I'm going to bed.

Looks like is going to tour Europe this morning.

mp, reply @ Comment by EvilHenryPaulson from thread 'New Housing Bubble in Canada?'

Okay. Done my 30 minutes of practicing sitting seiza. Time to lay down and rest up for a new work week.

Vacant stores are sign of times - Mauinews.com | News, Sports, Jobs, Visitor's Information - The Maui News

Look up to the second floor of those strip malls, and there are also more "For Lease" signs taped to the windows of empty offices than ever before, local Realtors and lease brokers said.

The two-year-old economic downturn has altered the commercial real estate landscape here for years to come, they said. Since commercial real estate typically trails residential sales and rentals (People always need a roof over their head, one expert explained.), it may be two more years before commercial space is again at a premium on Maui.

And it could be years more before expansions and new shopping centers planned long ago finally get built.

With the stores and restaurants that closed, we were aware of their struggles ahead of time," she said. "Most of them just held on as long as they could after the holidays. We may also see some more corporate bankruptcies soon, too (of franchises)."

C-SPAN2 was mildly interesting this weekend with an interview with Stiglitz who said the FED helped cause this mess...also a repeat from Dec. of Timothy Carney who wrote 'Obamanomics'...and also Paul Johnson, a historian, who said that Keynes would not have approved of hugh govt. deficits or 'vulgar Keynesianism'...

Few points on Taiwan:

1.) Closer ties with China are inevitable. Taiwan's economy is completely dependent on China. Ma won the election not because people wanted better political ties with China, but because people were tired of the economy suffering from too much anti-China posturing.
2.) Taiwan's president is as much a pro-unificationist as Obama is a socialist. Maybe deep down he is, but most of that label is just opposition political mud slinging to pre-emptively keep him from moving in that direction.

Taiwan is going to buy arms from the US and China will bitch. China will keep Taiwan out of some international organization and Taiwan will bitch. And the status quo will go on.

The big flash point in the relationship will be if China blows up economically. There's a real danger that either Taiwan sees an opportunity to go for full on independence while China is occupied, or China invades Taiwan to distract the angry populace with nationalism. Until then, I see nothing changing regardless of the cross straits outrage of the week.

LATE NIGHT BONUS FEATURE:

"Commercial rents were down 36% in October from a year earlier and were 44% below the peak in October 2007, according to Moody's Investors Service Inc. In addition, the national office market's vacancy rate is expected to rise as high as 19% by the end of 2010, the highest on record since Grubb & Ellis Co. began tracking the national market in 1986."

CASH IS KING !!!!!!

Oxtail
thanks for that. With respect to unification though, I think it comes down to on what terms with what assurances. The sense I get is that Taiwan just wants to be able to keep doing what it already is, if they had a guarantee of that they wouldn't mind changing the flag. Like one step further than Hong Kong. Which would mean indefinite stasis if taking over Taiwan wasn't the holy grail of mainland populism. When the issue does come up I wouldn't expect the US 7th fleet to be intervening, Taiwan is much more likely to be sold out from within.

US futes dipping nicely.

But Yerp looks in for some pain, Stoxx futures down 2.55%, CAC40 catching a 3.45% wave deep into elmo territory.

Ouch.

C

French and Swiss banks have some exposure (private sector loans & govt. bonds) to Greece...UK banks to Ireland...and German banks to Spain...but MrM was saying on another thread this debt will likely just be restructured with no outright default...so no problem...kick the can...

So angry when I look at TARP.

Paulson during House Hearing on TARP:
"I think the best way we can protect the taxpayer is, first of all, that the American people will benefit by having the credit they need..."

Greenspan was saying on the boob tube today I think something like if the U.S. continues to spend so much that's there going to be problems...maestro!

In fact, Slumdog was on a few threads ago talking about Haiti...and I don't think he even mentioned gold.

CR should have a thread 'bout gold and the gold markets. The new bubble that's losing air.

Not sure CR considers gold his thang.

Jitters in Yerp:

Euro, Asian Stocks Decline on Europe Budget Deficit Concern - Bloomberg.com

C

YLSP wrote:

The secrete to having a strong dollar is to have an economy that is growing and is an attratctive place to invest.

This is the old spend and borrow more forever routine. I am sure it's all sustainable. No need for a change in course.

For a smart guy, Bernanke sure seems not to 'get it'. From his point of view, the problem wasn't a credit explosion that blew a bubble, but rather an unnecessary and reversible hiccup in the growth of asset values and debt at rates well in excess of the economy. After all, there is no bubble, there was no bubble, and money was not too cheap or too easy.

The billionaire international investors who want (possibly?) undeliverable gold delivery maybe think it's their thing...especially if they can't get their physical gold...so maybe some jitters in the gold markets...that of course aren't manipulated...

post-G7 finance meeting in Iqaluit, post-BIS meeting in Sydney.... how much longer until there is some half-hearted effort to quell investor fears with the EU, a Greek budget ring fence? guaranteed EU bonds in exchange for fiscal consolidation? some tap-dancing?

The global finance/central banking system is not an 'organized' international network. Say this enough and it will become true.

This is all from September 24 hearing where Bernanke and Paulson pitched TARP togteher:
Mr. BERNANKE. Well, first, I am not comparing the current situation with the Great Depression, but a lot of what you said, there is some relevance. In particular, the Great Depression was triggered by a series of financial crises. Stock market crash, collapse of the banks, and the effects on credit and on money were a very big part of what happened then.

Now we have a very, very different financial system. It is much more sophisticated and complicated, it is much more global. We also have a much bigger and more diversified economy. But what that episode illustrates, as do many other episodes in history, is that when the financial system becomes dysfunctional, the effects on the real economy are very palpable.

Mr. MEEKS. Okay. But again, why wouldn’t they want to then
not replace the loss of shareholder value first before lending out
money? Since they lost it, why wouldn’t they want to replace their
shareholder value first as opposed to lending out money once
they—
Mr. BERNANKE. They maximize their shareholder value by mak-
ing good loans, and that is their business. That makes them valu-
able.

Counterpointer wrote:

What part of the financial system is BB referring to?

I wish I could figure these guys out.

Sometimes it's like they're in an alternate universe but it doesn't seem like they're lying.

What does Ben know that we don't that makes him incomprehensible?

This is his testimony to sell TARP.

The USD has risen as much in 2 months as it took 5-6 months to fall
too much is happening too fast without any real underlying change in views
investors are begging to take a breather, they just need a nudge to encourage concerted action and safety in numbers
things have fallen, but everything including oil is still within what would be a comfortable decline and a perfect buying opportunity for the improvements of fund inflows
step aside from the political headlines, and the economic data are still setting post-global financial crisis records for improvement
yes depending on the specific part of the world the writing is on the wall for credit expansions being limited by inflation worries, or fiscal expansions being limited by balance sheet worries... but look at interest rate expectations, the steepness on yield curves
the only way this makes sense to the majority of investment controllers is if it's just a expected mild pullback, it's not like the EU would ever be punished financially if it just let Greece declare bankruptcy, on the whole there's no where else to turn to instead, only liquidity disruptions have much power for now
in a few years it comes down to debt repayment and stagnation/decline or debt abandonment and growth (or neither if debt levels are stable and income is not vulnerable to trading partners who are unstable)
regardless of whatever may be signalled today, investors will lap up any and all growth exposure on the market despite a likely checkered credit history
the key factor that matters is how the different generations within a country will handle everything

C'mon, he's a turnaround ace. Turned around Merrill from the brink that Stan O'Neal had brought it to.

Around, over, and ... down the sh!tter.

It should be fairly simple to plot time in position for his last 4 jobs. Linear projection, CIT gets, what, 4 months?

C

EvilHenryPaulson wrote:

The USD has risen as much in 2 months as it took 5-6 months to fall
too much is happening too fast without any real underlying change in views...

There must be a lot of big moves going on in the shadow CDS markets, that normal investors, and probably the gov. can't really see. I'll wager someone TBTF is going to end up BK without any warning. I suspect it will be like AIG, nationalized overnight with the gov on the hook for the $$$. Funneled to the counterparties at 100 cents on the dollar, of course.

Counterpointer wrote:

But not your gov. Not this time.

Not our gov't.

European.

wait until America wakes up and takes over
The New Orleans Saints won the superbowl and the federal government is frozen, both are bullish indicators
again, more like the start of 2008 than fall, summer, or even spring 2008

EvilHenryPaulson wrote:

I'm going to have to look for my reflection in a mirror

Would that mean six more months of Olympics?

Well, it's op ex manipulation Friday, so they just might. Also 10y note up on the block on Wed, long bond on Thursday.

C

Looks like someone is sensitive to critics discussing the fall in the purchasing power of the $. Nice smoke and mirrors play.....

Weak Dollar Illusory as Correlated Trade Shows Gains (Update1) - Bloomberg.com

EvilHenryPaulson wrote:

if it just let Greece declare bankruptcy,

EHP during the Asian crisis Malaysia defied conventional wisdom by instituting capital controls and all the terrible things that the financial pundits said would happen didn't - in fact Malaysia did better rather than worse. Argentina defaulted and it too didn't suffer after doing so. If Greece a member of the EU defaults that could really set the precedent for others. That has to be a truly scary proposition.

morning gabyjan: I was yapping on the telephone..lol. I have a pretty snow today finally.

YouTube - Bangles - Manic Monday - 1986

Double dip was bound to happen, you can only delay the inevitable not prevent it. There was no way to re-inflate the bubble and we are seeing the second act of this opera play out. I know my "investments" these days are in paying down debt. At the rate I'm going our family of 4 with a nice, modest, home will be debt free in a year or two. The banks have brought this on themselves by offering no decent returns anywhere.

Good morning everyone. Your Saints won HomeGnome! I had a very weird dream last night. My wife and I were living in a broom closet in a Chinese Hospital. It was unused, and we would sneak out at night and raid the cafeteria. We were scared to death because we didn't have our passports and the risk of discovery was growing everyday. A dream filled with great dread. Hate waking up with a sense of dread. This one was interesting because I was aware I was dreaming, observation mode, but I couldn't do anything about the dream...

Double dip was bound to happen, you can only delay the inevitable not prevent it.

You make it sound as if it already happened. I'm not as sure as you seem to be. Show me an spx break below 1030, and I'll come on board as a bear. Meantime I'll watch.

TrimTabs: Here's Why The Real Jobs Loss Number Was 5x Worse Than What The BLS Reported

The BLS has seriously underreported job losses for the past two years due to their flawed methodology. TrimTabs has identified the following four problems:

1. The BLS employment estimate is based on a survey, and not on an actual count of employees

   . While the BLS survey is large and supposedly designed to capture the complex nature of the employment market, it is still a survey and therefore subject to error. TrimTabs believes that rapid changes in an employment cycle cannot be captured by surveys.

2. Several times a year, the BLS applies enormous seasonal adjustments to their survey results to account for seasonal fluctuations in the job market. For example, this January, the BLS added 1.92 million jobs to their survey results to report a job loss of 20,000 to account for the layoff of retail holiday workers. In our opinion, the sheer magnitude of the seasonal adjustment which dwarfs the monthly result renders this month’s job loss estimate meaningless.
3. At the time of the first release, only 40% to 60% of the BLS survey is complete and is subject to large revisions over the next two months.
4. The BLS applies a mysterious “birth/death” adjustment to their survey results to account for business openings and closings. While the payroll data was adjusted substantially, the “birth/death” adjustments were left unchanged. In 2008 and 2009, the BLS’ “birth/death” adjustment added 904,000 and 882,000 jobs, respectively, for a total of 1.79 million. By way of comparison, in 2006 and 2007, the BLS’ “birth/death” adjustment added 964,000 and 1.13 million jobs, respectively. We find it highly unlikely that in 2008 and 2009, during the worst recession since the 1930’s, more businesses opened than closed netting 1.79 million jobs.

Testy Conflict With Goldman Helped Push A.I.G. to Edge - NY Times

How about some Yeats this morning....this one was going through by head last night too...
The Stolen Child

Where dips the rocky highland
Of Sleuth Wood in the lake,
There lies a leafy island
Where flapping herons wake
The drowsy water rats;
There we've hid our faery vats,
Full of berrys
And of reddest stolen cherries.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.

Where the wave of moonlight glosses
The dim gray sands with light,
Far off by furthest Rosses
We foot it all the night,
Weaving olden dances
Mingling hands and mingling glances
Till the moon has taken flight;
To and fro we leap
And chase the frothy bubbles,
While the world is full of troubles
And anxious in its sleep.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.

Where the wandering water gushes
From the hills above Glen-Car,
In pools among the rushes
That scarce could bathe a star,
We seek for slumbering trout
And whispering in their ears
Give them unquiet dreams;
Leaning softly out
From ferns that drop their tears
Over the young streams.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.

Away with us he's going,
The solemn-eyed:
He'll hear no more the lowing
Of the calves on the warm hillside
Or the kettle on the hob
Sing peace into his breast,
Or see the brown mice bob
Round and round the oatmeal chest.
For he comes, the human child,
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than he can understand.

My Way News - Stock investors see threats from all directions

By TIM PARADIS
NEW YORK (AP) - The threats seem to be coming from all directions.

Jittery stock traders react to each day's news as if it could be the start of Financial Crisis 2.0. On Thursday, the Standard & Poor's 500 index suffered its biggest one-day drop in more than nine months because of worries about debt problems in Greece, Portugal and Spain. Concerns about China's plans to limit economic growth and proposed regulatory bank changes from Washington also have pummeled the market.

The fears aren't as intense as in 2008, when the S&P 500 fell 38.5 percent. But January was the worst month for the market since it began its recovery last March. And the S&P 500 has fallen 7.3 percent from the high of 1,150.23 it reached Jan. 19.

Man I missed the most of the first half...was cooking steaks myself. Had a huge wind gust and all my steaks started burning...I managed to save them mostly, but the garlic bread was toast......by the time I got back to them, they were charred beyond recognition. What I get for trying to grill in windy weather.

Five myths about how to create jobs - washingtonpost.com

1. Surely there's a quick fix.
   Oh, were only that the case.
2. The key to boosting employment quickly is to help small businesses.
   New jobs come from both small and big businesses. From 1987 through 2005, nearly a third of the net new jobs were created by businesses that each employed more than 500 workers.
3. High-tech jobs will solve the problem.
   There is a lot of talk these days about green businesses, biotechnology and other emerging industries that will create the jobs of the future. While they are obviously part of the solution, these industries are too small to create the millions of jobs that are needed right away.
4. Higher productivity -- when an economy produces more goods and services per worker -- kills jobs.
   Not so. While productivity growth means that individual companies may need fewer employees in the short term, it spurs long-term gains in the economy as a whole.
5. Increasing exports will revive manufacturing employment.
   Maybe for some companies in some industries, but not for the economy overall. While it's painful to accept, reducing unemployment is not mainly about regaining the jobs that have been lost.

Bubblisimo Gerkinov wrote:

Yep ... that's what I saw.

What I saw was that the team with the better defense won; defenses win championships. Also helped that NO had a better than decent offense.

The onside kick was a turning point. 'Ballsy' so to speak.

*"The onside kick was a turning point. 'Ballsy' so to speak." *

I didn't see it........someone said it was TOTALLY unsuspected....