Author Archives: Yves Smith
Michael Hudson: The EU Parliament Elections as a Vote Against the Oligarchs
The US press and newscasts make it appear that Europeans have voted against poor immigrants and foreigners. What they voted against was the super-rich, the oligarchy.
Read more...Joe Costello: Why the Oil Industry is Running Into Major Trouble
Over the last year, some deep truths about oil and the oil industry have begun to bubble to the surface. Not necessarily that they were ever hard to see, but they were easy to obscure and maybe more importantly, without too much effort, ignore. No longer.
Read more...Links 5/31/14
Wolf Richter: The Big Hoax Of The Wall Street Hype Machine
Wall Street earnings are running on hype, momentum, and earnings expectations gamesmanship. Investors beware!
Read more...Randy Wray: Taxes and the Public Purpose
Governments use taxes to move resources to the public sector, where they can be used to promote social goals.
Read more...Private Equity Says “Nothing to See Here” on Secret Document Release, So Why Not See Them All?
In response to media inquiries, private equity firms have reversed themselves on their position that revealing limited partnership agreements would hurt them. So there should be no objection to passing legislation in every state to make these agreements subject to disclosure.
Read more...Links 5/30/14
Big Food, Big Pharma, Big Tobacco, Big Finance, and Little Marijuana
Yves here. This post is an interesting “be careful what you wish for” warning as far as the legalization of marijuana is concerned.
Read more...Bill Black: OCC as Case Study of How Regulators Decide to Fail
Yves here. I’m highlighting this post for a basic reason: there’s a lot of cynicism about regulation. Many Americans have bought the right-wing line that regulations can’t work. But here, whether by accident or design, a reform program at a key bank regulator, the OCC, is going off the rails due to bad strategic choices.
Read more...Where Have All the Fiduciaries Gone? Even Rich People Can’t Escape Being Screwed
A new case filed against Deutsche Bank’s wealth management business shows that even money can’t buy safety from predatory finance.
Read more...Links 5/29/14
The Surprising Information that Private Equity Limited Partners Don’t Get
Private equity firms invest in companies, yet the limited partners in the overwhelming majority of funds can’t see their financial statements. And there’s good reason to be concerned.
Read more...Wolf Richter: Housing Bubble 2 Already Collapsing for the 99%
One of the side effects of QE is that housing prices and sales levels for the top 1% in most markets are strong, while activity in the rest of the market is falling.
Read more...Yanis Varoufakis: One Extreme Europe? On the Parliamentary Election Results
Conventional wisdom that extreme parties on the right and left won in the European Parliamentary elections. In fact, only one extreme won.
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