Recent comments

  • Whether or not Taibbi's example is correct, it has the appearance of potential impropriety and leverage.  Taibbi is to be highly commended for his thorough and gutsy piece in Rolling Stone.

    If there were to be some 'listening' to information that should be private, it could be done here and here.  WHen you see ATT as a network provider, the name Russell Tice comes up and bingo.  This was in DKOS a few days ago. 

    Goldman is so dominant, they can probably make any market they want so why bother with the intrigue.  But when your as dominant as they are and as arrogant, it gives rise to questions that would not otherwise be asked.

    With is move on bonuses at this this time they've sowed the wind.  That's not a good move when you have as much to lose as they do.

    Reply to: GIVE IT BACK GOLDMAN!   15 years 3 months ago
  • They are a profound reflection of the good judgment of Goldman's management and they move public opinion in a way that makes people more receptive to the details of the market built for just a few.

    I know enough about large, highly profitable corporations to say this. They don't advertise it, they avoid publicity, and they're very sensitive to timing so as not to offend their public. This garish display of bonuses at a time when the people who provided the foundation for the bonuses face ruin indicates that there is some serious judgment missing at GS. It's a matter of timing, as well. Now is really not the time to do this.

    The pay off for the CDS bets that you wrote about is maybe the most outrageous piece of this story. The political insider leverage to achieve all of this for GS is also right up there.

    Fascinating times, that's for sure.

    Reply to: GIVE IT BACK GOLDMAN!   15 years 3 months ago
  • Right, there are assuredly too many people. Perhaps you linked to some Monstano research, trying to promote more GMO Foods? Check the background of these, Monsanto is everywhere trying to get their patented seeds to supplant the world.

    Reply to: Could Malthus have been wrong?   15 years 3 months ago
    EPer:
  • ok!

    sounds very good because you are going to run into the biggest political data repression going. I mean massive corporate lobbyists trying to repress any attempts, any at all to obtain any accurate figures. i.e. getting raw data is a real bitch, a lot of work (as in we should get paid for tackling this one it's so much effort from 1st principles!) I'll do one on GDP vs. "productivity" because I have a lot of that research already in Hard drive.

    Reply to: The Deflationary Bust is Bottoming? June 2009 edition   15 years 3 months ago
    EPer:
  • Because I've been putting together some charts in the last few days, and the one missing link is whether offshoring can be held responsible for "jobless recoveries". No promises, but I might be posting something shortly on that issue.

    It would be interesting if somebody could do a lexis/nexis or other similar search to see how often the term "offshoring" or something similar popped up in given months after the past two recessions.

    Reply to: The Deflationary Bust is Bottoming? June 2009 edition   15 years 3 months ago
  • what would be interesting is to see what is the total GDP contribution of CTI's clientele. The claim is they don't "pose systemic risk" but I doubt that.....there are two things that the government shits on every time:

    1. manufacturing
    2. small business

    Reply to: Will the government let CIT fall   15 years 3 months ago
    EPer:
  • Reuters

     

    The timing is "terrible," said Al Ferrara, partner in retail and consumer products business of consulting firm BDO Seidman LLC. "Retailers now are basically gearing up for the back-to-school and the fall season."

    CIT, which lends to hundreds of thousands of small and mid-sized U.S. businesses, said late Wednesday that government bailout talks had ended, a move that could set the stage for bankruptcy.

    For the retail industry, CIT's key function is as a factor, buying receivables -- or the right to receive money owed by retailers -- from suppliers at a discount so that those suppliers continue to have working capital. CIT gets paid back when the retailers sell the goods, typically in 60 to 90 days.

    "CIT is one of the very few large, sophisticated factors out there for retail suppliers," said Mallory Duncan, general counsel for the National Retail Federation, an industry trade group. "If you remove CIT, then an awful lot of suppliers do not have access to the operating cash they need to supply the next round of goods to retailers."

    The American Apparel & Footwear Association estimates that about 60 percent of the industry's factoring is done by CIT.

     

     Holiday Inventories held up? More lost revenue - more CRE distress

    Reply to: Will the government let CIT fall   15 years 3 months ago
  • That's a quote from Alan Tonelson, who focuses on manufacturing, has a new post up affirming what this working stiff noticed but with much more detail...

    Folks, we need a manufacturing policy ASAP!

    Reply to: Industrial Production & Capacity Utilization - A Contraction is a Contraction   15 years 3 months ago
    EPer:
  • Whole bunches of folks have declared a bottom in housing, so of course it must be true!

    We'll just ignore the fact no one can afford the prices still without a job and assuredly cannot get 20% down together.

    This MGIC is huge, might do an Instapopulist on that and link to this report on top of it if you have more intel.

    Although I am really wondering about insurance generally. It seems when something happens they spend all of their money figuring out how to not pay up.

    I went shopping for auto insurance and it was a joke! I mean they won't replace for a new car, or equivalent, this isn't covered, that isn't covered....it was like I am paying an extortion fee to not get arrested. This is just PE (personal experience) but it made me wonder if the coverage and payout of insurance generally as declined while fees increase, esp. auto. It's obviously hugely profitable, we're swamped with TV ads daily, which implies quite the profit scam in my view (to be able to pay for that flood to the point you want to step on all lizards and squish them as well as do serious violence to any poor woman with heavy make up wearing a white smock!)

    Reply to: A new record we don't want to see - 1.53 million foreclosures in 6 months   15 years 3 months ago
    EPer:
  • That's what I heard. In fact, author George Akerlof is talking about a New Housing Bubble.

    I was wondering how that bubble is going to happen with this happening today?

    (Reuters) - Mortgage insurer MGIC Investment Corp (MTG.N) reported a wider quarterly loss and said it will stop writing new business as losses mount in the battered housing sector, sending its shares down 14 percent in premarket trade.

    The largest U.S. mortgage insurer said it will wind down its business and try to capitalize a fresh enterprise that would write new loans beginning next year.

    Reply to: A new record we don't want to see - 1.53 million foreclosures in 6 months   15 years 3 months ago
    EPer:
  • Good thing too. I was afraid that I might be able to stretch my unemployment check far enough to pay rent and bills this month.
    That would have been terrible for the economy.

    Reply to: The Deflationary Bust is Bottoming? June 2009 edition   15 years 3 months ago
    EPer:
  • While I realize this site steers clear of any whiff of conspiracy normally, it is interesting to note, in light of Matt Taibbi's outstanding Rolling Stone article on Goldman Sachs, and a number of other columns/posts, that members - past and present - of Goldman Sachs have had exposure to the intelligence establishment - quite normal for Wall Streeters, of course, as they were the founders and creators of the American intelligence establishment.

    One example: Stephen Friedman (former senior chairman and parter at Goldman Sachs), who left the NY Federal Reserve Bank rather suddenly (shouldn't he at least be required to give two weeks' notice in that type of position?).

    Mr. Friedman was once was a member of the Aspin-Brown Commission on the US Intelligence Community, as well as a member of an external review panel of the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). One wonders how many others at Goldman have ties to the intelligence community?

    Just asking.....

    Reply to: GIVE IT BACK GOLDMAN!   15 years 3 months ago
  • EPI (see middle column links) has done quite a bit of research with income disparity stats over the last 30 years, which just continues to increase. But I have never seen any data/graphs correlating slope of this decline to jobless "recoveries". So that would make a very interesting post to see the correlation of wages disparity, middle class decline with use of recessions to, once again, redistribute wealth to the rich.

    Reply to: The Deflationary Bust is Bottoming? June 2009 edition   15 years 3 months ago
    EPer:
  • I believe commodities soared but today went crashing down again. It feels like large investors are just hovering over data and to me, this is kind of a bummer, esp. for energy prices because I think your analysis is correct, yet we have this hemorrhaging jobs data....which implies even more pain for the middle class.

    Reply to: The Deflationary Bust is Bottoming? June 2009 edition   15 years 3 months ago
    EPer:
  • multiple posts on EP about this. We didn't focus in on the bonuses, more the actual profits. There are many focused on the paying out CDS bets via AIG @ 100%. I wrote about it at the time, which was obfuscated by AIG executive bonus outrage.

    Reply to: GIVE IT BACK GOLDMAN!   15 years 3 months ago
    EPer:
  • Has past "jobless recoveries" only increase income inequality?

    Not that we have had a lot of "jobless recoveries". I am kind of thinking out loud because I am trying to figure out how to look at this issue.

    Reply to: The Deflationary Bust is Bottoming? June 2009 edition   15 years 3 months ago
  • FT reported this morning that China's foreign reserves plowed past $2,000 bil. They are putting incredible amount of pressure on to commodity prices as well. This leads me to a deep concern:

    It looks like the source of the global recovery will come from China but at what cost? This is how we get our "jobless recovery". This $2,000 bil. in foreign reserves is used to paper over things again here particularly in the financial sector. All of this hot money will flow freely into the sector creating nothing of real value. Meanwhile, wage growth will continue to stall and no real economic growth will happen.

    Reply to: The Deflationary Bust is Bottoming? June 2009 edition   15 years 3 months ago
  • to like big, big corporations. They like to give them financial help and work hand in hand with them. Hm? What is that called when the government works hand in hand with big corporations?

    The coming universal health plan is a financial gift for big corporations, not so much for small business. It seems that small business is not in vogue with the current powers.

    Reply to: Goldman Sachs - Biggest Profits Ever - How?   15 years 3 months ago
    EPer:
  • Yes, I saw that.
    Most states have very specific laws about rental contracts.
    I doubt loan officers want to be unclogging toilets.

    I have read articles about banks doing everything under the sun to avoid loss writedowns: not filing foreclosures, foreclosing without transferring deeds, etc.

    As much as they want to rub on the genie lamp, prices are not going to rebound in the near future and the losses are unavoidable.

    It's inevitable - M2M has to be restored.

    Reply to: The Logical Flaw   15 years 3 months ago
  • through the contact form and I will manually create an account. I do have hotmail blocked due to the massive spam generated from there, but I can unblock individual cases. Go ahead and use whatever the email address was in the block so I can see if we have a bug.

    Reply to: Help Build The Economic Populist   15 years 3 months ago
    EPer:

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