I think this is the beginnings of an economy based on perpetual growth and fossil fuel energy running headlong into geological energy constraints. Basically I see an undulatory downward path for the rest of my life. From here out, I think any rallies in our economic condition are going to be met with spiking commodity prices that knock us right back down.
Joined: Oct 04, 2004 Posts: 5664 Location: Body in OK, Heart in TX
Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 7:15 am Post subject: Re: Black Friday--This One's For You Rocc
Minvaren wrote:
Little doubt of that. Your 401k might not be so lucky, though.
What 401K?
The dorm next to mine at Bard was called Fagan. My Old School is about that college, where I went for 2.5 years. Steely Dan is great. Lots of good memories associated with their music.
Bye Rocc. I'll miss you. Good luck. Take good care of those kids (I know you will). _________________ "Every junkie's like a setting sun..." - Neil Young
Joined: Sep 16, 2004 Posts: 4863 Location: Southwest WI
Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 7:22 am Post subject: Re: Black Friday--This One's For You Rocc
Its not the end. Not by a long shot. Sure your retirement may be gone and a lot of people could become jobless in the next 12 months, but as long as there is food at the grocery store and gas at the gas station, i'm not buying it.
Its beautiful here today and suppose to be in the mid to upper 70'sF this weekend... That is nuts... We could be having snow right now.
I say enjoy the ride. This could be good for a lot of us. If this does really KILL consumption, then we just bought ourselves some time...something we all need. I'd much rather Peak hold off for a few more years, even if i'm poorer as a result. My son is only just over a year and i'd like him to be a little bigger before the Zombies come out.
Steely Dan? Try Genesis _________________ Clothing should be optional.
Joined: May 13, 2005 Posts: 3030 Location: The Urban Village
Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 7:27 am Post subject: Re: Black Friday--This One's For You Rocc
frankthetank wrote:
Its not the end. Not by a long shot. Sure your retirement may be gone and a lot of people could become jobless in the next 12 months, but as long as there is food at the grocery store and gas at the gas station, i'm not buying it.
Its beautiful here today and suppose to be in the mid to upper 70'sF this weekend...
I'm in the same camp (pardon the pun), including the weather - it's gorgeous here in the DC metro area. Anyone who wants to come storm the Capitol will enjoy the best weather we ever get here.
Joined: Sep 09, 2004 Posts: 410 Location: Upstate New York, U.S.A.
Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 7:37 am Post subject: Re: Black Friday--This One's For You Rocc
Given new developments, both Rocc and Cashmere have decided to say their goodbyes. _________________ "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived." - Henry David Thoreau
Joined: Aug 03, 2007 Posts: 4401 Location: Boston Suburbs
Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 10:34 am Post subject: Re: Black Friday--This One's For You Rocc
BigTex wrote:
Steely Dan was in Dallas about a month ago and I went to the show.
Those guys are awesome.
Plus Donald Fagen wrote a song about heading for the bunkers. _________________ As long as I am around, there are no worries we have reached "Peak Words"
Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 10:27 pm Post subject: Re: Black Friday--This One's For You Rocc
I agree with jlw61. I am going to have to get the hell away from the elect. media and take a day w/family. This week has been the hardest week on me mentally in recent memory. Hell I feel like I've been on an emotional rollacoster and couldn't get off. Im gonna turn the crap off, gather up the wife and kid and go some where for a day. See you guys on black tuesday!
Joined: Oct 23, 2004 Posts: 5928 Location: New Jersey
Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2008 8:30 am Post subject: Re: Black Friday--This One's For You Rocc
The worst week ever for US market investors, ending with a scary Black Friday, now in retrospect appears to have been made worse by fraud and deceit.
Even though as far back as 2004 we discussed a possible housing and credit collapse here, the magnitude of corporate deception has been astounding. Just how could F & F, AIG, and Lehman have hidden losses hundreds of billions $s each so long if they had fairly valued their assets?
Quote:
OCTOBER 11, 2008 Documents Show AIG Knew Of Problems With Valuations
By LIAM PLEVEN and AMIR EFRATI
Top officials at American International Group Inc. knew of potential problems in valuing derivative contracts long before these risky transactions caused the insurer's shareholders severe pain, according to documents released by congressional investigators.
The disclosures come as prospects dimmed this past week for AIG's efforts to quickly sell assets to repay its bulging debt to the government. The derivative-contract problems would have driven AIG into bankruptcy; in the past month, the government has made available to AIG nearly $123 billion in a rescue plan.
A federal criminal probe under way since earlier this year is also looking at how candid company executives were with investors at a December 2007 investor conference and whether executives at AIG's financial-products unit, which sold derivatives contracts, misled AIG's outside auditor last fall.
At congressional hearings Tuesday, a former internal AIG auditor wrote that he had early on raised concerns about being excluded from conversations about the valuation of the derivatives. The auditor, Joseph St. Denis, wrote in a letter to the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform that in early September 2007, he learned that AIG's financial-products unit had been asked for billions of dollars in collateral related to derivatives it had sold.
OCTOBER 11, 2008 Lehman Swap Payments Look Bigger Than Expected
By SERENA NG, EMILY BARRETT and JACOB BUNGE
Banks, hedge funds and other institutions that sold credit-default swaps on now-defaulted Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. may have to pay out more than $91 for every $100 of debt they insured, a larger sum than some expected.
The payouts, which have to be made by Oct. 21, were determined Friday in an auction that saw Wall Street dealers and banks submitting bids to derive a price for an estimated $400 billion in credit-default swaps on Lehman's debt. The swaps are insurance-like contracts that require sellers to make payouts if bonds or loans default.
Before Lehman filed for bankruptcy-court protection on Sept. 15, swap sellers were accepting up to $8 annually to insure every $100 in Lehman debt, in part because they didn't expect the firm to collapse. The default caused some swap sellers to incur significant losses, but analysts believe most institutions had partially hedged their positions and should be able to meet their obligations under the contracts.
Buyers and sellers of Lehman swaps included more than 350 institutions such as the Government of Singapore Investment Corp., AIG Financial Products and many banks and hedge funds, according to the International Swaps and Derivatives Association.
WSJ _________________ It's already over, now it's just a matter of adjusting.
Joined: Aug 03, 2006 Posts: 4331 Location: Graceland
Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2008 9:04 am Post subject: Re: Black Friday--This One's For You Rocc
DantesPeak wrote:
The worst week ever for US market investors, ending with a scary Black Friday, now in retrospect appears to have been made worse by fraud and deceit.
Even though as far back as 2004 we discussed a possible housing and credit collapse here, the magnitude of corporate deception has been astounding. Just how could F & F, AIG, and Lehman have hidden losses hundreds of billions $s each so long if they had fairly valued their assets?
Quote:
OCTOBER 11, 2008 Documents Show AIG Knew Of Problems With Valuations
By LIAM PLEVEN and AMIR EFRATI
Top officials at American International Group Inc. knew of potential problems in valuing derivative contracts long before these risky transactions caused the insurer's shareholders severe pain, according to documents released by congressional investigators.
The disclosures come as prospects dimmed this past week for AIG's efforts to quickly sell assets to repay its bulging debt to the government. The derivative-contract problems would have driven AIG into bankruptcy; in the past month, the government has made available to AIG nearly $123 billion in a rescue plan.
A federal criminal probe under way since earlier this year is also looking at how candid company executives were with investors at a December 2007 investor conference and whether executives at AIG's financial-products unit, which sold derivatives contracts, misled AIG's outside auditor last fall.
At congressional hearings Tuesday, a former internal AIG auditor wrote that he had early on raised concerns about being excluded from conversations about the valuation of the derivatives. The auditor, Joseph St. Denis, wrote in a letter to the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform that in early September 2007, he learned that AIG's financial-products unit had been asked for billions of dollars in collateral related to derivatives it had sold.
OCTOBER 11, 2008 Lehman Swap Payments Look Bigger Than Expected
By SERENA NG, EMILY BARRETT and JACOB BUNGE
Banks, hedge funds and other institutions that sold credit-default swaps on now-defaulted Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. may have to pay out more than $91 for every $100 of debt they insured, a larger sum than some expected.
The payouts, which have to be made by Oct. 21, were determined Friday in an auction that saw Wall Street dealers and banks submitting bids to derive a price for an estimated $400 billion in credit-default swaps on Lehman's debt. The swaps are insurance-like contracts that require sellers to make payouts if bonds or loans default.
Before Lehman filed for bankruptcy-court protection on Sept. 15, swap sellers were accepting up to $8 annually to insure every $100 in Lehman debt, in part because they didn't expect the firm to collapse. The default caused some swap sellers to incur significant losses, but analysts believe most institutions had partially hedged their positions and should be able to meet their obligations under the contracts.
Buyers and sellers of Lehman swaps included more than 350 institutions such as the Government of Singapore Investment Corp., AIG Financial Products and many banks and hedge funds, according to the International Swaps and Derivatives Association.
Sarbanes-Oxley did a great job of giving us an early warning, huh?
Consider how much more colossal the failures of Bear Stearns, Fannie, Freddie, AIG, Lehman Brothers, WaMu, Wachovia are when compared to Enron and Worldcom, and how even after Bear Stearns failed no one seemed to appreciate what we had on our hands.
It's comical that such an enormous amount of money has been spent on Sarbanes-Oxley compliance and all of that money was likely wasted on an utterly false sense of security. _________________
Joined: May 26, 2008 Posts: 1157 Location: Chicago, IL
Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2008 10:13 am Post subject: Re: Black Friday--This One's For You Rocc
BigTex wrote:
Consider how much more colossal the failures of Bear Stearns, Fannie, Freddie, AIG, Lehman Brothers, WaMu, Wachovia are when compared to Enron and Worldcom...
If there is justice, the former's CEO will be joining the latter's in an 10x6. _________________ 9/29/08, cube, The Dow will drop to 4,000 within 2 years
Joined: Oct 23, 2004 Posts: 5928 Location: New Jersey
Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2008 10:54 am Post subject: Re: Black Friday--This One's For You Rocc
VMarcHart wrote:
BigTex wrote:
Consider how much more colossal the failures of Bear Stearns, Fannie, Freddie, AIG, Lehman Brothers, WaMu, Wachovia are when compared to Enron and Worldcom...
If there is justice, the former's CEO will be joining the latter's in an 10x6.
Yes, what has happened here is much worse than Enron. There seems to be some kind of sub rosa effort to play down the gross level of malfeasance implied by the various bankruptcies - but especially for Lehman.
I mentioned elsewhere that the $2.0 trillion in credit losses to date, mostly mortgage backed, are being compunded by another $1 trillion or so over and above that amount due to faulty derivative bets. These total losses are eventually spread through the entire economy, being a loss of real capital. Therefore we see new efforts to replace 'capital', but with fiat money only - which creates more new problems.
Anyway, the loss of trillons in real capital is devastating to the economy. While the coming and passing of PO is bad enough, our financial system has compounded the problem. Expect at best, a minor depression by 2010. _________________ It's already over, now it's just a matter of adjusting.
Joined: Dec 27, 2004 Posts: 13065 Location: naive idiot fantasy world
Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2008 2:01 pm Post subject: Re: Black Friday--This One's For You Rocc
rdsaltpower wrote:
I am going to have to get the hell away from the elect. media and take a day w/family. This week has been the hardest week on me mentally in recent memory. Hell I feel like I've been on an emotional rollacoster and couldn't get off.
I guess I've separated myself enough from the system, at least emotionally, after all these years of "prepping" that I can't seem to work up much worry over the panicking financial world...
Slight unease is about the most I can generate.... _________________ "...powerdown so soft and fluffy you'll think you're living in a pillow." - jboogy
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