Monthly Archives: November 2007

Ben Stein Watch: November 11, 2007

Posted on November 11, 2007 by Felix

Ben Stein’s big idea this week is that if banks have taken large losses, their board members should be held responsible. It’s something I’ve said in the past, so I should agree with him, right? But this is Stein, of … Continue reading →

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Extra Credit, Weekend Edition

Posted on November 10, 2007 by Felix

Prince Alwaleed: Why Chuck had to go Redstone: ‘If Content Is King, Copyright Is Its Castle’: The codger comes out swinging. Who’s Afraid of a Falling Dollar?: "For the vast majority of the country, a ‘strong dollar’ is more like … Continue reading →

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Deciphering Auction Results

Posted on November 9, 2007 by Felix

In the wake of my entry yesterday about auction houses’ estimates and reserves, Rik Pike of Christie’s has been very helpful in clearing a few things up for me. For one thing, there’s no doubt that estimates refer to the … Continue reading →

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Secrecy in Book Publishing

Posted on November 9, 2007 by Felix

Between the issues dated January 8 and November 12, nothing by Malcom Gladwell appeared in the New Yorker, and nothing appeared on his blog, either. Gladwell finally broke his silence on Monday: I took a little break from blogging, to … Continue reading →

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Stiglitz’s US Datapoints

Posted on November 9, 2007 by Felix

Vanity Fair gives Joe Stiglitz 4,000 words in its December issue, and he delivers what Andrew Leonard describes as "a stinging, biting, razor-sharp dissection of everything George W. Bush has done wrong as the keeper of the American economy". A … Continue reading →

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Carina: The 18-Notch Downgrade

Posted on November 9, 2007 by Felix

You wondered what would happen when a CDO was forced to liquidate? Now you know: The ratings on the most senior class of Carina CDO Ltd. were lowered to BB, two levels below investment grade, from AAA, while another AAA … Continue reading →

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Emilio Botin for Citigroup CEO!

Posted on November 9, 2007 by Felix

Chalk up another victory for Santander’s Emilio Botín. When I said last month that he was the big winner in the Battle of ABN Amro, I was concentrating mainly on Banco Real, the Brazilian bank that Santander now owns. But … Continue reading →

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You Just Can’t Find the Skilled Blue-Collar Workers These Days

Posted on November 9, 2007 by Felix

When it comes to reasons for electricity prices going through the roof, the inability of your local utility company to find qualified line technicians is not going to be very high up the list. But when it comes to the … Continue reading →

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Replica Spam and the Poetry of Karl Marx

Posted on November 9, 2007 by Felix

Never mind that Murakami boutique at the Museum of Contemporary Art in LA. You only have nine more days to buy a REPL1CA [W4TCH] from the Untitled Project Store, which goes dark on November 18. Regularly priced at $850, it … Continue reading →

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Extra Credit, Friday Edition

Posted on November 9, 2007 by Felix

Deregulated thinking: "Deregulation could be causing higher [electricity] prices. But I suspect it’s only one factor among many, and would look relatively small if you could effectively control for many of the other factors." Bending Ears on Economics as ’08 … Continue reading →

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Mystery Stock Update

Posted on November 8, 2007 by Felix

On Monday I wondered what stock could possibly have been worthless at the end of 2005, but worth $14 million at the end of 2006. A very loyal reader (really: the name on the comment is "averyloyalreader") pointed out that … Continue reading →

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Has Nassim Taleb Killed Black-Scholes?

Posted on November 8, 2007 by Felix

Nassim Taleb and Espen Haug have a paper out. Here’s the abstract: Options traders use a pricing formula which they adapt by fudging and changing the tails and skewness by varying one parameter, the standard deviation of a Gaussian. Such … Continue reading →

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The World’s Wost ETF

Posted on November 8, 2007 by Felix

Greg Newton has found an ETF with the ticker symbol DCR, the MacroShares Oil Down fund. Its net asset value is $7.91 per share, but its price is $14.25 per share: a premium of more than 80%. Yes, I know … Continue reading →

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WSJ Circulation: A Correction

Posted on November 8, 2007 by Felix

I was wrong about the WSJ’s circulation on Tuesday; I got confused by some slightly misleading language in the New York Times. If and when WSJ.com goes free, the newspaper will still have a huge circulation lead over all other … Continue reading →

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Negative Convexity at Morgan Stanley

Posted on November 8, 2007 by Felix

Morgan Stanley was short subprime. Subprime went down. Morgan Stanley lost $3.7 billion on the trade. How is that possible? Morgan Stanley’s CFO, Colm Kelleher, explained it thusly: “We began with a short position in the subprime asset class, which … Continue reading →

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CheatNeutral

Posted on November 8, 2007 by Felix

If carbon offsetting is a joke, you might as well make it funny. (Via Tabarrok)

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Rio Tinto Won’t be Independent for Long

Posted on November 8, 2007 by Felix

When mergers get mooted, the stock-market reaction is generally predictable: the stock of the target company rises, and the price of the would-be aquirer falls. In the case of the latest proposed mining mega-merger, the stocks followed most of the … Continue reading →

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On Auction Houses’ Estimates and Reserves

Posted on November 8, 2007 by Felix

There’s something I’ve always wondered about auction-house estimates: are they estimating the hammer price, or are they estimating the final sale price, including commission? The auction house press releases, and newspaper reports in the wake of the auction, always talk … Continue reading →

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Extra Credit, Thursday Edition

Posted on November 8, 2007 by Felix

Two for the pot: Citi needs more new hires than just a CEO. The Carbon Calculus: Energy sources which become cost-efficient if you charge for carbon emissions. No government after 149 days and no one notices: [insert obligatory Belgian joke … Continue reading →

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Fiji Water goes Carbon Negative

Posted on November 7, 2007 by Felix

You thought it was cool to be carbon-neutral? Well, Fiji water, one of the most environmentally absurd companies on the planet, has now gone carbon-negative! I’m sure Nigel Tufnel would be proud. Claudia Deutsch reports: The announcement comes after a … Continue reading →

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Japan Datapoint of the Day

Posted on November 7, 2007 by Felix

And you thought it was bad here, in the US: Japan’s housing starts dived 44% in September from the year earlier, the sharpest fall on record, following a 43.3% plunge in August and a 23.4% drop in July. As Brad … Continue reading →

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Whole Foods Board Wimps Out, Exonerates Mackey

Posted on November 7, 2007 by Felix

When the world found out that John Mackey, the CEO of Whole Foods, was a sockpuppet hyping his own stock on internet message boards under an assumed name, it was clear that he should resign immediately. Instead, the Whole Foods … Continue reading →

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Toxic Waste Watch: Beware CDO-backed ABCP!

Posted on November 7, 2007 by Felix

Since when do CDOs borrow money? I’m obviously rather behind the curve here, since I thought that a CDO was basically an unlevered entity which invested in debt. When it got income from that debt, the income would go first … Continue reading →

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How to Address a Goldman Sachs Banker

Posted on November 7, 2007 by Felix

Goldman Sachs is building a new headquarters building which will carry the address 200 West Street. It’s on the west side of the street, on the block between Vesey and Murray. But if you plug the address into Google Maps, … Continue reading →

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Bleg: Looking for a Free-Float League Table

Posted on November 7, 2007 by Felix

Companies like PetroChina and Google, which have a very small free float, have been getting a lot of press for their enormous market capitalizations. Does anybody have a league table of the most valuable companies in the world by value … Continue reading →

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