Comments on: Bond Insurer Shockwaves Expand

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 05:54:00 +0000

Re: MBIA is complaining to Congress about the guy who blew the whistle.

I bet you a pile of casino chips that Congress will listen to MBIA and somehow take sides against the shorts and The Bush Admin will have The Fed use some hidden authority to banish shorts, as they are a threat to the economy….versus the reality of how the members of SIFMA are finacial terrorists!

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 05:50:00 +0000

Re: unny, nobody ever complains about “dangerous market manipulation of longs,”

Everybody loves a bubble until it pops!

By: gaius marius

gaius marius — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 19:57:00 +0000

clearly some of the officers of MBIA have fallen into that swirling void of panic, confusion, fabrication and anger that is so often the emotional toll of spectacular personal failure. shareholders should be moving immediately to replace them if possible. judging by this sad commentary, they’re too impaired to work in the best interests of the company.

By: Mac

Mac — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 19:31:00 +0000

MBIA: So those naughty rating agencies gave incorrect ratings to all those CDO thingies.

Heck, what else could they be mis-rating… maybe, us? Oh, wait…

By: Francois

Francois — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 18:42:00 +0000

"MBIA did not post collateral, arguing, like other bond insurers, that its creditworthiness was rock solid, as reflected by its AAA credit ratings."

That, in itself, was the telltale sign to short the hell out of these clowns.

And it should have triggered alarm bells and red flags all over the investment world.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 18:29:00 +0000

“…Before, the muni exposures were considered to be a non-problem. (Accrued Interest reminded us that even though in theory muni bond insurance is a scam, in practice it is valuable to municipalities for whom getting a rating is more costly than buying credit enhancement, and to muni buyers who are often very dependent on ratings in their purchase process)…” If its a scam, then it should be inappropriate for a municipality to participate. Period. The municipalities that do this now, are artificially adjusting the risk level downwards(since its now obvious there’s nothing but smoke behind a monoline’s guarantee) which will further mislead potential investors.

By: hammerhead

hammerhead — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 16:43:00 +0000

Does anyone have any idea how the ARS freeze will be resolved? It will be difficult for municipalities to float new bond issues if investors are afraid to invest in them. Hospitals and schools will still have to be built.

By: Yves Smith

Yves Smith — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 15:15:00 +0000

Anon of 9:38 AM,

Whoops, the perils of posting in haste. Have corrected that section. Thanks for the catch.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 14:38:00 +0000

News flash…Money market funds cannot buy auction rate securities by regulatory mandate. The insestors are overwhelmingly corporations, money managers and individuals. They are in a real bad way here.

By: a

Thu, 14 Feb 2008 13:07:00 +0000

“So there was considerable hand-wringing about the damage this was causing poor hapless government bodies.”

There was a time – gosh it must be 100 years ago – when it was considered a bad thing to go into debt. These poor hapless governement bodies – whose revenues, by the way, often depend directly or indirectly on property taxes or taxes on real estate transactions or incomes – are crying because they think they have a constitutional right to borrow money at a low rate of interest. Well they don’t. They will learn eventually the virtues of thrift, unfortunately it will come the hard way.