simplesimon

Thursday Outlook: Commodities, Emerging Markets

The lobbyist remark hit the nail. I'm not sure the average joe understands how bad it has gotten. The surcease of all that filthy lucre flowing in the halls of congress can only help. I heard a local car dealer remark two years ago, that the repo rate for car loans, previously owned or new, was close to 23%...that's millions of cars on the lots of repo car brokers ( auto advantage, carmax? - "buy this care where someone else took the depreciation!" ) became a lucrative business. All we had to do was destroy the credit of 30 -40 million hapless souls who did not see the greed implosion coming. This repo rate was to "keep the dollar and the economy 'sound'? Protected from those 'vile defaulters'? What soundness? One company's precipitous demise comforts me, and that was GMAC whose arrogance exceeded their avarice, until they shot themselves in the foot; and are now licking that wound, and asking themselves, "Perhaps we ..sniff...went too far? I'm, sniffle, having difficulty finding a job wehre I get to wear my Armani suit and con the gullible" (Disclosure: I have in mind my neighbor, formerly raking in 100 "large' a year...who tried to sell me an immaculate CTS with moon roof...which turned out, I learned later, to have a blown engine ) Can you say, 'ethical conduct, boys and girls?
Reform, ethical conduct...THESE are the words I listen for in the campaign blurbs. Perhaps a chant, "No more quid pro quo; no more quid por quo..."

Wednesday Outlook: Commodities, Emerging Markets

Very thorough outlay of the big picture. Thanks. And I like the metaphor of a 'stampede'. ( the cowboys of old used to chase down and 'rope and hog tie' the leader to stop the stampede; and don't we wish there were a few of those brave souls now! ) A flock of birds, or a school of fish also works. So, we knew the economy would contract...so when the figures come in, "we" ( they?) wheel like a school of fish even though there is no shark, just photographers ( bean counters ) . I freely admit that i , personally am not in the loop, nor an expert - hence the moniker, 'simple simon'...but there are cash rich ( cash drunk ) sovereign funds, and others, 'poised' , as the last commentator said, to ameliorate or 'deflate' the current panic. For those folks ( sovereign funds like Dubai ) 25% loss of a trillion here and a trillion there, doesn't matter that much, if there is a hundred trillion remaining to squander somewhere. It's the small potatoes 'flock' that needs realistic assessments via 'big picture' analysis like this here. Thanks again.