Market Holiday

Dollar Facing Short-Term Positives

Bear Flag on the EUR/DLR

Explain This Rally!

Goldman is a primary dealer. There are $250 billion in Treasuries to be sold this week. Guess who is the buyer of last resort? The primary dealers. Where will they get the money? Will they need to liquidate their equity positions to buy Treasuries? Is this why they ramped the markets so high? Time will tell.

Justin Fox on Regulatory Reform and Market Irrationality

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If oil prices keep climbing, expect a reawakening of the 'speculators are evil' witch-hunt. "If the screaming gets loud enough, you could see some pretty draconian measures."

Oil is topping anyway.

Stocks Will Fall 37% or Gold Will Rally 60%

It seems to me that all these market mood swings will be the status quo for the next few years. It will be great for traders, but bad for the "buy and holders". Every six months or so, expect an inflation scare followed by the reality of deflation. The road will be very rocky. Don't expect your thesis to hold for more than a few months. Good luck all, especially all those with that "store of wealth" shiny metal.

Stocks Will Fall 37% or Gold Will Rally 60%

I like this analysis on gold: Shows where demand is coming from now.

www.debtorsprisonblog....

Any talk of a V-shaped recovery is poppycock, Bob Rodriguez of First Pacific Advisors says, warning the bulk of U.S. credit problems are still to come. By the close of 2011, Treasury debt outstanding will be $14.6-16.6T, and debt-to-GDP ratio will rise to between 97-110%, which leads him to wonder: "How do we finance all this debt?"

Check your math, Bruce.

Any talk of a V-shaped recovery is poppycock, Bob Rodriguez of First Pacific Advisors says, warning the bulk of U.S. credit problems are still to come. By the close of 2011, Treasury debt outstanding will be $14.6-16.6T, and debt-to-GDP ratio will rise to between 97-110%, which leads him to wonder: "How do we finance all this debt?"

A National Lottery: For every dollar you pay in income taxes, you get a chance to win a $1Billion. Maybe that would bring in the tax cheats.

Any talk of a V-shaped recovery is poppycock, Bob Rodriguez of First Pacific Advisors says, warning the bulk of U.S. credit problems are still to come. By the close of 2011, Treasury debt outstanding will be $14.6-16.6T, and debt-to-GDP ratio will rise to between 97-110%, which leads him to wonder: "How do we finance all this debt?"

Government could institute 100% estate tax or, say, 10% tax on wealth over $1million. Maybe that would do it. But, but, they said on TV that the bottom was in...

Buyers step in very late in the game to lift stocks from their lows and mitigate damages from today's selloff. Unofficial final numbers: DJIA -0.67% (-58.14) to 8,682.73. S&P -1.32% (-12.53) to 932.21. Nasdaq -0.59% (-10.88) to 1,825.92.

Nothing to see here... Move along.

GM confirms it's selling Hummer to Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery, which GM says will secure over 3K jobs in the U.S. Terms to follow.

Remember, Hummer does not make the Humvee (HMMWV). That is made by AM General.

Emerging Markets Close at 8-Month High: Global Recession's Over

The globe can't recover without the US. (Short bus riders think they can). They just don't realize it yet. Watch out when they do....

5 Reasons Why the $700B Bailout Could Translate to $250 Oil

I would think that demand destruction will be quite severe. If the government prints, then all bets are off.
On the subject of the bailout, watch this video:
market-ticker.denninge...

It's a Bull Market in Government Intervention

The New Bill (as yet unnamed).
This is a bill – not yet passed – but if it passes, it will become law. Keep this fact in mind. The bill is sold to us as one designed to help the American taxpayer who is losing their home. But, that is not what it does.

Now, read this part of the “bill:”
“Sec. 8. Review: Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.”

>>>>
Take a moment to re-read that. This new LAW would place the Secretary of the Treasury ABOVE THE LAW.
>>>>


So, this bill is being sold to us, the taxpayer, as a design to protect the American public. Ask yourself, if this new law is so helpful to the American taxpayer, why are we not allowed to review the decisions he is making with OUR tax-money? Why aren’t courts or oversight committees allowed to see what exactly it is he will be doing?

Here is what the bill doesn’t do. So far, it doesn’t include anything to actually help those whose homes are in foreclosure, or about to be in foreclosure.
Now, this is what it DOES do:
1) Creates a NEW TAXPAYER FUNDED account, called the “RTC.”
2) In this account, trillions in bad debt is funneled from companies who failed due to irresponsibly risky decisions
3) In this account, billions in loans dumped related to STRESSED COMMERCIAL real estate
4) In this account, financial institutions will compete for how little they will accept for their bad debts
5) With this law, the secretary will decide how much of your money he will pay for bad loans, regardless of the true market value.

To make this crystal clear: this account will be used to take YOUR money and then with that money (taken from you), PURCHASE the very liabilities that Wall Street can’t sell to any other business or country. And why can’t they sell them? It's simple: they are worthless!

We are told that this bill is the lesser of two evils. So, if this is the lesser, what is the greater? The greater “evil” is allowing free markets to work as designed!

In a free market, these companies would fail. They made risky bets that blew-up, and now they are weak. From the ashes, new stronger companies would emerge to fill the void. Yes, it would hurt for a while – but that is the nature of a free-market. This bill spits in the face of the very foundation on which our great country was built. It is designed to bail-out bankrupt institutions that ruined the fiscal health of the country!

Furthermore, after these people – among the richest in the world – get our money, will they pay any additional personal tax to offset the massive burden they are placing on the system? Once again, the "lower classes" will be lining the pockets of the uber class.

What is maddening about this situation is that the U.S.A already had rules and regulations in place – rules created because of the Great Depression – to prevent this from happening again. So why is this happening again?

It’s simple really: it’s because the people you elected turned a blind eye and chose not to enforce the law while everyone was making a killing. As a good example of this, you may have heard recently in the news, is how the SEC is “banning illegal naked short selling” in the market place. Well, here’s a news flash – Naked Short Selling has always been ILLEGAL. Why are you placing a ban on something you are supposed to ARREST people for?

Clearly, these people are not representing your interests. I know, I know, I can practically hear you now, “Since when do they represent my interests?”

That’s right. Since when.

They weren’t thinking about you when they collected $100s of millions from lobbyists.
They weren’t thinking about you while Wall Street speculated with the money you placed in their bank accounts and spun it into trillions.
They weren’t thinking about you when they paid JP Morgan $30 billion (of your money) to buy Bear Sterns, or another $85 billion (of YOUR money) to AIG
They weren’t thinking about you when, all this time, they told you that this problem was contained.

And so, I ask you today – what makes you think that they are thinking about you now?

How does that make you feel?

1) This new Law places Secretary Paulsen above the law; “Decisions… non-reviewable … agency discretion …may NOT be reviewed by ANY COURT OF LAW OR ANY ADMINISTRATIVE AGENCY”
2) Wall Street, where “Greed is Good”, is getting YOUR money, to ensure they keep their 5 mansions, private jets, multi-million dollar yacht, and bonuses: (Goldman Sachs, alone, paid bonuses of 18 billion in 2007 and 16 billion in 2006)
3) The U.S.A – the BASTION of “free market” capitalism – is utterly preventing, in any way it can, to allow the free market to actually WORK. If you think America is a free-market economy, stop that false belief right now. Even SOCIALIST GOVERNMENTS would not embark down this path of socialist “financialism” (www.upi.com/Business_N.......

So, what can we do at this point?

First: Forward this email. No matter how embarrassed or worried you might feel about it, forward it to other red-blooded Americans so they can at least be AWARE this is happening. If they get irritated with you, they are choosing to live in ignorance.

Second: Call your representatives. They are the people who are supposed to do YOUR bidding. Call them, make them justify this new Law. Don't believe them if they tell you, "this is the best we can do."
This law is not good for you, it will not prevent a crash, it will not cause home value to suddenly turn around. It will cause a short term rally in the stock market, it will allow rich bankers to off-load bad debts, and it will allow Wall Street to recover catastrophic stock losses while the big money sells into the rally (while they work hard to convince you to leave your 401K invested).

I can assure you this: if this law passes, America will fundamentally turn its back on the very premise on which our country was founded: Free-Market Capitalism.

The markets will correct themselves regardless of any action the government attempts to make. It is unavoidable. Nothing goes "up" forever, and we all recognize this.

"When the going gets tough, the tough get going."

Well, apparently not in America. In the U.S.A, when the going gets tough, the tough get handouts. For anyone who has money.

Ever wonder why congress and our government makes these panic changes over weekends? Well, I'm not sure about you, but I'm not usually watching the markets or the news right now. I'm usually outside playing with my son or enjoying time with my friends and neighbors. Tomorrow I'll be watching the game. Frankly, I'd rather be at my neighbor's BBQ than sitting here writing this. But this time, there is something more important to do.

Below I've pasted all the names and numbers for every member of the house and senate for your convenience. You can email them, but they appear to be completely ignoring email at present.

BTW, if they refuse to take your calls, make note of it and let me know. This is expressly illegal given the call they answered to represent your interests in the government of the United States of America.

Please consider forwarding this email so that others have an opportunity to take action if they choose to.

God Bless America,

Short Ban: Government Policy Created Too Hastily

Short term boost in the market, but I do not see how this will correct everything. The bottom line is that financial institutions made bad bets in derivatives. You can't easily fix that with something like the old RTC. If the government trys, interest rates will rise and housing prices and these same derivatives will fall. It is an attempt to forestall a downward spiral and will work until it suddenly does not.