Trane250

Foreign Investors: Listen to Putin's Renault Threat

Russia suffered over 70 years of totalitarian rule and a further 10 year of predatory cowboy capitalism foisted on them by American academics like Jeffrey Sachs. Cut them some slack, Dr. Pirrong. They're trying. They are not perfect and neither are we. The Russian brand of capitalism is still evolving and it is incumbent upon us to steer them in the right direction, not get on our high horse and endlessly criticize.

REITs Whimper After Relatively Strong Year

The anxiety over REIT mortgage refinancing is overblown. The banks will compromise and accommodate wrt the decreased cash flow that REITs will have available to service mortgages. They don't want to be stuck with more foreclosed properties.

Do your homework before you invest, but the opportunity to make big bucks in REIT stocks is out there.

The Evolution of U.S. Manufacturing

During the Bush regime, the US ran up a trade deficit in manufactured goods of $3.4 trillion. During the first few months of Obama, our trade deficit in manufactured goods is approaching $500 billion and in a recession no less. That is unsustainable.

Chandler appears to be one of those ubiquitous "new world order," "new economy" types who keep spouting the same mantra about how trade deficits don't matter and the US is the world's "largest manufacturer." Poppycock. That manufacturing output figure includes the "manufacture" of electric power. A lot of the exports are really "re-exports" of goods or partially finished goods produced abroad.

I'm old enough to remember when just about everything had a "made in USA" label. It's a rarity to find such a label now.

There's a limit to how much money we can borrow from abroad or print up on our Swiss-made intaglio presses to support a life style we haven't earned.

Rail Transport: Why Can't We Learn from Europeans?

I heard that Ansaldo was dickering to buy a factory in Schenectady, NY from SuperSteel, which assembles rail & transit cars for Kinki-Sharyo of Japan for the NYC transit system.

Ansaldo just discarded the well-respected name of Union Switch & Signal of Pittsburgh in favor of their own. Union Switch is a world leader in the design and manufacture of train & transit control and operating systems.


On Oct 01 04:16 PM Valley Boy wrote:

> Yes, Trane250, it sure seems like European train-lovers are in on
> American transit deals. An article in today's latimes.com
> titled
> "L.A. Mayor praises light-rail car plant" lends support to that idea.
> The article mentions "a planned construction of a light-rail car
> manufacturing plant along the Los Angeles River" to be built by "Italian
> rail-car maker AnsaldoBreda."

Rail Transport: Why Can't We Learn from Europeans?

On Oct 01 12:47 PM Valley Boy wrote:

> For a very recent update, see portlandonline.com for the article
> titled "Transportation Secretary LaHood Visits Portland."
> That is dated July 2 of this year. The article mentions "the first
> modern streetcar built in USA in 60 years" by "local union workers
> at Oregon Iron Works in Clackamas County." The new streetcars are
> servicing a new route in downtown Portland, an area with tightly
> congested streets.

These streetcars are being built using designs, tooling and parts being supplied by the Skoda Works of the Czech Republic.

Rail Transport: Why Can't We Learn from Europeans?

Ryan Avent wrote: "But we could build trains!"

Ryan, can you give me the name of one American company that designs and builds its own passenger cars or subway cars or integrated train sets? I'll clue you in, there are none. The last one, the Budd Company of Philadelphia, shut down around 1985.

Which Pfizer / Wyeth Sites Will Shut Down?

The bottom line is what motivates Pfizer. To hell with anything else.

"After several years of eliminating jobs that once totaled 3,600 at that company's [Warner-Lambert's] Ann Arbor, Mich., facility, Pfizer announced its closing in January 2007. Among those put out of work was Bob Sliskovic, a scientist credited with developing Lipitor."

Staying Neutral on Entergy as Spinoff Is Delayed

The solution is simple: sell the entire nuclear generation assets. There are plenty of large utilities that could buy Entergy Nuclear and still maintain their investment grade credit rating.

Natural Gas, And Lots of It

With such a huge surplus of natural gas, why not liquefy it for export? Goodness knows we could use the revenue.

Coal ETFs Are Here to Stay

Sequestering carbon underground is pipe dream. The truly nasty products of coal burning (oxides of nitrogen, particulates, sulfur dioxide and mercury) can be significantly reduced using current technology. Perhaps sometime in the future, algal photosynthesis and bio-capture can reduce CO2 emmissions and provide a new source of food.

What Does the Fed's Statement Mean for Mortgage Rates?

Not to worry. After this "purchase" program runs its course, the fed will begin a new one. If they don't, investors will demand a very high yield on newly issued MBSes and that will send the "new economy" into a nosedive.

Electricity Is Not an Energy Source

Here are a few things for the "greenies" in the Green Mountain state to consider: Entergy Nuclear the operator of the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant has applied for a 20 year license renewal. It is not clear if the NRC will grant such a request, which means that it may be decommissioned in 2012. HydroQuebec can also not renew the power purchase contracts that it has with the VT utilities. What will you greenies do then?

The Price of Milk

Dairy farmers were paid an average of $12 per hundred weight of milk (about 12 gallons) this past summer whereas cost of production hovers between $18 to $20. As in the past, this will result in more farm foreclosures and auctions. The big winners are the big dairy processors and the supermarkets. Rank capitalism applied to dairying will result in the end of the family farm era and the monopolizing of production by big business. Then see what your milk and ice cream will cost.

www.freewebs.com/proag...

Is WFC Playing a Mortgage Shell Game?

"I have the original purchase documentation on the mortgage from July 21st 2008, when it was bought (by Wells in Frederick MD) from the original funding company in Tempe AZ."

OK, then post it so that we can all see for ourselves. Otherwise, you're blowing hot air.

Chart of the Day: Wells Fargo's Construction Loans

When buying Wachovia, I'm sure that Wells looked at Wachovia's overall footprint including its extensive branch network and its nationwide retail and wholesale brokerage operation and concluded that the purchase of Wachovia was too good of an opportunity to pass up.