Aside from the Hollywood Cinemadustrial Complex and what's left of the munition-makers, what other jobs in SoCal would make somebody feel warm & fuzzy enough to commit to paying $500k for a house?
OT but look for the level of shut down to ramp up...
China sets out new quarantine regulations for flu
BEIJING, June 17 (Reuters) - China plans to restrict movement in residential areas and shut down entertainment centres to prevent the H1N1 flu strain from spreading, under worst case contingency plans released by the health ministry on Wednesday.
The ministry says stringent quarantine measures on incoming travellers have prevented the disease from spreading among the general population.
With 264 cases as of Wednesday, and new cases cropping up around China, the ministry's new plan seeks to address possible outbreaks in residential neighborhoods.
Schools could be closed and meetings or gatherings delayed or cancelled, the plan said.
China has been eager to show it can effectively control H1N1, after its cover-up of SARS contributed to the spread of that disease. Experts also fear the flu strain could turn more lethal if it spread widely in China, given the large population and uneven health services. China sets out new quarantine regulations for flu
| Reuters
1,400 jobs, 750 construction jobs for build out of physical plant
50M annual payroll, 35M payroll for construction jobs
A billion a year impact, some 3,500 total jobs for area. This is a shot in the arm, a pint of whiskey, a quart of plasma, and two dancing girls worth of stimulus.
The company decided to manufacture here, not China. They have the designer of the Miata leading the concept, they love us Louisianana and we already like them very much.
Scumpeter wrote of the importance of intentions in economic endeavor. These people came here intentionally, they have intentionally embarked on creating a vision. The resurrection of the domestic auto industry has begun.
Speaking of housing, values are fixing to improve round here right now. In fact, Monroe is one of the ten cities where house prices never went down, in fact continue to rise through all of the pain.
The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) today announced it has assumed responsibility for the pension plan covering nearly 3,000 workers and retirees of the Fortunoff Fine Jewelry & Silverware LLC and M. Fortunoff of Westbury LLC units of Source Financing Corp., a retail holding company based in Uniondale, N.Y....
According to PBGC estimates, the Fortunoff, The Source, Cash Balance Plan is 54 percent funded, with assets of $45 million and benefit liabilities of $82 million. The agency expects to cover the entire $37 million shortfall. The plan has been frozen since October 29, 2006.
sounds like a big nothingburger - if these numbers were goosed like UE, the normal uptick in volume as summer approaches would probably negate this and more.
energy
i'm no epidemiologist but usually a flu strain is deadly in the introduction stages then loses its lethality over a period of time. Hopefully we have seen the most lethal mutation of the strain.
Basel
ignore that dead canary and get back to work
Rather the opposite case with pandemic flu - you may be confusing the experience within a wave vs. between waves:
Wave Nature
Flu pandemics typically come in waves. The 1889–1890 and 1918–1919 flu pandemics each came in three or four waves of increasing lethality.[24] But within a wave, mortality was greater at the beginning of the wave.[25]
Can Merck (MRK Quote) raise the bar? Can Pfizer (PFE Quote)? Can U.S. Steel (X Quote)? Or Phelps Dodge (PD Quote)? Union Pacific (UNP Quote)? No, no, no, no, no and no. So what happens to them? Despite the billions in buybacks and the plethora of strong buys that the Street has put out about these companies, their stocks have no traction. They just stumble along, rising and falling haphazardly with every whim and quizzical speech of the Federal Reserve chairman that still controls their destiny.
Angry Saver (profile) wrote on Wed, 6/17/2009 - 11:31 am
I have a question for all the "Mad Money" disciples. When did Cramer stop being wrong?
There was a period in 2000-2003 where he was calling a secular bear and we even exchanged e-mails about the market going sideways until the 1% rates kicked in. Started losing the plot again in 2006, I think he's now getting more right than wrong, but not by a lot.
Thanks Angry Saver, that really made me nostalgic. Some great names in there.
Funny how some of the very same things Cramer was going on about in that speech were repeated pretty much word for word by many commentators during the housing bubble, just with different company names: New Century, Countrywide, Bear Stearns, etc.
Makes one wonder if we, as a society, aren't doomed to an endless series of boom and bust cycles of ever increasing frequency. (and notwithstanding what the POTUS proclaims, his reform suggestions today will only exacerbate the problem - giving the Fed more power? please).
You ever been a mid-level nobody at a big corp? You know things are going on. You get fragments. Then the big kids call everyone into the auditorium and let you know that 1/3 of the staff is toast. Maybe another company will be buying yours?
Thats how life feels now. You know the big kids got plans but they aren't sharing...
"I know of new hires earning $12,000/year living in company dormitories.
The Buffalo crash, in my opinion, is an example of what happens when the airlines do things like this.
More will die. "
Maximum efficiency, minimum redundancy... when redundancy can be the difference between life and death.
Reporting from Sacramento -- The state's largest pension plan is scheduled to vote today on a proposal to spread this year's severe investment losses over 30 years and save cash-strapped state and local governments hundreds of millions of dollars initially. But Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger opposes the move as a "pass-the-buck-to-our-kids idea."
The California Public Employees' Retirement System, the fund for state and local government workers, has to take action to cover tens of billions in losses from the recession. Its holdings were valued at $239.2 billion at the start of last July but plummeted nearly 30% by the end of March, a month when key stock market indexes fell to their lowest levels in more than a decade. The portfolio has since risen to $184 billion with Wall Street's second-quarter spurt, but it is still down 23% from July. Without action, cities, counties and other public entities would be hit next year with large increases in their annual CalPERS contributions -- jumping from 16.9% of total payroll this July to 24.8% next July. Under the proposal, called a smoothing policy, the public entities would pay a substantially smaller increase next year -- 19.7% of total payroll.
RE the Foreclosure Radar report: nobody really knows what to make of the reductions. There was a harder moratorium that expired during that time, so that might play a role. There's also the federal incentives to servicers to perform mods that might be playing a role. All these schemes do is delay the inevitable, however. Watch the re-default rate closely.
Flu pandemics typically come in waves. The 1889–1890 and 1918–1919 flu pandemics each came in three or four waves of increasing lethality.[24] But within a wave, mortality was greater at the beginning of the wave.[25]
The state's largest pension plan is scheduled to vote today on a proposal to spread this year's severe investment losses over 30 years and save cash-strapped state and local governments hundreds of millions of dollars initially. But Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger opposes the move as a "pass-the-buck-to-our-kids idea."
Split the baby: defer funding requirements (thus saving some current jobs) and reduce future compensation for ALL beneficiaries.
New regulations will only apply to institutions who took "significant taxpayer money" perhaps
significant=1 trillion dollars. everyone else no big deal
I'm in the Tampa area. I looked at the RE listings in this past Sundays paper. A house close to us that sold in 2006 for 490K is listed for 339K. 31% hit here in what would be considered the lower upper end homes in the area (Valrico) for anyone else here in the area. Both parents of my son's best friend are agents and don't appear to be very busy at all.
@Shill Maybe China/Russia/Brazil are scared about the months of september/october...and the uncertainties they bring. dollar collapse? stock collapse? bonds collapse? anything can happen.
"Current and future University of California retirees please note: a take-away is on the way."
Yeh, that was sorta baked in from the start. Everybody I know within range of optimum retirement age (60 with 20+ years in) has been bailing.
This quote from your link tells the tale:
"President Yudof has asked the Task Force to balance the perspectives of the long-term costs of UC post employment benefits and the need to maintain competitive post-employment benefits in order to recruit and retain quality faculty and staff for the University."
I can't speak for every campus, but people at some campuses are so underpaid that only the health care and retirement make the job worthwhile. The only way to stay "competitive" while cutting benes is to raise wages.
For the time being work is so hard to get that absurdly overqualified people are applying for grunt jobs at various campuses. But how long will that last? And if it did last for a long time, society would probably be so poor we'd have to close half the damned colleges anyway.
unlike somehow exempted, it would seem that the giant PFs (e.g. CalPERS, CalSTRS) could fall under the "financial institutions posing systemic risk" definitions...
Look what's happening. We got record deficits, sky high unemployment, jobs going away, corruption on the highest levels of government, a tax thief as our sec. of state, and a perpetuation of Greenspan's and bush's fiscal policies. just inflate your way to prosperity huh? **** the middle class. Who needs them, as long as the elite can further solidify their power with every uptick in the DJIA. and the dumbfounded, ignorant populist aren't helping
Don't get blindsided by the hype ..stomping out green shoots
Advertising by the National Association of Realtors in 2005 and 2006 after home prices had doubled in five years telling all Americans it was the best time to buy and that buying a house is always a great investment.
Both liberal and conservative ideologue pundits skewing every issue in order to prove their pre-ordained position.
Corporate titans like GE own TV networks and slanting the reporting of the news in a way that aligns with their corporate interests.
bob...what is your feeling about what they can take away that has already been promised? My sis works in CA education, and when she got the job years ago, and I looked at the retirement planned benefit, I could not believe how generous it was. First thing out of my mouth was, "they'll never be able to keep this promise."
Of course, I didnt think theyd be reneging quite so soon.
I also wonder about health care in retirement promises. If you retire now, and you get health care through the school...do you think they can take it once you are retired? I know they can decide that you wont get it if you stay on and they change policy before you retire. My mom is dealing with the same thing at a private university that saw its endowment go down 35%. And of course, 45% of the annual operating budget is funded by the endowment. So Im thinking to tell her to take what she can get now and get it before the promise can be shown to be just wishful thinking.
Abercrombie has already incurred $51 million in non-cash impairment charges in the first quarter form its "strategic review" of Ruehl's operations, the company said. The additional $65 million will come on top of that and be spread out over the next three quarters.
Separately, the company said that it has amended its existing credit agreement effective June 16. The new terms allow it to exclude from its calculation of the minimum coverage and maximum leverage ratios up to $61 million of the estimated $65 million of new charges associated with closing Ruehl. At the same time, it agreed to a reduction in its available credit to $350 million from $450 million, along with increases in borrowing costs.
Tight stops usually result in a large cash position. CALPERS can't be in cash in a low rate environment, as it blows their income and growth projections.
Anyone who's traded for a while knows that discipline always trumps conviction. In order to outperform an unmanaged index, it's pretty much a mathematical necessity to run 5% stops. Plus, a fund that size has absolutely no business in anything illiquid, that you can't sell with a mouse click.
in the good old days, before we became a full fledged casino, you could run tighter stops than 5%. Right now, if I go in at all, I watch the thing like a hawk and have my itchy mouse trigger finger ready at a moments notice. Dont trust the insiders if you are retail. They got it out for you.
I took a ride to a town of 25,000 that's sporting a 29% unemployment rate here in Appalachia out west, and it doesn't look all that different in appearance, vs. the usual 10% unemployment rate town does, I suppose.
USDA Deliberately Misleading Investors To Hide Looming Food Shortage
I saw a piece on this last week (Bill Gary's Price Perceptions newsletter). I was formerly unaware that there are right now only 4 weeks of corn in storage worldwide, the lowest in 31 years.
I wouldn't be surprised if many alumni who were regular, large donors for decades pulled the plug on gifting this year. The response could change to "Uh, I'll have to get back to you..." for former $250k/yr donors.
They can take away a fair amount and keep the old-timers who haven't retired; even half or two-thirds of what they'd get is better than nothing. And there's not much other work out there. Frankly, a lot of retirees I know keep working at least part time. 20 years at the uni. In the short run, there'll be little difference.
In the long run, if the economy ever comes back -- UC would be in trouble. They'd have a hard time keeping anybody; and since the university as I know it runs with no backup -- only one person doing a function, and if she doesn't show up it doesn't get done -- it'd be chaos unless they staffed up.
In short -- in the short run, they can get away with it; in the long run, no. But what university or state administrator is looking more than a year ahead these day?
I know nothing about what they can do to retirement medical benes, or what benes retirees get now.
For what it's worth, from what I hear, no big name school is in worse shape than Harvard Law right now. The past several years they went on an unprecedented spending spree and those donations are drying up fast...
ghostfaceinvestah (profile) wrote on Wed, 6/17/2009 - 1:43 pm
Makes one wonder if we, as a society, aren't doomed to an endless series of boom and bust cycles of ever increasing frequency. (and notwithstanding what the POTUS proclaims, his reform suggestions today will only exacerbate the problem - giving the Fed more power? please).
Boom and bust cycles seem to be intrinsic to the human condition, or at least to his condition under the auspices of civilization. Unfortunately, magical thinking about controlling these cycles through one or another contrivances also seems intrinsic to the human condition. Science being one of the better side effects of an essentially irrational impulse. Once it was done with cave paintings, once with runes, hieroglyphs, sigils derived from automatic writing... now we use mathematical equations. Not merely to describe, but to define and influence reality.
ZackAttack,
I heard the exact same thing from a person in management of a large fertilizer producer. They're reeling from oil prices, a switch to a protein based diet in China and political problems in So. America (particularly Argentina).
"I wouldn't be surprised if many alumni who were regular, large donors for decades pulled the plug on gifting this year. The response could change to "Uh, I'll have to get back to you..." for former $250k/yr donors."
In the public universities, big alumni givers are not common. They are prized like precious pearls, of course.
Alumni make a lot of gifts, but few big gifts. The big givers are usually non-alums who are interested in something that the university is doing, interested in helping certain types of students, etc. Or can be made to be interested. There don't have to be many of them when their gifts are in the seven-figure range. And many seven-figure givers are so far unaffected by the economic madness.
By the same token, loss of just a couple of big givers can make a dent in charitable income out of all proportion to their percentage of the total giving population.
I know it's not So Cal but here is a little detail on the trustee sales in El Dorado county from those numbers I posted last week. Make of it what you will but I still find it interesting
Week of 4/8/08: 12 back to lender, 4 cancelled, 0 sold
Week of 6/08/09: 23 back to lender, 3 cancelled, 3 sold
Someone mentioned a quote on boomer wealth, renters vs owners. It's from a Feb 2009 CEPR publication
'The Wealth of the Baby Boom Cohorts After the Collapse of the Housing Bubble
David Rosnick and Dean Baker
" Finally, the projections show that for both age groups, the renters within each wealth quintile in 2004 will have more wealth in 2009 than homeowners in all three scenarios. In the second and third scenarios, renters will have dramatically more wealth in 2009 than homeowners who started in the same wealth quintile. Homeownership is not everywhere and always an effective way to accumulate wealth. For those who owned a home in the last few years, the collapse of the housing bubble led to the destruction of much or all of their wealth."
And to the folks who asked for the pdf, I'll forward those today. Things are very tense on campus and in real life so I had neglected to check my email. Please accept my apologies.
Crops in the ground will be ripening over the summer and when time comes to harvest, if the dollar has got whacked in the meantime, there's an awful lot of incentive for the corporate farmers to sell their food overseas for more money, instead of here.
"And to the folks who asked for the pdf, I'll forward those today. Things are very tense on campus and in real life so I had neglected to check my email. Please accept my apologies."
Tell us about the campus tense, Jane, if you can. My department's kind of isolated. I'm hearing nothing.
Check out POT action today, they are shutting in more production and IIRC the current potash inventory is like 100% above five year average or similar? Crop yields are hugely impacted by fertilizer usage, and that is waaaaay down due to cost and financing issues...globally.
"Crops in the ground will be ripening over the summer and when time comes to harvest, if the dollar has got whacked in the meantime, there's an awful lot of incentive for the corporate farmers to sell their food overseas for more money, instead of here."
I mentioned before about how hyperinflation was in Argentina, and how the farmers started to only export the food once the currency was useless. After a while the government stepped in, but the farmers just quit and refused to work. That's what I see will happen in US as well.
Oh, and most food destined for the city got robbed on the way by armed gangs. City of Los Angeles (no internal water supply, no farms) beware.
The more the govt meddles in the market, the harder it gets for the market to function, to the point that there will be severe shortages and starvation - see USSR, Cuba, China, etc...
@CCLT: On your question about prices, nornal seasonal is for corn/beans to peak May-July, low in Dec-January and sometimes a second one in March-April. You have to consider that most grains are substitutible and are two-hemisphere crops, denominated internationally in US dollars. So a Brazilian soybean farmer's primary concern is the dollar/real exchange rate.
Scrooge,
Just before the last election, the Kircheners prohibited (directly and through export tax hikes) exports of certain staple agricultural exports. This depressed domestic prices and was popular amoung the poor and was suspected to be done for votes.
After the elections, there were orders to start exporting again, but their supply chain was broken. Someone I know with a ranch in Argentina let their peaches rot on the tree last year. It was cheaper than exporting them. This person is convinced that Argentina will soon be a net importer of dairy, possibly beef.
"I mentioned before about hyperinflation in Argentina, and how the farmers started to only export the food once the currency was useless. After a while the government stepped in, but the farmers just quit and refused to work. That's what I see will happen in US as well."
Exactly. Where did the bailout money go? I'd bet at least half of it ended up in foreign banks. Guess what they did with those new shiny dollars? Those dollars are now sloshing around into various markets, creating de facto hyperinflation (especially via oil prices), slowly at first but it will pick up the pace soon. Printing money while GDP is contracting and fast always leads to disaster...
If eurusd hits 1.70-1.80 the ECB will declare emergency and maybe even issue fixed currency rate. Then everybody else will join the party...
Around 30 million people get food stamps, which means probably 50 million stomachs are dependent upon freeloading, as food supplies are dwindling and food banks are overdrawn...
Around 30 million people get food stamps, which means probably 50 million stomachs are dependent upon freeloading, as food supplies are dwindling and food banks are overdrawn
Shadow, that's exactly the word the Kirchners use when they speak about the farmers, "greedy".
Here's a nice story about a man who delivered $800k from Hugo Chavez to the Kirchners. U.S. Links Smuggled Cash To Venezuela - NY Times
The Kirchners recently permitted Venezuela to nationalize an Argentine company's holdings immediately after a personal visit from Chavez.
Sad to hear that Argentina has gone from a net exporter to a net importer. What a fertile and beautiful country that is.....constantly ravaged by brutal government policies. That is a country I've thought about visiting on my trip as well.
The California Public Employees' Retirement System, the fund for state and local government workers, has to take action to cover tens of billions in losses from the recession. Its holdings were valued at $239.2 billion at the start of last July but plummeted nearly 30% by the end of March, a month when key stock market indexes fell to their lowest levels in more than a decade. The portfolio has since risen to $184 billion with Wall Street's second-quarter spurt, but it is still down 23% from July.
Tight stops on a quarter of a trillion dollar portfolio? I'd love to see what that would do to the market. (edit: If you convince them, remind me to load up on volatility.)
Re: Argentina and ag plays, one to keep on your radar screens is CRESY.
Sort of like a South American farmland REIT. Bazillions of acres of cropland valued on the books at something like $300/acre. The annual report gives you a great intro lesson in South American farm policy over the last two decades.
Oligarchs trying to hold power - playing on the poor for support - starvation for all..... Keep them poor and ignorant, keep them voting for the free lunch, what a disaster...
There were some on-campus discussions regarding the furloughs whch I didn't attend (someone has to stay and work). Rumor is no reductions at all for faculty, staff get nailed with 10%. Faculty retain their step increases agreements and all merits remain capped for staff. This doesn't surprise me as we haven't seen merits in almost a decade. Apparently this is the second or third time it's happened and tempers are really high.
What a great analysis! I haven't seen any article that connected all the dots this way. So the bailout spurred inflation in other countries, which will ultimately spur inflation in US via commodity/oil. Makes sense.
Sales have increased year-over-year for 11 consecutive months.
And again, after SoCal sales bottomed in 1992 after the '90-'91 recession, and began a multi-month, multi-year rise, prices continued on down to their bottom in 1996, 4 years after the sales bottom. A probable majority of conventional 20% down buyers participating in the recent 11 month sales uptick have lost their equity.
Cramer was right! That man is a genius.
Cramer rocks (snark off)
Yeah, CR, you need to start referring to this as the "Cramer bottom".
" Nemo (homepage, profile) wrote on Wed, 6/17/2009 - 2:20 pm
Yeah, CR, you need to start referring to this as the "Cramer bottom"."
Or the Crammer Bottom....
Does this bottom make my butt look big?
CR has NO IDEA what it's like out there. He has NO IDEA! CR is shameful! He's shameful!
Recessions over ! whooo !
-splat
Ahem.
Jim Cramer's Complete Market Meltdown Rant! (Uncut) - Channel: ConspiracyCentral on LiveVideo.com
Woo Hoo! Houses can only go up again! Happy days are here again!
Aside from the Hollywood Cinemadustrial Complex and what's left of the munition-makers, what other jobs in SoCal would make somebody feel warm & fuzzy enough to commit to paying $500k for a house?
OT but look for the level of shut down to ramp up...
China sets out new quarantine regulations for flu
BEIJING, June 17 (Reuters) - China plans to restrict movement in residential areas and shut down entertainment centres to prevent the H1N1 flu strain from spreading, under worst case contingency plans released by the health ministry on Wednesday.
The ministry says stringent quarantine measures on incoming travellers have prevented the disease from spreading among the general population.
With 264 cases as of Wednesday, and new cases cropping up around China, the ministry's new plan seeks to address possible outbreaks in residential neighborhoods.
Schools could be closed and meetings or gatherings delayed or cancelled, the plan said.
China has been eager to show it can effectively control H1N1, after its cover-up of SARS contributed to the spread of that disease. Experts also fear the flu strain could turn more lethal if it spread widely in China, given the large population and uneven health services.
China sets out new quarantine regulations for flu
| Reuters
I'll be honest following housing nowadays is sorta like following the LA clippers or the Detroit Lions
See how nice things happen when you let prices correct and bad debt default...
Press conference was today:
Louisiana Economic Development Home
1,400 jobs, 750 construction jobs for build out of physical plant
50M annual payroll, 35M payroll for construction jobs
A billion a year impact, some 3,500 total jobs for area. This is a shot in the arm, a pint of whiskey, a quart of plasma, and two dancing girls worth of stimulus.
The company decided to manufacture here, not China. They have the designer of the Miata leading the concept, they love us Louisianana and we already like them very much.
Scumpeter wrote of the importance of intentions in economic endeavor. These people came here intentionally, they have intentionally embarked on creating a vision. The resurrection of the domestic auto industry has begun.
Great news! You guys get out there and buy those houses! Don't wait, go now or be priced out forever.
may? Isn't that like 80bps ago on the 30yr?
Speaking of housing, values are fixing to improve round here right now. In fact, Monroe is one of the ten cities where house prices never went down, in fact continue to rise through all of the pain.
Pension fund failure Wednesday.
PBGC Assumes Source Financing's Fortunoff Pension Plan
The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) today announced it has assumed responsibility for the pension plan covering nearly 3,000 workers and retirees of the Fortunoff Fine Jewelry & Silverware LLC and M. Fortunoff of Westbury LLC units of Source Financing Corp., a retail holding company based in Uniondale, N.Y....
According to PBGC estimates, the Fortunoff, The Source, Cash Balance Plan is 54 percent funded, with assets of $45 million and benefit liabilities of $82 million. The agency expects to cover the entire $37 million shortfall. The plan has been frozen since October 29, 2006.
Cramer is calling a power bottom in RRE?
Oh my.
Everybody was looking at this thing through rose-covered glasses...
sounds like a big nothingburger - if these numbers were goosed like UE, the normal uptick in volume as summer approaches would probably negate this and more.
energy
i'm no epidemiologist but usually a flu strain is deadly in the introduction stages then loses its lethality over a period of time. Hopefully we have seen the most lethal mutation of the strain.
Basel
ignore that dead canary and get back to work
Like some have said, like politics, economics are local. Some areas will do better than others.
I expect to see a lot of new faces from in-migration in the next year.
From previous thread:
"I read about a 22 year old commercial airline pilot pulling down $22k a year, the other day..."
Unfortunately, stories like this are no longer exceptional. They are the rule, especially with the feeder airlines.
I know of new hires earning $12,000/year living in company dormitories.
The Buffalo crash, in my opinion, is an example of what happens when the airlines do things like this.
More will die.
Cramer was fooled by the rise in median prices
Cramer loves rising prices. Always has.
Does anybody remember Cramer's (in)famous "winners of the new world" stock picks at the end of the dot.bomb error (not era)?
The Winners of the New World | Smarter Money | Financial Articles & Investing News | TheStreet.com
I have a question for all the "Mad Money" disciples. When did Cramer stop being wrong?
There might even be a place for Broward
hmmm...
Rather the opposite case with pandemic flu - you may be confusing the experience within a wave vs. between waves:
Wave Nature
Flu pandemics typically come in waves. The 1889–1890 and 1918–1919 flu pandemics each came in three or four waves of increasing lethality.[24] But within a wave, mortality was greater at the beginning of the wave.[25]
Influenza pandemic - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
We needed the housing bubble to get us here, but it's like watching the Cinderella Story after midnight, now.
How have sales been doing since interest rates have gone up ?
Can Merck (MRK Quote) raise the bar? Can Pfizer (PFE Quote)? Can U.S. Steel (X Quote)? Or Phelps Dodge (PD Quote)? Union Pacific (UNP Quote)? No, no, no, no, no and no. So what happens to them? Despite the billions in buybacks and the plethora of strong buys that the Street has put out about these companies, their stocks have no traction. They just stumble along, rising and falling haphazardly with every whim and quizzical speech of the Federal Reserve chairman that still controls their destiny.
Cramer circa 2000
With rates going up should housing start to slow down?
"That's why we keep coming back to it. That's why, despite the 80% increase in the Nasdaq last year, we are looking at another record year now."
Cramer circa 2-2000
Angry Saver (profile) wrote on Wed, 6/17/2009 - 11:31 am
I have a question for all the "Mad Money" disciples. When did Cramer stop being wrong?
There was a period in 2000-2003 where he was calling a secular bear and we even exchanged e-mails about the market going sideways until the 1% rates kicked in. Started losing the plot again in 2006, I think he's now getting more right than wrong, but not by a lot.
CR will you do a post about the 90 day memoratorium on california foreclosures?
What happened with those mortgage application stats in the last couple of weeks again?
oh, yeah...
I thought they closed the sanitarium.
CR will you do a post about the 90 day memoratorium on california foreclosures?
Check my homepage for info. Much ado about nothing.
"Does anybody remember Cramer's (in)famous "winners of the new world" stock picks at the end of the dot.bomb error (not era)?
http://www.thestreet.com/funds/smarter/891820.html"
Thanks Angry Saver, that really made me nostalgic. Some great names in there.
Funny how some of the very same things Cramer was going on about in that speech were repeated pretty much word for word by many commentators during the housing bubble, just with different company names: New Century, Countrywide, Bear Stearns, etc.
Makes one wonder if we, as a society, aren't doomed to an endless series of boom and bust cycles of ever increasing frequency. (and notwithstanding what the POTUS proclaims, his reform suggestions today will only exacerbate the problem - giving the Fed more power? please).
@Max: I don't see how to get your homepage. On the same topic, what do you think about this?
California lenders held back 84% of the foreclosure inventory in May
Lenders 'doing everything possible to delay foreclosure' | L.A. Land | Los Angeles Times
Gary - Ahem, one better
The Big Picture
Russia Makes the First Call for the Monetization of Gold
Russia Makes the First Call for the Monetization of Gold -- Seeking Alpha
@Shill
great link; thanks!
Re: Cramer
Don't forget iTulip's smackdown. Vintage 2001 material.
Lawyer Liz: Just in case you're reading this thread...the latest info on possible Cali bailout.
NOT, so far.......but admin could hang a U-ie if it looks to shrivel green shoots.
Calif. Aid Request Spurned By U.S. - washingtonpost.com
Shill,
That was interesting.
You ever been a mid-level nobody at a big corp? You know things are going on. You get fragments. Then the big kids call everyone into the auditorium and let you know that 1/3 of the staff is toast. Maybe another company will be buying yours?
Thats how life feels now. You know the big kids got plans but they aren't sharing...
"I know of new hires earning $12,000/year living in company dormitories.
The Buffalo crash, in my opinion, is an example of what happens when the airlines do things like this.
More will die. "
Maximum efficiency, minimum redundancy... when redundancy can be the difference between life and death.
Greetings from the Republic of Moral Hazard:
Reporting from Sacramento -- The state's largest pension plan is scheduled to vote today on a proposal to spread this year's severe investment losses over 30 years and save cash-strapped state and local governments hundreds of millions of dollars initially. But Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger opposes the move as a "pass-the-buck-to-our-kids idea."
The California Public Employees' Retirement System, the fund for state and local government workers, has to take action to cover tens of billions in losses from the recession. Its holdings were valued at $239.2 billion at the start of last July but plummeted nearly 30% by the end of March, a month when key stock market indexes fell to their lowest levels in more than a decade. The portfolio has since risen to $184 billion with Wall Street's second-quarter spurt, but it is still down 23% from July. Without action, cities, counties and other public entities would be hit next year with large increases in their annual CalPERS contributions -- jumping from 16.9% of total payroll this July to 24.8% next July. Under the proposal, called a smoothing policy, the public entities would pay a substantially smaller increase next year -- 19.7% of total payroll.
Source: CalPERS plan to blunt effect of losses slated for vote - Los Angeles Times
The state flag is being altered to depict a bear eating its young – which in fact a male bear will do, given the opportunity.
Sorry:
Foreclosure "Prevention" Act Exemptions
RE the Foreclosure Radar report: nobody really knows what to make of the reductions. There was a harder moratorium that expired during that time, so that might play a role. There's also the federal incentives to servicers to perform mods that might be playing a role. All these schemes do is delay the inevitable, however. Watch the re-default rate closely.
Anyone have any insight as to WHY? TARP payments are being made on this day?
Capitol one just announced also?
Something smells in Denmark for sure.
4SHZL
AH HELL NAW! Email/call your state senators immediately!
4shzl
Its a smoothie! I bet it will tast good!
Greetings from the Republic of Moral Hazard:
I'm sure I could help them place some money in a high-beta cost swap leveraged return hedge fund.
For a fee, of course.
Cramer is calling a power bottom in RRE?
Yes he did. Yesterday.
Cramer's 'Mad Money' Recap: Housing Nightmare Over (Final) | Mad Money Recap | Financial Articles & Investing News | TheStreet.com
There was another article on the for-pay site, but this captures the essence of the argument.
Current and future University of California retirees please note: a take-away is on the way.
University of California Human Resources and Benefits - At Your Service
Wave Nature
Flu pandemics typically come in waves. The 1889–1890 and 1918–1919 flu pandemics each came in three or four waves of increasing lethality.[24] But within a wave, mortality was greater at the beginning of the wave.[25]
The flu is both a wave and a particle.
The state's largest pension plan is scheduled to vote today on a proposal to spread this year's severe investment losses over 30 years and save cash-strapped state and local governments hundreds of millions of dollars initially. But Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger opposes the move as a "pass-the-buck-to-our-kids idea."
Split the baby: defer funding requirements (thus saving some current jobs) and reduce future compensation for ALL beneficiaries.
Shill
New regulations will only apply to institutions who took "significant taxpayer money" perhaps
significant=1 trillion dollars. everyone else no big deal
*Note to younger people under 35
Get the hell out of CA
@Max
thanks for digging up the link
DHS just announced 1.8B of preparedness grants to local law enforcement and others. One way to help California I guess.
Its a smoothie!
It's going to take one hell of a lot of lube to turn what we (in Kahlifornia) have got coming into a smoothie.
I'm in the Tampa area. I looked at the RE listings in this past Sundays paper. A house close to us that sold in 2006 for 490K is listed for 339K. 31% hit here in what would be considered the lower upper end homes in the area (Valrico) for anyone else here in the area. Both parents of my son's best friend are agents and don't appear to be very busy at all.
For Boomers, recession is redefining retirement
For Boomers, recession is redefining retirement - USATODAY.com
•35% of those ages 45 to 54 have stopped putting money into their 401(k), IRA or other retirement accounts.
•25% said they have prematurely withdrawn funds from their retirement accounts.
•56% have postponed a major purchase.
•24% have postponed plans to retire.
"Today, I see myself working until I drop," says Kyril Wickenberg, 59, of Savannah, Ga.
sucker's rally.
FT doesn't think we're done yet.
http://media.ft.com/cms/07b1fc8c-5aa1-11de-8c14-00144feabdc0.gif
BURN!
Tear it DOWN!!!
Tarp money is being spread around today and i deleted my e-mail from the New York Fed and BSB asking for my account number.
@Shill Maybe China/Russia/Brazil are scared about the months of september/october...and the uncertainties they bring. dollar collapse? stock collapse? bonds collapse? anything can happen.
"Current and future University of California retirees please note: a take-away is on the way."
Yeh, that was sorta baked in from the start. Everybody I know within range of optimum retirement age (60 with 20+ years in) has been bailing.
This quote from your link tells the tale:
"President Yudof has asked the Task Force to balance the perspectives of the long-term costs of UC post employment benefits and the need to maintain competitive post-employment benefits in order to recruit and retain quality faculty and staff for the University."
I can't speak for every campus, but people at some campuses are so underpaid that only the health care and retirement make the job worthwhile. The only way to stay "competitive" while cutting benes is to raise wages.
For the time being work is so hard to get that absurdly overqualified people are applying for grunt jobs at various campuses. But how long will that last? And if it did last for a long time, society would probably be so poor we'd have to close half the damned colleges anyway.
Steered manure is best covered up with a TARP
Mortgage Payment Shocks May Rise in Coming Months
Research Recap » Blog Archive » Mortgage Payment Shocks May Rise in Coming Months
CALpers wanted to play with the big financial boyz & got burned. Didn't they do this once before during the currency crisis?
CalPERS warns of rate hike « Calpensions
3:18pMicrosoft CEO: 'We may be successful, we may not'
and that is my contribution to the brilliant quote of the day
thank you captain obvious
Shouldn't have CALpers had tight stops?
unlike somehow exempted, it would seem that the giant PFs (e.g. CalPERS, CalSTRS) could fall under the "financial institutions posing systemic risk" definitions...
Look what's happening. We got record deficits, sky high unemployment, jobs going away, corruption on the highest levels of government, a tax thief as our sec. of state, and a perpetuation of Greenspan's and bush's fiscal policies. just inflate your way to prosperity huh? **** the middle class. Who needs them, as long as the elite can further solidify their power with every uptick in the DJIA. and the dumbfounded, ignorant populist aren't helping
Don't get blindsided by the hype ..stomping out green shoots
good articles> 404 Not Found recommended reading
Advertising by the National Association of Realtors in 2005 and 2006 after home prices had doubled in five years telling all Americans it was the best time to buy and that buying a house is always a great investment.
Both liberal and conservative ideologue pundits skewing every issue in order to prove their pre-ordained position.
Corporate titans like GE own TV networks and slanting the reporting of the news in a way that aligns with their corporate interests.
bob...what is your feeling about what they can take away that has already been promised? My sis works in CA education, and when she got the job years ago, and I looked at the retirement planned benefit, I could not believe how generous it was. First thing out of my mouth was, "they'll never be able to keep this promise."
Of course, I didnt think theyd be reneging quite so soon.
I also wonder about health care in retirement promises. If you retire now, and you get health care through the school...do you think they can take it once you are retired? I know they can decide that you wont get it if you stay on and they change policy before you retire. My mom is dealing with the same thing at a private university that saw its endowment go down 35%. And of course, 45% of the annual operating budget is funded by the endowment. So Im thinking to tell her to take what she can get now and get it before the promise can be shown to be just wishful thinking.
thoughts?
a private university that saw its endowment go down 35%. And of course, 45% of the annual operating budget is funded by the endowment.
It wouldn't happen to be in Connecticut, would it?
More store closings..less credit...
Abercrombie to shutter Ruehl stores, take charge - MarketWatch
Abercrombie has already incurred $51 million in non-cash impairment charges in the first quarter form its "strategic review" of Ruehl's operations, the company said. The additional $65 million will come on top of that and be spread out over the next three quarters.
Separately, the company said that it has amended its existing credit agreement effective June 16. The new terms allow it to exclude from its calculation of the minimum coverage and maximum leverage ratios up to $61 million of the estimated $65 million of new charges associated with closing Ruehl. At the same time, it agreed to a reduction in its available credit to $350 million from $450 million, along with increases in borrowing costs.
basel..it would be in NJ
but there are similar problems in new haven and cambridge, etc
Tight stops usually result in a large cash position. CALPERS can't be in cash in a low rate environment, as it blows their income and growth projections.
Shouldn't have CALpers had tight stops?
I know, I wonder that too.
Anyone who's traded for a while knows that discipline always trumps conviction. In order to outperform an unmanaged index, it's pretty much a mathematical necessity to run 5% stops. Plus, a fund that size has absolutely no business in anything illiquid, that you can't sell with a mouse click.
you cant do tight stops in these markets...the insiders will find a way to blow you out over and over. You will end up hating yourself.
OT: Zillow now excluding completely valid sales. This one is a foreclosure with multiple people looking at it
6645 Medinah Ln, Alexandria, VA 22312 - Zillow
When the price gets too low, zillow just ignores it?
USDA Deliberately Misleading Investors To Hide Looming Food Shortage
Market Skeptics
( Note: Very long read but well worth the time )
in the good old days, before we became a full fledged casino, you could run tighter stops than 5%. Right now, if I go in at all, I watch the thing like a hawk and have my itchy mouse trigger finger ready at a moments notice. Dont trust the insiders if you are retail. They got it out for you.
I took a ride to a town of 25,000 that's sporting a 29% unemployment rate here in Appalachia out west, and it doesn't look all that different in appearance, vs. the usual 10% unemployment rate town does, I suppose.
Still feels very early 1930...
JD - early 1930s feel is what Marti wolf has been yipyappin about in today's FT. It's a good read.
Nevada Senator Ensign's genitals caught up in mortgage crisis - hoocoodanode?
Senatorial Affair Revealed Thanks to Housing Crisis - John Ensign - Gawker
By the way, I don't care what Mr. Ensign does with said genitals - but apparently he is quite the hypocrite. And I doubt this is the end of the story.
USDA Deliberately Misleading Investors To Hide Looming Food Shortage
I saw a piece on this last week (Bill Gary's Price Perceptions newsletter). I was formerly unaware that there are right now only 4 weeks of corn in storage worldwide, the lowest in 31 years.
Summers says new financial rules mean more capital
Summers: My bad I meant Printing.
I wouldn't be surprised if many alumni who were regular, large donors for decades pulled the plug on gifting this year. The response could change to "Uh, I'll have to get back to you..." for former $250k/yr donors.
GD9000:
They can take away a fair amount and keep the old-timers who haven't retired; even half or two-thirds of what they'd get is better than nothing. And there's not much other work out there. Frankly, a lot of retirees I know keep working at least part time. 20 years at the uni. In the short run, there'll be little difference.
In the long run, if the economy ever comes back -- UC would be in trouble. They'd have a hard time keeping anybody; and since the university as I know it runs with no backup -- only one person doing a function, and if she doesn't show up it doesn't get done -- it'd be chaos unless they staffed up.
In short -- in the short run, they can get away with it; in the long run, no. But what university or state administrator is looking more than a year ahead these day?
I know nothing about what they can do to retirement medical benes, or what benes retirees get now.
zattack-true? if so wow! does it get low before harvest every year?
For what it's worth, from what I hear, no big name school is in worse shape than Harvard Law right now. The past several years they went on an unprecedented spending spree and those donations are drying up fast...
@CCLT - well, I trust the source. I'll try to get an independent cite on it, though.
ghostfaceinvestah (profile) wrote on Wed, 6/17/2009 - 1:43 pm
Makes one wonder if we, as a society, aren't doomed to an endless series of boom and bust cycles of ever increasing frequency. (and notwithstanding what the POTUS proclaims, his reform suggestions today will only exacerbate the problem - giving the Fed more power? please).
Boom and bust cycles seem to be intrinsic to the human condition, or at least to his condition under the auspices of civilization. Unfortunately, magical thinking about controlling these cycles through one or another contrivances also seems intrinsic to the human condition. Science being one of the better side effects of an essentially irrational impulse. Once it was done with cave paintings, once with runes, hieroglyphs, sigils derived from automatic writing... now we use mathematical equations. Not merely to describe, but to define and influence reality.
ZackAttack,
I heard the exact same thing from a person in management of a large fertilizer producer. They're reeling from oil prices, a switch to a protein based diet in China and political problems in So. America (particularly Argentina).
"I wouldn't be surprised if many alumni who were regular, large donors for decades pulled the plug on gifting this year. The response could change to "Uh, I'll have to get back to you..." for former $250k/yr donors."
In the public universities, big alumni givers are not common. They are prized like precious pearls, of course.
Alumni make a lot of gifts, but few big gifts. The big givers are usually non-alums who are interested in something that the university is doing, interested in helping certain types of students, etc. Or can be made to be interested. There don't have to be many of them when their gifts are in the seven-figure range. And many seven-figure givers are so far unaffected by the economic madness.
By the same token, loss of just a couple of big givers can make a dent in charitable income out of all proportion to their percentage of the total giving population.
I know it's not So Cal but here is a little detail on the trustee sales in El Dorado county from those numbers I posted last week. Make of it what you will but I still find it interesting
Week of 4/8/08: 12 back to lender, 4 cancelled, 0 sold
Week of 6/08/09: 23 back to lender, 3 cancelled, 3 sold
Someone mentioned a quote on boomer wealth, renters vs owners. It's from a Feb 2009 CEPR publication
'The Wealth of the Baby Boom Cohorts After the Collapse of the Housing Bubble
David Rosnick and Dean Baker
" Finally, the projections show that for both age groups, the renters within each wealth quintile in 2004 will have more wealth in 2009 than homeowners in all three scenarios. In the second and third scenarios, renters will have dramatically more wealth in 2009 than homeowners who started in the same wealth quintile. Homeownership is not everywhere and always an effective way to accumulate wealth. For those who owned a home in the last few years, the collapse of the housing bubble led to the destruction of much or all of their wealth."
And to the folks who asked for the pdf, I'll forward those today. Things are very tense on campus and in real life so I had neglected to check my email. Please accept my apologies.
My source is a for-fee newsletter, called Bill Gary's Price Perceptions. He covers the grains and the softs mostly, a little bit of PMs.
Something to consider...
Crops in the ground will be ripening over the summer and when time comes to harvest, if the dollar has got whacked in the meantime, there's an awful lot of incentive for the corporate farmers to sell their food overseas for more money, instead of here.
Perish the thought~
Rosnick/baker report: The Wealth of the Baby Boom Cohorts After the Collapse of the Housing Bubble - CEPR
Zack thank you for the insight I will enjoy the read.
Appreciated.
"And to the folks who asked for the pdf, I'll forward those today. Things are very tense on campus and in real life so I had neglected to check my email. Please accept my apologies."
Tell us about the campus tense, Jane, if you can. My department's kind of isolated. I'm hearing nothing.
Check out POT action today, they are shutting in more production and IIRC the current potash inventory is like 100% above five year average or similar? Crop yields are hugely impacted by fertilizer usage, and that is waaaaay down due to cost and financing issues...globally.
"Crops in the ground will be ripening over the summer and when time comes to harvest, if the dollar has got whacked in the meantime, there's an awful lot of incentive for the corporate farmers to sell their food overseas for more money, instead of here."
I mentioned before about how hyperinflation was in Argentina, and how the farmers started to only export the food once the currency was useless. After a while the government stepped in, but the farmers just quit and refused to work. That's what I see will happen in US as well.
Oh, and most food destined for the city got robbed on the way by armed gangs. City of Los Angeles (no internal water supply, no farms) beware.
So the government still took care of the poor, right? It was just the greedy farmers that got punished... ya right...
The more the govt meddles in the market, the harder it gets for the market to function, to the point that there will be severe shortages and starvation - see USSR, Cuba, China, etc...
@CCLT: On your question about prices, nornal seasonal is for corn/beans to peak May-July, low in Dec-January and sometimes a second one in March-April. You have to consider that most grains are substitutible and are two-hemisphere crops, denominated internationally in US dollars. So a Brazilian soybean farmer's primary concern is the dollar/real exchange rate.
For corn specifically, July rain is critical.
Scrooge,
Just before the last election, the Kircheners prohibited (directly and through export tax hikes) exports of certain staple agricultural exports. This depressed domestic prices and was popular amoung the poor and was suspected to be done for votes.
After the elections, there were orders to start exporting again, but their supply chain was broken. Someone I know with a ranch in Argentina let their peaches rot on the tree last year. It was cheaper than exporting them. This person is convinced that Argentina will soon be a net importer of dairy, possibly beef.
Just one person's opinion, but an informed one.
"I mentioned before about hyperinflation in Argentina, and how the farmers started to only export the food once the currency was useless. After a while the government stepped in, but the farmers just quit and refused to work. That's what I see will happen in US as well."
Exactly. Where did the bailout money go? I'd bet at least half of it ended up in foreign banks. Guess what they did with those new shiny dollars? Those dollars are now sloshing around into various markets, creating de facto hyperinflation (especially via oil prices), slowly at first but it will pick up the pace soon. Printing money while GDP is contracting and fast always leads to disaster...
If eurusd hits 1.70-1.80 the ECB will declare emergency and maybe even issue fixed currency rate. Then everybody else will join the party...
Thanks Zattack!
Around 30 million people get food stamps, which means probably 50 million stomachs are dependent upon freeloading, as food supplies are dwindling and food banks are overdrawn...
Around 30 million people get food stamps, which means probably 50 million stomachs are dependent upon freeloading, as food supplies are dwindling and food banks are overdrawn
School being out is tough on a lot of kids...
Shadow, that's exactly the word the Kirchners use when they speak about the farmers, "greedy".
Here's a nice story about a man who delivered $800k from Hugo Chavez to the Kirchners.
U.S. Links Smuggled Cash To Venezuela - NY Times
The Kirchners recently permitted Venezuela to nationalize an Argentine company's holdings immediately after a personal visit from Chavez.
@lama
Sad to hear that Argentina has gone from a net exporter to a net importer. What a fertile and beautiful country that is.....constantly ravaged by brutal government policies. That is a country I've thought about visiting on my trip as well.
The California Public Employees' Retirement System, the fund for state and local government workers, has to take action to cover tens of billions in losses from the recession. Its holdings were valued at $239.2 billion at the start of last July but plummeted nearly 30% by the end of March, a month when key stock market indexes fell to their lowest levels in more than a decade. The portfolio has since risen to $184 billion with Wall Street's second-quarter spurt, but it is still down 23% from July.
Tight stops on a quarter of a trillion dollar portfolio? I'd love to see what that would do to the market. (edit: If you convince them, remind me to load up on volatility.)
Re: Argentina and ag plays, one to keep on your radar screens is CRESY.
Sort of like a South American farmland REIT. Bazillions of acres of cropland valued on the books at something like $300/acre. The annual report gives you a great intro lesson in South American farm policy over the last two decades.
Chart looks like crap, wouldn't touch it now.
Oligarchs trying to hold power - playing on the poor for support - starvation for all..... Keep them poor and ignorant, keep them voting for the free lunch, what a disaster...
I was talking about the Obama administration...
Scrooge,
The sour economy in Argentina makes it one of the few bargains for Americans. You should still go.
Bob,
There were some on-campus discussions regarding the furloughs whch I didn't attend (someone has to stay and work). Rumor is no reductions at all for faculty, staff get nailed with 10%. Faculty retain their step increases agreements and all merits remain capped for staff. This doesn't surprise me as we haven't seen merits in almost a decade. Apparently this is the second or third time it's happened and tempers are really high.
@timmyone
What a great analysis! I haven't seen any article that connected all the dots this way. So the bailout spurred inflation in other countries, which will ultimately spur inflation in US via commodity/oil. Makes sense.
Sales have increased year-over-year for 11 consecutive months.
And again, after SoCal sales bottomed in 1992 after the '90-'91 recession, and began a multi-month, multi-year rise, prices continued on down to their bottom in 1996, 4 years after the sales bottom. A probable majority of conventional 20% down buyers participating in the recent 11 month sales uptick have lost their equity.