If you has only a passing interest in oil prices, it was not hard to notice the gaping price disparity between the two most widely quoted indexes, the current month Brent crude futures versus WTI (West Texas Intermediate), In the days prior to contract expiration in December, WTI traded as much as $9 below Brent. […]
Read more...This blog from time to time has commented on deteriorating economic conditions in China, and expressed the view that the slowdown is likely to be worse than most mainstream forecasters have anticipated (although the projections are now being revised downward). That sort of post has often lead to reader comments that a lower level of […]
Read more...The amazing intelligence of crows Joshua Klein (hat tip reader Richard) Light pollution forms ‘eco-traps’ BBC Was Tycho Brahe Murdered by a Contract Killer? Der Spiegel (hat tip reader Ilja) Troubled Technologies: An ’09 Watch List Internet Evolution 8 years in 8 minutes Keith Olbermann (hat tip reader Paul) Global imbalances and the Triffin dilemma […]
Read more...Steve Waldman offers a radical and unconventional cure to our financial mess. Stop lending. Waldman is deadly serious and thinks our attachment to lending is based on dangerously flawed premises: I am glad that the banks, for all the hundreds of billions of dollars we are giving them, are not lending. That is not because […]
Read more...As readers may recall, we have been skeptical of the TARP from the get-go. As the program ricocheted from one high concept to another, one had to wonder: were Paulson and the Treasury truly that incompetent, or was the seeming cluelessness, as some have suggested, a cover for a program to transfer funds to the […]
Read more...Pickings are thin tonight! Please send links! Bronx Zoo, NY Aquarium Face Layoffs Gothamist. Actually, they’ve begun. Please consider signing a petition. Europe launches antitrust attack on Microsoft Financial Times Merrill to Pay $550 Million in Subprime Settlements Bloomberg Economists were invented to make astrologers look good Josh Reviews Everything Antidote du jour:
Read more...Of course, it takes one to know one. The no-doubt accurate call on the health of British banks comes from one of their own, Royal Bank of Scotland. Funny how no US bank is willing to make the same call. From the Independent: Britains biggest banks are “technically insolvent”, Royal Bank of Scotland said yesterday… […]
Read more...Farms to take heat out of warming BBC Martian Methane Reveals the Red Planet is not a Dead Planet NASA Toddlers as young as two treated for obesity on NHS, says dietician Telegraph THE FLY SHOW – Asshat of the Year 2008 Barry Ritholtz The 10 most unethical people in business Tom Kostigen, Marketwatch. I […]
Read more...We have said from time to time that we had expected growth in China to be lower than mainstream forecasts. Although China is not as export dependent as widely believed, it had been enjoying not only a trade boom, but also a commercial real estate bubble. With two engines of growth in stall, China seems […]
Read more...The market’s case of nerves this week seems a tad more justified, given that the details of the Bank of America rescue plan are apparently out, Previous press reports suggested the Charlotte bank might need $8 to $10 billion of additional equity to compensate for losses related to the Merrill acquistion. Yes, as Senator Everett […]
Read more...R.i.P. Ricardo Montalban Brad DeLong Hallucinations more common in people who drink lots of coffee BBC Ethics Exam Cassandra Care for a Silkworm With Your Tang? Science The Startling Dropoff in Trade Flows Menzie Chinn A cat fight at the Fed Tim Iacono OECD warns over growth in China, Germany and Russia as downturn goes […]
Read more...We posted this in June: The Wall Street Journal reports today that Citigroup is shutting down Old Lane Partners, a hedge fund started by Vikram Pandit that the bank acquired a mere 11 months ago. The bank decided it couldn’t spare the capital to shore up the struggling hedge fund. The article noted: Old Lane […]
Read more...Predicting the demise, or at least the marginalization of the euro is a popular pastime for some writers (Ambrose Evans-Pritchard of the Telegraph, one of our favorite deflationistas, engages in occasional euro-bashing). Similarly, quite a few investors I know think the euro has no hope of serving as a reserve currency. particularly because some eurozone […]
Read more...One of the problems with trying to gauge foreclosure activity is that the data is pretty poor. We discussed this problem last year in “Foreclosure Stats: Pick a Number, Any Number“: We’ve noted more than once that quite a few government statistics near and dear to analysts and investors, such as GDP, inflation, and employment […]
Read more...Those of you antique enough to remember Peter Lynch, storied investor who took Fidelity’s once obscure Magellan fund from $18 million to $14 billion in assets (and a seemingly unmanageable 1,000 positions) may also recall that he was famous as a tireless stockpicker. He wrote a book for retail investors, Beating the Street. One of […]
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