Submitted by Leo Kolivakis, publisher of Pension Pulse. Terence Corcoran of the National Post reports that pensions learn little from market disaster: The Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan released its 2008 annual report last week, ominously titled “Let us explain.” Reflecting the plan’s heavy equity portfolio and risky dips into fancy investment products, the OTPP followed […]
Read more...One benefit of performing research is picking up interesting trivia. Adam Smith, in The Wealth of Nations, advocated usury laws (limits on interest rates) because they would promote lending to prudent borrowers and productive projects, which was better for society as a whole: The legal rate…ought not be much above the lowest market rate. If […]
Read more...A lot of readers are very unhappy about the bank bailouts, particularly given the lack of any meaningful financial services industry reforms. Kvetching is therapeutic, but productive action is better. I recommend looking at “A New Way Forward“”s website. If its goals appeal to you, I suggest you consider joining the protest scheduled for Saturday […]
Read more...Note that the 53% cumulative default rate for junk bonds over the next five years foreseen by Deutsche Bank analyst Jim Reid is nearly twice the level forecast by Moodys of 29%, It is also well in excess of the rate during the S&L crisis, which produced a nasty but comparatively short recession. From Bloomberg: […]
Read more...Submitted by Rolfe Winkler, publisher of OptionARMageddon. [Reader note: I thought it useful to add commentary around the FDIC data. Those that would prefer to skip straight to it, see the chart and read paragraphs 4-9]. Conventional wisdom says that financial companies are having trouble borrowing because credit markets are broken. This is dangerously wrong. […]
Read more...Clues to ancient invasion in DNA BBC Torpedoes, Carrots, and Pythons: My Favourite Spam Subject Lines Bill Sweetman Beat Sweeteners Matthew Yglesias Larry Summers, Tim Geithner and Wall Street’s ownership of government Glenn Greenwald, Salon and A Rich Education for Summers (After Harvard) Louise Story, New York Times. The spins are night and day (and […]
Read more...In a world of floating rates, driving the value of one’s currency down takes a bit of doing, but as China (since 1994) and Japan (circa 2003) have demonstrated, central banks can lower currency prices. And trashing one’s currency is part of the standard program recommended for countries facing deflation. The preferred method these days […]
Read more...This is going to get interesting. The head of the Congressional Oversight Panel, Elizabeth Warren, is expected to issue a report this week calling on the Treasury to get much tougher with the big recipients of TARP funds. And if the report in the Guardian is right, the recommendations have been softened a tad so […]
Read more...Submitted by Tyler Durden, publisher of Zero Hedge There was a time on Wall Street when insider trading was rampant, when sellside analysts would pump stocks under the guidance of their superiors only to have their corporate finance colleagues do an equity offer shortly after, when the amount of money a bank’s corporate clients paid […]
Read more...Film makers leave Hollywood BBC Believing in Treatments That Don’t Work New York Times U.S. property bust threatens condo “death spiral” Reuters Be Nice Baseline Scenario. So NC isn’t the only site witnessing a recent fall in civility. The Age of Balance Sheet Recessions: What Post-2008 U.S., Europe and China Can Learn from Japan 1990-2005 […]
Read more...There are two schools of thought on financial innovation. One is the mainstream view, repeated faithfully by a compliant media, that financial innovation is really really important and under no circumstances must be threatened. Then we have the Old Fart view, best represented by two men who by any standards ought to have retired by […]
Read more...A Bloomberg story gives the not-heartening news that the government-prodded mortgage modifications are producing higher failure rates as the economy decays: Mortgages modified in the third quarter failed at a faster pace than those revised in the first, and the delinquency rate on the least risky loans doubled, signs of deteriorating credit quality, U.S. regulators […]
Read more...This was too cool to leave as a mere Antidote du Jour. Is this what geeks do for fun in New Zealand Wales? If the video plays in a herky-jerky fashion, try viewing it here. Enjoy!
Read more...A couple of weeks ago, I put up a bleg for a referrals for a lawyer to review my literary agent’s contract (mind you, she already landed a publisher, but since it takes months for the agency to finalize the contract with the publisher, I haven’t yet signed the agent’s contract. I received an overwhelming […]
Read more...Submitted by Leo Kolivakis, publisher of Pension Pulse. More “bonus outrage”, this time from Fannie and Freddie: Continuing bonuses paid to employees at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are offensive since taxpayers are helping keep the mortgage-finance companies afloat, a leading Senate Republican said on Friday. “It’s an insult that the bonuses were made with […]
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