It’s Your Money

It was, anyway. Remember when you had some? Dow plummets on opening, Wall Street rout drags everyone else down. Look on the bright side ... the credit markets more quickly via capital infusions from the Paulson facility. And unlike the Paulson ... that the Treasury could receive some kind of equity kicker in the refinance. Thus a homeowner [more...]

Date: 2008-10-10 13:45:35

Blog posts (480) | Videos (103)
 

Monday: Bi-Partisan Bank Robbery?

I don’t pretend to understand Credit Derivative Swaps and financial ‘instruments’ and it looks like the people who have been playing with them for ... like the Home Owners Loan Corporation (HOLC) where the government would restructure and refinance bad mortgages from individual homeowners and make them affordable.  The theory goes that if those [more...]

Date: 2008-09-22 12:26:24

To the rich go the spoils

By BJ One of the reasons that I'm highly skeptical that the economic downturn sparked by the credit crisis will be easily or quickly reversed is ... institutions, while putting taxpayers on the hook for trillions more in far-less-than-certain loan-backed ... at least $1.6 billion went that the executives won't be feeling too bad: Banks that are getting [more...]

Date: 2008-12-23 13:20:08

It’s Back To Reality In California

The Glendale News Press reports fromCalifornia. “Beset by a distressed economy and a soaring number of city inspections, the FourOneSix mixed-use condominium project on Broadway Avenue has pushed back its opening to January and will wait until its debut to push ahead with unit sales, officials said. Sales have been slow at the FourOneSix project [more...]

Date: 2008-10-06 19:59:29

19th Finance Fiesta!  I hope you checked them out, if not be sure to look at all the great posts ... t dream anymore“, and I gotta agree Mrs Micah talks about throwing good money after bad, for me it’ ... want to because my DH is feeling the itch before the weather gets bad! My grandmother [more...]

Date: 2008-10-09 13:00:05

Holiday Windfalls: 7 Tips on Using Them

The holidays often come with a windfall or two: a monetary gift from a relative or a bonus from an employer ... an important bill. If so, that kind of practical application may make your decision for you. If you don’ ... cringe right now, but that doesn’t actually mean that investment is a bad choice. There are still [more...]

Date: 2008-12-25 13:30:00

Pakistani Bailout Plan

Governor of The State Bank of Pakistan Dr. Shamshad Akhtar has at last woken up after days of uncertainty of the banking sector and has admitted ... ballooned, and has generated bad habits of credit cards, auto loans, house loans and other types ... put the fear of God in the public about the fact that something can also go bad, while leaving them [more...]

Date: 2008-10-17 20:00:23

Q&A with Parag Khanna: Redrawing the map for a safe, secure world

Last week, Parag Khanna sat with the TED Blog to discuss no less than the political future of the world we live in. He works in the expansive field of geopolitics, and his TEDTalk discusses the history and future of some of the world’s most troubled states and the possibilities of a borderless world. In this interview, he expanded on his theories, delving into the causes of terrorism, the impact of the G20, a solution for Sudan and more. [more...]

Date: 2009-09-28 21:59:24

Time for A Trip to the Mall

Andrew Leonard: There’s only one shopper with a purse large enough to make a difference in this kind of mess — and that’s the U.S. government ... cards, and digging themselves even deeper into debt at a time when credit card companies are raising ... t have any credit card debt, you’re gainfully employed, and you are staring at a $499 price tag [more...]

Date: 2008-12-02 15:17:43

Finance Has Lost Sight of Its Role

Why are we in the mess we are in? There are lots of proximate causes: overleverage, global imbalances, bad financial technology that lead to widespread underestimation of risk. Readers can no doubt improve on that list. But these still are all symptoms. Until we isolate and tackle fundamental causes [more...]

Date: 2008-11-24 04:32:53

CD Ladder Explained

The recent stock market decline probably makes more than a few people realize that it’s wise to have a balance of growth and income investments as ... to your typical savings accounts. You can purchase CDs at the same bank you have your savings account ... . This is why CDs usually pay higher yields than savings accounts and money market funds. What Is [more...]

Date: 2008-11-07 02:31:41

Personal Balance Sheet, September 2008 ($171,916, -0.8%)

Every month, I publicly review my personal financial condition. If you’re wondering why I post under a pseudonym, Flexo, this is the primary reason ... . Here is a review of my account balances and “modified net worth.” Click on the following report ... checking out NetworthIQ. If you’ve been following Consumerism Commentary, you may have noticed [more...]

Date: 2008-10-04 14:51:00

Thoughts On The Problems Facing America

I am not an economist, and I am not a political science major. In fact, I’ve never even stepped foot into a university for the purpose of learning ... , authorized up to $700 billion dollars to buy distressed assets and attempt to restore confidence in a credit market — a credit market that, in my humble opinion [more...]

Date: 2009-01-17 19:26:55

Get Your Tax and Financial Questions Answered for Free

We’re back! Our imaginary vacation was great. It was fun to take some time off from writing and enjoy the holidays ... Savings Accounts. Stock Market Graphs My favorite article this week is Why Your 4th Quarter 2008 Investment Statements Look So Bad - Blame the First 8 Days in October. I great series of graphs [more...]

Date: 2009-01-07 14:57:55

Creative Financing In Large Real Estate Transactions

I have a friend who has fallen on hard times, and he owns home that is (was) ... the valuations have fallen so far. Use Your IRA To Help Reduce Your Mortgage Balance The first thing ... collateral that they can borrow against. In the case of somebody who is trying to finance (or refinance [more...]

Date: 2008-10-10 12:38:03

Depression Watch: you don't say

Daniel Hannan points out the obvious: We tried to warn you. We said that the bail-out would fail. We pointed out that nationalisation never worked ... , is that they will be told to meet the government's ethnic quotas, to redistribute a proportion of accounts of more than £50,000 to customers with credit problems, and create a number of sinecures for [more...]

Date: 2008-11-21 16:26:00

Restoring Functioning Markets in a Broken World

Much of what has been written about the financial crisis has focused on the why, as opposed to the what now? ... , I'm sick of it. We're in trouble: the time has come for the conversation to shift from bad guys ... to move OTC transactions - interest rate swaps, credit default swaps, etc. - to a listed medium where [more...]

Date: 2008-10-27 04:21:48

Roman Polanski is Not a Victim

Enough already. The Global Committee to Defend Roman Polanski is shocked and appalled by the arrest of their talented friend in Switzerland over the weekend. This quote from our colleague Bruce Crumley's report from France provides a flavor of the outrage: "To see him thrown to the lions and put in prison because of ancient history [more...]

Date: 2009-09-28 21:33:59

Sales are down, but not hideous

I know this was intended to be another doom-and-gloom story, but a drop of 2% to 4% from last year (excluding car and gas sales) ... sales paid for by credit card, checks and cash — retail sales fell between 5.5 percent and 8 percent ... doesn't sounds that bad. Am I missing something? What I'm also wondering is, with so many things [more...]

Date: 2008-12-26 21:45:00

Countrywide Home Loans is killing me

First a little history: November 16, 2007 I had major surgery and my employer let me go on my first week home on disability ... , and executive employment can be hard to find. I lived off credit for 9 months increasing my debt to a crisis ... yet they assigned the data to only one of the loans causing more delay (they kept saying [more...]

Date: 2009-01-17 20:06:52

In defense of borrowing short and lending long

Maturity mismatch is taking something of a beating in the comments, including from smart people like former co-blogger Winterspeak ... . A wheelbarrow is simpler than a car. It is less likely to break, and less expensive to fix when it does break. But I would still rather have a car to do my shopping. So what are the reasons [more...]

Date: 2008-09-23 23:16:20

Business Pundit’s Biggest Winners and Losers of 2008

If one sentence comes to mind regarding this year, it is “Good riddance ... Like the stock market, this former fortress of savings crumbled after the credit crisis creamed its foundation ... Services While executives with golden parachutes floated majestically away to the Bahamas, luxury cars [more...]

Date: 2008-12-31 17:16:12

The Current State of Affairs

Well, I was feeling lucky last week, but now BRKB is sliding with the rest of the market and I am officially in the red with all of my retirement accounts. This means everything is shrinking in value, and not that I’m actually in debt. Which I am. But not against those accounts. I don’t margin trade. At any rate, I took a good long look [more...]

Date: 2008-10-08 14:28:40

Fiscal Insanity Virus Strikes Canada, Sweden, Italy, IMF

The world health organization has confirmed new cases of the extremely contagious Fiscal Insanity Virus (FIV) that is rapidly spreading the globe ... a deadline of just a few weeks to get more loans out into the sagging economy, prompting the banks ... the banks to provide adequate credit in Canada,” Mr. Flaherty said at a news conference in Saskatoon [more...]

Date: 2008-12-24 22:38:00

The Mini Depression and the Maximum-Strength Remedy

This is not the Great Depression of the 1930s, but nor is it turning out to be merely a bad recession of the kind we've experienced periodically over ... now is not the supply of credit. Yes, Wall Street is paralyzed at the moment because the bursting ... loans. But even if credit were flowing, those loans wouldn't save jobs. Businesses want to borrow [more...]

Date: 2008-11-09 15:02:00

CR Sunday Interview: Bill Schelly

***** I enjoyed Bill Schelly's new book on Joe Kubert, Man of Rock, that will be rolling into bookstores and comic book shops this fall. The comics historian's lengthy disquisition on a living comics legend proves to be a very traditional biography, a fitting choice given that its subject is one of the foundational talents of American mainstream [more...]

Date: 2008-10-12 15:12:01

Quick Takes on One Week's Kerfuffles

Remember when the tail-end of December was quiet? Those days are long gone, it seems ... firms. To his credit, Arrington does at least seem to recognize that it is often clients’ demands ... policy and plan accordingly. I feel bad for the PR ninny who tells his client that TechCrunch [more...]

Date: 2008-12-18 16:06:02

Corporate Bonds: When Safe Asset Classes Become Risky

We hear about "credit crisis" and "risk aversion", but I thought I would make those issues much more concrete for readers ... are considered investment grade. With the current credit crunch, however, there are increasing fears ... the individual retirement accounts, pension funds, and other prudent investment accounts tied [more...]

Date: 2008-09-29 22:40:16

Things I Do Understand

In the previous post I mentioned things about this current mess that I do not understand, but I do understand what looting looks like: Up to 10, ... in cash was transferred out of the account of the bank’s European business into accounts at the New ... in the US 10-year credit default swap. In other words, the market is now pricing-in the genuine [more...]

Date: 2008-09-22 16:59:27

BANKS FACE ANOTHER BAD YEAR IN 2009

Rising loan losses, the threat of more regulation and tougher competition adds up to another year of poor profits for banks BY DAVID ELLIS ... a significant deterioration in the health of their credit cards and home equity loan portfolios ... bad the outlook for 2009 is just as dismal. It may seem hard to imagine how 2009 can be worse than [more...]

Date: 2008-12-22 15:14:10

The Seven Steps of Financial Preparedness

The following is a guest post from Marotta Asset Management. When a hurricane threatens, making a plan and gearing up for emergencies is imperative ... . The second step to prepare for financial emergencies is to extricate yourself from credit card debt ... around the country. Ramsey suggests paying off your credit card by starting with the smallest [more...]

Date: 2008-10-13 10:29:04

Things You Tend Not To Spend Much Time Thinking Seriously About When Making A Decision To Relocate

I have had this item on my blogging to-do list for probably 18 months now, without attempting to address it ... s start with credit history, something discussed in this blog a long time ago. Or, rather, your lack of such overseas, which will hamper your efforts to obtain auto financing or even apply for local credit [more...]

Date: 2009-01-15 20:29:06

Links and Minifeatures 2008 10 31 Friday (Happy Halloween!)

Sitting here waiting for trick or treaters while the wife takes our own out: ********** News so twisted it takes Scrappleface to make sense of it: ... ? ********** Obama doesn't need credit card security! Now read why this is a bad thing Even the Washington ... . Barack Obama's presidential campaign is allowing donors to use largely untraceable prepaid credi [more...]

Date: 2008-11-01 02:21:56

New York City: Partly Cloudy With A Chance Of Markdowns

Millions of people watched the ball drop in Times Square to ring in 2009. But how many of them will go on to visit New York City in 2009? ... are starting to get to the point where the bad news is going to come and come at an ever growing rate ... as the credit crunch goes global. A poster on the culinary forum eGullet suspected the city's steakhouses [more...]

Date: 2009-01-05 20:30:43

Deal Journal] Bottom Feeding: Banco Santander of Spain is in advanced talks to take full control of Sovereign Bancorp, ... the credit crisis? Look to a measure called Value at Risk, or VaR, explains Gordon Crovitz. WSJ ... a program to buy mortgage-backed securities. The United Arab Emirates will guarantee domestic bank [more...]

Date: 2008-10-10 14:10:24

Washington Post Takes On Barry’s Credit Card Donation Issues

Woah! How did this end up not only in one of the main U.S. papers, but, on page A2? Obama Accepting Untraceable Donations ... to use largely untraceable prepaid credit cards that could potentially be used to evade limits on how ... from flowing into its accounts, aides acknowledged. Instead, the campaign is scrutinizing its books [more...]

Date: 2008-10-29 12:35:10

Gates of Vienna News Feed 10/8/2008

As of tonight the news feed has been up and running every day for three months (except for when I’ve been away).I’ve received a few complaints about it. Some readers don’t like to have to scroll through the headlines to get to the good stuff, and others don’t want me to waste space on American news stories which are being covered thoroughly [more...]

Date: 2008-10-09 03:43:00

No Taxation Without Inflation

by The Mogambo Guru While reading a short essay by Donald H. Grove, I was pleasantly surprised to learn of Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) who "is a member of the House Financial Services Committee helping to hold the line against Chairman Barney Frank", which automatically makes her one of my favorite people, [more...]

Date: 2009-01-14 22:19:52

Deal with Credit Before Divorce

by Rob Kosberg When you are about to file for divorce, you know that this is a horrible experience no matter how much you want to do it ... . Legal advice may help with this. Finances should be worked out, if at all possible, before the divorce is completed. Credit reports for each partner need to be secured, examined and fixed [more...]

Date: 2009-01-17 22:06:48

Fannie and Freddie to Announce Mass Loan Modification Program

re-default. This may also further erode investor confidence in residential mortgage backed securities, ... monies to put towards housing payments. Step 3) Start Improving Your Credit Rating This can take a long ... you pay your bills on time, that you have good credit.  Paying your bills on time only accounts for 30 [more...]

Date: 2008-11-11 19:02:07

BRIC Countries: China

The following is a guest post from Marotta Asset Management. In mid-September, the Chinese observe the Moon Festival ... , Deng did not deify Mao. Rather he declared the leader to be "seven parts good, three parts bad ... , Deng simply allowed freedom at the bottom. Then he sanctioned and took credit for whatever reforms [more...]

Date: 2008-09-20 10:09:29

2008 Food Quotes of the Year: Zing!

With Christmas on the horizon (seriously, it’s riding a horse and headed straight for us), we’re taking a short break from CHG’s usual seriousness (er … yeah), and instead presenting a retrospective of our favorite Thursday Quotes of the Week. Enjoy!FOOD QUOTES: FAIRLY PROFOUND“Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast [more...]

Date: 2008-12-24 16:45:00

Not Ready Yet to End Our Addiction to Growth

The value of public companies listed on stock markets has dropped by about a third in the past year. This means that shareholders believe that this group of companies, which are an important but not dominant factor in the global economy (the public sector, notably health and education, and privately-owned enterprises, [more...]

Date: 2008-10-14 02:37:26

What’s the Opposite of Leadership?

When last we spoke, the Dow was starting Friday in freefall while all eyes turned to a meeting of the G7 called by the chief executive of the United ... it all up with, “splunge!” The next day, the IMF mostly followed the G7’s “lead.” That was all very bad news ... up the credit market (and, ideally, provide time for more and better long-term changes to [more...]

Date: 2008-10-13 12:21:38

Boston Tea Party Presidential candidate Charles Jay answers Obama-McCain debate questions

Posted at cj08.com (I wasn’t invited to Friday night’s presidential debate, but you knew I was going to weigh in anyway. My “participation” comes in the way of interspersing my responses into the actual text of the debate, which you will see below. All of those responses to the questions asked by moderator Jim Lehrer are in bold type [more...]

Date: 2008-09-27 18:49:05

Предсказания Кюнстлера на 2009 - США, Нефть, Геополитика, Путин

Спонсор месяца - #1 RX pharmacy affiliate program!Сайт дня (как попасть) - http://www.business-magazine.ru/There are two realities "out there" now competing for verification among those who think about national affairs and make things happen. The dominant one (let's call it the Status Quo) [more...]

Date: 2009-01-01 07:59:00

UPDATED..WaPo: Obama Taking Illegal Donations UPDATE: Will Media Report Palestinian Campaigning for Obama from Gaza?

How is he doing it? Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign is allowing donors to use largely untraceable prepaid credit cards that could ... to the candidate. “That’s an error,” she said. Moreover, she added, her credit card was never billed ... card to “fool” Obama’s insecurity system. Team Obama deliberately avoided credit-card security [more...]

Date: 2008-10-29 12:32:34

Reader Mailbag #29

Each Monday, The Simple Dollar opens up the reader mailbags and answers ten to twenty simple questions offered up by the readers on personal finance ... (k) with $12K (I am 29), and a credit card debt of $1600 which I will be finished paying in October ... (k) contributions. Having $12K at age 29 isn’t a bad start, but I’d make sure I was contributing at [more...]

Date: 2008-09-22 14:00:00

Psst! Hey Chicken Little, the economic sky isn’t falling

I’m not one to rant and I’ll try real hard to avoid that in this article, but I just have to get this out of my system a bit ... at work, on the news, in the papers and across the blogosphere is how bad the economy is.  How close ... invaded or a comet was on a collision course with earth! Is it really that bad? Is it really the day [more...]

Date: 2008-10-08 09:00:56

Link-O-Rama

As those of you who've inexplicably continued to check the Fat-O-Meter despite no change in months have no doubt noticed, I'm back on the weight-loss plan. Again. This is my third attempt to restart the weight-loss process since dropping 92.5 pounds several years ago only to gain most of it right back, [more...]

Date: 2009-01-16 06:40:28

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