Archive for the 'Economy' Category
$20 Billion Later Halliburton Moves Headquarters to Dubai
March 13th, 2007Enemy Collaborator Democrats squealing years late and $20 billion short… Priceless. Via: Huffington Post: Business must be slowing down in Iraq. After booking over $20 billion in revenues from its work in Iraq, some on no bid contracts and now under Congressional scrutiny for both the quality of its work and billing practices, Halliburton is […]
Bloomberg: U.S. Housing Bust Deepens
March 12th, 2007Uglier by the minute. Via: Bloomberg: Hold on to your assets. The deepest housing decline in 16 years is about to get worse. As many as 1.5 million more Americans may lose their homes, another 100,000 people in housing-related industries could be fired, and an estimated 100 additional subprime mortgage companies that lend money to […]
Visa Chief: Cashless Society by 2012
March 12th, 2007Sure. Via: Independent Online: Paying for goods with notes and coins could be consigned to history within five years, according to the chief executive of Visa Europe. Peter Ayliffe said that, by 2012, using credit and debit cards should be cheaper and more convenient than cash. Some retailers could soon start surcharging customers if they […]
New York Times: Crisis Looms in Mortgages
March 11th, 2007If you liked my Wall Street Chop Shop piece, here’s a New York Times version of it; months late, of course… Via: New York Times: Like worms that surface after a torrential rain, revelations that emerge when an asset bubble bursts are often unattractive, involving dubious industry practices and even fraud. In the coming weeks, […]
Goldman, Merrill Almost ‘Junk,’ Their Own Traders Say
March 10th, 2007Via: Bloomberg: Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Merrill Lynch & Co. and Morgan Stanley, which earned a record $24.5 billion in 2006, suddenly have become so speculative that their own traders are valuing the three biggest securities firms as barely more creditworthy than junk bonds. Prices for credit-default swaps linked to the bonds of the New […]
New Century Stops Accepting Loan Applications
March 9th, 2007HAHA! Right down the street from the Wall Street Chop Shop I worked for… Via: Business Week: Subprime lender New Century Financial Corp. said Thursday it has stopped accepting all new loan applications as it struggles to obtain financing amid market speculation that the company could file for bankruptcy. In a Securities and Exchange Commission […]
Goldman Sachs Chief Economist: “There Are Going to be Dead Bodies Around When This Is Over”
March 8th, 2007Ahhyep. Via: Telegraph: The global currency storm of the past week is starting to infect the corporate bond markets and may prove harder to contain than last year’s May sell-off, Goldman Sachs has warned. Jim O’Neill, the bank’s chief global economist, said investment firms playing the “carry trade” had been caught on the wrong side […]
U.S. REGULATORS ANNOUNCE CRACKDOWN ON SUBPRIME LENDING PRACTICES
March 5th, 2007Maybe I need to get a blinking siren thing for Cryptogon… We’ve got a perfect storm situation in the markets now. Via: Finfacts Ireland: The Wall Street Journal reports that US Federal bank regulators have announced a crackdown on loose lending standards on subprime home mortgages as two major lenders struggled to cope with losses […]
STOCKS, GOLD CONTINUE SELL OFF ON YEN ADVANCE
March 5th, 2007I’m trying to understand the clobbering of gold right now, which went limit down in Tokyo today. Maybe institutions need liquidity to cover their yen (carry trade “easy money”) bets as that thing squeezes relentlessly higher. How? Panic yen covering on the one hand, selling off gold on the other? If the capital from the […]
What Happened to Gold as Global Stock Markets Sold Off?
March 3rd, 2007WARNING: This is not a recommendation to buy sell or hold any financial asset or investment. Again, the assumptions for gold proved to be wrong. As stock markets sold off around the world last week, gold declined sharply. How can this be? Gold has been turned into a funny money bet, just like stocks, bonds […]
