December 2008
“’Six hundred twenty is not a subprime score,’ GM’s sales and marketing chief...”
– - Automotive News (12/30/08)
Good luck with that.
Open wide...
From WSJ:
Mortgage ‘Cram-Downs’ Loom as Foreclosures Mount
Mortgage lenders who wake up Thursday with a New Year’s hangover are likely to face another headache soon: The effort to give bankruptcy judges the power to rewrite mortgages is gaining steam.
The banking industry hoped the mortgage “cram-down” measure died when Congress removed it from the $700 billion...
2008: The second least active solar year since...
From Investor’s Business Daily:
The Warm Turns
Posted 12/30/2008
Climate Change: The Earth has been warming ever since the end of the Little Ice Age. But guess what: Researchers say mankind is to blame for that, too.
As we’ve noted, 2008 has been a year of records for cold and snowfall and may indeed be the coldest year of the 21st century thus far. In the U.S., the National...
Reflections on Annus Horribilis...
The Great Crash, 2008 A Geopolitical Setback for the West By Roger C. Altman
The financial and economic crash of 2008, the worst in over 75 years, is a major geopolitical setback for the United States and Europe. Over the medium term, Washington and European governments will have neither the resources nor the economic credibility to play the role in global affairs that they otherwise would have...
Part 3 of 3: From Triple A to Toxic Soup
Part 1: A Beautiful Machine
Part 2: A Crack in The System
Part 3: Downgrades And Downfall
From Naked Capitalism:
GMAC: A Mini-AIG in the Making?
Dwight Cass at BreakingViews makes some astute and troubling observations about the GMAC rescue, which spurred a market rally in the face of truly awful economic releases (one might take the cynical view that, given how thin trading is this week and the tape-painted appearance of the end-of-day recovery in stocks yesterday, that a rally was...
Worse than it looks? Stay tuned...
From Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, DC:
Falling House Prices: It’s Worse Than It Looks
The October data from the Case-Shiller index showed another sharp price decline, with prices in each of the 20 cities in the index falling from the prior month. However bad the picture appears, the current reality is likely somewhat worse.
It is...
From the NY Times: Breaking Up Is Harder to Do After Housing Fall
With nearly one in six homes worth less than the mortgage owed on it, according to Moody’s Economy.com, divorce lawyers and financial advisers around the country say the logistics of divorce have been turned around. “We used to fight about who gets to keep the house,” said Gary Nickelson, president of the American Academy of...
“Confidence is a fragile commodity.”
New York, Boston Real Estate Prices Expected to...
“Right now, people are still living on last year’s bonus,” says Barclays Capital economist Ethan Harris, who is based in New York. “You can sort of feel the local economy on the edge of a cliff.”
From WSJ:
Although New York has been at the epicenter of the financial crisis, housing prices in the city haven’t dropped nearly as fast as cities elsewhere. The...
Link-a-palooza
Madoff Spotlight Turns to Role of Offshore Funds
NY Times
12/30/2008 09:14 PM
Money flows out of hedge funds at record rate
FT ($)
12/30/2008 09:16 PM
Dollar Heads for Biggest Annual Drop Against Yen in Two Decades
Bloomberg
12/30/2008 07:53 PM
$135b still frozen by an early ‘08 debacle
Boston Globe
12/31/2008 05:08 AM
Fed Selects Four Firms to...
China: Back to the future
From Minyanville:
Professor Fil Zucchi writes about a mass exodus of Chinese workers back to the farms.
I had a chance to chat at length with a Chinese-American businessman whose company owns manufacturing operations in China. He suggested that the Chinese government has pretty much given up on the notion of being able to transform its export economy to a domestic, consumer-based one....
Hold your nose...Greenwich, CT seeks bailout...
Greenwich seeks a piece of the stimulus pie By Neil Vigdor. Staff Writer It didn’t exactly amount to the three wise men bearing gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh, but a trio of Greenwich politicians held formal talks on Christmas Eve to discuss the town’s strategy for getting a piece of an anticipated $700 billion economic stimulus package for infrastructure projects.
First...
A sign of the times...
Pawnshop Clients Now Drive BMWs
More callers are cutting the landline cord
From Triple A to Toxic Soup...
Part 1: A Beautiful Machine
Part 2: A Crack in The System
Appearing Wednesday: Downgrades and downfall
Link-a-palooza
GMAC To Get $6 Billion Lifeline
Washington Post
12/30/2008 05:15 AM
Speculative-Grade Distress Ratio Rises to 85 Percent
Bloomberg
12/29/2008 04:25 PM
Dismal holiday sales weigh on mall owners
Reuters
12/30/2008 05:12 AM
Lehman bankruptcy filing wiped out billions
Reuters
12/30/2008 05:11 AM
Nikkei closes last session of worst-ever year
FT
...
2008: The year the notebook overtook the desktop
From NEW YORK (AP):
Shipments of notebook computers edged passed desktop sales in the third quarter for the first time, according to data from the research firm iSupply. Preliminary figures for the quarter show notebook PC shipments shot up 40% from the same period a year ago to 38.6 million. Meanwhile desktop shipments fell 1.3% to 38.5 million. The numbers underscore a broader shift toward...
A fascinating article from The Economist on the... →
Hard to see how this will be competitive vs....
From Scientific American:
Storing the Breeze: New Battery Might Make Wind Power More Reliable
Using a massive battery to store electricity generated by wind may make it more reliable—and cheaper.
Winter winds howl off the Dakota prairie through Minnesota, turning the 1,100 megawatts worth of wind turbines in Xcel Energy’s system in that state. By 2020, the utility expects to more...
God speed, Samuel Huntington →
A cheesier cheese?
Chuck-E-Cheese-Like Product: Hit by rising dairy costs, the scientists at CEC Entertainment, which operates Chuck E. Cheese, decided to offset these prices by coming up with their own cheese, which notably was made with products other than cheese. The new mozzarella product, they said, “provides our guests with a cheesier taste,” said Mike Magusiak, president of CEC, who explained it “spreads...
Is the SEC asleep at the wheel (yet again)?
Gaming in Dark Pools
Rob Curran reports:
The rapid evolution of modern markets has caught securities regulators off guard in many instances this year, and they may be overlooking the scope of another problem in the rapidly growing alternative stock exchanges known as dark pools.
One hedge fund manager says the only thing stopping him gouging clients of dark pools is his lawyer and his scruples....
Maybe the 'Burbs aren't so boring after all...;-)
From Footnote.org:
Life in the burbs…
A few years ago, friends of mine were going through a rough patch in their marriage because she was spending too much time on a site called Adult Friend Finder (no link included for firewall reasons) — something that the husband only found out about after hiring a private detective. I was fascinated with the story, in part because I thought that bored...
Remember when everyone was worried about this?
Military recruiters having no trouble filling quotas
In a crumbling economy, jobs disappear and opportunities fade. But one employer always has openings: the U.S. military. Just four years after South Florida recruiters struggled to meet even half their quotas, the Army is exceeding enlistment goals by appealing to a wide range of candidates who see limited job options in the civilian world....
Gaza boils over...
Images of Hamas targets released Sites struck by IAF fighter pilots in Operation ‘Cast Lead’ —Israel National News
Israel pounds Gaza for 2nd day ‘A time for calm and a time for fighting, and now the time has come to fight’ —Reuters
Year of intelligence-gathering yields ‘alpha hits’ More than 170 pre-selected targets struck by IAF aircraft...
Link-a-palooza
A Mortgage Paper Trail Often Leads to Nowhere
NY Times
Morgenson
12/27/2008 02:16 PM
2008 could nail its spot as worst year ever for Wall Street
Reuters
12/27/2008 05:01 AM
Accounting Standards Wilt Under Pressure
Washington Post
12/27/2008 05:07 AM
Older Investors Should Examine the Risks in Bonds
NY Times
12/27/2008 04:59 AM
Madoff Must Reveal All...
Why Does Hollywood Hate the Suburbs?
America’s long artistic tradition of claiming spiritual death by station wagon
How to win friends and influence people...
Little Blue Pills Among the Ways CIA Wins Friends in Afghanistan
By Joby Warrick Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, December 26, 2008; A01
The Afghan chieftain looked older than his 60-odd years, and his bearded face bore the creases of a man burdened with duties as tribal patriarch and husband to four younger women. His visitor, a CIA officer, saw an opportunity, and reached into his bag for...
Own a piece of Fenway Pawk (and the team that...
Times Co. Seeks Buyer for Its Stake In Red Sox Article
By RUSSELL ADAMS Seeking to fortify its core assets, New York Times Co. is actively shopping its stake in the holding company of the Boston Red Sox baseball club, according to two people familiar with the discussions.
More…
Go with your gut!
Our unconscious brain makes the best decisions possible
Researchers at the University of Rochester have shown that the human brain—once thought to be a seriously flawed decision maker—is actually hard-wired to allow us to make the best decisions possible with the information we are given. The findings are published in today’s issue of the journal Neuron.
More…
Ignominious Seven From 2008
from Breakingviews.com: The financial crisis of 2008 was full of surprises. Among the most stupefying were the tales of financial wheezes people thought were a good idea during the preceding bull market. More will surely emerge as gallons of toxic waste slosh out of banks and hedge funds in 2009. While waiting for the full inventory, here are seven that with luck we won’t see again.
¶PIK toggles....
The Winds of War....
India warns citizens of unsafe travel to Pakistan… Pakistan moves troops toward border… U.S. URGES CALM… Indian PM meets military chiefs…
2008 Lookback: Of All the Nerve
From WSJ MarketBeat:
Posted by David Gaffen
Market meltdowns have a way of revealing the true nature of many people. It’s a given that Wall Street produces more than its fair share of the egotistical and greedy, but in 2008, some public figures, through their actions and statements, managed to set new highs in terms of their sheer audacity. The things done or said by these folks engendered a...
Link-a-palooza
Ruble Falls to Record Low Versus Euro as Russia Weakens Defense
Bloomberg
12/26/2008 04:05 AM
California Bond Yields Rise to Four-Year High on Budget Impasse
Bloomberg
12/26/2008 04:03 AM
Japan’s Recession Deepens as Factory Output Plummets
Bloomberg
12/26/2008 04:05 AM
S.Korea says economy faces unprecedented crisis
Washington Post
12/26/2008 04:39 AM
...
