TinyTim

The Single Most Important Thing to Understand About the Fed

A more interesting book on the subject is Web of Debt by Brown. She's no macro-economist, in fact, she's a lawyer, and some of the book needs a more expert analysis, but she proposes a non-commodity monetary system without a central bank.

Depressed Detroit: The Sale of the Pontiac Silverdome

I don't know which is more appalling. That the city let it go for $583,000, or that $55.7 million in 1975 is up to $227 million in 2009 dollars.

If a deal for $17M fell thru just last year, one has to wonder about other issues. Many of these issues question the competency of the city.

The Smart Grid Gets Its Own ETF

Alan Y. - Good point. This ETF is less about the Smart Grid, a name it uses because of the huge hype around it, and more about renewable energy.
While the Smart Grid may encompass several technologies, from an investment standpoint, it's really just about smart meters, which is covered by 4 or 5 companies, only a few or which are pure plays.

Kicked Out of Finance and into Journalism

"But I don’t really consider investment newsletters to be journalism in the first place."

Aren't you answering your own question/ issue here?

From what I see, all these folks are using the Net as their media. So what would you want to do, regulate and censor the Internet?
I've been hearing a lot about that lately in other contexts.

In my mind, the media doesn't matter. I have the same skepticism re what I read in some blog / email online as I do for a Reuters article in my local or national press.

I get a kick out of the thin skin journalists have for each other. Fox was just crucified for using campaign photos of Palin in an article about her book. Some Mideast news photographer of long standing just had his portfolio wiped because he Photoshopped an image.

If they can spin pictures this easily, imagine what happens with the words.

Newspapers: The Opportunity of Bankruptcy

Good read with good points.

I'm curious about the business model of the free weeklies.
The largest is (now) Village Voice Media. Bought out by New Times of Phx not too long ago. They have approx a dozen free weeklies in various cities.

They're online and have in-depth research on select local stories with limited news scope.
The surprising thing is they're packed with ads, and not classified.
That's the income. They seem to be thriving.

Cadmium: Spent Energy?

Good read. Very complete.
Glad I quit smoking. My understanding is the highest correlation for cadmium as a carcinogen is prostate cancer.

Cadmium was also used as an alloy in copper to make what was called a type of "bronze" or cad-copper for overhead electrical contact wire for trolleys and light rail. The cadmium gave the alloy better wear resistance than pure electrical copper.

Confirmed: Defense Spending Creates Fewer Jobs than Other Types of Spending

""Military Keynesianism" - the idea that war is the best economic stimulus - is false."

OMG. Where did this come from??

Many famous people have said that spending resources to create things that get blown up is the worst sort of economics- no increased productivity, no improved infrastructure, not even a consumption benefit.

"military spending increases unemployment and decreases economic growth."

This would be relative since defense contractors are notoriously bloated, inefficient and overpaid. Anyone fro a $5K toilet seat??

Defending the Fed's Independence, Part II

"Because independent central banks do a better job of controlling inflation."

OMG. My buck is now worth a nickel. YMBK
How do you define better??

Getting Technical: The Humpy Pattern Thesis Lives On

Ummmm. Climbing a wall of worry.

People feel compelled to climb because they need the returns.

The Importance of Fed Independence

"people do not feel like the Fed is operating on their behalf, they don't think that the Fed's actions are in their best interests,"

Guess what? They're not.

Your thesis is that the Fed needs to be independent from government. They are 100% independent of government already. It's the banksters that they are beholden to.

To hell with the Fed. Let Congress (as opposed to the banks) issue it's own money without the banks per the Constitution. Why should taxpayers pay exorbitant fees (interest) to banks to provide a service the Treasury is supposed to do.

The irony is painfully obvious. The one function the government shouldn't outsource is one of the few they do.

Assessing Black Swan Events in the Insurance Industry

Power law phenomona in nature, such as eathquakes and asteroids are more applicable to insurance underwriting than a normal distribution black swan.

The big question is how applicable the power law is to finance and economics.

Nissan to Build the World’s Cheapest Car

This is interesting when combined with Nissan's BEV Leaf and the surprisingly low pricing announced for it.

Obviously, Nissan sees a lot of volume in "Third World" emergence.

Motorola Keeps Destroying Value

What are the chances of them finding a buyer for the old General Instruments?
About the same as the cell phone div a few months ago. Although they should try again with all the Droid hype.

Without detailed analysis, one factor that shouldn't be discounted is - they need the cash. This happened eight years ago when they spun off the government electronics business to General Dynamics. Defense is a nice, stable sector right now. They probably wish they had sold something else.

Chris Galvin was in way over his head. The grandchildren usually don't survive in family businesses.

It's amazing how many technologies Motorola created, developed and took a swing at, only to whiff in the market for one lame reason or another. Only to have another company make a killing on the same idea.

If they sell set-top boxes and cell phone, what's left?
First responder radios and cell phone infrastructure?

Book Review: The Greatest Trade Ever, By Gregory Zuckerman

Thanks for the great review. I plan to read this one.
I love these unexpected success stories, like Rich Dennis' turtles.

Dan Gross has an interesting podcast with Zuckerman at Slate:
www.slate.com/id/2234549/

It's curious that Zuckerman took the trouble to cover others that had a similar idea. Apparently he wasn't as accurate with these without the one-on-one interview time. I followed Michael Burry's Scion Capital hedge fund for some time and while he was way early and a lot of his investors wanted or did pull out, he still made an amazing fortune. The guy was a freshout Stanford brain surgeon. Go figure.

Here's a Jon Markman piece from two years ago on Burry:
articles.moneycentral....

Treasury Meets the Bloggers, Gives Them Cookies

Very good point. How does one measure big?
I'm all for busting up the megabanks and keep up the good work in refuting arguments like Too Small To Compete.

The worrisome point is that even smallish banks could have a huge systemic impact considering the LTCM situation with deriatives.

Considering the demise of many local papers and consequent rise in importance of bloggers, these invites are indicative of the saavy of the Treasury types.

Besides, what would they do if they gave a meeting and no one came.

"The free cookies were good and fresh, with a warm, fluid chocolate interior"
LOL. A measure of the high regard for the blogger audience?
Those were the most expensive cookies you will ever eat.