CR - the FDIC pig link didn't work for me in Firefox, and the Calculated Risk link worked, but didn't have the home page update with the FDIC thread. Using Firefox.
"The World Bank on Thursday raised its forecast for China's growth this year to 7.2% from 6.5%, citing a bigger-than-expected stimulus effect."
"China's authorities are on pace to pump an extra five to six trillion yuan ($732 billion to $878 billion) into the economy this year, or about 15% to 18% of annual gross domestic product"
And by the way, CR, that's a fantastic little editorial comment at the end there. Those 4 words pretty much say it all about our nation's fine oversight and regulatory regimes.
any reform regulation that doesn't do the following four things
doesn't allow banks to get to the point where they are too big to fail;
puts a hard wall between "main street banking" and "Wall Street banking"
eliminates incentive compensation for the top officers of depositary institutions
Require the originating bank to maintain some part of a securitized asset on its books and limited guaranteed depository institutions to only purchasing securitized assets from such banks.
is just so much Obama whitewash.
Trying to bring the holding companies within the ambit of regulation is exactly the wrong thing to do. It is the depositary institution that must be protected - it is one that is most important from an economic perspective and should be clean and simple. The remaining activities- credit default swaps, trading, securitization etc in an unregulated and unsupported entity. In a crisis the depositary institution can be spun out allowing the vultures to pick over the unregulated entity.
If some portion of a securitized asset is on the books of a bank those assets are subject to audit by the bank examiners and don't just disappear into the the ether.
Nobody has been able to domesticate a wolf and you are never going to be able to regulate Wall Street. Wall Street makes its living getting past regulations which create inefficiencies that some of the brightest and best try to take advantage off.
You cannot have an entity that
(a) has tremendous influence over both monetary levers (interest rates, liquidity provision) and economic levers (capital levels, lending practices)
(b) is independent and can resist political pressure
Unless, of course, the Congress fully abdicates its financial oversight powers
Here's a blast from the past (circa 2001) courtesy of my very old filing cabinet:
Dec. 2000: Earn More with Our 10 Month Special CD! $10K minimum, 6.90% APY. Apr. 2001: Short Term, Great Rate and Flexible Withdrawals! 91 day CD, $5K minimum, 5.30% APY June 2001: Short Term, Great Rate and Flexible Withdrawals! 91 day CD, $5K minimum, 4.60% APY
Aug. 2001:
Dear Customer,
As you probably are aware, Superior Bank FSB was closed on Friday, July 27, 2001... (accompanied by FDIC info.)
I've since gotten much better about filing and shredding envelopes. One of the offers actually hit the shredder but was from May 2001 and I think said something like 5.7% APY. That's when I stopped shredding yesterday and looked at the rest of them. At the time, I didn't pay any attention to this stuff.
"The World Bank on Thursday raised its forecast for China's growth this year to 7.2% from 6.5%, citing a bigger-than-expected stimulus effect."
"China's authorities are on pace to pump an extra five to six trillion yuan ($732 billion to $878 billion) into the economy this year, or about 15% to 18% of annual gross domestic product"
Spend 15% GDP to produce 0.7% extra growth?
This is consistent with the history of inflationary and debt-driven stimulus policies - rapidly diminishing returns with each additional stimulus, ultimately culminating in the collapse of the monetary system involved.
I can't speak to how useful it is to someone who is not already familiar with the terminology, as I am too well versed in the particulars to quite see it from that point of view, but as a piece of entertainment, surely tickles my funny bone. One would hope that someone new to CR would be able to pick up on the substance and be entertained as well.
One would hope that to some extent, China. They have a vested interest in keeping U.S. rates low, as if they get out of hand, our consumer economy would come to a bit of a halt and we would start moving into a more productive one, which would crush their industry and may lead to some unrest for them.
However, from my point of view, it does not really matter as it has just gotten too far out of whack and a correction is inevitable and the longer it is postponed, the more painful it will be for China and the U.S. when it happens.
@ac rapidly diminishing returns with each additional stimulus, ultimately culminating in the collapse of the monetary system involved.
Sometimes I wonder, what if the current stimulus succeeds? Suppose US stimulates, say 2T, and the economy recovers. Success!!!
What happens in the next recession? No president / congress wants to be seen as timid. The stimulus next time will be ... 5T? 8T? 20T? 50T?
One recoils from imagining the stimulus fail. One shudders to imagine it succeed.
I actually think it's preferable ... it's more in the spirit of CR and HCN.
I daresay the average CR reader is a few steps above your typical Yahoo Finance denizen - they'll appreciate the humor. And if someone wants more clinical definitions, there's always Wikipedia.
Besides, I'm having too much fun with it personally to want to stop now.
OT:
The unemployment rate in South Carolina now stands at 12.1 percent, according to new numbers released Friday.
The national unemployment rate is 9.4 percent.
agreed AC but I'd rather face collapse than the angry yellow horde (is that PC?)
the other day I was at the shooting range here in Cambodia firing my favorite PK 57 machine gun... talk about adrenaline...
had a fight with the wife? great stress reliever....
here's a YouTube video of the very range I go to... check out the armory...
plus the video has a Russian blonde hottie in it (she's firing the PK 57) whereas my future vid mash-up will take a different angle....
they also fire a rocket... can't do that in the States...!
Think about that final line in the context of current availability of credit for ag investment, and internal focus of developed economies dealing with their own...'issues' - recall the fertilizer manufacturers shutting in more capacity story of a couple days back
World hunger reaches the 1 billion people mark
By ALESSANDRA RIZZO, Associated Press Writer Alessandra Rizzo, Associated Press Writer – 1 hr 17 mins ago
ROME – One in six people in the world — or more than 1 billion — is now hungry, a historic high due largely to the global economic crisis and stubbornly high food prices, a U.N. agency said Friday.
Compared with last year, there are 100 million more people who are hungry, meaning they receive fewer than 1,800 calories a day, the Food and Agriculture Organization said in a report.
Almost all the world's undernourished live in developing countries, where food prices have fallen more slowly than in the richer nations, the report said. Poor countries need more aid and agricultural investment to cope, it said. Yahoo! 404 - Page Not Found
There has been a lot of talk about requiring securitizers to keep "some skin in the game." I'm beginning to wonder whether such a requirement would be enforceable, given all the opportunities for hedging.
TBTF is a myth. So is the idiotic CONcept of "we have to save wall street to save main street. Total bs. The majority of Americans were far better off before we started the finance capitalism experiment.
Lehman went down, WM, Indy Mac, GM, Chrysler all went down. Life went on. Only the ponzi part of the eCONomy was ever at risk.
TBTF is a ruse so that the sham artists in American finance can maintain their ill gotten gains and CONtrol over our eCONomy.
every time I hear this phrase "some skin in the game." I can't help thinking
about Buffalo Bill in The Silence of the Lambs
is this the "skin" talking about? I'll pass....
about failing to modify loans well i guess that is the reason countrywide got 3.3 billion hand-out so they could modify loans! that was yesterday or day before
i like sheila but she's embarrassing the big boys not playing good with others i give her between 7-19 and 9-30.
seems like theres a lot of bank buying lately
we dont have a middle class anymore so i think we need to bring down the 3 lowest tiers of the "rich"and we got our new middle class. and we tell the kids that they are middle class now that ought get spending started.
OT, but this is for Volker, a salute to the values of New Orleans...good food, good music, friends, good times...from the NY Times..unlike the frantic efforts of the rest of us..
hey one more hilarious YouTube vib (has nearly 2 million hits...) YouTube - Old woman shoots MP40 Machine gun Grandma Shoots MP40 machine gun....
listen to grandma's accent,
if that was a picture of BHO up there on the target
I bet'cha granny would've never taken her finger off that trigger
.... c'mon Granny I'll take you on with my PKM 57....
now you'all can get back to discussing serious stuff that
you have absolutely no control or influence over /snark off
"The Doyles pay $5,031 a month on a mortgage of $947,000. They have an interest-only loan at a 6.3% rate that will reset in about seven years.
Craig, a writer in the television and movie industry, is still finding work but not as much as before. This is the first month the family has failed to make its mortgage payment.
" I feel like Obama's plan has done absolutely nothing," says Craig, 38, occupation: idiot
Obama's done nothing...Obama? How about not paying your enitre month's salary on an INTEREST only loan ?
His wife worries about HER home...lady...your home is as good as gone.
They're probably going to default at a rate that makes subprime look like a walk in the park," warned Rick Sharga, senior vice president for RealtyTrac, a foreclosure research firm in Irvine, Calif.
Option ARMs have triggers that reset to a new interest rate based on either a set timeframe or when debt exceeds some cap above the loan's value. The spring drop in interest rates allowed many borrowers to escape a day of reckoning because the lower rates prevented a triggering of that cap.
I'd say Bair is in an extremely strong position with Congress. They do not want to give power to the Fed and Bair is staying in the picture as a very credible alternative. Besides, she is right on the facts, which doesn't hurt, and she is right on what resonates with people. The biggest problem with 'too big to fail' is the way it annoints certain people as special people - and they get unlimited money while others get laid off and have their homes taken away. Stuff like that leads to extreme political problems.
There wont' be a recovery even with 2T in stimulus. We make nothing of value, housing will still tank, no high paying jobs returning, interest rates will rise and of course, the consumer has no credit, money or home equity left. We'll be eating our green shoots--literally and figuratively.
Analysts put the current default rate on option ARMs at 35 percent or higher.
"We can't rebuild housing values when there's a serious risk that another set of mortgages is collapsing," said Elizabeth Warren, a Harvard University law professor who heads a government panel overseeing the spending of Wall Street bailout money.
If the subprime crisis hit like a heart attack, the option ARM problem is more like a worsening chronic illness.
Subprime mortgages caught the nation by surprise because of their short two-year resets to higher interest rates. Option ARMs reset over a longer horizon and thus are a slowly unfolding nightmare.
"This one, everyone knows it's worsening. Everyone sees it worsening," said Sandipan Deb, a credit analyst in New York with Barclays Capital, a global investment firm.
White House Council of Economic Advisers Chairman Christina Romer writes for the Economist with an important take on the recession. “As someone who has written somewhat critically of the short-sightedness of policymakers in the late 1930s, I feel new humility. I can see that the pressures they were under were probably enormous. Policymakers today need to learn from their experiences and respond to the same pressures constructively, without derailing the recovery before it has even begun.”
Nice bit of humility from Romer. We're constantly hearing how much smarter we are today than back in the 1930s ... which reeks of the justification for loose lending a few years ago (e.g. credit scoring has revolutionized lending).
Political code for "we were left out of the Fed power grab".
Exactly. My guess is she got the whitepaper when we did. It's no secret that Geithner tried to have removed.
But her doggedness is the exact reason we need an independent FDIC, whose primary responsibility is to the DIF and not the banks that the OCC/FRB/OTS regulates.
I suspect we will see a ramp up from that number this year given limitations on credit availability (and willingness of farmers) to purchase fertilizer...another thing that disturbs me is that after weeks of nothing, my Google news alerts for ug99 have pinged me 4 or 5 times this week...
Obama will have problems getting the 'reforms' passed as they are now proposed. The biggest problem for him now is political. It is becoming evident that he is not a decisive person, but more a manager of advisors. The advisors are the weak point - unelected, easy to criticize, unpopular... and seen as shills for a single interest group.
A congressman cannot get re-elected on the strength of supporting Tim Geithner.
ZURICH (Reuters) - Switzerland and the United States have reached agreement on a double taxation treaty, the Swiss finance ministry said on Friday, a key step toward removal from a list of tax havens.
Oh Gnomes of Zurich, you're giving us Gnomes a bad rep.
FDIC is only throwing in its lot with the building global consensus which is not aligned with the Fed. Geithner has always been the sopund of one hand clapping. BOE King says TBTF must be ended,. The FT reports the Swiss are exploring ending too big to fail banks. The meme that the Fed is leading the world is proving to be yet another bubble. The Fed blowing itself.
" I feel like Obama's plan has done absolutely nothing," says Craig, 38, occupation: idiot
Obama's done nothing...Obama? How about not paying your enitre month's salary on an INTEREST only loan ?"
I read that link as well. Financing nearly a million on an interest only loan at 6.3%, on a free-lancer's income....contestants for the Darwin award.
By coming out in direct opposition she is making iot more and more difficult for Obama to do anything. Look at thie inspector general that just got fired. Shit storm brewing over that and anyhting seen as political will have Obama walking on eggshells.
June 19 (Bloomberg) -- A quarter of emerging-market corporate bonds ranked below investment grade may be in default next year, according to ING Groep NV’s David Spegel.
The failure rate may jump to 25.5 percent in March from 6.5 percent last month based on the current level of missed coupon payments triggering defaults, Spegel, head of emerging- market strategy at ING in New York, wrote in a research note received today. Emerging-market borrowers missed 13.9 percent of the $450 billion of coupon payments on international bonds due in May, he said.
“This is our worst-case scenario,” Spegel wrote in the report.
Angry Saver (profile) wrote on Fri, 6/19/2009 - 9:04 am
TBTF is a ruse so that the sham artists in American finance can maintain their ill gotten gains and CONtrol over our eCONomy.
Yes, but they also own and run that eCONomy. And substantial amounts of paper that bind them directly to and influence the state of the real economy of goods and services. Declaring it all null and void, and letting anarchy take over isn't an option. It's just that the system and rule of law designed to prevent and protect against tyranny has itself become tyrannical (or always was). We can't go back in time though.
@Gnome - you mean their gov'ts aren't bailing them out and backing their debts? That's shocking! No wonder they're emerging markets - they haven't gotten with the program yet.
"Get rid of the FDIC so that people will actually lose money in a bad bank."
If that happens, it all comes undone. No one would put their money in. And really that is hardly fair as those that have caused the greatest pain, are non bank entities. I do not think you should consider a "bank holding company," an actual bank.
We'll get there the hard way or the easy way, but we are definitely headed back in time.
I disagree, but in a diplomatic way We will never revert to the same standard of living due to technology, learning curves, production innovations, etc. But we will spiral into something that is very resonant culturally and wealth-distribution-wise with an earlier time. The question for us becomes how far back we have to go.
Think about that final line in the context of current availability of credit for ag investment, and internal focus of developed economies dealing with their own...'issues' - recall the fertilizer manufacturers shutting in more capacity story of a couple days back
World hunger reaches the 1 billion people mark
thanks for the posting... I see it just about fifty feet from where I write this, women with their babies living on the street...
that's why I get a bit fed up with so much boo-hooing Stateside... come to Asia and I'll show what it means to live day by day....
you have no idea how good you have it!!
DOW 6000
your comment: " I feel like Obama's plan has done absolutely nothing," says Craig, 38, occupation: idiot
in that industry (Hollywood) which I happen to know quite well, surfaces are very important... the house you live in, the entertaining
that you do... they don't call it tinseltown for nuthin'
I wasn't speaking quite so globally. Just pointing out that if we don't actually fix the regulatory system, and write down a bunch of debt in the process (the easy way), we will have an even bigger blowup in a year or two (the hard way). Of this I am quite certain. -- and I'm rarely certain of much.
I'm not looking to go back. I'm advocating that we let the free market dispose of the ponzi debt.
The majority have little or no wealth, so it's hard to argue the majority would be hurt financially. This is a swindle for the benefit of a small minority. A free market driven debt bust is the fairest way to right the economic ship. We need to liberate ourselves from the mountain of non-economic debt.
I don't want to pay one nickel to bailout fraud. And I see no reason to bill my children for today's fraud either.
Ponzi debt must end. And screw John Thain and his $35K dollar toilet and $1 million dollar office renovation. $4 billion in bonuses to the employees of a failed MER. WTF!
it is not about skin in the game- you are quite right there are myriad ways to hedge it. The most important reason to have some of the loans on the books of the bank is that they will then be subject to audit by bank examiners- albeit on a sampling basis. This will force the banks to make sure that there is appropriate documentation supporting those loans thereby eliminating one major problem. Plus if they are on the books of banks, the examiners might be able to provide some early warning. The problem with the securitization is that nobody is accountable for those assets.
LONDON (Reuters) - Tiny mussel-like creatures living 100 million years ago made giant sperm longer than their own bodies, proving size has always mattered for some animals when it comes to sex, scientists said on Thursday.
Giant sperm are still around today. A human sperm, for example, would have to be 40 meters long to measure up against a fruit fly's. The insect is only a few millimeters in size but can produce 6 cm-long (2.5 inch) coiled sperm.
The same thing goes on in local government. They may not call it that but it does happen. Whenever a local government allows a Corporate firm to get a tax free incentive to bring their plant to a town that is bribery. I'm sure many small town or city politicians who have dreams of higher office consider how these firms that they allow into their communities for these tax incentives, will eventually want to rep
recommended : Econ & Finance Articles
When elected government officials secretly collude with bankers to create a non-governmental Federal Reserve Bank that controls the currency of the country and systematically generates inflation to allow government to spend at an ever increasing rate.
Taxing citizens to create bureaucratic government agencies and programs that fail to accomplish their mission while continuing to grow in size as politicians use them to reward the contributors to their re-election campaigns.
Hey, it's BFF today!
Round and round the wheel goes, where she stops ... hey, is that marked 'Corus'?
CR - the FDIC pig link didn't work for me in Firefox, and the Calculated Risk link worked, but didn't have the home page update with the FDIC thread. Using Firefox.
Sorry - Firefox 3.011
Market's up ... no need for reform.
FDIC there now with refresh
WSJ article on Chinese stimulus: China's Money Tide Not Rolling Out Yet
Beijing Shows No Sign of Easing Money Flow - WSJ.com
Two stats in different paragraphs:
"The World Bank on Thursday raised its forecast for China's growth this year to 7.2% from 6.5%, citing a bigger-than-expected stimulus effect."
"China's authorities are on pace to pump an extra five to six trillion yuan ($732 billion to $878 billion) into the economy this year, or about 15% to 18% of annual gross domestic product"
Spend 15% GDP to produce 0.7% extra growth?
Should we start a pool on how long Bair has left? She is obviously not a team player - unless it's all an act and she's playing 'bad cop'. Hmmm.
"Hey, it's BFF today!"
Does the FDIC have any money on hand to facilitate a BFF, or do they need to wait for some premium cash to come in?
And by the way, CR, that's a fantastic little editorial comment at the end there. Those 4 words pretty much say it all about our nation's fine oversight and regulatory regimes.
@squid - that seems pretty good compared to $13.9T in the US for 'less bad'.
BTW, who wrote the BFF entry in the glossary? It is f'n brilliant!
any reform regulation that doesn't do the following four things
is just so much Obama whitewash.
Trying to bring the holding companies within the ambit of regulation is exactly the wrong thing to do. It is the depositary institution that must be protected - it is one that is most important from an economic perspective and should be clean and simple. The remaining activities- credit default swaps, trading, securitization etc in an unregulated and unsupported entity. In a crisis the depositary institution can be spun out allowing the vultures to pick over the unregulated entity.
If some portion of a securitized asset is on the books of a bank those assets are subject to audit by the bank examiners and don't just disappear into the the ether.
Nobody has been able to domesticate a wolf and you are never going to be able to regulate Wall Street. Wall Street makes its living getting past regulations which create inefficiencies that some of the brightest and best try to take advantage off.
Too big to bail.
...that's more like it.
You cannot have an entity that
(a) has tremendous influence over both monetary levers (interest rates, liquidity provision) and economic levers (capital levels, lending practices)
(b) is independent and can resist political pressure
Unless, of course, the Congress fully abdicates its financial oversight powers
Treasury-Altered Reality Plan, that was a fat finger problem ... I hit the wrong key, and just published a title (with no content).
sorry about that.
Mook, it seems like the FDIC was a little out of the loop (at least that is they was Bair's comments come across)
best to all
Sounds like they were out of the loop.
C
CR.... remember the movie Chinatown and the closing line?
Forget it Bill, it's the FDIC.
BTW, who wrote the BFF entry in the glossary? It is f'n brilliant!
Glad you liked it! I was on kinda a tear there for about 24 hours.
@ Blackhalo - OTOH, how useful is a sarcasm -based glossary?
Mook
glad to see someone's an Ambrose Bierce fan and
squidward ... guess you've never seen millions of angry Chinese en masse...?
On the topic of BFF...
Here's a blast from the past (circa 2001) courtesy of my very old filing cabinet:
Dec. 2000: Earn More with Our 10 Month Special CD! $10K minimum, 6.90% APY.
Apr. 2001: Short Term, Great Rate and Flexible Withdrawals! 91 day CD, $5K minimum, 5.30% APY
June 2001: Short Term, Great Rate and Flexible Withdrawals! 91 day CD, $5K minimum, 4.60% APY
Aug. 2001:
Dear Customer,
As you probably are aware, Superior Bank FSB was closed on Friday, July 27, 2001... (accompanied by FDIC info.)
I've since gotten much better about filing and shredding envelopes. One of the offers actually hit the shredder but was from May 2001 and I think said something like 5.7% APY. That's when I stopped shredding yesterday and looked at the rest of them. At the time, I didn't pay any attention to this stuff.
"The World Bank on Thursday raised its forecast for China's growth this year to 7.2% from 6.5%, citing a bigger-than-expected stimulus effect."
"China's authorities are on pace to pump an extra five to six trillion yuan ($732 billion to $878 billion) into the economy this year, or about 15% to 18% of annual gross domestic product"
Spend 15% GDP to produce 0.7% extra growth?
This is consistent with the history of inflationary and debt-driven stimulus policies - rapidly diminishing returns with each additional stimulus, ultimately culminating in the collapse of the monetary system involved.
You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.
Seriously, who the F**K would be dumb enough to buy these, at yields of 0.15% - 3.82%?
No, seriously. Who the F**K would be dumb enough to buy these?
Besides Bernanke of course.
$31 billion in 3-month bills
$27 billion in 7-year notes
$40 billion in 2-year notes
$37 billion in 5-year notes
$30 billion in 6-month bills
shit, meet fan.
"OTOH, how useful is a sarcasm -based glossary? "
I can't speak to how useful it is to someone who is not already familiar with the terminology, as I am too well versed in the particulars to quite see it from that point of view, but as a piece of entertainment, surely tickles my funny bone. One would hope that someone new to CR would be able to pick up on the substance and be entertained as well.
@shill - the primary lenders have their orders, and will obey.
I'd love to see the market hand it to them, but the Fed/Treasury surely have them covered through some back-door deal.
Good thing the President is willing to use his "influence" with Summers and Geithner.
I have trouble reading that as anything other than a pretty serious, and well-deserved dis.
Was cheered to see a copy of Bierce's Tales on Kasparov's bookshelf in the new documentary.
Putin's Young (fascist) Guard would smear him by saying he took American money.
$31 billion in 3-month bills
$27 billion in 7-year notes
$40 billion in 2-year notes
$37 billion in 5-year notes
$30 billion in 6-month bills
Sen. Dirksen must be spinning in his grave ... "a billion here, a billion there" apparently isn't anything close to "real money" any more.
In this context, it's freakin' pocket change.
OT - but, imho, significant - 15 state now have outstanding Title XII Loans.
"would be dumb enough to buy these?"
One would hope that to some extent, China. They have a vested interest in keeping U.S. rates low, as if they get out of hand, our consumer economy would come to a bit of a halt and we would start moving into a more productive one, which would crush their industry and may lead to some unrest for them.
However, from my point of view, it does not really matter as it has just gotten too far out of whack and a correction is inevitable and the longer it is postponed, the more painful it will be for China and the U.S. when it happens.
@ac rapidly diminishing returns with each additional stimulus, ultimately culminating in the collapse of the monetary system involved.
Sometimes I wonder, what if the current stimulus succeeds? Suppose US stimulates, say 2T, and the economy recovers. Success!!!
What happens in the next recession? No president / congress wants to be seen as timid. The stimulus next time will be ... 5T? 8T? 20T? 50T?
One recoils from imagining the stimulus fail. One shudders to imagine it succeed.
"Still analyzing the whitepaper"?
Ms. Bair is not long for this world. Two insults in 2 minutes does not bode well.
Time to start a pool. Anybody want the over on September 30, 2009?
OTOH, how useful is a sarcasm-based glossary?
I actually think it's preferable ... it's more in the spirit of CR and HCN.
I daresay the average CR reader is a few steps above your typical Yahoo Finance denizen - they'll appreciate the humor. And if someone wants more clinical definitions, there's always Wikipedia.
Besides, I'm having too much fun with it personally to want to stop now.
OT:
The unemployment rate in South Carolina now stands at 12.1 percent, according to new numbers released Friday.
The national unemployment rate is 9.4 percent.
@Squid
Don't worry it is going to fail...
agreed AC but I'd rather face collapse than the angry yellow horde (is that PC?)
the other day I was at the shooting range here in Cambodia firing my favorite PK 57 machine gun... talk about adrenaline...
had a fight with the wife? great stress reliever....
here's a YouTube video of the very range I go to... check out the armory...
plus the video has a Russian blonde hottie in it (she's firing the PK 57) whereas my future vid mash-up will take a different angle....
they also fire a rocket... can't do that in the States...!
YouTube - Russians in Cambodia -Русские в Камбодже
Think about that final line in the context of current availability of credit for ag investment, and internal focus of developed economies dealing with their own...'issues' - recall the fertilizer manufacturers shutting in more capacity story of a couple days back
World hunger reaches the 1 billion people mark
By ALESSANDRA RIZZO, Associated Press Writer Alessandra Rizzo, Associated Press Writer – 1 hr 17 mins ago
ROME – One in six people in the world — or more than 1 billion — is now hungry, a historic high due largely to the global economic crisis and stubbornly high food prices, a U.N. agency said Friday.
Compared with last year, there are 100 million more people who are hungry, meaning they receive fewer than 1,800 calories a day, the Food and Agriculture Organization said in a report.
Almost all the world's undernourished live in developing countries, where food prices have fallen more slowly than in the richer nations, the report said. Poor countries need more aid and agricultural investment to cope, it said.
Yahoo! 404 - Page Not Found
@ Duke
they also fire a rocket... can't do that in the States...!
That's because we are the land of Freedom...
or is it the land of Fee-dumb?
Foreclosures grind on as lenders fail to modify loans
Foreclosures grind on as lenders fail to modify loans - USATODAY.com
===
The Doyles pay $5,031 a month on a mortgage of $947,000. They have an interest-only loan at a 6.3% rate that will reset in about seven years.
There has been a lot of talk about requiring securitizers to keep "some skin in the game." I'm beginning to wonder whether such a requirement would be enforceable, given all the opportunities for hedging.
@energyecon - One billion, and growing at 50 to 100 million a year the last few years.
TBTF is a myth. So is the idiotic CONcept of "we have to save wall street to save main street. Total bs. The majority of Americans were far better off before we started the finance capitalism experiment.
Lehman went down, WM, Indy Mac, GM, Chrysler all went down. Life went on. Only the ponzi part of the eCONomy was ever at risk.
TBTF is a ruse so that the sham artists in American finance can maintain their ill gotten gains and CONtrol over our eCONomy.
Ponzi debt must end.
every time I hear this phrase "some skin in the game." I can't help thinking
about Buffalo Bill in The Silence of the Lambs
is this the "skin" talking about? I'll pass....
How much will budget difficulties affect police pay in Oakland?
In Oakland, talks over cops' contract grow tense - Inside Bay Area
(describes ongoing, unhappy negotiations)
@Saver - your comments go along with my musings this morning.
Scene - CEO's office at Goldman Sachs
"So, what are we doing today, Brain?"...
about failing to modify loans well i guess that is the reason countrywide got 3.3 billion hand-out so they could modify loans! that was yesterday or day before
i like sheila but she's embarrassing the big boys not playing good with others i give her between 7-19 and 9-30.
seems like theres a lot of bank buying lately
we dont have a middle class anymore so i think we need to bring down the 3 lowest tiers of the "rich"and we got our new middle class. and we tell the kids that they are middle class now that ought get spending started.
just some thoughts
"Only the ponzi part of the eCONomy was ever at risk."
Agreed. They are trying to save the blood-sucking parasite under the pretense that the host will be better off.
I like Sheila a lot more than I like Ben and Tim. Why isn't she towing the shadow government's party line?
CR..........
"Still analyzing the whitepaper"?
what a sly devil.............c'mon....say it.........I doubledog dare ya!
""Still analyzing the whitepaper"? "
Political code for "we were left out of the Fed power grab".
OT, but this is for Volker, a salute to the values of New Orleans...good food, good music, friends, good times...from the NY Times..unlike the frantic efforts of the rest of us..
The Way of the Bayou - Opinionator Blog - NYTimes.com
hey one more hilarious YouTube vib (has nearly 2 million hits...)
YouTube - Old woman shoots MP40 Machine gun Grandma Shoots MP40 machine gun....
listen to grandma's accent,
if that was a picture of BHO up there on the target
I bet'cha granny would've never taken her finger off that trigger
.... c'mon Granny I'll take you on with my PKM 57....
now you'all can get back to discussing serious stuff that
you have absolutely no control or influence over /snark off
"The Doyles pay $5,031 a month on a mortgage of $947,000. They have an interest-only loan at a 6.3% rate that will reset in about seven years.
Craig, a writer in the television and movie industry, is still finding work but not as much as before. This is the first month the family has failed to make its mortgage payment.
" I feel like Obama's plan has done absolutely nothing," says Craig, 38, occupation: idiot
Obama's done nothing...Obama? How about not paying your enitre month's salary on an INTEREST only loan ?
His wife worries about HER home...lady...your home is as good as gone.
"any reform regulation that doesn't do the following four things....."
......is exactly what we will get. There might be words/phrases implying the "challenges" are resolved, but actually mean SQUAT.
to piggy back another story on scotto:
Worse than subprime? Other mortgages imploding slowly | McClatchy
Worse than subprime? Other mortgages imploding slowly
WASHINGTON — Call it son of subprime.
They're probably going to default at a rate that makes subprime look like a walk in the park," warned Rick Sharga, senior vice president for RealtyTrac, a foreclosure research firm in Irvine, Calif.
Option ARMs have triggers that reset to a new interest rate based on either a set timeframe or when debt exceeds some cap above the loan's value. The spring drop in interest rates allowed many borrowers to escape a day of reckoning because the lower rates prevented a triggering of that cap.
I'd say Bair is in an extremely strong position with Congress. They do not want to give power to the Fed and Bair is staying in the picture as a very credible alternative. Besides, she is right on the facts, which doesn't hurt, and she is right on what resonates with people. The biggest problem with 'too big to fail' is the way it annoints certain people as special people - and they get unlimited money while others get laid off and have their homes taken away. Stuff like that leads to extreme political problems.
There wont' be a recovery even with 2T in stimulus. We make nothing of value, housing will still tank, no high paying jobs returning, interest rates will rise and of course, the consumer has no credit, money or home equity left. We'll be eating our green shoots--literally and figuratively.
Analysts put the current default rate on option ARMs at 35 percent or higher.
"We can't rebuild housing values when there's a serious risk that another set of mortgages is collapsing," said Elizabeth Warren, a Harvard University law professor who heads a government panel overseeing the spending of Wall Street bailout money.
If the subprime crisis hit like a heart attack, the option ARM problem is more like a worsening chronic illness.
Subprime mortgages caught the nation by surprise because of their short two-year resets to higher interest rates. Option ARMs reset over a longer horizon and thus are a slowly unfolding nightmare.
"This one, everyone knows it's worsening. Everyone sees it worsening," said Sandipan Deb, a credit analyst in New York with Barclays Capital, a global investment firm.
They're probably going to default at a rate that makes subprime look like a walk in the park
======
yep and the magnitude of $$ involved is much much larger
White House Council of Economic Advisers Chairman Christina Romer writes for the Economist with an important take on the recession. “As someone who has written somewhat critically of the short-sightedness of policymakers in the late 1930s, I feel new humility. I can see that the pressures they were under were probably enormous. Policymakers today need to learn from their experiences and respond to the same pressures constructively, without derailing the recovery before it has even begun.”
Nice bit of humility from Romer. We're constantly hearing how much smarter we are today than back in the 1930s ... which reeks of the justification for loose lending a few years ago (e.g. credit scoring has revolutionized lending).
OT:
A little celebration of the beauty of the earth:
World Rose Festival offers a rare opportunity to see best roses from around the globe
@Markar,
Agreed.
The party is over and now it is time for the painful clean up.
Hangover included.
Where are my F*cking Banker Perp Walks?
Political code for "we were left out of the Fed power grab".
Exactly. My guess is she got the whitepaper when we did. It's no secret that Geithner tried to have removed.
But her doggedness is the exact reason we need an independent FDIC, whose primary responsibility is to the DIF and not the banks that the OCC/FRB/OTS regulates.
I suspect we will see a ramp up from that number this year given limitations on credit availability (and willingness of farmers) to purchase fertilizer...another thing that disturbs me is that after weeks of nothing, my Google news alerts for ug99 have pinged me 4 or 5 times this week...
Obama will have problems getting the 'reforms' passed as they are now proposed. The biggest problem for him now is political. It is becoming evident that he is not a decisive person, but more a manager of advisors. The advisors are the weak point - unelected, easy to criticize, unpopular... and seen as shills for a single interest group.
A congressman cannot get re-elected on the strength of supporting Tim Geithner.
ZURICH (Reuters) - Switzerland and the United States have reached agreement on a double taxation treaty, the Swiss finance ministry said on Friday, a key step toward removal from a list of tax havens.
Oh Gnomes of Zurich, you're giving us Gnomes a bad rep.
I think she's the best of what we've got, and whoever called her hair greasy should
worship every drop of grease in her hair.
Stafford got arrested.
FDIC is only throwing in its lot with the building global consensus which is not aligned with the Fed. Geithner has always been the sopund of one hand clapping. BOE King says TBTF must be ended,. The FT reports the Swiss are exploring ending too big to fail banks. The meme that the Fed is leading the world is proving to be yet another bubble. The Fed blowing itself.
Check out this hit piece per the China Daily on what the US should NOT be doing in Iran.
Asia Times Online :: Middle East News, Iraq, Iran current affairs
-- Switzerland and the United States have reached agreement on a double taxation treaty --
I hope its an agreement that makes it easy to renew my US passport.
" I feel like Obama's plan has done absolutely nothing," says Craig, 38, occupation: idiot
Obama's done nothing...Obama? How about not paying your enitre month's salary on an INTEREST only loan ?"
I read that link as well. Financing nearly a million on an interest only loan at 6.3%, on a free-lancer's income....contestants for the Darwin award.
People are Smart
By coming out in direct opposition she is making iot more and more difficult for Obama to do anything. Look at thie inspector general that just got fired. Shit storm brewing over that and anyhting seen as political will have Obama walking on eggshells.
Stress Tested?
June 19 (Bloomberg) -- A quarter of emerging-market corporate bonds ranked below investment grade may be in default next year, according to ING Groep NV’s David Spegel.
The failure rate may jump to 25.5 percent in March from 6.5 percent last month based on the current level of missed coupon payments triggering defaults, Spegel, head of emerging- market strategy at ING in New York, wrote in a research note received today. Emerging-market borrowers missed 13.9 percent of the $450 billion of coupon payments on international bonds due in May, he said.
“This is our worst-case scenario,” Spegel wrote in the report.
Get rid of the FDIC so that people will actually lose money in a bad bank. Prevent Moral Hazard!!
Sheila go home.
energyecon
how to gets alerts for ug99?
Angry Saver (profile) wrote on Fri, 6/19/2009 - 9:04 am
TBTF is a ruse so that the sham artists in American finance can maintain their ill gotten gains and CONtrol over our eCONomy.
Yes, but they also own and run that eCONomy. And substantial amounts of paper that bind them directly to and influence the state of the real economy of goods and services. Declaring it all null and void, and letting anarchy take over isn't an option. It's just that the system and rule of law designed to prevent and protect against tyranny has itself become tyrannical (or always was). We can't go back in time though.
@Gnome - you mean their gov'ts aren't bailing them out and backing their debts? That's shocking! No wonder they're emerging markets - they haven't gotten with the program yet.
"Get rid of the FDIC so that people will actually lose money in a bad bank."
If that happens, it all comes undone. No one would put their money in. And really that is hardly fair as those that have caused the greatest pain, are non bank entities. I do not think you should consider a "bank holding company," an actual bank.
When re-instating Glass-Steagal gets on the official agenda, we'll know they're serious about reform. Until then, it's all BS PR.
"Switzerland and the United States have reached agreement on a double taxation treaty"
United States will be gone by 2015. Next week the disintegrating process might start for real if and when auctions fail...
We can't go back in time though.
We'll get there the hard way or the easy way, but we are definitely headed back in time.
"When re-instating Glass-Steagal gets on the official agenda, we'll know they're serious about reform."
Agreed. And a repeal of the CFMA
Congress made them legal
I'll say it again:
Elephants and Asses
Trampling The Masses
Our current Fascists, sorry, political parties, are the CAUSE of our problems.
They will offer no solutions.
"It is becoming evident that he is not a decisive person,...."
..........he is an appeaser. He wants to please everyone and have none disapprove - usually a third child trait.
Stafford got arrested.
====
liz - I think you mean Stanford got arrested (in Stafford, Va)
MLM (profile) wrote on Fri, 6/19/2009 - 9:27 am
We can't go back in time though.
We'll get there the hard way or the easy way, but we are definitely headed back in time.
We will never revert to the same standard of living due to technology, learning curves, production innovations, etc. But we will spiral into something that is very resonant culturally and wealth-distribution-wise with an earlier time. The question for us becomes how far back we have to go.
I disagree, but in a diplomatic way
Go to Google News, search on ug99 (done in this link)
ug99 - Google News
At the bottom of the page is a link to create email alerts
energyecon !!!
Think about that final line in the context of current availability of credit for ag investment, and internal focus of developed economies dealing with their own...'issues' - recall the fertilizer manufacturers shutting in more capacity story of a couple days back
World hunger reaches the 1 billion people mark
thanks for the posting... I see it just about fifty feet from where I write this, women with their babies living on the street...
that's why I get a bit fed up with so much boo-hooing Stateside... come to Asia and I'll show what it means to live day by day....
you have no idea how good you have it!!
DOW 6000
your comment: " I feel like Obama's plan has done absolutely nothing," says Craig, 38, occupation: idiot
in that industry (Hollywood) which I happen to know quite well, surfaces are very important... the house you live in, the entertaining
that you do... they don't call it tinseltown for nuthin'
Resistance -
I wasn't speaking quite so globally. Just pointing out that if we don't actually fix the regulatory system, and write down a bunch of debt in the process (the easy way), we will have an even bigger blowup in a year or two (the hard way). Of this I am quite certain. -- and I'm rarely certain of much.
@ Resistance,
What about a nice geomagnetic storm?
Geomagnetic storm - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
What would that do to our technologies and production innovations; let alone our eCONomy?
We can't go back in time though.
RIF,
I'm not looking to go back. I'm advocating that we let the free market dispose of the ponzi debt.
The majority have little or no wealth, so it's hard to argue the majority would be hurt financially. This is a swindle for the benefit of a small minority. A free market driven debt bust is the fairest way to right the economic ship. We need to liberate ourselves from the mountain of non-economic debt.
I don't want to pay one nickel to bailout fraud. And I see no reason to bill my children for today's fraud either.
Ponzi debt must end. And screw John Thain and his $35K dollar toilet and $1 million dollar office renovation. $4 billion in bonuses to the employees of a failed MER. WTF!
@ Angry.
I, for one, appreciate your anger.
It's called Fascism and America is charging ahead; full steam!
@ Duke
See Me- Dig Me
it is not about skin in the game- you are quite right there are myriad ways to hedge it. The most important reason to have some of the loans on the books of the bank is that they will then be subject to audit by bank examiners- albeit on a sampling basis. This will force the banks to make sure that there is appropriate documentation supporting those loans thereby eliminating one major problem. Plus if they are on the books of banks, the examiners might be able to provide some early warning. The problem with the securitization is that nobody is accountable for those assets.
Too Big To Fail?
LONDON (Reuters) - Tiny mussel-like creatures living 100 million years ago made giant sperm longer than their own bodies, proving size has always mattered for some animals when it comes to sex, scientists said on Thursday.
Giant sperm are still around today. A human sperm, for example, would have to be 40 meters long to measure up against a fruit fly's. The insect is only a few millimeters in size but can produce 6 cm-long (2.5 inch) coiled sperm.
Just trying to lighten the mood a bit.
thank you much.
come to Asia and I'll show what it means to live day by day.... - D of CD
The old boys club are trying to marginalize her! More power to Ms. Bair. Too big to fail holds us over a barrel. Lets end it.
Going "hungry" is less than 1,800 calories a day? That's ridiculous. I'd say going hungry is no more than 1,000 calories a day.
The same thing goes on in local government. They may not call it that but it does happen. Whenever a local government allows a Corporate firm to get a tax free incentive to bring their plant to a town that is bribery. I'm sure many small town or city politicians who have dreams of higher office consider how these firms that they allow into their communities for these tax incentives, will eventually want to rep
recommended : Econ & Finance Articles
When elected government officials secretly collude with bankers to create a non-governmental Federal Reserve Bank that controls the currency of the country and systematically generates inflation to allow government to spend at an ever increasing rate.
Taxing citizens to create bureaucratic government agencies and programs that fail to accomplish their mission while continuing to grow in size as politicians use them to reward the contributors to their re-election campaigns.
Bair has been talking much and about everywhere, but a few questions must be asked:
1) FDIC's guarantee of $6 trillion is backed by what exactly, her good mid-western charachter?
2) Big banks are bad? Well, other countries have big banks that seem to be doing OK. Perhaps quality of regulation itself is more of the issue?
3) Since she has been at helm of FDIC since 2006, what stopped her mandating higher capital requirements, say in early 2007?
The Too Big To Fail doctrine is addressed more in detail in the Grayson-Glass-Steagall Act of 2009 - A proposal for regulatory overhaul of the financial system - can be read here:
Zero Hedge: Guest Post: The Proposed Grayson-Glass-Steagall Act Of 2009