Tucsonbill

Charlie Gasparino: Another Crash 'Has to Happen Again'

There are really many great insights among these comments. I will only add that the Glass-Steagall repeal blended the two areas of finance that should never have been allowed to merge. The reasons on each side are transparant: Fox-in-the-henhouse on one side and GREED on the other. The second point is that Alan Greenspan was pivotal in taking the losses on the dot-com era and attempting to spread these losses over a much larger field of play, namely the real estate market, and lessening the depth of financial loss. The problem was built in: dot com losses were at the hands of sophisticated investors ( or so they thought) and the real estate market is peopled by real "average Joes". The opportunities to defraud the average guy were numerous. And ever one of the thieves jumped in and took his measure .
So, instead of canonizing Greenspan we should be castigating him.

Is Raser Technologies a Bargain, Or Just Cheap?

Tom, I thought the Beaver, Ut plant was the source of power for Anaheim, Ca.----Tucsonbill

A Golden Investment in 2009 and Beyond

After 30 years as a broker who NEVER bought a gold stock, I changed in 2001 and the gold shares of many companies have done well. Even the drop of 2008 was muted by gold shares and they are rising again. Why? Because fiat currencies are suspicious, being diluted (deflated) and representing falling economies. This trend is still in place. Hold them forever? A one -decision investment? No way. But for now gold is a required part of any portfolio. Seeking out the smaller, junior is quite a bit harder than selecting major producers. And riskier. But bigger rewards are there for the wise and knowledgeable investor.

Larry Kudlow is Dead Wrong: CRA Didn't Start the Meltdown

I have tried to watch Larry Kudrow for some time and find it very unsettling. He has a "bloody pulpit" in hand thanks to CNBC and misuses it regularly.  Looking like he knows what he's talking about  (you know, that aging preppy boy, Wall Street facade) and sounding like a free- marketeer gone awry is what we get from him and his tirades. Looks are deceiving and extremism is not defensible in the pursuit of truth. I think that the abuse of credit started with its uncontrolled availability--namely the Greenspan Fed's lowering rates and holding them down for much too long. The "boys" of the Street just were doing what boys will do even if they were as immoral as hell.  But trying to lay it on the Community Reinvestment Act?? Oh brother!

Wall Street Breakfast: Must-Know News

Alan Greenspan is like the child passing the cemetery--whistlling and saying what he does out of fear of the truth or of the unknown. His policy "enabled" the greedy in our system to commit their financial atrocities. "Just don't give a convicted felon a gun" would apply here. Maybe the metaphor is too harsh but the message is not. The low interest rates instituted by Greenspan did, in fact, encourage lenders to rapaciously feed money to the unwary among us.  There is fault aplenty to go around, but the beginning of the difficulty was Alan Greenspan's attempt to shift the losses in the high tech markets to another, broader market, namely the housing market. Could this broad action dilute the losses? said he. What actually happened was that he embroiled the greedy with the uninformed to create a much bigger credit problem enveloping the entire global structure. This was unconscionable. Only some among us would have suffered from bad judgement with the High Tech losses and our capital system would have had its painful day. But with our homes on the block almost all of our citizens were swept up in the losses and attendant credit crises. Now, it appears that the pain will be protracted and the solution unsure. God Bless/help America.