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redriver
19 Comments
An Absence of Leadership
All this to protect financials!? The normal investor has had a year to get out of financials and they did, hence the drops. The only "people" in the financials are greedy little investors/hedge funds looking for a quick fit. And they just got it by us gambling with your children's future.
How is anyone in american government supposed to go over to a second and third world country and tell them to receive our funding you have to do as we have in creating our great nation. Free markets, joke. Limited government intervention, lie. Power to the individual versus the government, shame. Well at least we will be able to finally "fit" into the United Nations family. We are of them now.
What country are we now? Not America. Shame on us all. Shame indeed.
Oh by the way, did any of your representatives listen to anything you had to say on this matter? We are Fools. Looking forward to that Carter era inflation.
We will never find leaders if we the people do not deserve them.
Good luck.
New Attack Plan: Bring Back RTC on a Grand Scale
There is only one way out of this mess and that's to spend our way out regardless of inflationary woes. Not that I am for any of this but when we allow ourselves through our representatives to get boxed into a corner, it is what it is. Spend a couple of Trillion on creating a new RTC or, on an infrastructure improvement plan........ either way its going to really really hurt. We got exactly what we deserved. The "Big Brain" concept highlighted by Greenspan and Ben has always been a joke. This economy is just too complicated for anyone person to understand, plan and guide.
Hope the Chinese, Japanese and the Saudi's keep buying our paper because if they stop, its over.
As for the really rich,there is nothing preventing them from dumping their citizenship to protect their assets from us poor suckers.
Residential Real Estate: How Much More Pain?
Residential Real Estate: How Much More Pain?
Forget $100 a Barrel - Oil Will Plummet to $30
These kids are so funny. I especially like the psuedo crazed brainwashed stare in his picture. Combined with the scam artist pusher it sure was funny. Look for him on an infomercial soon.
I guess this is one more example of what the audacity of hope breeds.
Why Visa Should Thrive
Visa Inc. = US consumers hmmmmmm.
So as Visa grows internationally let's say in Europe, the only benefit Visa Inc. gets is some small fee percentage vs. the overall profit stream. Whereas MC when it grows its numbers worldwide, the stock benefits to a much greater degree. If I have this right, it looks like its MC. Agree that Discover and Amex will be very competitive as well.
Oil Price Targets
Fannie and Freddie: Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off
But, "Its George Bush's Fault!!!!?????????&quo... God that's so old.
So for a dose of the truth here's " Taking you back to school", again:
Fannie Mae was created in 1938 as part of DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENT Franklin Delano Roosevelt's SOCIALIST New Deal. (Read, The Forgotten Man) The collapse of the national housing market in the wake of the Great Depression discouraged private lenders from investing in home loans. Fannie Mae was established in order to provide local banks with federal money to finance home mortgages in an attempt to raise levels of home ownership and the availability of affordable housing.(Sounds familiar, Socialists drooling now)
Initially, Fannie Mae operated like a national savings and loan, allowing local banks to charge low interest rates on mortgages for the benefit of the home buyer. This lead to the development of what is now known as the secondary mortgage market. Within the secondary mortgage market, companies such as Fannie Mae are able to borrow money from foreign investors at low interest rates because of the financial support that they receive from the U.S. Government. It is this ability to borrow at low rates that allows Fannie Mae to provide fixed interest rate mortgages with low down payments to home buyers. Fannie Mae makes a profit from the difference between the interest rates homeowners pay and foreign lenders charge.
For the first thirty years following its inception, Fannie Mae held a veritable monopoly over the secondary mortgage market. In 1968, due to fiscal pressures created by the Vietnam War, DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENT Lyndon B. Johnson privatized Fannie Mae in order to remove it from the national budget. At this point, Fannie Mae began operating as a GSE, generating profits for stock holders while enjoying the benefits of exemption from taxation and oversight as well as implied government backing. In order to prevent any further monopolization of the market, a second GSE known as Freddie Mac was created in 1970. Currently, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac control about 90 percent of the nation's secondary mortgage market.
GSEs such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mae, with their combination of private enterprise and public backing have experienced a period of unprecedented financial growth over the past few decades. The current assets of these two companies combine for a total that is 45 percent greater than that of the nation's largest bank.
On the other hand, their combined debt is equal to 46 percent of the current national debt. It is this combination of rapid growth and over leveraging that has lead to the current concerns of Congress, the Justice Department and the SEC with regards to the financial practices of these GSEs.
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are the only two Fortune 500 companies that are not required to inform the public about any financial difficulties that they may be having. In the event that there was some sort of financial collapse within either of these companies, U.S. taxpayers could be held responsible for hundreds of billions of dollars in outstanding debts. A recent investigation by the Justice Department and the SEC into the accounting practices at Freddie Mac revealed accounting errors in the amount of 4.5 to 4.7 billion dollars and resulted in the termination of three of the company's top executives. Ongoing investigations by DEMOCRATIC CONTROLLED Congress, particular the DEMOCRATIC CONTROLLED House Finance Services subcommittee that oversees the activity of GSEs, will determine the future role of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and the secondary mortgage market that they dominate.
Just the facts.
The Obama camp can now formulate a response.
U.S. Housing Market Forecast: 2008-2010
Nationalizing Oil: Well-Intentioned, But Wrong
Can't wait to see that Chinese oil rig being built off the Florida coast (first of six I am told), flying the Chinese flag half way into our "protected zone".
Hoping the Housing Crisis Is Over
Zeus
The WSJ Is Wrong on the Housing Crisis
Homebuilder Bailout: An Updated Analysis
"Be aware that if this provision becomes law, it will incentivize builders to dump assets at levels and prices that were previously imprudent and economically unfeasible in an attempt to reclaim cash in the form of back taxes. This will exacerbate the strain on the financial sector since it is the devalution of real assets that triggered much of this mess in the first place. Property values will drop faster, property value led defaults will accelerate, and MBS and related securities, products and pools will get hit that much faster and harder as well."
From Reggie himself.
My father doesn't think this will pass the house, "its pretty easy to get the senators to vote this way but its harder to get through the house since there are just so many more of those pinheads. This should work in our favor."
TWT
The Reverse Ripple Theory of Metropolitan Home Price Corrections
The only comps acceptable in Queen Creek are foreclosures.
Being based in Phoenix I will agree with the "concept" (actually the reality) that the outlying areas will be the first to rebound because that is where all the big right offs have been with the recent REO's. With Speedwagon finished lot prices of 30 cents on the improvement dollars (land is free - no joke here. Ex.: If it took $1200/Front foot to build, the finished lots went for $300/front foot), this will enable at least one old time Phoenix builder who bought some of these REO's to "begin selling new homes in the valley starting from $89,900 by year-end".
Now the really interesting phenom to watch (as mentioned) will be the reverse flow of devaluations back to the core. Flushing the toilet seems to be a good analogy. Can't wait for that calm flat water. In the mean time, its going to be very interesting.
The other point that needs to be addressed is that a great deal of the cost increase of new home construction was not caused by the usual suspects but by the cities and towns themselves. (Seeking Alpha 2/20 article 64780) Under the umbrella of "better" "quality" "livable" they drastically raised the cost of doing business. A University of Washington Economics professor completed a study last year on this very topic and found that in Seattle the city actually was responsible for over 88% of the cost increases over the last seven years! This number is lower here in Phoenix but a large number still. Larger lots=less density=more $/unit. Front porches on entry level homes. Stucco pop-outs on rear windows behind fences. 38' wide roadways. The list goes on. For us to get back to market, everything related to the run-up must be addressed.
Good article.
"Reluctant Banks" Let Defaulted Borrowers Stay in Homes
So, we should all go out, buy the highest price foreclosed home we can afford (there will be fewer people then coming to kick us out) and just never make any payments. Probably live rent free for at least 3 years. If you're not going to buy another car or home for awhile, what do you need credit for anyway? Plus, when the government sends the $7000 tax rebate along for buying the foreclosure we can all meet in Hawaii for drinks. I'm buying!
Its a great country, with "free" health care on the way. ;-)