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Category Archives: housing
Extreme Measures II: Gillian Tett at the Financial Times
Yves Smith at Naked Capitalism submits: Recently, we’ve noticed a new theme among economics writers: Extreme Measures. Commentators have looked toward the end of the road we are on and fear it leads to a precipice. Hence the calls for … Continue reading
Posted in banking, bonds and loans, hedge funds, housing, regulation
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Extreme Measures I: Bill Gross at Pimco
Yves Smith of Naked Capitalism submits: We’ve noticed a new theme among economics writers: Extreme Measures. Commentators have suddenly looked into the abyss, either of the depth of the US subprime/housing problem or the progressing credit crunch that has already … Continue reading
Posted in banking, bonds and loans, housing, regulation
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Ken Lewis’s Savvy Countrywide Investment
Bank of America has managed to nab itself a very attractive
investment in Countrywide.
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Suprime Collateral Damage: Homes in Chelsea (London)
Yves Smith of Naked Capitalism submits: Bloomberg tells us that sales of 2 million pound ($4 million) homes and flats in London are on hold as buyers pull back, expecting subprime woes to put a damper on City bonuses this … Continue reading
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Special Situation: Lehman Subprime Unit Shutdown
Yves Smith of Naked Capitalism submits: The securities industry is highly cyclical, and like the markets they trade in, Wall Street firms are prone to overshoot and undershoot. Executives cut too deeply in downturns, resolve not to repeat that mistake … Continue reading
Posted in housing
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Mortgage Delinquency Rises at Fastest Rate in 17 Years
Yves Smith of Naked Capitalism submits: Bloomberg informs us that the FDIC has released data showing that mortgages over 90 days past rose over 36% from second quarter last year to second quarter this year, the biggest increase since 1991. … Continue reading
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Bush’s FHA Band-Aid
Yves Smith of Naked Capitalism submits: The Bush Administration, which resisted proposals to have Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac buy more mortgages to alleviate stress in the housing markets, is instead looking to the Federal Home Administration, which traditionally has … Continue reading
Changing Motivations for Home Ownership
Yves Smith at Naked Capitalism submits: Courtesy Paul Kedrosky at Infectious Greed comes this chart that shows over time how renters’ reasons for taking the plunge into home ownership have changed. While this is a UK rather than US sample, … Continue reading
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Municipalities May Suffer Subprime Fallout
Yves Smith of Naked Capitalism submits: Gillian Tett, in “Credit compass fails to work,” in the Financial Times (subscription required), uses the woes suffered by monoline insurers such as MBIA and Ambac to illustrate that in our current credit crunch, … Continue reading
Posted in bonds and loans, cities, housing
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Paul Krugman Does a Hail Mary Pass
Krugman recommends that the Federal government buy mortgages to rescue stressed borrowers. Does he realize that the only realistic way to make this happen in our Brave New World of voodoo credit is to expropriate assets?
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Posted in banking, housing, regulation
1 Comment
How Tight Are Mortgage Underwriting Standards, Really?
The WSJ’s Jonathan Karp wants to tell us "How
the Mortgage Bar Keeps Moving Higher", in the words of his headline.
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Cramer’s Meltdown Spills Into Print
There’s a school of thought that Jim Cramer just plays a screaming
nutcase on
TV, that in reality he’s actually quite smart and knows his onions.
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Mortgages go Messianic
It seems that Patrick Flood, the former CEO of
Christian mortgage lender HomeBanc, has a fully fledged Messianic
Complex.
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Abolish Mortgage-Interest Tax Deduction, But Not Now
Matt Cooper is 100% right, today, when he says that we should
abolish
the mortgage-interest tax deduction.
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Posted in fiscal and monetary policy, housing, Politics
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When Is A Bailout Not A Bailout?
Dean Baker says
it’s bailout – of hedge-fund managers, no less. Tim Worstall
says
it’s a bailout, which raises all manner of moral-hazard issues. Joanna
Ossinger says
it’s a bailout. But it’s not.
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Posted in housing
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Let Fannie and Freddie Buy Profitable Mortgages
Is it a good idea to lift restrictions on the kind of mortgages that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac can buy? In a word, yes.
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How Politicians Can Help Fix the Mortgage Mess
Hillary Clinton has a plan to address
the subprime mortgage mess, and, to my surprise, it’s actually eminently
sensible.
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Countrywide Falls to Book Value
Dave Neubert is buying
shares in Countrywide, and it seems he’s mainly looking at one crucial indicator:
the price-to-book ratio.
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Subprime in Germany
Who or what is an IKB? I know there are lots of obscure European banks, but
IKB is obscure even by German standards. And somehow – really, no one
seems to have the foggiest notion how – IKB’s Rheinland Funding vehicle
seems to have contrived to amass an eye-popping €17 billion ($23 billion)
in US
subprime exposure.
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Posted in banking, bonds and loans, hedge funds, housing
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How Non-Recourse Mortgages Can Drive Default Rates Up
In some states, mortgages can be non-recourse.
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Subprime: The Cause Of All Market Moves
It’s all subprime’s fault.
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Great Moments in Punditry: Jim Cramer on Housing
If I have any ambitions of being a financial pundit, should I try to come up
with stuff like this, from Jim Cramer?
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Mortgage Mess: It’s Not the Fault of Accounting Rules
There are many reasons why the mortgage market is looking ugly right now. But accounting rules in general, and FAS 140 in particular, are not among them.
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Posted in housing
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New ABX Mortgage Index Still Looks Ugly
The much-followed ABX index of subprime mortgage bonds rolled over yesterday.
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Posted in bonds and loans, housing
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Chart of the Day: Fixed vs Variable Subprime Default Rates
Alea today finds the most astonishing
chart, which I simply have to reproduce:
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