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Fed. 1) 13Day RP + 9.00B [ sofar
http://www.ny.frb.org/markets/omo/dmm/temp.cfm
Turn off sound, pic's are worth the time
#msg-24369980 & you have mail/
ty...rsi just needs to take a breather /
I'm thinking it's time to get a bigger box at the bank. :^)
ah ha not the box...The Bank ;))
l was just looking @ options SSRI, SLW
Richard Russell - BIG snippet
Dow Theory Letters
Nov 7, 2007
Extracted from the Nov 6, 2007 edition of Richard's Remarks
There's a problem, and it's a doozie. Maybe it's just as much a question as a problem. Here's the question -- "Can you run a great empire on borrowed money?" My answer -- you can for a while, but only for a while. Eventually, something's got to give. The "give" will come in the nation's currency, in its standard of living -- or in the demise of the empire itself. It happened in Rome, it happened in Britain, and I'm very much afraid it's going to happen to the United States. The big question, of course, is the timing.
I sit here in La Jolla and I do a lot of wondering. For instance, I wonder if we get a primary bear signal, whether that will be the signal for one of the above listed items -- a fall in the currency, a fall in the standard of living or a demise in the American empire itself. Maybe all three, and then again, maybe none of the above, maybe something else that I'm not thinking about.
If we do get a bear signal, and a bear signal is in no way guaranteed, but if we do get a bear signal, and stocks start to head south in earnest, all the talk will be of subprime mortgages and the trouble with the big banks on Wall Street. Yes, that will be very specific and easy for most people to understand. People like answers, very definite answers -- answers with clear solutions.
But it may not happen that way if we get a bear signal. And I keep coming back to that original question. It's a question that haunts me. "Can a great empire continue to function on borrowed money?" You see, that's what worries me. Because there's no question that the United States is an empire with its military bases and influence spread around the world. And there's no question but that the US is running current account deficits of upward of $800 billion a year. And it's the truth that the US needs roughly $2.3 billion dollars coming in every day to sustain us and keep the nation running.
Ah well, I'm reminded of the introduction to a book by James Farrell. It runs like this -- "Alone and afraid, in a world I never made." Of course, I'm not alone, and I don't think I'm afraid. And it's obvious that I never made this world, because if I had made it, I would have made it quite a bit differently.
The current issue of Time magazine surprised me. The issue had a two page report on libertarian, Dr. Ron Paul, the Texas Congressman, who is running for President. Ron believes in the US Constitution. Ron would like to shut down the Federal Reserve and go back to the gold standard. I gather Ron would end the war in Iraq -- further, he would close down all our 120 military bases that are spread across the face of the globe. Ron would legalize narcotics and thereby end our expensive and idiotic "war on drugs."
I guess, to make it short, Ron would pretty much get the government out of our hair, and return it to its original Constitutional form. I'm all for that. Furthermore, I'd mandate that every US Congressman and Senator be fully conversant with the US Constitution. I'd mandate that each and every one of them take an intensive course in Constitutional law. What they'd learn would probably shock them, but they'd get over it.
I'll vote for Ron Paul in the coming election. He's not going to win, but I just can't see myself voting for one of the other candidates. "Why are they running?" I ask. "Do they stand for anything different? Do they question where this nation is heading? Do they ask how this nation is going to continue living on borrowed money? Do they ask why the Federal Reserve was never subject to a Constitutional Amendment?"
Gold -- has been making upward tracks, and I note that some of the gold-bugs are growing skeptical. A few are issuing warnings. Some of the warnings are based on individual Elliott Wave interpretations. A few of these Elliotteers are showing that gold is entering corrective wave 4 preparatory to the "real" upward explosion which would be wave number 5.
They may be correct, and then again, they may be out in left field. Personally, and I've said this before, there are now too many Elliott experts, and they don't all agree. Personally, I'm staying with market action, and so far, the market action for gold has been good.
The other argument is that "the public is now hot for gold," and that gold has become "too popular and therefore Gold is overbought." My own appraisal is that the public hasn't even begun to buy gold. The average American hasn't the faintest idea of where to buy gold. Furthermore, the average American has absolutely no idea of the meaning of gold -- or why gold is considered real money.
As the rise in gold continues, the chorus of "it's gone too far" gets louder. In fact, I wonder if the camp of the gold sceptics is actually becoming lop-sided (a contrary take on contrary opinion!). Today in the Financial Times I read this about gold (although the Financial Times and its sister publication, the Economist have never liked gold), "As the price approached $800, the momentum of buying interest slowed -- one sign that a correction could be at hand."
So I have three conclusions about gold at this time --
(1) What we're seeing now is not public buying. The public couldn't be less interested in gold. At over $800 a [1oz] coin, gold is pricing itself outside the grasp of the public.
(2) A surprisingly large number of gold-bugs are calling for a correction in gold. That means these sceptics are on the sidelines and waiting impatiently for a correction.
(3) It's a bull market in gold. In big bull markets, guessing at the start of corrections is seldom a successful or profitable business. Ride the bull.
Here's an interesting test. Go into any privately-owned local store and buy something that costs say $50. Then go to the owner of the store and say, "I'm really sorry, I forgot my wallet. But I happen to have a South African krugerrand with me, and I wonder if you'll accept this in payment?" See what the store owner says. My bet is that he'll turn you down. Why don't you try it?
http://www.321gold.com/editorials/russell/russell110707.html
Richard Russell - BIG snippet
Dow Theory Letters
Nov 7, 2007
Extracted from the Nov 6, 2007 edition of Richard's Remarks
There's a problem, and it's a doozie. Maybe it's just as much a question as a problem. Here's the question -- "Can you run a great empire on borrowed money?" My answer -- you can for a while, but only for a while. Eventually, something's got to give. The "give" will come in the nation's currency, in its standard of living -- or in the demise of the empire itself. It happened in Rome, it happened in Britain, and I'm very much afraid it's going to happen to the United States. The big question, of course, is the timing.
I sit here in La Jolla and I do a lot of wondering. For instance, I wonder if we get a primary bear signal, whether that will be the signal for one of the above listed items -- a fall in the currency, a fall in the standard of living or a demise in the American empire itself. Maybe all three, and then again, maybe none of the above, maybe something else that I'm not thinking about.
If we do get a bear signal, and a bear signal is in no way guaranteed, but if we do get a bear signal, and stocks start to head south in earnest, all the talk will be of subprime mortgages and the trouble with the big banks on Wall Street. Yes, that will be very specific and easy for most people to understand. People like answers, very definite answers -- answers with clear solutions.
But it may not happen that way if we get a bear signal. And I keep coming back to that original question. It's a question that haunts me. "Can a great empire continue to function on borrowed money?" You see, that's what worries me. Because there's no question that the United States is an empire with its military bases and influence spread around the world. And there's no question but that the US is running current account deficits of upward of $800 billion a year. And it's the truth that the US needs roughly $2.3 billion dollars coming in every day to sustain us and keep the nation running.
Ah well, I'm reminded of the introduction to a book by James Farrell. It runs like this -- "Alone and afraid, in a world I never made." Of course, I'm not alone, and I don't think I'm afraid. And it's obvious that I never made this world, because if I had made it, I would have made it quite a bit differently.
The current issue of Time magazine surprised me. The issue had a two page report on libertarian, Dr. Ron Paul, the Texas Congressman, who is running for President. Ron believes in the US Constitution. Ron would like to shut down the Federal Reserve and go back to the gold standard. I gather Ron would end the war in Iraq -- further, he would close down all our 120 military bases that are spread across the face of the globe. Ron would legalize narcotics and thereby end our expensive and idiotic "war on drugs."
I guess, to make it short, Ron would pretty much get the government out of our hair, and return it to its original Constitutional form. I'm all for that. Furthermore, I'd mandate that every US Congressman and Senator be fully conversant with the US Constitution. I'd mandate that each and every one of them take an intensive course in Constitutional law. What they'd learn would probably shock them, but they'd get over it.
I'll vote for Ron Paul in the coming election. He's not going to win, but I just can't see myself voting for one of the other candidates. "Why are they running?" I ask. "Do they stand for anything different? Do they question where this nation is heading? Do they ask how this nation is going to continue living on borrowed money? Do they ask why the Federal Reserve was never subject to a Constitutional Amendment?"
Gold -- has been making upward tracks, and I note that some of the gold-bugs are growing skeptical. A few are issuing warnings. Some of the warnings are based on individual Elliott Wave interpretations. A few of these Elliotteers are showing that gold is entering corrective wave 4 preparatory to the "real" upward explosion which would be wave number 5.
They may be correct, and then again, they may be out in left field. Personally, and I've said this before, there are now too many Elliott experts, and they don't all agree. Personally, I'm staying with market action, and so far, the market action for gold has been good.
The other argument is that "the public is now hot for gold," and that gold has become "too popular and therefore Gold is overbought." My own appraisal is that the public hasn't even begun to buy gold. The average American hasn't the faintest idea of where to buy gold. Furthermore, the average American has absolutely no idea of the meaning of gold -- or why gold is considered real money.
As the rise in gold continues, the chorus of "it's gone too far" gets louder. In fact, I wonder if the camp of the gold sceptics is actually becoming lop-sided (a contrary take on contrary opinion!). Today in the Financial Times I read this about gold (although the Financial Times and its sister publication, the Economist have never liked gold), "As the price approached $800, the momentum of buying interest slowed -- one sign that a correction could be at hand."
So I have three conclusions about gold at this time --
(1) What we're seeing now is not public buying. The public couldn't be less interested in gold. At over $800 a [1oz] coin, gold is pricing itself outside the grasp of the public.
(2) A surprisingly large number of gold-bugs are calling for a correction in gold. That means these sceptics are on the sidelines and waiting impatiently for a correction.
(3) It's a bull market in gold. In big bull markets, guessing at the start of corrections is seldom a successful or profitable business. Ride the bull.
Here's an interesting test. Go into any privately-owned local store and buy something that costs say $50. Then go to the owner of the store and say, "I'm really sorry, I forgot my wallet. But I happen to have a South African krugerrand with me, and I wonder if you'll accept this in payment?" See what the store owner says. My bet is that he'll turn you down. Why don't you try it?
http://www.321gold.com/editorials/russell/russell110707.html
Wow, very nice. /
Fed. Stuff: 40.00B matures tomo..
1) 6.00b 14day
2) 21.00b 7day
3) 4.25b 2day
4) 8.75b 1day
Fed. Stuff: 40.00B matures tomo..
1) 6.00b 14day
2) 21.00b 7day
3) 4.25b 2day
4) 8.75b 1day
Fed. 1day RP + 8.75B [ net all add ]
http://www.ny.frb.org/markets/omo/dmm/temp.cfm
Fed. 1day RP + 8.75B [ net all add ]
http://www.ny.frb.org/markets/omo/dmm/temp.cfm
W@G2 QQQQ 11/07/07 for a 11/09/07 close
54.75 bob3
54.68 The Cap'm
52.50 frenchee
Coeur D'Alene Up on Metals Price Gains
Tuesday November 6, 12:42 pm ET
Analyst Says Coeur D'Alene Underpriced, Higher Precious Metals Prices Lift Shares
NEW YORK (AP) -- Shares of silver and gold miner Coeur d'Alene Mines Corp. rose in afternoon trading Tuesday, on higher metals prices and a Bear Stearns analyst's comment that the stock is underpriced.
Shares climbed 53 cents, or 13.8 percent, to $4.37. Shares are down about 21 percent in the past 52 weeks, compared to dramatic gains for many other precious metals miners, given rising gold and silver prices.
Michael Dudas, in a client note, reiterated a $5.50 target price and "Outperform" rating on shares.
"At current levels, we do not believe the shares fully reflect the current silver and gold price environment," wrote Dudas. "As a lagging precious metals stock, we expect a sharp recovery as silver prices achieve levels not seen since 1980."
Silver prices are up about 16 percent since the beginning of the year, trading at an eight-month high Tuesday of $15.335 an ounce on Tuesday.
Gold rose 26 percent in the same period, and on Tuesday hit a 27-year high of $825 per ounce. The higher prices boosted the precious metals mining sector.
A weak dollar, rising oil prices and two domestic interest rate hikes in the past two months have fed investor demand for precious metals such as gold, which is considered a hedge against inflation.
Coeur d'Alene on Friday said third-quarter profit fell amid rising costs and lower production. But Dudas noted the company has several promising exploration and new mine projects in its pipeline.
"While results were lower than our expectations, the company continues to make significant progress with long term projects, which we anticipate will positively impact future results," he wrote.
Coeur D'Alene Up on Metals Price Gains
Tuesday November 6, 12:42 pm ET
Analyst Says Coeur D'Alene Underpriced, Higher Precious Metals Prices Lift Shares
NEW YORK (AP) -- Shares of silver and gold miner Coeur d'Alene Mines Corp. rose in afternoon trading Tuesday, on higher metals prices and a Bear Stearns analyst's comment that the stock is underpriced.
Shares climbed 53 cents, or 13.8 percent, to $4.37. Shares are down about 21 percent in the past 52 weeks, compared to dramatic gains for many other precious metals miners, given rising gold and silver prices.
Michael Dudas, in a client note, reiterated a $5.50 target price and "Outperform" rating on shares.
"At current levels, we do not believe the shares fully reflect the current silver and gold price environment," wrote Dudas. "As a lagging precious metals stock, we expect a sharp recovery as silver prices achieve levels not seen since 1980."
Silver prices are up about 16 percent since the beginning of the year, trading at an eight-month high Tuesday of $15.335 an ounce on Tuesday.
Gold rose 26 percent in the same period, and on Tuesday hit a 27-year high of $825 per ounce. The higher prices boosted the precious metals mining sector.
A weak dollar, rising oil prices and two domestic interest rate hikes in the past two months have fed investor demand for precious metals such as gold, which is considered a hedge against inflation.
Coeur d'Alene on Friday said third-quarter profit fell amid rising costs and lower production. But Dudas noted the company has several promising exploration and new mine projects in its pipeline.
"While results were lower than our expectations, the company continues to make significant progress with long term projects, which we anticipate will positively impact future results," he wrote.
Fed. 2day RP + 4.25B [ Drain -2.50B ]
http://www.ny.frb.org/markets/omo/dmm/temp.cfm
Fed. 2day RP + 4.25B [ Drain -2.50B ]
http://www.ny.frb.org/markets/omo/dmm/temp.cfm
Chan: This week in gold
Jack Chan
www.simplyprofits.org
Nov 5, 2007
GLD - remains on buy signal from 9/04.
SLV - on buy signal, waiting for new set up.
GDX - back to buy signal and waiting for new set up.
XGD.TO - back to buy signal and we had an excellent set up on Friday.
Summary
We added to positions this week upon new set ups, and will add more upon further set ups.
Disclosure
We do not offer predictions or forecasts for the markets. What you see here is our simple trading model which provides us the signals and set ups to be either long, short, or in cash at any given time. Entry points and stops are provided in real time to subscribers, therefore, this update may not reflect our current positions in the markets. Trade at your own discretion.
End of update
Nov 3, 2007
Jack Chan
Archives
email: jack@simplyprofits.org
website: www.simplyprofits.org
321gold Ltd
Chan: This week in gold
Jack Chan
www.simplyprofits.org
Nov 5, 2007
GLD - remains on buy signal from 9/04.
SLV - on buy signal, waiting for new set up.
GDX - back to buy signal and waiting for new set up.
XGD.TO - back to buy signal and we had an excellent set up on Friday.
Summary
We added to positions this week upon new set ups, and will add more upon further set ups.
Disclosure
We do not offer predictions or forecasts for the markets. What you see here is our simple trading model which provides us the signals and set ups to be either long, short, or in cash at any given time. Entry points and stops are provided in real time to subscribers, therefore, this update may not reflect our current positions in the markets. Trade at your own discretion.
End of update
Nov 3, 2007
Jack Chan
Archives
email: jack@simplyprofits.org
website: www.simplyprofits.org
321gold Ltd
Borrowers Face Dubious Charges in Foreclosures
By GRETCHEN MORGENSON
November 6, 2007
As record numbers of homeowners default on their mortgages, questionable practices among lenders are coming to light in bankruptcy courts, leading some legal specialists to contend that companies instigating foreclosures may be taking advantage of imperiled borrowers.
Because there is little oversight of foreclosure practices and the fees that are charged, bankruptcy specialists fear that some consumers may be losing their homes unnecessarily or that mortgage servicers, who collect loan payments, are profiting from foreclosures.
Bankruptcy specialists say lenders and loan servicers often do not comply with even the most basic legal requirements, like correctly computing the amount a borrower owes on a foreclosed loan or providing proof of holding the mortgage note in question.
“Regulators need to look beyond their current, myopic focus on loan origination and consider how servicers’ calculation and collection practices leave families vulnerable to foreclosure,” said Katherine M. Porter, associate professor of law at the University of Iowa.
In an analysis of foreclosures in Chapter 13 bankruptcy, the program intended to help troubled borrowers save their homes, Ms. Porter found that questionable fees had been added to almost half of the loans she examined, and many of the charges were identified only vaguely. Most of the fees were less than $200 each, but collectively they could raise millions of dollars for loan servicers at a time when the other side of the business, mortgage origination, has faltered.
In one example, Ms. Porter found that a lender had filed a claim stating that the borrower owed more than $1 million. But after the loan history was scrutinized, the balance turned out to be $60,000. And a judge in Louisiana is considering an award for sanctions against Wells Fargo in a case in which the bank assessed improper fees and charges that added more than $24,000 to a borrower’s loan.
Ms. Porter’s analysis comes as more homeowners face foreclosure. Testifying before Congress on Tuesday, Mark Zandi, the chief economist at Moody’s Economy.com, estimated that two million families would lose their homes by the end of the current mortgage crisis.
Questionable practices by loan servicers appear to be enough of a problem that the Office of the United States Trustee, a division of the Justice Department that monitors the bankruptcy system, is getting involved. Last month, It announced plans to move against mortgage servicing companies that file false or inaccurate claims, assess unreasonable fees or fail to account properly for loan payments after a bankruptcy has been discharged.
On Oct. 9, the Chapter 13 trustee in Pittsburgh asked the court to sanction Countrywide, the nation’s largest loan servicer, saying that the company had lost or destroyed more than $500,000 in checks paid by homeowners in foreclosure from December 2005 to April 2007.
The trustee, Ronda J. Winnecour, said in court filings that she was concerned that even as Countrywide misplaced or destroyed the checks, it levied charges on the borrowers, including late fees and legal costs.
“The integrity of the bankruptcy process is threatened when a single creditor dishonors its obligation to provide a truthful and accurate account of the funds it has received,” Ms. Winnecour said in requesting sanctions.
A Countrywide spokesman disputed the accusations about the lost checks, saying the company had no record of having received the payments the trustee said had been sent. It is Countrywide’s practice not to charge late fees to borrowers in bankruptcy, he said, adding that the company also does not charge fees or costs relating to its own mistakes.
Loan servicing is extremely lucrative. Servicers, which collect payments from borrowers and pass them on to investors who own the loans, generally receive a percentage of income from a loan, often 0.25 percent on a prime mortgage and 0.50 percent on a subprime loan. Servicers typically generate profit margins of about 20 percent.
Now that big lenders are originating fewer mortgages, servicing revenues make up a greater percentage of earnings. Because servicers typically keep late fees and certain other charges assessed on delinquent or defaulted loans, “a borrower’s default can present a servicer with an opportunity for additional profit,” Ms. Porter said.
The amounts can be significant. Late fees accounted for 11.5 percent of servicing revenues in 2006 at Ocwen Financial, a big servicing company. At Countrywide, $285 million came from late fees last year, up 20 percent from 2005. Late fees accounted for 7.5 percent of Countrywide’s servicing revenue last year.
But these are not the only charges borrowers face. Others include $145 in something called “demand fees,” $137 in overnight delivery fees, fax fees of $50 and payoff statement charges of $60. Property inspection fees can be levied every month or so, and fees can be imposed every two months to cover assessments of a home’s worth.
“We’re talking about millions and millions of dollars that mortgage servicers are extracting from debtors that I think are totally unlawful and illegal,” said O. Max Gardner III, a lawyer in Shelby, N.C., specializing in consumer bankruptcies. “Somebody files a Chapter 13 bankruptcy, they make all their payments, get their discharge and then three months later, they get a statement from their servicer for $7,000 in fees and charges incurred in bankruptcy but that were never applied for in court and never approved.”
Some fees levied by loan servicers in foreclosure run afoul of state laws. In 2003, for example, a New York appeals court disallowed a $100 payoff statement fee sought by North Fork Bank.
Fees for legal services in foreclosure are also under scrutiny.
A class-action lawsuit filed in September in Federal District Court in Delaware accused the Mortgage Electronic Registration System, a home loan registration system owned by Fannie Mae, Countrywide Financial and other large lenders, of overcharging borrowers for legal services in foreclosures. The system, known as MERS, oversees more than 20 million mortgage loans.
The complaint was filed on behalf of Jose Trevino and Lorry S. Trevino of University City, Mo., whose Washington Mutual loan went into foreclosure in 2006 after the couple became ill and fell behind on payments.
Jeffrey M. Norton, a lawyer who represents the Trevinos, said that although MERS pays a flat rate of $400 or $500 to its lawyers during a foreclosure, the legal fees that it demands from borrowers are three or four times that.
A spokeswoman for MERS declined to comment.
Typically, consumers who are behind on their mortgages but hoping to stay in their homes invoke Chapter 13 bankruptcy because it puts creditors on hold, giving borrowers time to put together a repayment plan.
Given that a Chapter 13 bankruptcy involves the oversight of a court, the findings in Ms. Porter’s study are especially troubling. In July, she presented her paper to the United States trustee, and on Oct. 12 she outlined her data for the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges in Orlando, Fla.
With Tara Twomey, who is a lecturer at Stanford Law School and a consultant for the National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys, Ms. Porter analyzed 1,733 Chapter 13 filings made in April 2006. The data were drawn from public court records and include schedules filed under penalty of perjury by borrowers listing debts, assets and income.
Though bankruptcy laws require documentation that a creditor has a claim on the property, 4 out of 10 claims in Ms. Porter’s study did not attach such a promissory note. And one in six claims was not supported by the itemization of charges required by law.
Without proper documentation, families must choose between the costs of filing an objection or the risk of overpayment, Ms. Porter concluded.
She also found that some creditors ask for fees, like fax charges and payoff statement fees, that would probably be considered “unreasonable” by the courts.
Not surprisingly, these fees may contribute to the other problem identified by her study: a discrepancy between what debtors think they owe and what creditors say they are owed.
In 96 percent of the claims Ms. Porter studied, the borrower and the lender disagreed on the amount of the mortgage debt. In about a quarter of the cases, borrowers thought they owed more than the creditors claimed, but in about 70 percent, the creditors asserted that the debt owed was greater than the amounts specified by borrowers.
The median difference between the amounts the creditor and the borrower submitted was $1,366; the average was $3,533, Ms. Porter said. In 30 percent of the cases in which creditors’ claims were higher, the discrepancy was greater than 5 percent of the homeowners’ figure.
Based on the study, mortgage creditors in the 1,733 cases put in claims for almost $6 million more than the loan debts listed by borrowers in the bankruptcy filings. The discrepancies are too big, Ms. Porter said, to be simple record-keeping errors.
Michael L. Jones, a homeowner going through a Chapter 13 bankruptcy in Louisiana, experienced such a discrepancy with Wells Fargo Home Mortgage. After being told that he owed $231,463.97 on his mortgage, he disputed the amount and ultimately sued Wells Fargo.
In April, Elizabeth W. Magner, a federal bankruptcy judge in Louisiana, ruled that Wells Fargo overcharged Mr. Jones by $24,450.65, or 12 percent more than what the court said he actually owed. The court attributed some of that to arithmetic errors but found that Wells Fargo had improperly added charges, including $6,741.67 in commissions to the sheriff’s office that were not owed, almost $13,000 in additional interest and fees for 16 unnecessary inspections of the borrowers’ property in the 29 months the case was pending.
“Incredibly, Wells Fargo also argues that it was debtor’s burden to verify that its accounting was correct,” the judge wrote, “even though Wells Fargo failed to disclose the details of that accounting until it was sued.”
A Wells Fargo spokesman, Kevin Waetke, said the bank would not comment on the details of the case as the bank is appealing a motion by Mr. Jones for sanctions. “All of our practices and procedures in the handling of bankruptcy cases follow applicable laws, and we stand behind our actions in this case,” he said.
In Texas, a United States trustee has asked for sanctions against Barrett Burke Wilson Castle Daffin & Frappier, a Houston law firm that sues borrowers on behalf of the lenders, for providing inaccurate information to the court about mortgage payments made by homeowners who sought refuge in Chapter 13.
Michael C. Barrett, a partner at the firm, said he did not expect the firm to be sanctioned.
“We certainly believe we have not misbehaved in any way,” he said, saying the trustee’s office became involved because it is trying to persuade Congress to increase its budget. “It is trying to portray itself as an organ to pursue mortgage bankers.”
Closing arguments in the case are scheduled for Dec. 12.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/06/business/06mortgage.html?_r=2&hp=&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&adxnnlx=1194347111-vNuwIiTMhBDoyOym8g+4UA
No physical here, sold last year so lt's
just stocks & some options ;)
also been take a few of your plays....in & out, hard to keep up with you my friend, but enough to know l'm lurking.
what size are you using on the tiny's...2k, 5k, 10k ???
Thank you
l may have exited a bit early from
your last msg but have done very well with the dirts...
Don Coxe post from below:
"So you look at what it is you need to do then. All of this is bad news for the Dollar but it's good news for gold.
So whatever else you do...don't...sell...your gold...or your gold stocks in this."
Making it all go away, waterboard
them all get a near real count...restitution to share holders
of any stocks @ $1.00 per share.
BTW that includes all pinkies.
OT ?: Paulson's Focus on `Excesses' Shows Goldman Gorged (Update1)
By Mark Pittman
Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson says the U.S. is examining the subprime mortgage crisis to ensure that ``yesterday's excesses'' aren't repeated. He could be talking about himself and his former firm, Goldman Sachs Group Inc.
Paulson, 61, doesn't mention that Goldman still has on the market some $13 billion of almost $37 billion in bonds backed by subprime loans or second mortgages that it created while he was chief executive officer. Those bonds have an average delinquency rate of almost 22 percent, higher than the average of other subprime bonds from the period, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Goldman, the most profitable investment bank, was one of 14 primary dealers of U.S. Treasuries who contributed to a three- year binge as $1 trillion of subprime mortgages were packaged and sold to investors. The value of Goldman's outstanding subprime bonds trails Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.'s $33 billion, out of $106.8 billion created during Paulson's years at Goldman, and Morgan Stanley's $28.8 billion, out of $82.5 billion.
``He should admit to having been involved in creating the problem that we have now,'' said Representative Brad Miller, a North Carolina Democrat, who introduced a bill Oct. 22 to make firms packaging subprime mortgages liable for bad loans in some circumstances.
The subprime crisis developed earlier this year when falling home prices triggered defaults by homeowners who wouldn't have normally qualified for a mortgage. Many were unable or unwilling to make adjustable-rate payments that were due to rise. Home foreclosures doubled in the third quarter from a year earlier to 635,159, RealtyTrac reported Nov. 1.
`Largely Contained'
Starting in March, Paulson said the damage was ``largely contained'' and was no risk to the larger economy. When other credit markets began to be affected, he and others began pushing for solutions.
``I can't help but notice that when middle-class homeowners were losing their homes to foreclosure, he was pretty nonchalant about it,'' Miller said of Paulson. ``But when Wall Street CEOs start seeing trouble in their absurdly complicated financial instruments built on the mortgages of middle-class homeowners, he feels their pain.''
Paulson declined to comment through spokeswoman Michele Davis, who said, ``he can't talk about Goldman business.'' Spokesman Michael DuVally of New York-based Goldman declined to say how much subprime mortgages contributed to the investment bank's profits, or Paulson's compensation, during his tenure from May 1999 through June 2006.
Goldman paid Paulson $38.5 million for 2005, and he received an $18.7 million bonus for the first half of last year.
Bet Against Subprime
While competitors reported losses from their subprime portfolios in recent months, Goldman said Sept. 20 that it profited from the market's decline by using derivatives to bet that mortgage securities would continue to fall.
Paulson's involvement in the subprime crisis ``points out that there needs to be complete accountability up and down the system,'' said Allen Fishbein, the director of credit and housing policy at the Consumer Federation of America in Washington. ``Goldman wasn't alone. All the brokerages did this.''
Goldman ranks 10th among 118 issuers, based on the amount of subprime loans still on the market. Bonds with a face value of $484.6 billion remain from those created in the years Paulson ran Goldman.
Countrywide
Market leader Countrywide Financial Corp. has $40.7 billion in subprime bonds still on the market, or 8.4 percent of the total. GMAC LLC's Residential Capital LLC has $34.4 billion. Lehman's $33.1 billion leads Wall Street firms. The amounts tally the securities issued, not what remains on the banks' books.
Calabasas, California-based Countrywide, the nation's biggest home lender; ResCap, the Minneapolis-based home lending arm of General Motors Corp.'s finance subsidiary; and Goldman were among those competing to create pools of mortgages consisting mostly of subprime loans, made to borrowers with poor credit records or high debt.
Goldman has more subprime debt outstanding than Credit Suisse, which has almost $10 billion; Citigroup Inc., with $6.8 billion; or JPMorgan Chase & Co., with $7.8 billion.
Losses on holdings of subprime securities have already claimed the jobs of two chief executive officers. Citigroup yesterday accepted the resignation of CEO Charles Prince after saying its holdings of subprime securities may cause writedowns of as much as $11 billion. Merrill Lynch CEO Stan O'Neal left last week amid writedowns of more than $8 billion.
House Bill
The data on subprime bonds, compiled by Bloomberg from reports by debt servicing companies, don't include all of the mortgage bond offerings managed by any of the firms. That's because all of them handle offerings by bond issuers outside of Wall Street, including Irvine, California-based New Century Financial Corp., a subprime lender now in bankruptcy.
The House bill Miller introduced is backed by Representative Barney Frank, the Massachusetts Democrat who is chairman of the Financial Services Committee. One provision would make firms that package and sell subprime mortgages liable for damages if loans violate certain minimum standards, including ensuring a borrower's reasonable ability to repay.
Paulson criticized the liability idea in an Oct. 16 speech at Georgetown University in Washington.
``We need to ensure yesterday's excesses are not repeated tomorrow,'' Paulson said. Penalizing Wall Street for packaging mortgage loans ``is not the answer to the problem,'' he said.
Potential Paralysis
The House measure would ``potentially paralyze securitization,'' which, Paulson said, has been ``extremely valuable in extending the availability of credit to millions of homeowners nationwide and lowering the cost of financing.''
In New Delhi on Oct. 30, Paulson repeated his pledge to find what went wrong in the financial system. ``We need to shed light on it and make the policy adjustments so this doesn't happen again,'' he said.
When the subprime mortgage issue exploded as an economic and political issue this year, Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben S. Bernanke was the federal government's point man. He was called before Congress to defend regulators' failure to prevent lending abuses.
Paulson's public role increased in the past month as the credit crunch spread to the commercial paper markets and off- balance-sheet structured investment vehicles, known as SIVs. He urged major lenders in a Sept. 12 meeting in Washington to help subprime borrowers keep their homes.
Saving SIVs
Paulson and Robert Steel, a former Goldman Sachs vice chairman who is the Treasury's undersecretary for domestic finance, helped persuade Citigroup and other banks to set up an $80 billion partnership to buy assets from any SIVs that couldn't refinance their debt.
Goldman under Paulson created 58 mortgage pools branded under the acronym of GSAMP, which originally stood for Goldman Sachs Alternative Mortgage Products, starting in July 2002. The value of the loans at risk of default is almost 50 percent for one Goldman pool, according to Bloomberg data, which includes pools identified as containing home equity financings as well as subprime mortgages.
The average delinquency rate for subprime bonds sold from May 1999 through June 2006 is 19.3 percent as of yesterday, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Among the top 20 issuers that have more than $5 billion outstanding, Goldman's GSAMP ranks ninth with 21.7 percent for delinquencies of 60 days or more, foreclosures or real estate that has been taken away from borrowers.
Higher Delinquencies
That rate is higher than for JPMorgan, with 20.8, and Citigroup, with 19.9 percent, according to data compiled by Bloomberg through October. Goldman's delinquency rate is lower than the 26.2 percent for bonds in Deutsche Bank AG's ACE trust, as well as 25.1 percent for Barclays Capital's SABR and 23.8 percent for Merrill Lynch's MLMI.
One of Goldman's bonds, GSAMP 2006-HE2 B2, is valued at 47 cents on the dollar, to yield 14.5 percent, according to Merrill Lynch. The pool, which was sold March 1, 2006, already has a delinquency rate of 16.4 percent. The bond was cut five levels from investment-grade Baa2 to a junk rating of B1 on Oct. 11 by Moody's Investors Service.
To contact the reporter on this story: Mark Pittman in New York at mpittman@bloomberg.net .
Last Updated: November 5, 2007 12:24 EST
Paulson's Focus on `Excesses' Shows Goldman Gorged (Update1)
By Mark Pittman
Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson says the U.S. is examining the subprime mortgage crisis to ensure that ``yesterday's excesses'' aren't repeated. He could be talking about himself and his former firm, Goldman Sachs Group Inc.
Paulson, 61, doesn't mention that Goldman still has on the market some $13 billion of almost $37 billion in bonds backed by subprime loans or second mortgages that it created while he was chief executive officer. Those bonds have an average delinquency rate of almost 22 percent, higher than the average of other subprime bonds from the period, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Goldman, the most profitable investment bank, was one of 14 primary dealers of U.S. Treasuries who contributed to a three- year binge as $1 trillion of subprime mortgages were packaged and sold to investors. The value of Goldman's outstanding subprime bonds trails Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.'s $33 billion, out of $106.8 billion created during Paulson's years at Goldman, and Morgan Stanley's $28.8 billion, out of $82.5 billion.
``He should admit to having been involved in creating the problem that we have now,'' said Representative Brad Miller, a North Carolina Democrat, who introduced a bill Oct. 22 to make firms packaging subprime mortgages liable for bad loans in some circumstances.
The subprime crisis developed earlier this year when falling home prices triggered defaults by homeowners who wouldn't have normally qualified for a mortgage. Many were unable or unwilling to make adjustable-rate payments that were due to rise. Home foreclosures doubled in the third quarter from a year earlier to 635,159, RealtyTrac reported Nov. 1.
`Largely Contained'
Starting in March, Paulson said the damage was ``largely contained'' and was no risk to the larger economy. When other credit markets began to be affected, he and others began pushing for solutions.
``I can't help but notice that when middle-class homeowners were losing their homes to foreclosure, he was pretty nonchalant about it,'' Miller said of Paulson. ``But when Wall Street CEOs start seeing trouble in their absurdly complicated financial instruments built on the mortgages of middle-class homeowners, he feels their pain.''
Paulson declined to comment through spokeswoman Michele Davis, who said, ``he can't talk about Goldman business.'' Spokesman Michael DuVally of New York-based Goldman declined to say how much subprime mortgages contributed to the investment bank's profits, or Paulson's compensation, during his tenure from May 1999 through June 2006.
Goldman paid Paulson $38.5 million for 2005, and he received an $18.7 million bonus for the first half of last year.
Bet Against Subprime
While competitors reported losses from their subprime portfolios in recent months, Goldman said Sept. 20 that it profited from the market's decline by using derivatives to bet that mortgage securities would continue to fall.
Paulson's involvement in the subprime crisis ``points out that there needs to be complete accountability up and down the system,'' said Allen Fishbein, the director of credit and housing policy at the Consumer Federation of America in Washington. ``Goldman wasn't alone. All the brokerages did this.''
Goldman ranks 10th among 118 issuers, based on the amount of subprime loans still on the market. Bonds with a face value of $484.6 billion remain from those created in the years Paulson ran Goldman.
Countrywide
Market leader Countrywide Financial Corp. has $40.7 billion in subprime bonds still on the market, or 8.4 percent of the total. GMAC LLC's Residential Capital LLC has $34.4 billion. Lehman's $33.1 billion leads Wall Street firms. The amounts tally the securities issued, not what remains on the banks' books.
Calabasas, California-based Countrywide, the nation's biggest home lender; ResCap, the Minneapolis-based home lending arm of General Motors Corp.'s finance subsidiary; and Goldman were among those competing to create pools of mortgages consisting mostly of subprime loans, made to borrowers with poor credit records or high debt.
Goldman has more subprime debt outstanding than Credit Suisse, which has almost $10 billion; Citigroup Inc., with $6.8 billion; or JPMorgan Chase & Co., with $7.8 billion.
Losses on holdings of subprime securities have already claimed the jobs of two chief executive officers. Citigroup yesterday accepted the resignation of CEO Charles Prince after saying its holdings of subprime securities may cause writedowns of as much as $11 billion. Merrill Lynch CEO Stan O'Neal left last week amid writedowns of more than $8 billion.
House Bill
The data on subprime bonds, compiled by Bloomberg from reports by debt servicing companies, don't include all of the mortgage bond offerings managed by any of the firms. That's because all of them handle offerings by bond issuers outside of Wall Street, including Irvine, California-based New Century Financial Corp., a subprime lender now in bankruptcy.
The House bill Miller introduced is backed by Representative Barney Frank, the Massachusetts Democrat who is chairman of the Financial Services Committee. One provision would make firms that package and sell subprime mortgages liable for damages if loans violate certain minimum standards, including ensuring a borrower's reasonable ability to repay.
Paulson criticized the liability idea in an Oct. 16 speech at Georgetown University in Washington.
``We need to ensure yesterday's excesses are not repeated tomorrow,'' Paulson said. Penalizing Wall Street for packaging mortgage loans ``is not the answer to the problem,'' he said.
Potential Paralysis
The House measure would ``potentially paralyze securitization,'' which, Paulson said, has been ``extremely valuable in extending the availability of credit to millions of homeowners nationwide and lowering the cost of financing.''
In New Delhi on Oct. 30, Paulson repeated his pledge to find what went wrong in the financial system. ``We need to shed light on it and make the policy adjustments so this doesn't happen again,'' he said.
When the subprime mortgage issue exploded as an economic and political issue this year, Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben S. Bernanke was the federal government's point man. He was called before Congress to defend regulators' failure to prevent lending abuses.
Paulson's public role increased in the past month as the credit crunch spread to the commercial paper markets and off- balance-sheet structured investment vehicles, known as SIVs. He urged major lenders in a Sept. 12 meeting in Washington to help subprime borrowers keep their homes.
Saving SIVs
Paulson and Robert Steel, a former Goldman Sachs vice chairman who is the Treasury's undersecretary for domestic finance, helped persuade Citigroup and other banks to set up an $80 billion partnership to buy assets from any SIVs that couldn't refinance their debt.
Goldman under Paulson created 58 mortgage pools branded under the acronym of GSAMP, which originally stood for Goldman Sachs Alternative Mortgage Products, starting in July 2002. The value of the loans at risk of default is almost 50 percent for one Goldman pool, according to Bloomberg data, which includes pools identified as containing home equity financings as well as subprime mortgages.
The average delinquency rate for subprime bonds sold from May 1999 through June 2006 is 19.3 percent as of yesterday, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Among the top 20 issuers that have more than $5 billion outstanding, Goldman's GSAMP ranks ninth with 21.7 percent for delinquencies of 60 days or more, foreclosures or real estate that has been taken away from borrowers.
Higher Delinquencies
That rate is higher than for JPMorgan, with 20.8, and Citigroup, with 19.9 percent, according to data compiled by Bloomberg through October. Goldman's delinquency rate is lower than the 26.2 percent for bonds in Deutsche Bank AG's ACE trust, as well as 25.1 percent for Barclays Capital's SABR and 23.8 percent for Merrill Lynch's MLMI.
One of Goldman's bonds, GSAMP 2006-HE2 B2, is valued at 47 cents on the dollar, to yield 14.5 percent, according to Merrill Lynch. The pool, which was sold March 1, 2006, already has a delinquency rate of 16.4 percent. The bond was cut five levels from investment-grade Baa2 to a junk rating of B1 on Oct. 11 by Moody's Investors Service.
To contact the reporter on this story: Mark Pittman in New York at mpittman@bloomberg.net .
Last Updated: November 5, 2007 12:24 EST
Silver Wheaton Acquires 11% Interest in Mines Management and Right of First Refusal Over Silver Stream
Monday November 5, 1:35 pm ET
VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA--(MARKET WIRE)--Nov 5, 2007 -- Silver Wheaton Corp. ("Silver Wheaton") (Toronto:SLW.TO - News) (NYSE:SLW - News) is pleased to announce that it has acquired 2,500,000 common shares of Mines Management, Inc. ("Mines Management") (Toronto:MGT.TO - News) (AMEX:MGN - News) at a price of US$4.00 per share for a total purchase price of US$10,000,000. The proceeds of the offering are primarily intended for use on further development of Mines Management's Montanore silver-copper project (the "Montanore Project"), one of the world's 30 largest silver deposits.
As a result of this transaction, Silver Wheaton owns 11.2% of the outstanding shares of Mines Management and has been granted a right of first refusal over any silver stream sales by Mines Management from any of its projects in Montana.
Mines Management's 100%-owned Montanore Project is located in northwestern Montana. The Montanore Project is reported by Mines Management to host mineral resources of 166 million ounces of silver and 1.2 billion pounds of copper in the measured and indicated categories and a further 65 million ounces of silver and 500 million pounds of copper in the inferred category (refer to the table at the end of this news release for further details).
"With this investment, Silver Wheaton now has a significant stake in six of the top 30 largest known silver deposits in the world," said Peter Barnes, President and Chief Executive Officer of Silver Wheaton. "Of these six projects, Silver Wheaton has silver stream agreements in place with two, Penasquito and San Dimas, and is the largest shareholder in companies owning a further four, being Revett Minerals Inc., Sabina Silver Corporation, Bear Creek Mining Corporation and now Mines Management. In addition, we have rights of first refusal over future silver stream sales with both Mines Management and Sabina Silver Corporation. This demonstrates the strength of Silver Wheaton in the silver sector, and our potential for significant further growth."
Silver Wheaton has acquired the Mines Management shares for investment purposes and may acquire additional securities or dispose of its beneficial ownership, control or direction over securities through market transactions, private placements, treasury issuances or otherwise as circumstances or market conditions warrant or arise.
Mines Management has reported that, as of October 14, 2005, the Montanore Project had the following measured, indicated and inferred mineral resources:
MONTANORE PROJECT(1,2)
http://biz.yahoo.com/iw/071105/0324287.html
Silver Wheaton Acquires 11% Interest in Mines Management and Right of First Refusal Over Silver Stream
Monday November 5, 1:35 pm ET
VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA--(MARKET WIRE)--Nov 5, 2007 -- Silver Wheaton Corp. ("Silver Wheaton") (Toronto:SLW.TO - News) (NYSE:SLW - News) is pleased to announce that it has acquired 2,500,000 common shares of Mines Management, Inc. ("Mines Management") (Toronto:MGT.TO - News) (AMEX:MGN - News) at a price of US$4.00 per share for a total purchase price of US$10,000,000. The proceeds of the offering are primarily intended for use on further development of Mines Management's Montanore silver-copper project (the "Montanore Project"), one of the world's 30 largest silver deposits.
As a result of this transaction, Silver Wheaton owns 11.2% of the outstanding shares of Mines Management and has been granted a right of first refusal over any silver stream sales by Mines Management from any of its projects in Montana.
Mines Management's 100%-owned Montanore Project is located in northwestern Montana. The Montanore Project is reported by Mines Management to host mineral resources of 166 million ounces of silver and 1.2 billion pounds of copper in the measured and indicated categories and a further 65 million ounces of silver and 500 million pounds of copper in the inferred category (refer to the table at the end of this news release for further details).
"With this investment, Silver Wheaton now has a significant stake in six of the top 30 largest known silver deposits in the world," said Peter Barnes, President and Chief Executive Officer of Silver Wheaton. "Of these six projects, Silver Wheaton has silver stream agreements in place with two, Penasquito and San Dimas, and is the largest shareholder in companies owning a further four, being Revett Minerals Inc., Sabina Silver Corporation, Bear Creek Mining Corporation and now Mines Management. In addition, we have rights of first refusal over future silver stream sales with both Mines Management and Sabina Silver Corporation. This demonstrates the strength of Silver Wheaton in the silver sector, and our potential for significant further growth."
Silver Wheaton has acquired the Mines Management shares for investment purposes and may acquire additional securities or dispose of its beneficial ownership, control or direction over securities through market transactions, private placements, treasury issuances or otherwise as circumstances or market conditions warrant or arise.
Mines Management has reported that, as of October 14, 2005, the Montanore Project had the following measured, indicated and inferred mineral resources:
MONTANORE PROJECT(1,2)
http://biz.yahoo.com/iw/071105/0324287.html
OT: Veteran's Day the Golden Corral honors
all with Free buffet every year, l get to see some old friends
& make a donation [not reg ]
Fed. 1day RP + 6.75B [Net add + 0.50B ]
http://www.ny.frb.org/markets/omo/dmm/temp.cfm
Fed. 1day RP + 6.75B [Net add + 0.50B ]
http://www.ny.frb.org/markets/omo/dmm/temp.cfm
W@G1 QQQQ 11/05/07 for a 11/07/07 close
54.75 bob3
54.42 The Cap'm
53.50 frenchee
53.00 rayrohn
Mexican President Calderon: Floods Cripple Mexico's Oil Industry
November 3, 2007 12:41 p.m. EST
Annabella Bulacan - AHN News Writer
Villahermosa, Mexico (AHN) - Mexican President Felipe Calderon on Friday warned it would take time to rebuild what has been devastated by the non-stop flooding plaguing the country, including the oil industry, which was crippled by the catastrophe.
"The storms have forced the closure of three of Mexico's main oil ports, preventing almost all exports and halting a fifth of the country's oil production. It has a strong economic impact" Calderon said in an interview.
The storm did not spare the Bay of Campeche, Mexico's main oil producing region and home to more than 100 oil platforms.
Overall, the region normally exports about 1.7 million barrels of crude daily. Since, most of the production remains shut down, it would mean that Mexico's output would drop by 2.6 million barrels a day.
The heavy floods that started last week also forced an oil platform into another rig in the Gulf of Mexico, where at least 21 people were reportedly killed.
Some 800,000 families were displaced as floods submerged Villahermosa, the capital of Tabasco. More than 300,000 people were also trapped in their homes and rescue operations are still underway.
One hundred percent of the crops were destroyed, on top of the multi million worth of properties and belongings of people that were swept away by floods.
"It's not just the worst natural catastrophe in the state's history but, I would venture to say, one of the worst in the country's recent history," the President said.
In a BBC report, Calderon assured, "Once the critical stage was over, we are going to reconstruct Tabasco whatever it takes."
http://tinyurl.com/35gh4s
Here's some of what Coxe had to say this week:
"But remember as we've said over and over - in bull markets the financial stocks trade off the earnings statements, in the bear markets off the balance sheets. And we have had nothing but further evidence that you've got to be disbelieving the balance sheets of a lot of the major financial institutions. That the valuation figures they're using for these Jurassic Park creations are wrong. Because what they were based on was the assumption that the Triple AAA component within them was such a big percentage and those were the ones that were taken by the more conservative institutions.
But what you're seeing is the valuations of these in the index that follows them - the ABX - is taking a huge haircut off them. Now either the ABX index is being driven by panic, or what it's saying is that there is gigantic overvaluation spread right across the financial system.
Well I don't know - let's say the answer falls somewhere in between - we're still talking about a hit to equity of the kind that's going to take these financial stocks down a long way from where they are.
It doesn't mean the system is going to go down. That won't happen. But, what it does mean is that, you know, you've got roughly 21% of the S&P that's in financials, so when you're told that the group that most relies on its balance sheet for its business, that its balance sheets are so prettied up as to make Enron's or Fannie Mae's look actually honest, if you've got that kind of situation, it's not the stuff of a bull market.
So you look at what it is you need to do then. All of this is bad news for the Dollar but it's good news for gold. So whatever else you do...don't...sell...your gold...or your gold stocks in this."
Courtesy... TheSlowLane @ SI
Don Coxe: Fridays weekly audio program.
http://events.startcast.com/events/199/B0003/#
Here's some of what Coxe had to say this week:
"But remember as we've said over and over - in bull markets the financial stocks trade off the earnings statements, in the bear markets off the balance sheets. And we have had nothing but further evidence that you've got to be disbelieving the balance sheets of a lot of the major financial institutions. That the valuation figures they're using for these Jurassic Park creations are wrong. Because what they were based on was the assumption that the Triple AAA component within them was such a big percentage and those were the ones that were taken by the more conservative institutions.
But what you're seeing is the valuations of these in the index that follows them - the ABX - is taking a huge haircut off them. Now either the ABX index is being driven by panic, or what it's saying is that there is gigantic overvaluation spread right across the financial system.
Well I don't know - let's say the answer falls somewhere in between - we're still talking about a hit to equity of the kind that's going to take these financial stocks down a long way from where they are.
It doesn't mean the system is going to go down. That won't happen. But, what it does mean is that, you know, you've got roughly 21% of the S&P that's in financials, so when you're told that the group that most relies on its balance sheet for its business, that its balance sheets are so prettied up as to make Enron's or Fannie Mae's look actually honest, if you've got that kind of situation, it's not the stuff of a bull market.
So you look at what it is you need to do then. All of this is bad news for the Dollar but it's good news for gold. So whatever else you do...don't...sell...your gold...or your gold stocks in this."
Courtesy... TheSlowLane @ SI
Don Coxe: Fridays weekly audio program.
http://events.startcast.com/events/199/B0003/#
Chapman: Gold, Silver, Economy & More
by Bob Chapman
The International Forecaster
Sunday, 4 November 2007
US MARKETS
Here we are four months into a credit crisis and it is only 5% resolved. We believe this crisis has a long way to go as the interbank system attempts to restore confidence and trust. The traditional buyers of short-term corporate debt, better known as commercial paper, are still on strike and there is no end in sight.
Over the past month the attention in the media has been focused on structured investment vehicles, SIVs, which have no visible market and hence no value. By our calculations the major New York banks are holding more than $400 billion of this toxic garbage.
As you know our Secretary of the Treasury Mr. Paulson, formally of Goldman Sachs, who we cannot decide whether he is still in Wall Street or doing what he should be for the American people, has been used as the front man to rescue his colleagues, the bankers and investment bankers. Though we are told no government money will be used, this past week Mr. Paulson floated a proposal to reward lenders for not raising interest rates on resetting loans and to reward homeowners who should never had loans in the first place. The banks and the deadbeats get bailed out and the American taxpayer again is allowed to foot the bill.
Demand for asset-backed securities, such as SIVs, CDOs and ABSs has evaporated. Those who have been able to find buyers are receiving $0.18 for the worst paper and $0.47 for the best assets. Thus, that $400 billion being held by big banks is worth perhaps $100 billion. Thus, by creating this Master-Liquidity Enhancement Conduit, or M-LEC, which will effectively be a buyer of last resort, using the proceeds of its own debt issues to purchase assets from troubled SIVs. The idea is to flog the $0.47 paper and avoid an avalanche of forced selling. After two weeks this new super toxic fund has gone nowhere. We argue that voluntary co-guarantee schemes like this are doomed to failure because only the weakest institutions want to participate. There now exists an entire market that is deemed too big to fail. If market prices prevail the results will be disastrous for banks, investment banks, hedge funds, brokerage firms, pension funds and thousands of other companies invested in toxic garbage. The Treasury’s participation tells you this situation is far worse than thought.
The banks created SIVs to move assets off its books and reduce the banks’ capital requirements. They were leveraging themselves to end run banking regulations. The risks these banks and others have assumed are a major threat to the solvency of these entities. In addition, many of the SIVs are leveraged 10-15 times or more. You might liken the process to a pyramid where you take short-term paper and use it for leverage to purchase long-term paper that pays a better yield. This if you get a spread of 4% and leverage it up 10-15 times you get a high risky return. The stage we are now at is that the commercial paper market is frozen, and the banks cannot attract funds that way to continue their game. That is why the discount rate was lowered ½% and the banks borrowed some $350 billion short term. The problem is the banks nor others cannot borrow 270-day money in the commercial paper market any more and the Fed has to continue to roll the loans to keep these big banks solvent. Heaven forbid the banks may have to take the toxic garbage back on their own books, even if they are not technically required to do so, they probably will have to. These buyers are colleagues and friends. If they do not take them back their reputations go up in smoke. If they take them back they could be on the edge of bankruptcy. The idea for the bank is to resurrect the good paper, take it on the books and sell off the bad paper. This is what they are trying to do with the super fund. Buyers of commercial paper do not want to assume risks for an extra 1% over government paper. It just isn’t worth the risk, especially with all the negative publicity. The SIVs are totally opaque. That means the banks that constructed them will have to dismantle them. Interestingly once dismantled the banking truimperate said they will offer $0.94 plus a 4% note. Even for the good participants that is double their current market value.
There is going to be a massive liquidation of assets in the coming year. The big banks with their capitalization will make it but others won’t. The super fund idea is simply to buy time, because inevitably the paper has to be marked to market. The banks want to spread out the losses to keep shareholders happy and to survive.
Gains in spending on commercial and public construction projects offset another decline in spending on housing projects in September, as overall construction spending was up by 0.3%. Private nonresidential construction spending climbed by 1.5% while public construction spending rose by 1.9%. Spending on housing projects fell by 1.4%, the 29th straight decline. Housing spending is off 16.4% yoy.
We told you that SIVs hold $400 billion in 36 of these vehicles. We are told these positions have been leveraged giving banks about $2 trillion in real exposure. This is an insolvable problem. Many banks have to be in serious trouble. Then there are the money market funds, investment banks and brokerage houses, hedge and pension funds. It doesn’t look good.
GOLD, SILVER, PLATINUM, PALLADIUM AND URANIUM
Friday was a confirmation of everything we have been saying. The large specs waited until just before the market closed. Gold was bouncing up and down like a ping-pong ball between 788 and 796. Gold was at about 795 with an hour and a half left to go, when the large specs struck like a King Cobra! The gold chart went freaking vertical as gold kicked in its afterburners, slicing through 800 like it did not even exist and charging uninterrupted to its new 27-year high of 808.10, before closing at 806 even. We'll bet you could have heard a pin drop among the gold bears in the COMEX as they watched all the stops set at 800 start "plinging" away, sending gold to it new all-time high, plunging them into some deep, dark water, while the script for Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea was rewritten and as they suffered simultaneously from a case of the bends and a collective myocardial infarction. The physical gold buying was absolutely furious and then the short-covering kicked in all as indicated by the vertical rise in the gold charts for the spot market.
Silver went on a binge, almost scraping against its February, 2007 highs, hitting 14.67 and closing at 14.53. The XAU and the HUI embarrassed all the other stock sectors, with the XAU rising from 181.00 to 187.63, while the HUI went raging like a wild man, rising from 422.1 to 439.38, both a new-all time closing and intra-day high! Not to be outdone, oil set yet another new all-time closing high of 95.93 after trading just over 96 for the December contract. Fanning the precious metal flames was the mortified dollar, as it plunged to a new all-time low on the spot USDX of 76.337. We will soon be a Banana Republic. The cartel has completely lost it. The large specs are now in control as long as they want to be.
http://news.goldseek.com/InternationalForecaster/1194207562.php
Chapman: Gold, Silver, Economy & More
by Bob Chapman
The International Forecaster
Sunday, 4 November 2007
US MARKETS
Here we are four months into a credit crisis and it is only 5% resolved. We believe this crisis has a long way to go as the interbank system attempts to restore confidence and trust. The traditional buyers of short-term corporate debt, better known as commercial paper, are still on strike and there is no end in sight.
Over the past month the attention in the media has been focused on structured investment vehicles, SIVs, which have no visible market and hence no value. By our calculations the major New York banks are holding more than $400 billion of this toxic garbage.
As you know our Secretary of the Treasury Mr. Paulson, formally of Goldman Sachs, who we cannot decide whether he is still in Wall Street or doing what he should be for the American people, has been used as the front man to rescue his colleagues, the bankers and investment bankers. Though we are told no government money will be used, this past week Mr. Paulson floated a proposal to reward lenders for not raising interest rates on resetting loans and to reward homeowners who should never had loans in the first place. The banks and the deadbeats get bailed out and the American taxpayer again is allowed to foot the bill.
Demand for asset-backed securities, such as SIVs, CDOs and ABSs has evaporated. Those who have been able to find buyers are receiving $0.18 for the worst paper and $0.47 for the best assets. Thus, that $400 billion being held by big banks is worth perhaps $100 billion. Thus, by creating this Master-Liquidity Enhancement Conduit, or M-LEC, which will effectively be a buyer of last resort, using the proceeds of its own debt issues to purchase assets from troubled SIVs. The idea is to flog the $0.47 paper and avoid an avalanche of forced selling. After two weeks this new super toxic fund has gone nowhere. We argue that voluntary co-guarantee schemes like this are doomed to failure because only the weakest institutions want to participate. There now exists an entire market that is deemed too big to fail. If market prices prevail the results will be disastrous for banks, investment banks, hedge funds, brokerage firms, pension funds and thousands of other companies invested in toxic garbage. The Treasury’s participation tells you this situation is far worse than thought.
The banks created SIVs to move assets off its books and reduce the banks’ capital requirements. They were leveraging themselves to end run banking regulations. The risks these banks and others have assumed are a major threat to the solvency of these entities. In addition, many of the SIVs are leveraged 10-15 times or more. You might liken the process to a pyramid where you take short-term paper and use it for leverage to purchase long-term paper that pays a better yield. This if you get a spread of 4% and leverage it up 10-15 times you get a high risky return. The stage we are now at is that the commercial paper market is frozen, and the banks cannot attract funds that way to continue their game. That is why the discount rate was lowered ½% and the banks borrowed some $350 billion short term. The problem is the banks nor others cannot borrow 270-day money in the commercial paper market any more and the Fed has to continue to roll the loans to keep these big banks solvent. Heaven forbid the banks may have to take the toxic garbage back on their own books, even if they are not technically required to do so, they probably will have to. These buyers are colleagues and friends. If they do not take them back their reputations go up in smoke. If they take them back they could be on the edge of bankruptcy. The idea for the bank is to resurrect the good paper, take it on the books and sell off the bad paper. This is what they are trying to do with the super fund. Buyers of commercial paper do not want to assume risks for an extra 1% over government paper. It just isn’t worth the risk, especially with all the negative publicity. The SIVs are totally opaque. That means the banks that constructed them will have to dismantle them. Interestingly once dismantled the banking truimperate said they will offer $0.94 plus a 4% note. Even for the good participants that is double their current market value.
There is going to be a massive liquidation of assets in the coming year. The big banks with their capitalization will make it but others won’t. The super fund idea is simply to buy time, because inevitably the paper has to be marked to market. The banks want to spread out the losses to keep shareholders happy and to survive.
Gains in spending on commercial and public construction projects offset another decline in spending on housing projects in September, as overall construction spending was up by 0.3%. Private nonresidential construction spending climbed by 1.5% while public construction spending rose by 1.9%. Spending on housing projects fell by 1.4%, the 29th straight decline. Housing spending is off 16.4% yoy.
We told you that SIVs hold $400 billion in 36 of these vehicles. We are told these positions have been leveraged giving banks about $2 trillion in real exposure. This is an insolvable problem. Many banks have to be in serious trouble. Then there are the money market funds, investment banks and brokerage houses, hedge and pension funds. It doesn’t look good.
GOLD, SILVER, PLATINUM, PALLADIUM AND URANIUM
Friday was a confirmation of everything we have been saying. The large specs waited until just before the market closed. Gold was bouncing up and down like a ping-pong ball between 788 and 796. Gold was at about 795 with an hour and a half left to go, when the large specs struck like a King Cobra! The gold chart went freaking vertical as gold kicked in its afterburners, slicing through 800 like it did not even exist and charging uninterrupted to its new 27-year high of 808.10, before closing at 806 even. We'll bet you could have heard a pin drop among the gold bears in the COMEX as they watched all the stops set at 800 start "plinging" away, sending gold to it new all-time high, plunging them into some deep, dark water, while the script for Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea was rewritten and as they suffered simultaneously from a case of the bends and a collective myocardial infarction. The physical gold buying was absolutely furious and then the short-covering kicked in all as indicated by the vertical rise in the gold charts for the spot market.
Silver went on a binge, almost scraping against its February, 2007 highs, hitting 14.67 and closing at 14.53. The XAU and the HUI embarrassed all the other stock sectors, with the XAU rising from 181.00 to 187.63, while the HUI went raging like a wild man, rising from 422.1 to 439.38, both a new-all time closing and intra-day high! Not to be outdone, oil set yet another new all-time closing high of 95.93 after trading just over 96 for the December contract. Fanning the precious metal flames was the mortified dollar, as it plunged to a new all-time low on the spot USDX of 76.337. We will soon be a Banana Republic. The cartel has completely lost it. The large specs are now in control as long as they want to be.
http://news.goldseek.com/InternationalForecaster/1194207562.php
Harding: A Nervous Market
by Sy Harding
Nov. 2, 2007
Is the market losing its nerve, and perhaps its momentum?
Four weeks ago the Dow closed up 171 points for the week, or 1.2%. That carried it up to a new record high at 14,164. But it seemed to find the atmosphere rarified at that altitude and has been gasping for air since.
It was unable to make any further progress the following week, closing basically unchanged for the week. The next week it plunged 577 points, or 4.1%. The following week, although investors seemed excited by its recovery, it actually only recovered half of the previous week's decline, closing up 284 points, or 2.1%, for the week.
And now this week, even though the Fed gave it what many thought would refill its oxygen tank for even loftier levels, a cut in the Fed Funds rate, the market continued to decline.
But not without plenty of day-to-day volatility. Its initial reaction to the Fed's rate cut on Wednesday was a rally of 137 points. But then, facing more bad news Thursday morning, it plunged a big 362 points on the day. Its problems on Thursday included earnings disappointments from Caterpillar, Honeywell, and Exxon Mobil among others. Those came on top of warnings over previous weeks from the likes of Harley Davidson, Hershey, Target, Lowe's, and others, raising concerns that consumers, which account for 66% of the economy, are pulling back on their spending.
But it was actually more bad news from the financial sector that really did it in on Thursday. CitiGroup was downgraded by a couple of brokerage firms, on expectations it will have to write down still more losses from the sub-prime mortgage mess. And Credit Suisse reported its September quarter earnings plunged 31%, and it will write down $1.9 billion in mortgage related losses.
It was an ugly day Thursday, a broad based sell-off in which 458 of the 500 stocks in the S&P 500 closed down on the day.
But there was still hope that the important employment report for October, due out Friday morning, would be able to salvage the week. Analysts projected that if 125,000 or more new jobs were created in October, the market would surge back up.
And Friday morning the Labor Department reported there were 165,000 new jobs created in October, much better than forecasts, much better than even hoped for.
However, just as the Fed's rate cut had failed to overcome the market's nervousness, the better than expected employment numbers, and even a separate report of higher than expected factory orders in October, had little effect. After an initial attempt to rally, the market turned south, with the Dow down more than 100 points by mid-day Friday.
Once again it was concerns about the financial sector that did it in, mostly fueled by rumors. One story floating around was that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is looking into how financial firms were able to price their debt-backed securities, for which there is no market, in order to come up with their recently announced write-offs and losses. And an article in the Wall Street Journal Friday morning alleged that Merrill Lynch has been selling some of its holdings in debt-backed securities to hedge funds to get the holdings off its own books for awhile, and avoid having to make more big write-downs. The rumor is that the hedge funds receive an agreement from Merrill that they can sell the holdings back to Merrill at a later date at a price that will guarantee the funds a profit. And then there was a story that Goldman Sachs, which was thought to be escaping the problems, will have to write down as much as $10 billion in mortgage mess losses. Goldman Sachs vehemently denied the rumor. But a nervous market can often move even further on rumors than on hard facts.
They did manage to bring the major indexes back from negative territory in the last half hour Friday, so that the Dow closed up 27 points for the day. That helped hide the fact that there were more stocks down than up in the broad market for the day. It did not blot out the fact that the Dow closed down 211 points for the week in spite of a Fed rate cut, and better than expected employment numbers.
The underlying problems obviously continue to rumble.
http://decisionpoint.com/TAC/HARDING.html
Thank you Fishpert, good stuff alt.energ now
consider WWAT.OB a 3 bagger since entry 4/12 @ .80 riding Free shares after selling off original bet 7/24.
Looking to add more since bulking up management team & recent PRs....do your own DD.
Bullwinkle has a nice weekly earnings list:
#msg-24249452
Bullwinkle has a nice weekly earnings list:
#msg-24249452