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California Prius incident probed; GM offers criticized - Detroit Free Press
China's Exports Rise 46 Percent in February - New York Times
Northern Rock Bounces Back - Forbes
Chile Quake to Cost Up to $7 Billion, Biggest Reinsurers Say - BusinessWeek
UK industrial output falls 0.4% in January - BBC News
![Freakonomics[Revised and Expanded]](/images/21xRHBWYYML.jpg "Freakonomics[Revised and Expanded]")
This Traveler IQ was calculated on Monday, December 14, 2009 at 12:15AM GMT by comparing this person's geographical knowledge against the Web's Original Travel journal's 4,891,786 travelers who've taken the challenge.
I pulled up these charts from Trulia. If you think NY Real estate market will not see 2002 prices or below, you are blinded.
1. Historical Median Sales Price (All Properties)
2. Historical Number of Sales (All Properties)
What a difference a decade makes huh?
Courtesy of Financial Times
The fearsome become the fallen
Zhou–backed by Russia, Brazil and India–wants to break the dollar’s hegemony in global finance. In a paper grandly called “Reform the International Monetary System,” Zhou has called for the creation of an international currency unit that he admits will require “extraordinary political vision and courage.” He suggests that we start with a blend of the dollar, pound, yen and euro–the so-called Special Drawing Rights (SDR) created by the IMF in 1969 that borrowed a concept first recommended by famed economist John Maynard Keynes.
http://finance.yahoo.com/banking-budgeting/article/106817/Dollar-Slams-Up-Against-a-Great-Wall
Moreover, he blasted the way “the global financial system relies heavily on the external credit ratings for investment decisions and risk management.” Having three U.S. ratings agencies dominate the world results in “a massive herd behavior at the institutional level. Moreover, the rating models for mortgage-related structured products are fundamentally flawed.” All true. The massive write-downs across the globe were the result of these flaws in the American way of doing things.
The economy shrank at a 6.3 percent pace at the end of 2008, the worst showing in a quarter-century.
More than 5.5 million are getting jobless benefits
As usual major media news outlets put a positive spin on a the negative news this morning. I think this short term bear market rally will be coming to close soon. Then we are off to testing new lows.
Interesting…
Not a flying car, but a roadable aircraft, the Terrafugia Transition took flight for the first time March 5, 2009.
With all the recent Fed actions, is there any one who here believes that inflation will not go out of hand in the near future? While I don’t think that we will see double digit interest rates, I do expect rates to trend higher (8-9%) within a few years.
I recently came across this blog post that shows a historical chart of the Fed Funds Effective Rate between 1954 and 2008. Paul Volcker, the Fed President at that time had to raise interest rate all the way to 20% to fight off inflation. But that drove the economy into a deep recession.
I recommend reading The Bear Facts for a look back at the early 80’s.
As an investor you would naturally ask how do we tackle inflation? What is the best way to invest in the inflationary environment?
This article posted on Global Economic Trend blog gives some ideas
# In hyperinflation the last place one wants to be is in cash.
# Commodities in general are a standout.
# Gold is a standout.
# Precious metals are a standout.
# Property is a winner.
# Equities are a winner.
# Treasuries are distinct losers if not an outright short.
# Foreign currencies
# Energy
I recommend investors to consider the following stock investments
1) Vanguard Precious Metals and Mining (VGPMX)
It’s down 66% from peak. I think this is a great safe way to play precious metals. The fund recently added Newmont Mining (NYSE:NEM).
2) Double Gold Long (DGP)
DGP has been performing well recently since Fed’s announcement of backing Mortgage treasury bonds.
Also while you are there, take a look at this article.
Gold railles to near $960 an ounce on Fed’s announcement.
3) U.S Oil Fund (USO)
As Oil continues to perform well, USO is a great fund to be in. Fed’s recent action not only helped Gold, but also Oil and other commodities.
Via vodpod.com
The Crisis of Credit Visualized from Jonathan Jarvis on Vimeo.
Updated, March 12: Dow closed 7170, S&P blasting through 750!
The rally today that we saw today was the best rally we have seen in a while. A tradeable rally like today should drive the major indices to test the 50 dma. The chart technician DeGraaf on on the CNBC Fast Money show implies that S&P could make a 35% rally to test 200 dma. Whether it will get there is anyone’s guess. But I think we might see a nice short term rally in the Global markets.
As of Feb 2009
300M Number of Americans
3.19 Average Family Size
93.65M Available “Family units”
126M Housing Units Available
32M Excess Homes on Market
11.6M Total Unemploymed people (pop size of Ohio)
http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/article/204158/The-American-Economy-What-the-Jobs-Housing-Numbers-Really-Mean?tickers=^dji,^gspc,XHB,SPY,DIA,QQQQ,IVZ
Via Marketwatch
Wall Street’s dollar menu
| GE 3/5/08: $33.55 Today: $6.79 |
| BAC 3/5/08: $37.55 Today: $3.23 |
| C 3/5/08: $22.15 Today: $0.97 |
Via BigPicture
Markets are deeply oversold at this point. I might by a little early here. But I expect a short-term bounce on S&P above 800.
