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     Ducxl |
actually the Crackhead thing is probably more fiscally responsible. THat's part of it.These companies in distress are PROFESSIONALS at money management! Back in 2000 an old co-worker was predicting this mortgage mess.I can recall it vividly.He said house values were going up MUCH too fast.Said people would end up walking away from their foreclosed houses because they'd owe more than they were worth in the end.So if an old school "Portugie" knew this was coming and he prepared why couldn't Wall St.? | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Buelliedan |
duc, One word brother.......GREED! | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Davegess |
AIG is in reality going bankrupt. They are just doing it in a slow orderly way. The loan gives them the time to sell assests and become liquid again. Letting them just crash could well have caused teh entire world economy to melt. I am not a fan of bailouts BUT sometimes we are better served by doing than not. the Great Depression was caused in a large part by the governments inability to shore up teh financial system. Money simply stopped circulating and as the supply of money shrunk everyone was hurt and poorest were hurt the most. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Ft_bstrd |
They have two years to liquidate assets and holding companies to make the loan call. The longer the distance from this week, the better it will look for AIG. Right now, they would have to liquidate $200B of assets to cover the $85B in loans simply because the market value of the assets sold is below market. Given a year or two, the values of the subsidiaries will climb allowing them to sell less of their profitable assets to make the call. If they fire sale their good assets to cover the bad assets, they will be left in the same situation as Lehman Bros. times 10. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Blake |
Buelliedan nailed it, pure and simple greed and a polyanish outlook on the real estate market thinking, just like they did with the dot com market some time ago, that it would just keep climbing. I heard one commentator describe the sub prime mortgages as "liar loans"; no one cared to check on the lies that the applicants used to qualify for 120% home loans. Cause they were greedy and thought that if the buyer defaulted they would still make out big on the continuously inflating home market. Thanks to those who answered me question. Sorry for the brain freeze o'mightly green illumator.  Some interesting related factoids sure to drive this straight to the Backfire Board... Campaign Contributions from 1989 through 2008
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| Rocketsprink |
Blake. What's the point of the above chart? What the hell does that have to do with the fact that the economy is taking a big shit? Yes, I know. It's the Democrats fault. Always is according to you. Who's been in control the last 8 years? How big is the deficit now? I know. Blame the Dems. Easier to point the finger than to take responsibility. Alright. I don't want this thread to end up on the Backfire Board, becuase like Ft Bstrd said, I bring all threads down, so goodbye. BTW, stick to the topic for a change. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Ft_bstrd |
I think Blake was answering the question as to what Obama received in campaign contributions. It was a revalant chart from that standpoint. There is enough blame to go around on both sides. Both sides knew there were issues and did nothing about it. Some of the framework that made our current situation began before the Bush administration. Sometimes it's the law of unintended consequences. It was a change in the accounting of executive compensation that led to the growth in the use of stock options. Few realized how insidious the use of options would become regarding corporate impact. Options aren't bad. It was the misuse of them that caused the problems. Lending isn't bad. The misuse of lending and the lack of common sense in it's approval created the problems. Sarbanes-Oxley was a complete over reaction as a result of trying to "clean up" the market. This lead to other areas of "unintended consequences". It's the way regulation works. Regulation is always too late, to expansive, and is like closing the door after the horse is out. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Danny_h__jesternut |
Construction worker I know lost their job cause the buisness is and has been a bit slow for awile now. This worker can't, hasn't found a new job cause its slow and most companies have cut back on help. They are about to loose their home, are the Feds going to help them? I think not. Screw the gov and the companies they bail out. Screw it all, let it all come crashing down, When rock bottom is hit then you come back up, lessons learned. 85 billion? There are only 250 million families in this land, give or take a few. Why not jest pay off all our home loans and give each house hold a million and let us spend our way out of ression. It would still have been cheeper than all the bail outs. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Oldog |
You know, non every body is in a jam, I may see my employer get the largest job we have ever had. My .02$ As I understand it ING ? is a major insurance provider and a lot of their assets are now in trouble, perhaps not the best management policy but I don't know, If any one can explain it better than the talking heads I am listening. I am angry to see the tax payers foot the bill I hope that some of the individuals that made bad decisions help pay for the mess, ( Pipe dream ) on another note Evey time I hit my ISP home page or MSN at work, its gloom and doom. FLAME ON! I am fed up with the press exadurating the state of things. "The stockmarket tumbled today amidst fears of ..... Depression ........ serious losses, Death of the American Dream" Quotes from this or that talking head about "canned goods and shotguns" I read further market tumbles 4% ?????? Wamu is in trouble Leahman Sachs is in trouble WTF! I don't know but I suspect that if the press had not started a RUN on IndyMAC that it might still be in operation today rather than a mess for the FDIC to clean up What happens if I go into a darkend movie theater and scream FIRE! FIRE! and start a panic? I get arrested, and depending on what else happens jail and or fine, Some form of similar responcibility enforcement should be considered, before the %@#%%#@ Lemmings go charging over the cliff Wamu is up for sale, guess what the boys in the corner offices screwed it up, normal concequence loss of job / business sorry perhaps they can work for walmart as greaters they appearantly can't see the concequences for making bad loans and shakey deals folks loose investments in bank while execs walk away with a wadd, err no execs can be sued for mismanagement by folks that were not covered by FDIC I hope so.} FLAME OFF I am not smart enough to know what to do about any of this or in a position to do any thing but voice my opinion here. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Ferris_von_bueller |
85 billion? There are only 250 million families in this land, give or take a few. Why not jest pay off all our home loans and give each house hold a million and let us spend our way out of ression. It would still have been cheeper than all the bail outs. I think your math is off. If you gave 250 million families each a million dollars that would amount to 250,000,000,000,000 dollars. In other words, 250 trillion dollars. The gross domestic product of the U.S. is only around 14 trillion per year with actual dollars in circulation being less than one trillion. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Danger_dave |
So give 'em a hundred grand and scale back the alcohol for the party. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Cyclonedon |
what's all this talk about? just this last Monday, John McCain said that our economy was solid and he's the Republican's choice for president! Everything must be good, right? | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Ducxl |
I'm seriously considering the Greens or Libertarians,who have few ties to the contributors to this mess. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Glitch |
The economy being fundamentally sound, is more what he said, not solid. To me there is a difference. The fundamentals are sound. What we need IMHO is the Fair Tax. It won't fix everything, but it will get the lobbyists out of the mix, and that would be a huge step in the right direction. Greens, never. Libertarians I could live with. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Rainman |
Perhaps the press is crying the sky is falling because, well, the sky is falling. Is it worse to be forewarned and maybe scared to hell or to have it sneak up on you? I'll take the free press. Also, one reason the reporters may be making such a big deal out of it is that, while press revenues from ads are down because of the down economy, the shareholders of the large corporations that own the press DEMAND the same return on their investments or more, causing cuts and the impression of a "industry in decline." The people killing off newspapers and TV news are the shareholders of the large corporations that own them. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Court |
>>>Sarbanes-Oxley was a complete over reaction as a result of trying to "clean up" the market. Huge over reaction. I was in a meeting a month ago and we were making plans to do a complex task on the towers that cross the Hudson near Bear Mountain. The work, in order to allow us to do it de-energized, had to be done during N outage at the Indian Point Nuclear plant. Thanks to Sarbanes-Oxley and to insure that I did not "manipulate energy markets" by discussing future events I could say the dates of the outage to the fellow on my left ( a "non-walled" employee" but was informed by an attorney that I would be subject to federal violations of I said the date to the fellow on my right, a "walled employee". You can read more about it on the FERC website. >>>Construction worker I know lost their job cause the business is and has been a bit slow for awhile now. I'm not sure where construction is slow. My firm has a $7B backlog that goes out to 2028. Last night I was with Judy Herman, General Counsel for Tishman Construction. 5 years ago they had 400 employees, presently they have 1,100 employees and all the work they can handle through 2016. I've had two calls, albeit one of them in Qatar, this week. Kid who used to work for me was unemployed 8 years ago, started his own electrical construction company and just signed his first $1,000,000,000 contract with National Grid last week for a 4 year project. The fundamentals of the economy are fine and Americans on whole are in the best shape they have ever been. The instant situations can nearly all be attributed to the mortgage mess and, as Blake pointed out, greed. I'm not sure that either political party bears any culpability for causing the mess, but they'll get to help clean it up . . as they always have in the past. I'm quite certain, after seeing both McCain and Obama speaking that neither the Patriot nor the neighborhood organizer have a clue as to what happened, how it happened or how to fix it. If the economy was an airplane and one of them were at the controls I wouldn't board. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Rainman |
If the economy was an airplane and one of them were at the controls I wouldn't board. Agreed. Unfortunately, we've bought our ticket and we'll have to take the ride with one of them behind the wheel. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Danger_dave |
http://www.emigratenz.org/ :-P | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Glitch |
Thanks for the kink Dave! Looks inviting Y'all look like y'all could use a hillbilly or two | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Danger_dave |
Dang Tootin' | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Corporatemonkey |
It is far from over. If the sec doesn't hurry up and reinstate the naked short sell rule, WAMU will fail. If WAMU fails we are in trouble. Not just for us here in Seattle. Wamu is the largest consumer bank. The FDIC losses could be downright frightening. Especially as the FDIC is running low on funds. Take that with the nearly depleted PBGC fund, and the current woes look like nothing. Court, construction jobs on your level (IE, Foster Wheeler, Flour, Shaw, etc...) are doing just fine. When you back down one level to lesser construction projects things aren't looking so good. Anyone want to apply for a job with KB Homes  | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Ducxl |
What IS this "Naked short rule" i've been hearing of? And WAMU??? Oh,they're just too big to allow to fail.The Fed i'm certain will give them plenty of loan money.Same for Merrill,and seemingly EVERYONE else on Wall st.  | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Corporatemonkey |
And WAMU??? Oh,they're just too big to allow to fail.The Fed i'm certain will give them plenty of loan money. It is not just the loan $. I don't think wamu would need as much as AIG, but in a worse case scenario wamu's failure could bring down the FDIC. As for naked short selling. Basically it is short selling shares BEFORE you have actually located shares to borrow. If you end up not locating the shares in due time then the sell is considered "failed to deliver." This basically mean phantom shares are entering the market to sell. Driving the stock price down. It is one the reasons a lot of stocks have recently dropped a huge amount almost overnight. Under this current administration common sense SEC rules have gone out the window. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Glitch |
While we're at it let's save the car manufacturers...uh...nevermind | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Jlnance |
Ducxl - I didn't know either: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naked_short_selling | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Corporatemonkey |
While we're at it let's save the car manufacturers. That's where the collapse of PBGC fund would cost us dearly. All those union workers and their pensions could cost us dearly.* * this is not a jab at union workers. My father is a retired union worker, and his pension is threatened. Scary times around our family... | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Court |
The phones have been ringing here and I'm getting the word that most stock loan places are being contacted by Morgan-Stanely asking them to no loan stock. This is going to be a fun couple weeks. . wife's entire family are in Stock Loan in NYC and London. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Court |
Hehehehehe . . . think we should arrange to have a securities seminar at Liberty on Saturday? Vick could give an overview of hedging, short sales and the SEC? Hey . . desperate times . . .  | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Corporatemonkey |
I just read a news bite that says the SEC has started enforcing the short sell rules. As of this post the market is up on the news. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Greenlantern |
Hehehehehe . . . think we should arrange to have a securities seminar at Liberty on Saturday? Please advise if this seminar will happen Saturday. I would want to be sure to wear My "conservative yet bullish" bandana vs. my "up yours conformist" one.  |
