Submitted by Leo Kolivakis, publisher of Pension Pulse. Bloomberg reports that U.S. stocks rose for a fourth week, pushing the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index above 1,000 for the first time since November, as better-than-estimated employment, manufacturing and home sales data boosted confidence that the worst slump since the Great Depression is ending: Bank of […]
Read more...Climate fixes ‘pose drought risk’ BBC GM gets to dump its polluted sites Detroit Free Press What Are They So Mad About? Steve Benen Arbitration RIP Independent Accountant Employment, Hours, and Estimated Output Menzie Chinn, Econbrowser For Private Equity, a Very Public Disaster Louise Story, New York Times. On Cerberus. This could not happen to […]
Read more...By dint of good fortune, Satyajit Das’ new post at Wilmott (which he has graciously authorized us to reproduce) is on our occasional Sunday beat, and comments on some recent books, the theme being remakes. Enjoy! From Das: Remakes are rarely as good as the original but can sometimes add something, if only a nostalgic […]
Read more...At this point, the New York Times story reporting that Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and Goldman chief Lloyd Blankfein spoke frequently during the crisis is close to a “dog bites man” news item. After Goldman was the only Wall Street player involved in the discussions of what to do about the rapidly unravelling AIG, and […]
Read more...Submitted by Leo Kolivakis, publisher of Pension Pulse. The Financial Posts reports that the Supreme Court rules on treating pension surpluses: A Supreme Court of Canada ruling on how employers deal with surpluses in a defined-benefit pension plan has company lawyers cheering and employee lawyers jeering. In a 5-2 ruling, Canada’s top court held that […]
Read more...Extinction hits ‘whole families‘ BBC Ten things we don’t understand about humans New Scientist The Recession Isn’t Over Yet (as of last week) Bill Connerly Remote Deposit Capture (RDC) iPhone App Adam Levitin, Credit Slips What If the Captain of the Titanic Managed to Get Three Quarters of the Passengers on Life Boats Dean Baker […]
Read more...One of my (many) pet peeves is the lousy incentives that investment bank top brass and staff have had for some time. In particular, the advent of the “other people’s money” model has meant that everyone has reason to be cavalier. The industry has a proud tradition of people failing upwards, or at least sideways, […]
Read more...Oh, there is nothing like a global retreat of liquidity to reveal who was wearing a swimsuit. And what wags like Warren Buffett fail to add, when a lot of people were found to be unclad, you also get to see who looks best of a typically not so fetching bunch. In this case, California […]
Read more...Even though China keeps putting out cheery official numbers, its purchases of commodities are down, suggesting there is less to its stabilization than meets the eye. It’s early to say that this is conclusive, but there is a good bit of other anecdotal information and some firmer information raising questions about the true state of […]
Read more...Submitted by Leo Kolivakis, publisher of Pension Pulse. Canada’s premiers met in Regina on Thursday, talking tough about the “Buy American” policy in the United States, pledging to equip Prime Minister Stephen Harper with provincial backing for his meeting with President Barack Obama next week. But the premiers also discussed another important issue, the pension […]
Read more...Comstock Partners has a new newsletter out, and it makes a cogent case that there is no pretty way out of our over-leveraged mess. The disheartening bit is not only the narrative but a series of charts. One, on debt to GDP, show that it has risen in the last year (debt was roughly $49 […]
Read more...One of the guest bloggers here, the esteemed Ed Harrison, was initially more hopeful about Obama than some of us (I an sufficiently cynical that I find it hard to get excited about any politician, although I will confess to falling for Australia’s Kevin Rudd) but is now calling him a black Herbert Hoover. Even […]
Read more...Via e-mail, I received Tyler Durden’s post on supposed Fed stealth monetization of debt via an allegedly stealth repurchase of a big chunk of the Treasury’s latest 7 year bond issue on the Fed’s open market desk. Full disclosure: Tyler Durden has been a guest blogger here, I think he often does a very good […]
Read more...Clever rooks repeat ancient fable BBC The itch without the pain Nature News Pricing of interest rate risk in fed funds futures contracts Jim Hamilton GE ‘Buy American’ Water-Filter Shortage Strands Work Bloomberg (hat tip DoctoRx) The Town Hall Mob Paul Krugman Stink boats and the forthcoming spectacular inventory bounce John Hempton. The one thing […]
Read more...Submitted by Leo Kolivakis, publisher of Pension Pulse. On Monday I reported that some UK pension schemes are shifting assets into bonds. On Tuesday Reuters carried an article, Dow rally for real? “Big Money” thinks so: Pension managers and mutual fund houses have been among the biggest buyers of the Dow Jones industrial average .DJI […]
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