Browse by Tags
-
Posted
Aug 19 2008, 11:11 AM
by
Todd Harrison
Rating:
Of late, “What will happen to Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae preferred shareholders?” and “What will happen to Countrywide debtholders?” seem to be the most pressing questions on the minds of credit market participants.
Given the magnitude of the credit losses both incurred to date and yet to be incurred, I believe market participants would be far better served by spending more time trying to figure out how these losses will be allocated and far less time trying to project whether those losses will total $500 billion, a trillion or even $2 trillion
Read More...
-
Posted
Jul 29 2008, 05:44 AM
by
Jon Markman
Rating:
Cities compete like crazy to get the Olympics, but are they really such a prize? New research by sports economics professor Brad Humphreys suggests that cost overruns are usually out of control, and countries end up with much lower economic growth a year later -- belying all the hype that comes in advance.
Humphreys says the Olympic Games in Beijing, scheduled to start in two weeks, were originally expected to cost $1.6 billion, but a recent tally shows that China has spent $40 billion. The University of Alberta lecturer says the Athens games in 2004 were budgeted for $1.6 billion and ended up costing $16 billion. The London games were budgeted at $8 billion and already $19 billion has been spent. And one of the worst examples is Montreal, where citizens just finished paying off the games, 30-plus years later. Taxpayers always end up footing a big bill for their leaders' Olympic vanity.
Read More...
-
Posted
Jul 28 2008, 11:52 AM
by
Todd Harrison
Rating:
Then there is Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae and the American taxpayer.
On Saturday HR 3221 was passed by the Senate in a vote of 72-13 as Capitol Hill tries to play a role in helping homeowners even if it means bailing out government-sponsored enterprises, Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac. The bill is estimated to help upwards of 400,000 homeowners.
Read More...
-
Posted
Jul 25 2008, 01:59 PM
by
Todd Harrison
Rating:
Catching up on some recent earnings conference calls, I ran across this item from Cash America the pawn and short-term loan shop. The company said refined gold sales were up 60% year-over-year, driving gross profit on refined gold sales up almost 70% year-over-year.
Commenting on the refined gold trend, Chief Financial Officer Thomas Bessant, Jr., said this increase is "consistent with the use of higher percentage of jewelry as collateral as our customers continue to be attracted to the alternatives available to them for pawn loans during this difficult economic cycle."
Interestingly, while Advance America reported a decline in loan rollovers and balances due to the economic stimulus checks, CSH said they think the economic stimulus checks actually had a positive impact on their business in the second quarter due to the retail pawn side.
Read More...
-
Posted
Jul 23 2008, 10:18 AM
by
Todd Harrison
Rating:
Maybe I'm being dramatic but yesterday's session reminded me of Tiger Woods at the US Open. By all rights stocks should have been looking at a moral victory, just showing up. Instead, stocks climbed off the canvass and won with the equivalent of two broken legs in the form of earnings reports and guidance from American Express and Apple. Investors should have been throwing their hats in the air when the closing bell rang.
Now we need to figure out how this improbable session unfolded the way it did. Where did the grit and determination come from? I think the hero, without a doubt, was Charles Plosser (president of Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia). His comments about the economy sparked a reverse in the market even before the session began.
Read More...
-
Posted
Jul 17 2008, 12:54 PM
by
Todd Harrison
Even eBay can't bid high enough to beat the lagging economy.
The company's shares dropped 7% yesterday after the company reported that some key indicators of its financial health were in a slump. EBay CEO John Donahoe attributed the poor performance to the weak economy.
Among the telltale signs of slowdown: The value of goods sold on the site only rose 4% between April and June, half the rate increase of the previous three months. Donahoe also said that the weak economy has pushed consumers away from higher priced goods, stagnating eBay's car sales, which had jumped 7% in the first quarter.
Read More...
-
Posted
Jul 14 2008, 11:53 AM
by
Todd Harrison
Rating:
Hello from New York, where I don't much care how they "fix" Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, but the related witch hunt to crack down on "rumor mongering" has me frothing at the mouth.
I expect the government to use whatever means they have at their disposal to ensure the smooth operations of the financial markets. You may approve or disapprove of the government behaving in such a manner but you can't deny that there is precedent for such manipulation (see: Long Term Capital, Bob Rubin's October '98 Bear Slaughter, Last August's manipulations, etc. et al).
Read More...
-
Posted
Jul 11 2008, 12:41 PM
by
Todd Harrison
Rating:
Without question, the September 1998 low was a good time to be buying stocks... for a trade. Since September, 28, 1998, the S&P 500 has returned 19.5%, excluding dividends. Adding dividends makes the return of stocks over that nearly 10-year span almost competitive with Treasuries, albeit with significantly more risk.
Regardless, given the news this morning that the U.S. government is weighing takeover options for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, it is tempting to think we may be finally have reached an important capitulation point in equity markets, especially with many technical indicators and sentiment indicators at negative extremes.
Read More...
-
Posted
Jun 26 2008, 01:18 AM
by
Jon Markman
Rating:
It’s easy to imagine that the 25 best-performing stocks in the S&P 500 Index this year are all oil and gas producers, and the 25 worst-performing stocks are all banks and brokers. Yet as we near the halfway mark in 2008, it turns out that there are quite a few surprises in the mix of best and worst.
For instance, the No. 1 stock in the benchmark index this year isn’t an oil producer, but a coal miner, Massey Energy. It’s up 155% so far, rising to $89 from $35 as coal prices have soared in the wake of booming demand in China and India. The No. 2 stock is actually a discount retailer, Big Lots. It’s up 100%, from $15 to $30, as investors speculate it will get a big share of tax-rebate money from low-income Americans.
Most of the rest of the next best 15 gainers
Read More...
-
Posted
May 21 2008, 04:49 PM
by
Charley Blaine
Rating:
A week ago, I blogged that the stock market rally from mid-March could continue for some time -- if oil prices would cooperate.
They haven't. Crude oil closed Wednesday at $133.17 a barrel, and stocks tumbled, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling 227 points. Things could get worse.
Here's why the stock market could test the lows of mid-March, amid the worst of the Bear Stearns crisis:
Read More...
More Posts Next page »
|
