Category Archives: remainders

Quote of the Day: Cristina Kirchner takes understandable pleasure in Lehman’s misfortunes. Counting the Cash for Lehman’s Chief: "Between 1993 and 2007, Mr. Fuld took home about $466 million in compensation, including base salary, bonuses, long-term incentive plan payouts and … Continue reading →

Meet the real Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae: Or Freddie Mackie and Fannie May, anyway. They’re not enjoying the housing crunch. Ben Stein Joins Newsmax Magazine: "Ben loves Newsmax magazine… He joins a stable of Newsmax writers and columnists who … Continue reading →

Closed door at The Washington Post: The conflicts of interest behind that Calomiris op-ed. Shocker! Steve Jobs Blames It All on Hedge Funds: "When it comes to these rumors, Mr. Jobs isn’t beleaguered at all. I think he likes having … Continue reading →

Price % Losers: Who knew there were so many listed Fannie and Freddie equity securities? Rising unemployment: James Hamilton crunches the numbers. "I don’t see any way to slice today’s report other than to say, at least as far as … Continue reading →

A masterwork goes missing: By Fernand Leger. "’It’s the largest loss Travelers ever had,’ said Andrew Gristina, director of fine art insurance for the company." All locked-up: A $2.3 billion fund with a 25-year lock-in. Moody’s and model risk, redux: … Continue reading →

Citi Adds Client Chief to Its C-Suite: They might have called him Chief Customer Service Representative, but then once the bloggers got his phone number, it would have been all over. Does Windows Still Matter? Microsoft has been doomed since … Continue reading →

Platform Blogging: Do the Republicans think that WWII cost less than the Iraq war? Wile E. Coyote Won’t Make Mark on South Korea You Must Remember This? KKR Hopes Not: "During 2007, when KFN lost $100 million, its managers made … Continue reading →

Demand and Price Are Falling for Lobster: Not many foods you can say that about. Need proof of racial profiling in credit card offers? Ask Rich Aguirre. "The credit card offers come to his Arizona home in both English and … Continue reading →

The Kettle? The Pot Says He’s Black: Nocera dismantles Icahn. Mexico: The Winds of Revolt: "History suggests that another bloody revolution may be somewhere on the horizon," says the irrepressible Walter Molano. Hirst’s Dealer Denies `Mountain’ of Unsold Works Before … Continue reading →

Why Do We Use Core Inflation? A clear essay from Mark Thoma. Citigroup Settles Charges of Widespread Theft of Customer Funds: Mostly from the "poor or recently deceased". Are Louis Vuitton’s Artist Collaborations Nearing Their End? Probably not, but they … Continue reading →

Trade of The Day: Buy Freddie Paper With Fed Leverage Their loss is your gain, Part II – or – WaMu Deathwatch Student Loan ABS: Do or do not! More bonds with high spreads and no credit risk. Revealed: the … Continue reading →

Risk aversion – Berkshire style: "when most people do stress tests the process is “well what happens if property prices drop 30%?” and someone says “what if they drop 40%?” and the response is – they can’t go that far. … Continue reading →

U.S. Sees Biggest GDP Gain out of Major Seven OECD Countries: Which probably says more about the usefulness (or otherwise) of GDP as an indicator than it does about the relative health of the OECD nations. Quiz Question: Financial Services … Continue reading →

Disclosure? I Call B.S.: If you knew exactly what was going to happen to CDOs back in 2006, you still wouldn’t have been able to calculate the effect on the banks. Have Economic Debates Changed Since 1977? A very funny … Continue reading →

Activist urges Natixis to halt rights issue: Einhorn moves to Europe. Letter here. Plummeting value of synthetic CDOs demand action: "Investors are easily sitting on unrecognised market value losses of several hundred billion dollars". Grade Inflation: "There is no evidence … Continue reading →

Explaining the brokers Part I: Why are brokers’ balance sheets so huge? The root of all evil? The harmful effects of money. Non-existent fees and the ephemeral nature of trading profits: A glimpse at what dsquared does in his day … Continue reading →

Hotel Occupancy Rate Rising, Data Show: "In May the average cost of a hotel room in New York climbed to $350 a night from $300 in May 2007." Dr. Doom: Nouriel Roubini gets the NYT Magazine treament. Finally, cities at … Continue reading →

Woods Fund Takes a Beating: "This year, the hedge fund was down about 77% through July, which comes on top of a roughly 34% decline last year." Traffic Safety Update: The roads are getting significantly safer — unless you’re a … Continue reading →

Macroblog returns: Yay! The first new post dives straight in to the subject of monetary policy over the past year. Random Observations about the US and/or the Clemson Area: Through the eyes of a recently-arrived Romanian. Alex Kummant, National Stationmaster: … Continue reading →

Statistics, damned statistics and value added: John Kay on the uselessness of many official statistics. Insolvent versus profoundly insolvent – Fannie Mae Part II: "If the shortfall at Fannie is more than 78 billion then Fannie is ‘profoundly insolvent’. It … Continue reading →

Reflections on Alt-A: A must-read from Tanta. "If subprime was supposed to be about taking a bad-credit borrower and working him back into a good-credit borrower, Alt-A was about taking a good-credit borrower and loading him up with enough debt … Continue reading →

Lessons Learned From A Dangerous Year: "For fixed-income investors, what matters most is not the return on your money, it’s the return of your money." What Bill Gates really means by creative capitalism: An elegant piece from Martin Wolf. Crisis … Continue reading →

Failure has a thousand fathers: "Earlier this summer people started to distrust Libor – partly because there were rumours that contributing banks were underreporting their borrowing costs in order not to appear in trouble. Serious, if true. But it can’t … Continue reading →

Information and energy: "On any plausible estimate of the properties of demand, the benefits of ever-cheaper and more plentiful information will far outweigh the costs of less carbon-intensive energy." Stephen Schwarzman’s Smart Hedge-Fund Acquisition: It’s GSO. And he paid in … Continue reading →

Hobbit Crisis: The Shire in Foreclosure: Yes. For real. What does the GDP deflator measure? Jim Hamilton explains it all. Ex-UI researcher faces deportation: A prime case of the utter idiocy that is the US immigration bureaucracy. Decline of Aspirational … Continue reading →