Category: Credit Crisis 2008
The analysis published under this category are as follows.Monday, July 14, 2008
Freddie and Fannie is A Sad Day for U.S. Taxpayers and Investors / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
"Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson swatted back reports of government nationalization of Fannie and Freddie, which would mean making explicit what, has long been an implicit taxpayer guarantee of their liabilities. This would instantly add $5 trillion in liabilities to the federal balance sheet, doubling the U.S. public debt burden and putting America's AAA credit rating at risk. This is a nightmare scenario for taxpayers." Wall Street Journal, Saturday, July 12, 2008 (prior to Sunday's announcements)Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, July 14, 2008
Trillion Dollar Bailouts Will Likely Cripple US Budget and Imperil the Dollar / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
Gold finished trading in New York on Friday at $959.10, up $18.90 and silver was up to $18.72, up 48 cents. Gold rose in trading in Asia before selling off in early European trading on profit taking due to falling oil prices and a rising dollar this morning. Both gold and silver were up nearly 3% last week on inflation hedging and safe haven buying and profit taking is to be expected.Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, July 14, 2008
Paulson Crosses Rubicon Lands In 5th Dimension / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
Earlier today I posted Operation "Rescue Fannie" Underway - Paulson a Blatant Liar . Since then, additional details are trickling out.Consider Paulson's Statement on Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae .
First, as a liquidity backstop, the plan includes a temporary increase in the line of credit the GSEs have with Treasury. Treasury would determine the terms and conditions for accessing the line of credit and the amount to be drawn. Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, July 13, 2008
Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac- The Mother of ALL Bailouts! / Housing-Market / Credit Crisis 2008
The US Government has gone all out to perform a full scale rescue of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to prevent a collapse of the US financial system. The move follows Friday's near collapse of both companies stock prices which saw shares of the too big to fail institutions plunge by more than 50%.
In a joint move the White house and Federal Reserve issued a number of initiates aimed at supporting both companies which include -
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Sunday, July 13, 2008
Credit Crisis Easing? Is the Stocks Bear Market End? / Stock-Markets / Credit Crisis 2008
“In a sign of some improvement in the credit crisis, Wall Street firms for the first time didn't borrow from the Federal Reserve's emergency lending program and commercial banks also scaled back.
“Investment firms didn't draw such loans for the week ending July 9. They borrowed just $1.7 billion in the previous week ending July 2, down from $6.1 billion in the week before that. Such borrowing rose as high as $38.1 billion in early April.
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Sunday, July 13, 2008
Financial Markets Reeling from Fannie & Freddie Collapse and Evitable Government Bailout / Stock-Markets / Credit Crisis 2008
“Finance is the art of passing money from hand to hand until it finally disappears,” said Robert W. Sarnoff. This is certainly the way it looked last week as the fall-out of the credit crisis deepened.
Markets had investors feeling dazed and confused after another roller-coaster week amid further evidence of the deteriorating health of the US financial sector and a renewed rise in oil prices. Adding to the pain, Barron's Randall Forsyth said: “Now that the bear market has officially arrived, it may stick around and gnash its teeth for a while – until it's scared away those who remain.”
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Sunday, July 13, 2008
Operation "Rescue Fannie Mae " Underway- Paulson a Blatant Liar / Companies / Credit Crisis 2008
On Friday Treasury Secretary Paulson Said Keep Fannie and Freddie in Current Form .
U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson signaled that a government takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac won't be necessary, saying they should continue as shareholder-owned companies with federal charters.
Sunday, July 13, 2008
Federal Reserve Strikes Gold! A Genius to Save the US Economy / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
Keith Fitz-Gerald writes: Every market cycle has its genius. Even a market cycle as wild and volatile as this one has been.
And the latest genius might be just what the U.S. Federal Reserve needs to restore order around here: She might even be able to bring credibility back to the global financial markets.
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Sunday, July 13, 2008
Plunging Dollar Drives Oil to New High.. Stocks Crumble on Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae Near Collapse / Stock-Markets / Credit Crisis 2008
The US Dollar, $USD, plunged below 72.00 to close at at 71.79 as oil rose intraday to $146 a barrel on worries that Israel may attack Iran, renewed militant activities in Nigeria and a strike in Brazil next week.Stocks fell lower on troubled mortgage GSEs, Fannie Mae, FNM and Freddie Mac, FRE. Today was an epic day a watershed day: the mortgage securitization infrastructure of the US collapsed. The two companies have lost $11 billion in recent months, and their shares have plunged to 1991 levels; they own or guarantee more than $5 trillion in mortgages, MarketWatch reports.
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Saturday, July 12, 2008
Farewell Indymac, Who's Next? (Part1) / Housing-Market / Credit Crisis 2008
On Friday, IndyMac joined the long and growing list of bankrupt mortgage companies (Accredited Home Lenders, Novastar Financial, Fremont General and dozens of others) that have been taken down by what has already surpassed mortgage and bank losses of the Savings & Loan Crisis. While Indy marks only the sixth bank failure since the official start of the banking-real estate avalanche is February 2007, you can bet this is only the beginning. The last wave of bank failures in the U.S. occurred during the recession of '90-'91, when 502 banks failed in a 3-year period. Prior to that, more than 1,600 banks insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) were closed or received FDIC financial assistance between 1980 and 1994 due mainly to the Savings & Loan crisis.Read full article... Read full article...
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Nature of the Fannie Mae Bailout / Stock-Markets / Credit Crisis 2008
I strongly believe that GSEs are part of the problem and no part of the solution. Government has no business promoting housing over renting and I would abolish HUD, the FHA, and end government sponsorship of the GSEs as quickly as practical. Ron Paul has advocated the same.Has anyone even bothered to look up the Mission Statement of Fannie Mae ?
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Saturday, July 12, 2008
Indymac America 's Northern Rock Goes Bust as US Housing Market Implodes / Companies / Credit Crisis 2008
One of America 's biggest savings and loans mortgage banks, Indymac goes bust as regulators stepped in to seize the banks assets on Friday. The bank saw panicking savers withdraw more then $1.3 billion in deposits in one day alone as the bank teetered on the brink of collapse under the weight of mortgage defaults as result of the meltdown in the US housing market in similar style to Britains Northern Rock bank run during September 2007.Read full article... Read full article...
Saturday, July 12, 2008
US Housing Mortgage Market Meltdown- Say good-bye to Fannie and Freddie? / Stock-Markets / Credit Crisis 2008
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and Secretary of the Treasury Henry Paulsen told Congress Thursday that new regulatory powers are needed to insulate the national economy from damage if a big Wall Street firm collapses. Now that is an interesting proposition. We have already bailed out Bear Stearns and several other brokerage institutions in March. So is someone else in trouble already? Who could it be?Read full article... Read full article...
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Credit Crisis Losses Pass $1.6 Trillion as Credit Contraction Ensures Recession / Economics / Credit Crisis 2008
- $1.6 Trillion in Losses and Counting
- Banks Start to Reduce Their Lending
- Take Freddie Mac. Please.
- The Ugly Muddle Through
- Once Again, the BLS Numbers Paint a False Picture
It seems that with each passing month the estimates for losses in the international banking system keep rising. This time last summer the largest estimates (from credible sources), if memory serves me correct, were around $400 billion, give or take a few months. By the end of the year it was in the neighborhood of twice that. Then last quarter we saw estimates approaching $1 trillion. Last week, the number being broached was $1.6 trillion, by Bridgewater Associates, one of the top, and more credible, analytical firms in the world.
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Friday, July 11, 2008
Stock Market Plunges on Paulson's Weak Fannie Policy Statement / Stock-Markets / Credit Crisis 2008
Treasury Secretary Paulson has carried his miraculously successful strong dollar policy statements to Fannnie Mae and Freddie Mac with a Statement on Fannie, Freddie .Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. made the following comment today on news stories about "contingency planning" at Treasury:
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Friday, July 11, 2008
Fannie, Freddie 'Insolvent' and Lehman Brothers May be Next Bear Stearns / Stock-Markets / Credit Crisis 2008
Gold finished trading in New York yesterday at $9 40.20 , up $ 13.90 and s ilver was up to $1 8. 24 , up 17 cents . Gold rose again in the New York Globex electronic market before trading sideways in trading in Asia and it has risen sharply again in early European trading to above $950 per ounce .Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, July 11, 2008
Fannie and Freddie Credit Implosions Are Too Big to Bail Out / Stock-Markets / Credit Crisis 2008
It's been a wild ride for Fannie and Freddie recently. Yesterday, James Lockhart, director of the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise, said the GSEs are "well capitalized".William Poole, former Fed governor disagrees. Poole Says "Fannie, Freddie Insolvent" . Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, July 11, 2008
The Real Reasons the US Banking System Lost its Way / Stock-Markets / Credit Crisis 2008
Shah Gilani writes: Unlike Dorothy in " The Wizard of Oz ," the brutalized U.S. banking system will never again return to that comfortable, cozy, and cushy capital place it once happily referred to as "home." But its "Wicked Witch" was its own greed. The curtain has finally been pulled back on the machinery, and the hot air used to pump up the U.S. banking system's version of the Emerald City in the Land of Oz .
For decades, American banks operated on a simple - and nicely profitable - business model: They took in deposits and lent out money.
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Friday, July 11, 2008
Investors Should Stay Clear of Traditional Asset Classes / Stock-Markets / Credit Crisis 2008
Originally published on May 5, 2008 on SeekingAlphaWashington continues to manipulate economic data, as it has for several years. The past few Establishment Survey reports confirm the deception of data, as many more jobs were lost than official numbers indicate. A better gauge of economic weakness, in my opinion, is consumer and mortgage late-payment and default rates, since this data is more difficult to manipulate. This is especially true for late credit card payments.
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Thursday, July 10, 2008
Economists Continue to Favor Failed Doctrine Against Real Facts / Economics / Credit Crisis 2008
What if what they taught you is wrong? - In this Financial Times commentary , Wolfgang Münchau comes ever so close to asking what must be one of the most difficult of all questions for any practicing economist to ask, "What if what they taught you is wrong?"
[Note: This is similar to what some U.S.-based financial advisers might be asking themselves today, eight years into a secular bear market in stocks where "stocks for the long run" may not make a whole lot of sense for someone whose "long run" is only 15 years or so and happened to begin around 2000.]
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