NYC Opens Hotlines To Texting Tipsters CBS News
Anti-Palin rally draws hundreds in Alaska USA Today. Perhaps more important, the anti-Palin crowd outnumbered the backers.
The Joys of Ownership Gretchen Morgenson, New York Times
Desperate companies turn to ‘usurious’ hedge funds The Independent
Endgame in the banking sector Willem Buiter
Credit and blame Economist (hat tip reader Jorgen)
Antidote du jour:
SPECTRE of Deflation says: “Anti-Palin rally draws hundreds in Alaska USA Today. Perhaps more important, the anti-Palin crowd outnumbered the backers.”
What do the polls say, not that I’m not impressed with her losing the vote at the Bullwinkle Cafe? You are really stretching on this one, but true believers always do.
Bob_in_MA says: Yves: So an impediment is that no one wants to expose where the market for dodgy commercial real estate debt is because everyone is afraid of being held to current market valuations (yes, the argument will be that Lehman is forced to sell at “fire sale” prices, that is, that a Lehman liquidation would be so large that it would artificially depress prices. But is this mere price discovery?)
That very succinctly sums up the situation. The LTCM bailout (or bail-in as Roubini calls it) was to allow the orderly liquidation of assets that had fallen in value.
In Lehman's case (and Bear Sterns, etc), it is to obfuscate the fall in value of assets. This is essentially the purpose of most of the Fed's (and ECB's) new credit facilities.
The assumption is that these assets will very quickly jump back in value. But did anyone make that assumption in 1998, or in the S&L crisis?
This is obviously the Japanese playbook, but we start with much greater debt at all levels.
ScottH says: I urge everyone to read “Endgame in the banking sector” by Willem Buiter at the link above. It is excellent.
Alex says: Doc, I believe the photo refers to an owl straining to get a level view of the U.S. financial system after it has just gone tits-up.
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FYI: According to Gary Kraftsow, author of “Yoga for Transformation”, many yoga positions aren’t relevant to everybody.
FYI: The rotation of the head of the barred owl is about 270 degrees. This unusual degree of rotation is due to the fact that owls have 14 neck vertebrae (we have 7) and a swivelling bone structure at the base of the neck. An owl’s body can face forward while the head is facing directly behind. Owls can’t move their eyes the way people can. We can see from side to side and move our eyes without turning our heads. Owls can’t – their eyes are fixed in the sockets so they must move their heads.
FYI: I can’t anything related to this image, but remain on high alert.