBC or Santander could authorise large investment without the internal checks and controls being employed is almost impossible. To try and believe that EVERY institution that invested in Madoff circumvented their internal control procedures IS impossible.
[...] So why plead guilty? The answer is simple. Look on the net and you will see that because this case is being labelled a fraud, it would appear that investors are going to be able to claim their investment back under the US government's financial fraud protection scheme. A judge has already given his approval in principle for compensation, w ithout any evidence having been presented and financial fraud being demonstrated in a court of law. And it would appear that there will never be such a demonstration in a court of law. Why? It would appear that all the funds financial records are mostly "missing" (rather like Dov Zakheim's US$1.4tn) and those few records that do survive are in a terrible mess.
However, since the guy has pleaded guilty we do not need to demonstrate the fraud, because he says he is guilty.
And look further on the net and you will see that these "victims" have also been told by the US tax authorities that they will probably also be entitled to claim back some taxes on these defrauded sums."
full text here:
The Madoff Double-bluff - sunniforum.com
.
foilhatgrrl writes:
bgates -
No matter how much I repeat the "it's a rebuilding year" mantra, I can't help but be disappointed by defense caving at the end of the game.
shit, you're talking about the forever in living memory unbeatable aussie cricketers
who just lost to the jaapies
hocooodienooode?
So we get existing and new home sales today at 10 am EST...
FFDIC....ANARCHY IN THE UK!...GOD SAVE THE QUEEN
Is Madoff's unlikely "confession" bogus, a mere scheme to protect investors against loss and prosecution?
Zeev Krankenfuss | Homepage | 12.23.08 - 9:19 am | #
Except that SIPC limit is $500,000
Money Man writes:
FFDIC....ANARCHY IN THE UK!...GOD SAVE THE QUEEN
Money Man | 12.23.08 - 9:23 am | #
I believe the rest of the quote goes: "The fachist regime"
--
"shit, you're talking about the forever in living memory unbeatable aussie cricketers who just lost to the jaapies hocooodienooode?"
kiewi,
I haven't watched cricket for decades but aussie are very good at sports. They are among the best among the majority white nations. Americans are quite bad, relative speaking. The title of pathetic goes to India.
Jas
Just skimming over today's GDP release and one thing stuck out immediately:
Disposable Personal Income was NEGATIVE 4.2%.
Good luck collecting all those debts from joe six pack.
No worries though. The fed will pick up the tab.
Welcome to the new (e)CONomy. What a sham!
it warms my heart beyond belief that people here know the words to a pistols song
Jas,
You lost me.
What is "B&BAD" ??
Yes, Eric, but you will recall that LTCM's 5 Billion bailout was justified under a systemic risk rationale.
Don't you think that 10 times that sum might persuade Government Sachs that TARP is the way to go?
David says: "He is pimping for Obama."
And who (what?) are you pimping for, David?
The topic of the thread is a cartoon about the great Hooooocodanode wail of the White House, the current administration, the one in office right NOW.
And you are whining about Obama.
Of course, most people aren't owning up the to the source of this debacle--you find as many "it's everyone's fault!" postings as you do from those correctly naming this planned and abetted deregulation disaster. But the koolaid is being burped up just the same.
If you hold that this Con Republican administration really didn't see this coming, I argue that is an excellent reason to never let another Conservative darken the doorstep of political power again.
Evil or incompetent, either way the Conservatives screwed up the world yet again. And they have done it so many times.
oh man...LOL!
Born & Bred American Dopes
Young business fella' who was an ex-skater. I saw the corruption, fraud, and greed firsthand. It has awakened my anti-governmental roots. I am an American but a patriot and cannot fathom our leadership leading us straight to damnation. You cannot just follow your leader because they "SAY" they know what they are doing. How many friends or neighbors have you spoken to that did not realize that the big banks just exist to outright screw their customers? Sheeple are People too......
Don't you think that 10 times that sum might persuade Government Sachs that TARP is the way to go?
Zeev Krankenfuss | Homepage | 12.23.08 - 9:30 am | #
Nope. I think those investors are all going to be S.O.L.
The title of pathetic(in sports) goes to India.
Jas
Jas Jain
Certainly in cricket, you are way behind the times, Jas. In the last 3 months they beat Australia 2-0 and England 1-0 at Test cricket, they also beat Australia in the 1-day cricket, and whitewashed England in the best of 7 series ( they were winning 5-0, when the Mumbai attack intervened.
Australia have been the best for about 5 years now - India is now right up there with them - if they keep up this winning streak, they'll be regarded as the best in a years time.
-K
--
B&BAD = Born-and-Bred American Dopes
AD = Americanized Dopes
The former are uniquely doped-for-life, e.g., Warren Buffett, due to America's unique position since the end of the WW II. With the Baby Doomers the serious job of BREEDING DOPES began in America and later it spread to many parts of the globe. East-Indians are the tops among AD.
American system will not outlive the last of the Doomers! They were specifically raised to lead to Americas doom by instilling debilitating moral values, e.g., Clintons, Bush, Jr., Bernanke, Obama...
Jas
SDS off $12.00? How is that right?
I don't know what S.O.L. stands for, but if that means investors loosing it all, I hope you are right.
Only time will tell.
SDS off $12.00? How is that right?
Down due to capital gain distributions.
Check out the link in rich's post above.
--
"Certainly in cricket, you are way behind the times, Jas."
SK,
No, I meant sports. Indians are at best one-trick pony, as they say here in America.
Jas
Thx Angry..
WASHINGTON -- The U.S. government left its estimate for economic deterioration last summer unchanged, according to data Tuesday that exceeded the expectations of Wall Street analysts.
They pushed back recognizing the size of the catastrophe! Market up.
"I don't know what S.O.L. stands for, but if that means investors loosing it all, I hope you are right."
Shit outta luck. SO yeah, what you said.
"SDS off $12.00? How is that right?"
Got the following message on Think or Swim this morning:
Please note the following if you trade ProShares ETFs: There are dividend distributions for 52 of their 76 ETFs. Distributions have reduced the net assets of each of the affected ETFs as of the close of business yesterday and the ETFs will trade ex-dividend today. Each portfolios exposure to its benchmark index will be adjusted today.
That might explain the drop.
The confusion caused by those PRoShares distributions has been fun to watch. There was even a small opportunity for about 5 minutes when, the one I watch, SRS, traded way below the ex-dividend value for about 2 minutes (-6, rather than -4 )..
-K
Munis are the next landmine to blow up. Most municipalities can't meet their promises to their workers for pensions and health care without tax increases. The first tax payer revolts will come at that level. The only way that they are going to be able to get out of some these labor contracts is through BK.
Shockingly, no dividend distribution for the long Proshares funds...
Munis are the next landmine to blow up
I think they get federal backing. On the WiMP principle, how can FDIC back Goldman's debt, the Fed buy GE ABCP, etc, and pitch state governments under a bus?
When the Fed finishes blowing through this last 260 bp in the long bond, I think the trade will be short treasuries/long munis.
Darn, i got haloed.
Crazy - was just thinking about this comment on munis. Remember when they were a predictable, boring, mostly stable asset class - more or less a safe haven for conservative investors?
This entire economic sham has manifested itself into every nook, leaving nothing "safe". The mental stress it is heaping on average investors is really starting to show it's effect. Defaults in the munis are a given in the next year. This is a slippery, dangerous slope - one that no amount of bailout dollars can fix. Mass muni defaults...gov't services locking up - this will make the current situation look like a Sunday picnic.
dd
Frankly, I'm getting sick of the revisionist history on this subject. The Bush administration saw what was coming and proposed a solution over five year ago. Don't take my word for it, it's in the NT Times from September 11, 2003:
New Agency Proposed to Oversee Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae
The democrats in congress - Barney Frank and Chris Dodd, to be specific - scuttled the effort.
"The Bush administration saw what was coming and proposed a solution over five year ago."
How would tighter regulation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have prevented the collapse of the investment banks?