After beating myself up for having a net worth under 100K I guess I can feel a bit better about myself.

This site Global Rich List Does put things in perspective. So even if you collected unemployment last year and made 18,000, you're still in the top 12% of the world in terms of wealth! Crazy

This is way too funny if it wasn't the truth.

Yea, we'll give you a check but no one will cash it.

The thing that gets me is the person that is trying to go from Indymac to Washington Mutual. Talk about going from one abusive boyfriend to another.

Yea, We knew this shit was going to happen eventually We saw it happen in September of '07

To be honest I hope people wake up & yank their money out of troubled banks & bring them to their knees. Savers have been practically shit on for the last 30 years. Just ask anyone that for whatever stupid reason, "believed in the system" & had more than $100,000 in Indymac Bank. They may have kept their money safe for the last 10 years, avoided the .com bubble in March '00, never got sucked into low interest, no documentation loan orgy over the last 5 years and now are going to get a haircut on their accounts over 100 K, basically 50 cents on the $.

The only way someone got even that is a saver with Indymac is to have loaded up on those 4.3% CD rates that they were offering. F**K, Fed Funds currently is 2% and that's the rate institutions borrow money. It really was a huge moral hazard, Let's offer rates DOUBLE the market rate to get enough Capital to keep going & if shit blows up in our face, THE TAXPAYERS OF THE USA WILL HOLD THE BAG!!!! Pretty smart, although a bit morally shady.

In a way we are all going to be holding the bag for the whole mess we are going to go through in regards to the Socialism for the Rich. There was no fear in making any loan to anyone with a pulse. While at the same time the whole thought of being prudent and conservative just went by the wayside. With what 70% home ownership in this country and with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac passing the joint around of the homeownership fetish in this country there was just too much froth for the whole thing. You look at the subsidies for Freddie and Fannie, The tax breaks for home ownership and the low interest rates below inflation for so long, people just had a no fear of anything. Just borrow, borrow and borrow like this tool; Do you really need $200 Jeans and BMW? We just can't have home ownership for home ownership sake to perpetuate the "American Dream" and keep prices rising year after year while having solvent institutions that have reserve capital to back up what they are lending. At some point you have to say, "Dude you're horrible with your money and you don't have anything to put Down on this purchase to offset this institution's risk, FLAT OUT NO!" The mission for Fannie & Freddie was at best schizophrenic. You can't make owning for everyone at all costs fit into the framework of being prudent, solvent and responsible for your balance sheet, it just doesn't happen, we can't all be winners.

We are all going to be homeowners as the U.S. Government is going to end up buying Fannie & Freddie. So I guess it makes the Government your benefactor landlord. So is this mess what the ownership society was all about? So instead of one big apartment bloc of flats owned and operated by the government as they did in the Eastern Bloc, we are going to have Uncle Sam own our Patio Home Condo's? Then again that's another thing with the people the invested in Freddie & Fannie, the GSE's that provided a nice stream of income, your shareholder equity at the end of this, ZERO. Do you think that in say 10 years if the "investment" for these Government Sponsored Enterprises pans out that they will return the gain to the taxpayers in the form of tax cuts?

At the end of the day we have to realize that Capitalism is a ZERO SUM GAME. You can't have success without failure. We compete every day for Jobs, Mates and parking spaces. This whole, let's help everyone out and bail them out is just plain bullshit. At the end of the day we are all going to fit the bill. If they tighten in the Easy money, people won't to be able to buy those McMansion's due to no institution willing to lend them money. How many people can lay down $40,000 Cold Hard Cash for a $400,000 house? They used to do it 30 + years ago & the payment could only be as high as 25% of your NET Income, since they wanted to make sure you could may your Bill every month.

We can either have responsible lending or easy money to let Real Estate prices keep their upward trajectory forever. You do that by making it affordable for people with the money they have, or give people more money to spend. The second option has been the policy for the country for the last 20 years and obviously that hasn't worked.

What I figure they are going to do since there is just took much at stake to let the economy inflate to Wilhelm Republic levels. All of us are going to be on the hook for bailing out all of the wreckless financial institutions. It's kind of like living in a Dorm and some drunken frat boys trashed the bathrooms. Well no one is going to fess up and everyone on the floor is going to get assessed a bill for the repairs.

At this point just keep on shorting the financials & buy Gold.

This article kind of irked me today Basically we are all going to chip in to bail out people that are under water in their mortgages. Frankly I think it absolutely sucks. Let's reward people that took on irresponsible risk by saving their asses at your expense. Here I though this was Capitalism and for taking a chance at profiting you also accepted the possibility of losing. So as a guy that is just saving his money to maybe, "PUT DOWN A DOWNPAYMENT" I have to watch my tax money go to people that gambled and LOST. I mean if you're a Real Estate Developer and you lost you should not come to me to recoup your losses.

The sad part is that's it is criminal what say the Banks have done with people's deposits. Here is a Freaking Fine Example I seriously want to know what they were smoking when they though of that project. Here is my guess, (1. Real Estate only goes one direction, that is Up 2. We can always write this off 3. There will be some government bailout to help us out, so if the bank goes under FDIC Insurance will cover it.) Seriously the amount of money that is swishing around is just astounding.

Now we have people on people calling for serious restrictions on Commodity and Futures trading. This is the blame for the run up in Energy Prices. Look no one really cared for the last 7 years when Housing prices ran up. People were actually cheering when it was going on, "Flip that House, Flip that House, Flip that House" on A & E. There was never a cry for "Win fall Profits Tax" or the People that were banking the dough in Arizona, California, Florida and Nevada were not going to SHARE THE PROFITS WITH YOU WHEN TIMES WERE GOOD! Then again, that's the coutry we live in now Privatize the profits & Socialize the Losses. It's OK to take a chance and lose money, but if you take a chance on a house it's not your fault. After all is it really too much to ask when you BORROWED MONEY & PROMISE TO PAY IT BACK? !?

Just think now in a couple of years as the 'Burbs unwind the Slumlords that have been sitting on property in the City for decades are going to be rewarded now that people won't be able to afford the white picket fence. Are they going to spread the money around as they start to say Cha-Ching after they can actually sell their stuff to people that are actually going to live there instead of flipping them to some "investor" on Craigslist that just can't pass up a bargin of a $25,000 house? I don't think so. We're just going to throw money down a hole on declining McMansions in the suburbs & exSuburbs as they turn into say Red Cross Offices as the Mansions on Delaware Ave did decades ago as the cost of keeping up those structures up just became too burdensome.

Oil up more than $10 a barrel in one Day!!!

Yea, in a sick way I kind of enjoying it. I own shares of UGA the U.S. Gasoline Fund Exchange Traded Fund. It is basically a basket of Gasoline Futures Contracts, so when the price of Gas goes up, so does this Fund. Hey, I just wanted in on a piece of the action. It's a still a capitalist kind of society until next January when most likely things will change drastically. Not because of some grassroots mandate, but by circumstance. This is only the begining. 30 years of an economic boom fed by an easy money orgy is not going to be corrected by 6 months of "flat" growth and bounce back like some bad cold recession like in 2001. This is going to be 1930's time and as prices for everyday things explode like Wilhelm Germany things are going to get ugly.

From my perspective things in this country are going to go left for a very long time. Everyone is going to be affected, heck even Ed McMahon is going to lose his home and he is supposed to be that "Great Depression Generation" that kept saving every penny they made, kept a cellar filled with canned goods & stole all the condiments from the restaurants they went to.

Then again it is what we signed up for when the Alpha Males on Wall St came up with these "innovative" products to make "Joe 6 Pack" a mini Donald Trump. No one complained about inflation when Real Estate Prices shot up to the stratosphere & people had to sign their lives away. What perfect timing was it when the changed the bankruptcy laws right before the top of the slippery slop started to turn? Everyone wanted to keep their profits private when their house doubled or tripled in a few years. Now they want to nationalize the losses when they owe the bank more money now that their mortgage is under water?

It makes me wonder if America is really the ultimate capitalist society that it claims to be? Money like life is a Zero Sum game, the losers pay off the winners, the Credits balance the Debits. Right now it seems that no one wants to pay off what they owe. It may be true that we never want to go too far to the left, since Americans are always for free enterprise and such. But with powerful market forces at work I leave you with this one thought.

What if in the ultimate free market Capitalist way a Hedge Fund cornered the market on some life saving Pharmaceutical Drugs keeping them out of reach of the public; With the intention of holding them on pure speculation that they price would go up? It would be a free market with those with access to capital using their leverage to gain more capital, thus making a profit...

These are interesting times, it will be interesting to remember when before the return to strict regulation people used to drive up the cost of shelter, heat, food, ect.

That's a poker term used to describe betting on the flop [2nd round of betting] after betting/raising on the deal.

Given that I still feel that the next 6 weeks are not going to be good for the economy I am going to buy the UGA fund. UGA is an exchange traded fund that tracks the price of gasoline via futures contracts. Basically I am looking to hedge the cost of driving to work every day. Somehow in this capitalist society I think everyone should have the opportunity be able to make $ by just watching the news.

Second given that everyone is paying to fill up their tank using their credit cards I think I will also add to my short position of Capital One.

We shall see, I may sell the UGA around Memorial Day.

GOLD UP $25 an Ounce in Overnight Trading!

Shit, (e:jim) I didn't realize what was going on today! So basically Bear Stearns just got bought out as a company for less than what their skyscraper is worth!

I am going to have more money come 9:30am than I had when I left work on Friday & I didn't even get paid. I didn't even work or get paid! How often does that happen?

For some reason I think that the markets will not go back to the 90's (Below 10,000) just yet but they are going to test it right now.

All of this rate cutting is actually hurting everyone IMHO. Eventually we are going to have to have a currency that is worth something. Every time Ben cuts rates the dollar gets hammered & Oil & Gas skyrocket, since they are priced in DOLLARS. Meaning the oil producing countries want more of those less worth dollars for the black gold they are pumping into our veins.

Eventually we are going to have to raise rates to bring some kind of price stability. We can't be printing up money & loaning out like Zimbabwe. If printing money turned around economies they would be ahead of Germany, Japan and Russia. We are going to see the "flight to quality" with treasuries going to less than 1% and at that point you will be PAYING THE BANK TO HOLD YOUR MONEY! Just think about it if you have a money market account the fees to the bank will be more than the interest you will be earning!!!

This is either going to end up with the ultimate capitalist scenario where the losers or the pigs get slaughtered and the winners pick up everything like J.P. Morgan, "On Pennies on the Dollar!" or we just say, "F* it!"& Nationalize everything.

We are all getting hit by the Chinese Curse, we are living in interesting times.





Coming to America Soon...

What a freaking bloodbath we are going to have in the stock markets today if trading overseas during the Holiday is any indicator. We're screwed.

I think for financial matters I am now the official stand in for (e:vyscious) DOOM DOOM BEAR MARKET!!!!

All I can say is start taking your money out of the bank & stuff it in your mattress.

We are now having the biggest 1 day crash since the 9/11 attack.

Yikes!!!!!

Although the Canadian Dollar "the loonie" is not quite at par or equal to the U.S. Dollar it is within striking distance. The last quote was at 98.6 cents US. So it isn't equal as of yet, but if you are going over to Canada anytime soon you are going to be getting less Canadian money than American when you to engage in the exchange transaction. The 5% juice or profit margin that the banks, casinos, traders use to make money their profit will put you "underwater."

So yea, "Helicopter Ben" may have cut rates to save the housing market but in the end he's going to do more damage then good in cutting rates today.

What is going to happen is the people with money are not going to park in the U.S. to get substandard returns with lower interest rates while having their principle getting gnawed at by a depreciating currency. They're going to go to Canada or Europe earn a better return on investment and gain with an ever increasing exchange rate on principle.

So now after 30 years of those red state ugly Americans ripping on the "Monopoly Money" guess what that $1 bill is only worth 0.98 cents in Canadian Funds! Not bad for a "Socialist" country, Eh?

and Whoa, when did I get to 200+ entries!?!