Not really. Greenspan inflated debt in the private sector upon a house of derivative financial instruments that was doomed to collapse, and his objective was economic growth based on that foundation. That's why he went before Congress and admitted that he was wrong all along. What Helicopter Ben and co. are trying to accomplish is basically extreme Keynesianism (if that's a word) that holds the whole world, not just America, at hostage. I think there is a chance that it might actually work if Obama's spending plan does succeed in creating new jobs and kick starting economic growth.
no one is being held hostage. not sure where you are getting this idea from. foreign purchases of our debt are declining as of last quarter. further the fed is manipulating treasury prices to drive down yields as a way to encourage people buy investments other than treasuries. they have stated that. i think it is stupid but that is what they are doing.
Yeah, I've watched Schiff and I know where he stands on this. Perhaps they're not quite holding them hostage, but it's also quite apparent that the rest of the world has bigger problems than the US does. I think the decline in foreign debt purchases is simply symptomatic of the global economic decline and the fact that these governments are now needing to draw on their foreign reserves to try to contain their own economic crises. This is just a theory though, and like I said -- there are probably good arguments to be made against it. I just think that the balance of power is tilting in America's favor again, and the US is trying to leverage that.
I agree. I think that this is the crux of the matter. When the yield gets this low, investors start looking for higher yields. The last go round when the market tried to supply this demand, the end result was deleterious. What could be safer than mortgage backed securities?
Anybody playing the move on gold and looking to short the falling dollar? I bought some actual bullion last week when gold was around $775.
Yeah, they started flying after the OPEC announcement. Oil, meanwhile, as I expected, continues to slide. That head and shoulders pattern is holding and it was rejected again as soon as it hit the downtrend line. It looks like it will have to, at the minimum, retest lows before it can rally again. It's also quite interesting that at this point oil has completely decoupled from commodity stocks, which are gaining quite nicely today as well.
How long do you think this rise in solars is going to last? I have a few shares in JASO I've wanted to get rid of, but I don't want to sell too quick.
I don't know ... I haven't followed the sector in the past few days. I just did a quick plot on JASO and it looks like it is approaching resistance at $3.56. If I were conservative, I'd be looking to sell at that point. But given that it has broken out of the downtrend and just broke out of what looks to be a 3 week bull flag formation, there's a possibility that it breaks through and heads for the next major resistance point at $6.50. I think I might add this stock to my watch list...it would be worth it to have a small position if it does end up breaking through that resistance.
u.s. credit default swaps and the current swift move down in the dollar suggests otherwise. the world has problems because we are the problem. we got too connected and now we don't know how to disconnect the troubled/horribly managed businesses from the system when they get too big. well we do know how but we don't want to admit that america needs to downsize. we don't want to admit that america needs to downsize because america cannot do that with the out of control debt levels. downsizing (aka significantly declining tax revenues) + out of control debt + future massive spending = bankruptcy and by downsizing i mean figuring out ways to disconnect dysfunctional businesses from the system that are viewed to have systemic risk if they go under as opposed to figuring out ways to prop them up in their current state.
I agree with most of this, but not about the dollar move. All I see there is a market reaction to an overbought state catalyzed by the Fed's aggressive rate cut. I do agree that America does need to downsize, and that the moral risk problem is one that the government has failed to solve (in fact it looks like they're simply throwing in the towel on that one). But the problem the rest of the world has is that the once-popular global decoupling theory has fallen completely flat on its face, and the bottom line is that they cannot afford for the US to go down because it means they all go down with the ship. Now if that were to actually happen then a new world order would arise that could be very different from the one we have now, but so far I don't think anyone's willing to pay the price. That all said, it is still quite possible that China plays the maverick role here. That is really the only government that I think could possibly be crazy/bold enough to jump ship.
Take Two getting slammed after hours for poor 2009 guidance. Will probably pick up some (hopefully) cheap shares to add to my "pray for a buyout" holdings next to Yahoo
What does an 88% loss (on SIRI) constitute? Oh yeah.....stupidity. Fortunately it was only gambling money.
Some people that I think highly of have been positioning their portfolios in Protective -- Bearish configurations as the market has risen in recent days. I have also gone into a Defensive mode to protect recent gains. I will be limiting myself on participating in anything significant on the upside, but rather that than give back too much of my gains. <i> Bulls make money. Bears make money. Pigs get slaughtered. </i>
