Tatertot

From The $700B Man, which chronicles how managing TARP almost destroyed Neel Kashkari's life: "$700B was a number out of the air," Kashkari recalls. "It was a political calculus. I said, 'We don't know how much is enough. We need as much as we can get. What about $1T?' 'No way,' Hank shook his head. I said, 'Okay, what about $700B?' We didn't know if it would work. We had to project confidence, hold up the world. We couldn't admit how scared we were, or how uncertain."

Umm, no one in the federal government is making anywhere near $10 million from salary or bonuses. Unless you are saying that Kashkari is receiving kickbacks from Goldman, in which case, you better be able to put some sort of evidence for such a slanderous claim.


On Dec 07 03:32 AM Michael Clark wrote:

> Not only that: the proud Mr. Kashkari probably received one of those
> $10 million dollar bonuses for the work he did. I don't think I
> feel too sorry for a bagman who gets paid in the lower millions to
> act as Hank Paulson's bunion boy. 'Almost ruined his life': but
> he'll be able to live the rest of his life comfortably for the 'service'
> he rendered his country. Carrying billions from Washington back
> to Wall Street....yes, it is a treacherous, difficult path he chose.
> What a patriot!

Monetizing Debt: Disinformation in the Blogosphere

I hate to break it to you, but it does actually say that the fed is issuing debt. Simple sentence structure dictates it, but also do the clause "via it's puppet..." show that that Durden was also talking about the Fed ultimately controlling the debt issuance.
The thing is, he even implicitly acknowledged that he said it in the comments:
In response to the comment
"T., the Treasury issues the bonds, not the Fed:
[excerpt of quote from piece]
not picking on you, just saying..."

To which Tyler responded
"Fair point. Although Treasury -> Fed = Monetization... that's the bottom line."

Which is the ultimate point. This is a monetization, no need to defend points that are ancilliary to the main point when the side points are clearly in the wrong.

On Aug 10 03:04 PM newone wrote:

> Sorry to say that you are the one who is publishing wrong information.
> Read Tylers article ( the one in quotes in your article) carefully.
> It clearly says that the bonds were issued via Treasury. He doesn’t
> say Fed issued them - and you blithely go on accusing him of mistating
> facts. That guy really knows what he is talking about and you are
> the one who is not clearly observing. Isnt anyone else reading this
> obfuscation ?

SoCal housing recovery? "New construction is now literally stopped."

I know a couple of really small developers in socal, and it is really is as bad as that article portrays. There just aren't that many construction jobs at all.

As bad as it is for the developers, it will help in the long run. There was some serious overdevelopment during those boom years, and it will take quite a while before all of the excess is reutilized. Creating a lot of capacity now, when there is so much overcapacity, would be very detrimental long term.

Joe Weisenthal wonders: If Wall Street's smugly confident alchemists could be so wrong about the economy, how bad will it be when physicists really mess things up?

As a physics major, I really was amused by that.

There Are Opportunities Everywhere - Barron's Interview

Why did you cut off the years of 1987 through 1990? The fund started in June of 1987, right before the market crash. In those three years you omitted the market ended up returning to its highs. So the return for the market was 0% those three years: it would have been nice if you had included that in your analysis.

Having said that, I agree with the rest of your post.


On May 04 12:02 AM H.J. Huneycutt wrote:

> "Since inception in 1987, his Baron Asset Fund has returned 13.16%
> annualized returns through September 2007."
>
> Interesting wording there --- "through September 2007".
>
> From 1990 to September 2007, the S&P 500 increased by about 12.1%
> annually and that would not include dividend payments. So it would
> appear that he basically performed in line with the market and that
> an index fund would probably generate returns similiar to him.<br/>
>
> That said --- I'm not a believer in the "you can't outperform the
> market" argument. There are lots of people who consistently outperform
> the market by analyzing the financial thoroughly or having a very
> keen understanding of the businesses one is investing in. It's just
> that most fund managers don't actually achieve this. And I'm not
> convinced that this guy's track record really suggests that he is
> one of the outperformers.

Seen at a Florida real estate agent's office: Short your home before it's too late!!

well, I was quite disappointed. That poster was just about short selling your delinquent house, when I clicked on that link I was expecting some derivative where you could short the value of your house.

Time for Dollar Bears to Go Long Commodity Currencies

what are you people smoking? The dollar may be overvalued, but to even include it in the greatest bubbles in history is so laughable I question your grasp of finance. Just look at a 5 year chart of the dollar. That is not indicative of a bubble by any definition of bubble you choose. Bear market rally, sure. But nowhere near a bubble. I'm not trying to defend the dollar here, I suspect it will decline. Yet, beware as there are some good things going for the dollar, namely a narrowing in the currency and trade deficits.


On Apr 16 06:58 AM nobby73 wrote:

> "We are witnessing one of the greatest bubbles in history. South
> Sea Bubble, Mississippi Bubble, Tulip Bubble, Dollar Bubble."
>
> Geoffster - I think you are correct, except that the Dollar Bubble
> has far surpassed all bubbles in history.

The Investment Circus: Why Mean-Ignorant Monkeys Beat Median-Jumping Clowns

aarc:

"Dow Jones made a rally from $42 in 1932 to $12,000 in year 2000. A massive 28,470% price appreciation over 68 years. Or an average of 418% price increase per year"
is completely wrong.

Shoot, just go thought it. 418% is more than quadrupling per year. If that didn't ring any alarm bells, then certainly just some quick calculations should have. If we quadruple for 1 year, end amount is $160, then $640 after another year, then $2560, then $10240, then $40960. Oops, we've more than doubled, more like tripled, the amount of the peak of the dow, and that only took us 5 years.

Curious Predictions About SoCal Housing

These numbers are encouraging, even if they are just for one month. If sales can continue this elevated clip, then hopefully we can work off our glut of houses. But that will take a long time, as there was a lot of overdevelopment.

The Homepage, Refreshed

for the subscription sites, just copy the title and pop that into google. Often times, the link you want is the first one, and due to some agreement that these sites have with google, you can access the article for free through google.

Is the USO ETF a Piece of Junk?

would it be possible to go long USL and short USO? That way, you essentially hedge any movements in the price of oil, but gain from the contango. What kind of returns could you expect from this?

Kraft, Kinross and ConocoPhillips: A Stock Banquet

These consumer staple companies are always about intangible assets. That's how they make money, by having brands that people buy. Without the brands, they would not make nearly as much money as they do now. Which is why it makes sense to value these things, and not just dismiss them as worthless.

12 Reasons I'm Still Buying Oil

I've seen that sixty minutes clip, and while it has some serious shortcomings, it doesn't even support your claim. JPM was listed as one of many companies that speculated on the oil market, and they weren't even singled out in that like Morgan Stanley or Goldman Sachs were. So where you get this notion that it was all (or largely) JPM fault, I have no idea.

And the video for the comptroller doesn't even state 53 trillion dollars of debt. And if you listen to him, he qualifies his statements with "if nothing changes". Clearly, it is going to have to change. But this idea that we are set in stone to pay that much is absurd. Change will happen, forcefully if need be, but it will.

Your entire point of oil appreciating sans a pickup in demand is entirely contingent on the dollar depreciating. But unless a general pick up in the economy ensues, I don't see where exactly the drop in demand for the dollar is going to come from. There is a flight to treasury bonds, and while I wouldn't touch them with a ten foot pole, by most indications the chinese will continue to buy treasury bonds. This provides a relatively stable base for the dollar. Also, even if the US only has reserve currency status by default, it still counts for something. I see no challengers in the short term that will challenge that. Now, in the case of a hyperinflation (or just a period of prolonged, extremely strong inflation), the dollar would perform poorly. But I see that as unlikely, and at least, you've made no case that we should take that view.

12 Reasons I'm Still Buying Oil

you really should have put some links, especially for your allegations that JPM was manipulating the market. As it is, some of your points are incredibly misleading. US GDP isn't number 177 out of 181, it was ranked that for GDP growth. And that was from way back in April, before the financial crisis hit. How about showing how the current GDP growth estimates? They show a US economy, that while it is bad, is outperforming many other economies. And it's not 53 trillion in debt, for the most part that is just "obligations" we have to future generations. While there is an implicit promise, I've never seen anything in writing.

I like oil, I think we'll see a nice rise once we get out of this downturn. If this downturn is very prolonged and we see deflation, don't expect oil to be a fantastic bet. Demand could still fall some ways, even if it is a necessity. I think your margin of safety is still relatively good at this point, but notable upside is contingent on an improving economy.

Boeing's Bad Balance Sheet May Doom It

I understand that desire, but none-the-less, it would be useful to see whether these are one-time events or indicative of a trend. Boeing has already dropped from $104 (peak) to about $40, so I'm wondering how much this information has already been incorporated into the stock price. If we have a trend down, it may be worth going short side, but two data points don't allow for that kind of analysis. Like I said, I like the article, but I'd need more before really acting on it.


On Feb 12 01:17 PM Stephen Rosenman wrote:

> Tatertot: I wanted to dramatize the collapse of BA's assets in one
> year. The market totally ignored the balance sheet. It will take
> a herculean effort to repair the balance sheet. Also the investing
> public ignored the looming problem BA faces with its new pension
> plan problems: pension plan assets went from $5.9 billion to a $8.4
> billion liability. Someone needs to fire the guy in charge of the
> pension plan.