January 17, 2018

Does The Hype Match What’s Really Happening?

A report from Las Vegas Now on Nevada. “Experts in real estate describe the downtown Las Vegas housing market in these words: The demand is high, and the inventory is low. The Fremont 9 is a major new housing complex that is expected to open later this year. The complex will add several hundred homes to a part of the city that’s waited a long time for more housing. But realtors say the demand still outweighs the supply. ‘If you see residential, the price on it is sky high,’ said Robin Camacho, a broker. Camacho says it’s the land that’s worth so much, which is a sign of the demand. ‘Downtown is hot right now. It’s the heartbeat of Las Vegas. Everybody wants to be downtown,’ Camacho said.”

“But does the hype match what’s really happening? Vacant hotels nearby remain relatively untouched, years after being bought by downtown developers. Ashley Ayala’s Sisterhouse Collective is starting its 4th year on Fremont East. But, the lack of homes is a major reason the business isn’t sustainable. Ayala says she’s closing her business at the end of the month. ‘I wish we could stay,’ Ayala said.”

The Omaha World-Herald in Nebraska. “Jerry Cunningham knows he got a steal on the four-bedroom, three-bathroom home he bought last year in Sidney, Nebraska. The 62-year-old retired California Highway Patrol trooper moved to Nebraska to be closer to his family. He purchased his house, a 2,200-square-foot home with a newly remodeled kitchen, for $180,000. Cunningham said he would have spent $500,000 on a similar home in Nevada, where he moved from.”

“He bought it from a former Cabela’s employee, who bought the house in 2012 for $189,000. Unbeknownst to him, Cunningham benefited from a recent upheaval that has flooded Sidney’s housing market with properties. Uncertainty has been high ever since Bass Pro Shops announced plans to buy Cabela’s, the Panhandle town’s top employer. Home prices in the town are falling fast as former neighbors, colleagues and friends put their homes on the market and leave town for new jobs. Among the homes for sale are high-end ones owned by former Cabela’s executives who also have moved on.”

“Residents say some houses are selling — just not for nearly what they would have three or four years ago. In October 2014, 10 homes on the market had reduced prices. In October of last year, 20 had. In December, 32 homes for sale had reduced prices from their original listing amounts. ‘There’s just going to be fewer people than houses, and some of them are going to be empty,’ said Charles Nathanson, a professor at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management who focuses on real estate.”

The Braintree Forum in Massachusetts. “A concerning recent trend in the local housing market is beginning to impact some in Braintree, according to new numbers released by Norfolk County Register of Deeds William P. O’Donnell. It was last month that The Forum first reported about O’Donnell’s concerns regarding notices to foreclose being issued across Norfolk County. While the total number of notices to foreclose actually dropped over 15 percent from 2016 to 2017, O’Donnell pointed to a disturbing trend at the end of 2017.”

“‘The numbers of Notice to Foreclose Mortgage recordings actually increased a sobering 57 percent in the fourth quarter of 2017 compared to the fourth quarter of 2016,’ O’Donnell said. ‘We will need to closely watch this number to see if a trend develops.’”

“It now appears that trend is showing up in Braintree. There were 12 Notice to Foreclose Mortgages filed in December, which is the first step in the foreclosure process,” O’Donnell said. That number represents a sharp uptick in notices to foreclose. Only four notices to foreclose mortgages were filed in Braintree between August and November, according to O’Donnell.”

From Richmond Confidential in California. “Residents on this stretch of Fourth Street say the fire on September 28 was not a surprise: It was inevitable. Squatters lived in the vacant home next door, at 662 Fourth St., for years. Records show that the tax assessor’s office informed a code enforcement officer of plans to auction off the lot in 2014. The house was never sold and, in late 2016, the city began to discuss demolishing it. Code enforcement case details show that a warrant was received on the house in 2016 and a notice was sent to the owner. According to Tim Higares, director of infrastructure and maintenance operations for the city, demolition was again discussed this year, but the process never began. A list of calls for service obtained from the Richmond Police Department for the three homes involved in the September fire shows at least seven calls regarding the vacant home since 2010.”

“The problems with 662 Fourth St., like so many other blighted homes in the Bay Area and around the country, started during the subprime mortgage crisis. A search of the address brings up a picture of the house from 2007. In this image, the home has a clean coat of light blue paint and a front lawn filled with thick, green grass and shrubs. At this time, the home was owned by an individual who had purchased it in 2005 for $360,000. In 2008, the title to the property was transferred to Deutsche Bank National Trust Company in a trustee’s deed after the individual defaulted on his mortgage. The individual had also accrued more than $30,000 in unpaid property taxes, according to tax assessor records.”

“The home was subsequently transferred between two obscure Wall Street companies, before Aafiyah Muhammad bought it at auction in July 2010. By October 2010, Muhammad and his associates had sold 662 Fourth St. and two other Richmond properties to Texas-based Brother’s Realty. However, that company quickly discovered that Muhammad didn’t actually own the two additional homes, and 662 Fourth St. had already been boarded up by the city and declared uninhabitable.”

“Federal court documents indicate that Muhammad was ordered to pay a $200,000 settlement in January 2013, after being sued by Brother’s Realty. The documents also reveal that Muhammad was in fact an alias of a man named Jamall Joseph Robinson, a former associate of Your Black Muslim Bakery, the group that orchestrated the 2007 murder of Oakland Post editor Chauncey Bailey. According to Higares, his staff doesn’t have the time to determine if a home owner listed by the tax assessor is in fact fake. ‘It’s a very long process, and in the meantime what you have is a piece of property that’s continually being breached,’ he said, ‘that’s catching on fire.’”

From Reason Magazine. “The rent is too damn high—so each year Congress appropriates billions of dollars to address the nation’s collective housing needs. The programs vary from loans to tax credits to straight-up subsidies, but a common feature is that federal taxpayers pony up the dough and then a motley collection of state-level politicians, financing agencies, and housing authorities decide how it’s spent. Can you guess where things go wrong?”

“In theory, oversight is provided by bureaucrats in Washington tracking every dollar and by local leaders increasing their re-election prospects by providing housing assistance to their constituents as effectively as possible. In practice, the feds turn a blind eye to inefficient uses of the funds while local officials gleefully engage in politically advantageous graft.”

“Take California Treasurer John Chiang. By virtue of his position on the three-member California Tax Credit Allocation Committee, Chiang exercises enormous influence over who gets $94.9 million each year in federal tax credits intended for developers of low-income housing. He has used this position to great effect, steering millions to major campaign donors.”

“If California-style corruption isn’t your bag, perhaps you’ll appreciate the sheer incompetence of the Atlanta Housing Authority (AHA), which is currently struggling to get out of an expensive subsidy deal it literally forgot it made with local developer Integral. Over the past two decades, the AHA has awarded $114 million in federally funded loans to the company, which has yet to pay them back, and which now owes about $29 million in interest to the agency.”

“That did not stop former AHA chief Renee Glover from unilaterally agreeing to sell Integral $137 million worth of AHA-owned land for the bargain price of $20 million. Glover resigned in 2013, and the current leadership can’t recall this deal ever being made. They’re now suing to stop it from happening.”

“In Michigan, the state’s housing finance agency was given $761 million in Troubled Asset Relief Program funds to protect distressed homeowners from foreclosure during the Great Recession. Instead of using the money as intended, officials sat on it while thousands in Detroit had their homes seized for failure to pay property taxes. When the state did start spending its bailout funds, half the total went toward demolishing the homes left vacant by those tax foreclosures.”

“But all of this pales in comparison to the misdeeds of the Navajo Housing Authority (NHA), which is supposed to provide housing on the Navajo Indian reservation. In the past decade, the NHA has received some $803 million in federal funding while building slightly over 1,000 homes. That works out to $723,000 per home, or about 10 times the median home price in the Navajo community of Kayenta, Arizona. Much of the money was spent on structures that were either never finished or never occupied, including a women’s shelter that stood completed but empty for nearly 18 years while homeless people slept outside it.”




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154 Comments »

Comment by Apartment 401
2018-01-17 09:23:39

Bitcoin #CRATER down 48% in a month from all time high:

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-01-17/did-bitcoins-bubble-just-burst

Comment by In Colorado
2018-01-17 09:49:49

Now that’s what I call a CRATER!

Comment by Ben Jones
2018-01-17 11:14:21

Almost as bad as those airboxes in Beijing we read about yesterday. Is it a coincidence that we have all this insanity after the greatest round of money creation in human history? Investment grade cars? Bonds that pay countries and even shack buyers to borrow money? I’ve watched some of these coin guys on videos. They talk like it’s some mystical new religion or science only the enlightened can understand. At least the Dutch got a tulip bulb.

Comment by BlackSwandive
2018-01-17 18:00:06

As prices go lower, the anger is really showing up in comments sections.

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Comment by Mafia Blocks
2018-01-17 18:24:09

The rage-ravaged skulls are many.

 
Comment by redmondjp
2018-01-17 21:03:52

Yes; posters who repeatedly put up garbage links claiming things that aren’t true have a way of making people angry.

 
Comment by Mafia Blocks
2018-01-17 21:13:15

Hello my good friend.

Winthrop, WA Housing Prices Crater 9% YOY

https://www.movoto.com/winthrop-wa/market-trends/

 
Comment by Ben Jones
2018-01-17 22:04:06

‘have a way of making people angry’

Jeebus, I’ve been running this blog for 14 years and nothing that’s posted here makes me angry. You might want to take an anger management course or something. Nothing we talk about here is that big a deal.

 
Comment by BlackSwandive
2018-01-17 22:13:25

Yeah, if you’re getting angry over anonymous forum posts, it’s time to step away from the keyboard.

 
Comment by Professor 🐻
2018-01-17 22:16:27

Time to purchase yourself a rage cage.

 
Comment by rms
2018-01-18 08:15:23

“People, I just want to say, you know, can we all get along?” —Rodney King

 
 
 
 
Comment by Sean
2018-01-17 10:00:05

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/12/11/people-are-taking-out-mortgages-to-buy-bitcoin-says-joseph-borg.html

People are taking out mortgages to buy bitcoin, says securities regulator

Bitcoin is in the “mania” phase, with some people even borrowing money to get in on the action, securities regulator Joseph Borg told CNBC on Monday.

“We’ve seen mortgages being taken out to buy bitcoin. … People do credit cards, equity lines,” said Borg, president of the North American Securities Administrators Association, a voluntary organization devoted to investor protection. Borg is also director of the Alabama Securities Commission.

“This is not something a guy who’s making $100,000 a year, who’s got a mortgage and two kids in college ought to be invested in.”

Comment by Mr. Banker
2018-01-17 10:16:03

A nation of totally dumbed-down ignorant pukes.

 
Comment by Puggs
2018-01-17 11:15:25

Apparently these people were not around for 2008 or forgot already.

Frenzy’s end bad.

 
Comment by Anonymous
2018-01-17 16:43:39

” It didn’t list contact details, or provide any information about its team, or have a white paper — which is something most startups issuing coins do offer. But people poured money in it anyway. On Jan. 6, its market cap was $2.6 billion; it’s down to $84 million now. ”

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-17/crypto-lending-site-s-shutdown-renews-ponzi-scheme-allegations

Comment by Ben Jones
2018-01-17 16:53:34

“Market capitalization is just a fancy name for a straightforward concept: it is the market value of a company’s outstanding shares. This figure is found by taking the stock price and multiplying it by the total number of shares outstanding.”

This is one of the problems here. There is no”market cap” for this stuff. There’s no real estate or factories or inventory. It’s a whole bunch of nothin’. It’ has less behind it than Quicken - at least they have some filing cabinets and water coolers. It reminds me of how dotcom “executives” used to ask me about the “burn rate” like it was an accounting term.

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Comment by BlackSwandive
2018-01-17 10:18:01

It’s turning into a slaughter, though there’s a massive dead cat bounce of 8% in just an hour.

Comment by Mr. Banker
2018-01-17 10:24:53

Sucker rally.

Comment by azdude
2018-01-17 10:29:11

BTFD puke!

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Comment by BlackSwandive
2018-01-17 10:31:13

The low was $9,287 at around 7:30am. I’m just wondering how long until this thing is back under $1,000.

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Comment by palmetto
2018-01-17 10:44:27

Buy Amazon! Amazon only goes up! Amazon doesn’t make any profit, but they make it up on volume.

Same as it ever was.

 
Comment by oxide
2018-01-17 11:20:21

Meanwhile, the consumer goods mutual fund in my Roth is at its 52-week low. I should probably transfer some funds to it in the next month or so.

 
Comment by In Colorado
2018-01-17 12:07:09

Speaking of Amazon, you should see how the Cloud zealots bow and worship at the AWS altar. They think that Bezos is a god.

 
Comment by Karen
2018-01-17 12:18:59

Speaking of Amazon, you should see how the Cloud zealots bow and worship at the AWS altar. They think that Bezos is a god.

There is no “cloud”. There are only other people’s computers.

 
Comment by In Colorado
2018-01-17 12:30:35

There is no “cloud”. There are only other people’s computers.

And a lot of data is far too sensitive to put it there. On Prem isn’t going away, but the players with weak hands (like HP Enterprise) will fold.

 
Comment by Ethan in Northern VA
2018-01-17 13:10:10

100+ datacenters for AWS alone in Northern Virginia. I’ve heard AWS is profitable?

 
Comment by Anonymous
2018-01-17 13:28:40

AWS is Amazon’s moneymaker.

Speaking of data centers, Switch is a five-minute walk from my home… Multiple huge buildings with huge AC units, and more under construction right now.

https://www.switch.com/las-vegas/

 
Comment by palmetto
 
Comment by Karen
2018-01-17 16:18:35

And a lot of data is far too sensitive to put it there. On Prem isn’t going away, but the players with weak hands (like HP Enterprise) will fold.

I just wanted to point it out for people who don’t know, which I think is most people. Even for individuals, so much software is SAAS now, which means all their data is on someone else’s computer. “The cloud” sounds like magic unless you understand what it really is.

 
Comment by Puggs
2018-01-17 16:24:47

The “cloud” is in Prineville Oregon. LOL!

 
Comment by oxide
2018-01-17 16:35:16

I starting using the “cloud” when I signed up for web-based email and stored my documents by emailing them to myself. I knew full well that my email inbox was really just a bunch of 1s and 0s on a giant hard drive in an air-conditioned room somewhere.

In 1996.

 
Comment by Professor 🐻
2018-01-17 19:53:16

“Meanwhile, the consumer goods mutual fund in my Roth is at its 52-week low. I should probably transfer some funds to it in the next month or so.”

Could be a warning sign of incipient recession. Are you sure now is a good time to BTFD?

 
Comment by Karen
2018-01-17 21:39:41

I knew full well that my email inbox was really just a bunch of 1s and 0s on a giant hard drive in an air-conditioned room somewhere.

You wish it were just a bunch of 1s and 0s on a giant hard drive somewhere. Even so-called anonymized data is easily de-anonymized.

 
Comment by In Colorado
2018-01-17 22:09:23

I think Oxide’s point was that SaaS has been around a lot longer than many are aware of.

 
 
 
 
Comment by Anonymous
2018-01-17 10:19:37

https://flic.kr/p/JBnVra

Lotta red there, LOL

Comment by Mr. Banker
2018-01-17 10:39:25

“This is not the end, nor is this the beginning of the end. But, perhaps, this is the end of the beginning.”

 
 
Comment by Professor 🐻
2018-01-17 19:39:57

Did you hodl on through the bungee drop to $9200?

Bitcoin‬
Bitcoin Crashes to Below $10,000 as Cryptocurrency Scams Scare Investors
This Is Why Cryptocurrencies Are Crashing
And how the market can right itself.
By Jen Wieczner January 17, 2018

Bitcoin and cryptocurrency prices deepened their weeks-long rout Wednesday as a spate of hacks and scam warnings compounded fears that regulators would crack down on the nascent digital assets. The price of Bitcoin crashed to well below $10,000, plunging to as little as about $9,200, down more than 50% from its highs a month ago.

Spooking investors was an announcement late Tuesday by Bitconnect, a popular but controversial site for trading and lending cryptocurrency, that it was closing down operations. Bitconnect had recently been accused of running a Ponzi scheme—the financial fraud most famously perpetrated by Bernie Madoff—by several influential investors, including Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin and billionaire cryptocurrency investor Mike Novogratz. (The company didn’t respond to the accusations.)

Some Bitconnect clients interpreted the abrupt shutdown as confirmation of those suspicions, and worried they would not be able to withdraw their money if the exchange, whose management team remains anonymous, became insolvent. While Bitconnect, whose own digital token had risen to more than $2 billion in market value as recently as last week, promised that investors would be able to withdraw their funds at an average of the cryptocurrency’s recent exchange rate, doubts persisted. Bitconnect’s own cryptocurrency quickly lost as much as 90% of its value.

 
 
Comment by In Colorado
2018-01-17 09:29:41

He bought it from a former Cabela’s employee, who bought the house in 2012 for $189,000. Unbeknownst to him, Cunningham benefited from a recent upheaval that has flooded Sidney’s housing market with properties

If Bass Pro closes the Cabelas main office and integrates it with its own HQ, houses in Sydney will become worthless.

Comment by Ol'Bubba
2018-01-17 10:22:43

Look at Sydney, Nebraska on the map. It’s isolated and sparsely populated. Even if you wanted to go there with an Oil City strategy, there might not be a large enough population base to provide basic services.

Comment by oxide
2018-01-17 11:30:23

Definitely a sweet and well-kept little town, but you’re right, it would be a tough place to live full time. There’s really no place to work except the pop-up hotels. It is close to Route 80 so maybe they can attract something.

Comment by Ol'Bubba
2018-01-17 11:55:15

I was looking at this from the Oil City perspective.

Even if you were retired and didn’t need to work, what if you need to hire a plumber or carpenter? Pickings are probably very slim.

Medical care is probably basic at best, and that’s a function of the population.

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Comment by In Colorado
2018-01-17 12:15:06

One would be very dependent on Cheyenne, WY for a lot of higher level services, even during Cabelas’ glory days.

I’m sure there will be people there who can do plumbing and other trades work. But if Cabelas shutsdown their HQ the town will definitely feel it.

I drove past Sydney once, it feels isolated, but that appeals to some people. The retired CHP trooper will probably live like a king there, and being that he came from the panhandle he might even like the slow pace there.

 
 
 
 
Comment by BlackSwandive
2018-01-17 10:26:24

That’s the problem with company towns, they can dry up overnight. Invest in Sidney tumbleweeds.

Comment by In Colorado
2018-01-17 12:20:47

In many ways, Sydney does represent what a lot of smaller towns were like, with the one big firm providing the town with its livelihood.

People actually fly to Sydney to shop at the Cabelas flagship store. My son actually once flew with some friends from Ft. Collins to Sydney in their private airplane (a short hop). Cabelas will send a shuttle to pick you up at the Sydney airport. Of course now there is a Cabelas on Denver’s north side, in Thornton. If they close the flag ship store then Sydney will be in a world of hurt.

Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-17 12:53:39

Yeah, I was going to mention that too. It used to be people from Denver went to NE to shop and people from NE went to Denver for medical care. But then Denver got their own Cabelas (and Bass Pro Shop and whatever else) and I’m sure the flow slowed down a lot. Probably the reason for the potential closing.

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Comment by Senior Housing Analyst
2018-01-17 09:34:44

Littleton, CO Housing Prices Crater 13% YOY On Skyrocketing Vacancy Rate

https://www.movoto.com/littleton-co/market-trends/

 
Comment by Anonymous
2018-01-17 10:03:13

Regarding downtown Vegas: “Everybody wants to be downtown”!!

Yeah right, with all the homeless, drug addicts/dealers, prostitutes, etc.

“Mayor Goodman says 5,500 more units are needed to meet demand downtown…” Yet, no activity on sites that are ripe for redevelopment and already owned by Hsei’s Downtown Project.

The DP is the poster child for (forced) gentrification of a downtown area.

Comment by Mr. Banker
2018-01-17 10:43:26

Vegas: Another sunny place for shady people.

Comment by BlackSwandive
2018-01-17 11:00:44

Vegas is an absolute pit. I don’t understand the appeal of living there.

Comment by Anonymous
2018-01-17 11:20:00

Relatively low cost of living. Especially if you’re a refugee from CA.

The sunshine and warm weather is nice too. I spend the hottest months of the year out in the Colorado high country. :D

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Comment by BlackSwandive
2018-01-17 11:04:26

“Jerry Cunningham knows he got a steal on the four-bedroom, three-bathroom home he bought last year in Sidney, Nebraska. The 62-year-old retired California Highway Patrol trooper moved to Nebraska to be closer to his family.”

No, he moved to Nebraska to live like a king off his gold-plated CA pension.

Comment by Ben Jones
2018-01-17 11:09:11

‘He purchased his house, a 2,200-square-foot home with a newly remodeled kitchen, for $180,000. Cunningham said he would have spent $500,000 on a similar home in Nevada, where he moved from’

Genius. What does it matter what a shack would cost in Nevada? He got schlonged and he’s patting himself on the back.

Comment by Mafia Blocks
2018-01-17 11:12:44

“He got schlonged”

Precisely.

Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-17 12:00:11

When you can pay for your schlonging out of petty cash it does have a different feel.

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Comment by In Colorado
2018-01-17 12:26:01

It’s possible that he paid cash for it. Depends how much equity he build when he lived in California (and where he lived). Say he bought a house in San Jose 20 years ago for 200K and sold it for 1 million. Of course, if he was stationed in Barstow then he probably didn’t clean up.

 
Comment by Mafia Blocks
2018-01-17 12:27:14

$180k isn’t petty cash for 99.5% of the population.

He got schlonged. And it hurt bad.

 
Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-17 12:55:43

And it hurt bad.

Not yet…maybe someday when the high of paying cash and living like a king wears off and he realizes where he’s at. I grew up in a similar place…and it’s nice to go back to visit but if I woke up there one day and realized that was it for the rest of my life…then it would hurt.

 
Comment by Mafia Blocks
2018-01-17 13:02:58

Paying $180k for a $75k item is a schlonging by definition.

 
Comment by In Colorado
2018-01-17 13:09:53

You’d think that if he wanted to move to Nebraska that he would have chosen Omaha or Lincoln.

He’ll be driving a lot to Cheyenne and sometimes to Ft. Collins for high end services.

But I agree, he’s probably romanticizing the past, and once it settles in that to even shop at a Sam’s Club that he’ll have to drive all the way to Cheyenne (100 miles) then it will sink in. They do have an Applebee’s, but that could go bye-bye if Cabelas closes the HQ and the store.

 
Comment by El Tr0ll de Marquis
2018-01-17 14:01:03

Not everyone wants to live in a city. My in laws live in a small town with about 2k people. Closest city with “amenities” is 50 miles away. They go there a couple of times a month for the big city stuff and are very content. They’ve lived there for 10 years since retirement and have no plans to leave any time soon.

 
Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-17 14:22:18

Not everyone wants to live in a city.

Definitely true. I know lots of them. But they’re not California retirees.

 
Comment by messagetorudy
2018-01-17 14:59:19

All this money printing is a form of economic warfare, and CA is the Weimar republic of our time with its insanity, criminality and degeneracy. It issues bonds for non existent projects, drives up the cost of everything to an insane degree, and then it spreads like a cancer. Same with Illinois, NY, NJ.

We should go dresden on them and the other blue states that conduct this form of warfare.

 
Comment by OneAgainstMany
2018-01-17 15:16:10

They do have an Applebee’s

You’re scraping the bottom of the barrel for any pros…

 
Comment by BlackSwandive
2018-01-17 18:26:18

“They do have an Applebee’s…”

I consider that a negative. In my opinion, Applebee’s is barely a step up from fast food, and some fast food is actually better. I have never had a good meal at an Applebee’s, and I would consider it a last resort type place, as in I am on the road and really need to eat a meal before I go to sleep and there is absolutely nothing else available.

 
Comment by Tarara Boomdea
2018-01-17 21:18:00

I have never eaten a meal with so much salt in it as you are served in Applebee’s; the fries were caked in it. It was awful. (This opinion is dated; I haven’t been in an Applebee’s in easily 10 years; maybe they’ve lightened up.)

Earlier than that, I was shocked and amazed at the amount of salt we went through weekly during the time we owned a pub-type restaurant in Manhattan - most meals didn’t taste that salty to me. I never put extra salt on any meal, anytime, anywhere. Maybe it was the choice of meal I’d eat at work or maybe the employees substituted spit 😬 - quite possible.

Good times.

 
 
 
Comment by Karen
2018-01-17 12:05:13

‘He purchased his house, a 2,200-square-foot home with a newly remodeled kitchen, for $180,000. Cunningham said he would have spent $500,000 on a similar home in Nevada, where he moved from’

Genius. What does it matter what a shack would cost in Nevada? He got schlonged and he’s patting himself on the back.

As a wise man recently said on this board, houses at their current prices do not provide a good value.

 
Comment by In Colorado
2018-01-17 12:23:23

If Cabelas goes away completely he’ll be lucky to get 50 grand for it. It’s not like people will commute from there to jobs in Cheyenne.

 
 
Comment by jeff
2018-01-17 11:13:15

“No, he moved to Nebraska to live like a king off his gold-plated CA pension.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0rhPn76VDw

 
Comment by Anonymous
2018-01-17 11:22:10

A friend from way back when (I’m from SoCal) works for the CA Dept of Corrections. When he retires, he expects to move to AZ or NV.

 
Comment by Tea Party Patriot
2018-01-17 11:46:13

The 62-year-old retired California Highway Patrol trooper moved to Nebraska to be closer to his family.

No, he moved to Nebraska to live like a king off his gold-plated CA pension.

It’s possible that the two statements are both true.

Comment by BlueSkye
2018-01-17 14:27:45

Perhaps his family were in on the schlonging then, if they didn’t tell him he was paying too much for a house.

 
 
Comment by rms
2018-01-17 13:07:04

“No, he moved to Nebraska to live like a king off his gold-plated CA pension.”

Nothing wrong with that idea.

 
Comment by oxide
2018-01-17 14:05:27

Here’s the house the Jerry Cunningham bought:

https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1334-24th-Ave-Sidney-NE-69162/113890829_zpid/?fullpage=true

Actually it’s kind of neat… but does he really want to climb stairs every night?

Sidney is right on Route 80; that alone is probably enough to support the Super WalMart and the Applebees. If Cunningham doesn’t mind a VERY quiet life, he’ll probaby do ok. After all, he can get satellite TV and Amazon can deliver socks. But yeah, he’ll have trouble finding plumbers or medical care. For his $200K he could have done better, say, 20 miles from Cheyenne instead of 100 miles.

Comment by Mafia Blocks
2018-01-17 14:50:30

A 35 year old house. $75k at best.

 
Comment by Ol'Bubba
2018-01-17 19:45:37

There’s no state income tax in Wyoming. Maybe he has family or friends in Sydney.

 
Comment by BlueSkye
2018-01-17 20:56:36

Hilarious railing on the inside staircase. Same rough lumber treatment as the front porch.

 
 
 
Comment by Senior Housing Analyst
2018-01-17 11:09:58

Calabasas, CA Housing Prices Crater 18% YOY On Plummeting Housing Demand

https://www.movoto.com/calabasas-ca/market-trends/

 
Comment by Anonymous
2018-01-17 11:30:04

So what do y’all think about this bunch trying to establish the state of New California?

https://newcaliforniastate.com/

Map here

I haven’t looked at this in depth. But going by this map, it looks like they would ditch the wealthy tax base areas, yet keep a lot of the FSA takers on board.

Maybe they expect to implement policies that would drive out the FSA?

Comment by In Colorado
2018-01-17 12:27:36

I’m sure the FSA would make a beeline to the coast should that ever happen.

 
 
Comment by jeff
2018-01-17 11:49:14

These guys are out celebrating Al Gore and the well paid climate scientists failed predictions.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04BpgxlLlxM

Comment by MWR
2018-01-17 12:11:49

I was a science student in the late 70s and early 80s. I Bought the whole global COOLING THING. We were going to be frozen by 2020{?} and the sun would be blocked out and our only chance for survival was to live underground.

Give the millennials a break with the global warming but anyone who’s over 50 who believes should have their motives seriously questioned.

Using 40 years of climate data on a planet that is 14B years old is the equivalent (if I did the math right) of looking at 7 seconds of a person’s life and draw a conclusion about them on that 7 seconds. Are they a bed wetter, pervert, drunk or???

Call me in a 100,000,000 years then let’s look at the climate data.

Comment by jeff
2018-01-17 12:35:30

“but anyone who’s over 50 who believes should have their motives seriously questioned.”

0:24 - 0:32

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOqSKXRnTlk

 
Comment by Avg Joe
2018-01-17 13:01:09

Earth is 4B years old, not 14.

 
Comment by Tea Party Patriot
2018-01-17 13:47:43

You probably just saw the cover of Time or Newsweek.

Global cooling

Global cooling was a conjecture during the 1970s of imminent cooling of the Earth’s surface and atmosphere culminating in a period of extensive glaciation. This hypothesis had some support in the scientific community, and gained temporary popular attention due to a combination of a slight downward trend of temperatures from the 1940s to the early 1970s and press reports that did not accurately reflect the full scope of the scientific climate literature, which showed a larger and faster-growing body of literature projecting future warming due to greenhouse gas emissions.[1] The current scientific opinion on climate change is that the Earth has not durably cooled, but underwent global warming throughout the 20th century.[2]

Introduction: general awareness and concern[edit]

By the 1970s, scientists were becoming increasingly aware that estimates of global temperatures showed cooling since 1945, as well as the possibility of large scale warming due to emissions of greenhouse gases. In the scientific papers which considered climate trends of the 21st century, less than 10% inclined towards future cooling, while most papers predicted future warming.[1] The general public had little awareness of carbon dioxide’s effects on climate, but Science News in May 1959 forecast a 25% increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide in the 150 years from 1850 to 2000, with a consequent warming trend.[3] The actual increase in this period was 29%. Paul R. Ehrlich mentioned climate change from greenhouse gases in 1968.[4] By the time the idea of global cooling reached the public press in the mid-1970s temperatures had stopped falling, and there was concern in the climatological community about carbon dioxide’s warming effects.[5] In response to such reports, the World Meteorological Organization issued a warning in June 1976 that “a very significant warming of global climate” was probable.[6]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_cooling

Comment by messagetorudy
2018-01-17 14:55:05

Fraud then, fraud now. I’ll give the left one thing, they are consistent.

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Comment by Tea Party Patriot
2018-01-17 15:02:54

You missed the point.

 
Comment by azdude
2018-01-17 15:41:54

there will always be fraud in the world.

 
Comment by BlueSkye
2018-01-17 16:34:31

The point! Revisionist history. The motivation is the whole story.

 
Comment by Tea Party Patriot
2018-01-17 16:36:21

You missed it too.

 
Comment by BlueSkye
2018-01-17 16:53:10

There is a difference lad, between missing your point and taking your point.

I’ve been a scientist since the 70s, but I’m not paid to toe that line.

 
Comment by Tea Party Patriot
2018-01-17 16:55:29

Whatever, you didn’t read and comprehend, Mr. Scientist.

 
Comment by Mafia Blocks
2018-01-17 17:09:26

Stamp those feet Mike…. Stamp’em but good!

 
Comment by jeff
2018-01-17 19:25:17

Is TPP MightyMike?

 
Comment by BlueSkye
2018-01-17 21:01:13

He’s got a Wiki link. That means he knows somethin I guess.

 
 
 
 
Comment by Anonymous
2018-01-17 14:50:38

Have there been any accurate specific predictions?

I fondly remember the less-than-accurate one about the NYC highway that was supposed to have been submerged years ago.

Comment by Mr. Banker
2018-01-17 15:11:51

Bahahahaha … Al Gore said he got that one right because of hurricane Sandy.

Comment by Mr. Banker
2018-01-17 15:17:19
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Comment by Anon
2018-01-17 16:41:44

Look into the arctic ice core research.

 
 
 
Comment by Karen
2018-01-17 12:17:58

“The rent is too damn high—so each year Congress appropriates billions of dollars to address the nation’s collective housing needs. The programs vary from loans to tax credits to straight-up subsidies, but a common feature is that federal taxpayers pony up the dough and then a motley collection of state-level politicians, financing agencies, and housing authorities decide how it’s spent. Can you guess where things go wrong?”

Take the name of any state, especially a highly-populated one, and type it in your browser’s search bar, adding the following phrases:

-housing partnership
-housing finance agency
-housing authority

There are probably others you could come up with. Once you click on any of the links from your searches, you will be directed to yet further agencies, sub-departments, private-public “partnerships”, etc. Rabbit trails that never end. Lots of money changing hands.

You will be blown away by the number of different agencies and groups all receiving your tax dollars to “help people”.

Then do these same searches, this time using the names of the various regions within your state, followed by the same or similar phrases, then the name of all the counties and cities within your state.

I tried this exercise once because I lived in a rental that was near some subsidized housing and the local housing authority was behaving rather badly towards us neighbors. In trying to figure out to whom I could appeal for help I went to the internet. I simply couldn’t believe what I saw. I drowned in it.

Comment by jeff
2018-01-17 13:35:32

I went with Florida housing authority

This was the first one on the first page…

Florida Public Housing Waiting Lists

There are 72 Public Housing Waiting Lists in Florida.

https://affordablehousingonline.com/public-housing-waiting-lists/Florida

Then I clicked search page 10 and got…

Palm Beach County Housing Authority fires director, citing ‘financial malfeasance’

August 1, 2017

A Palm Beach County agency key to solving South Florida’s affordable housing crisis has fired its director, accusing him of financial malfeasance, mismanagement and ethics violations.

Palm Beach County Housing Authority Director Van Johnson was accused by his board of giving himself $230,000 in bonuses since 2015 without meeting financial milestones, accruing a $1 million budget deficit and awarding unnecessary and expensive consultant contracts while the agency struggled to make payroll.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/local/palm-beach/fl-pn-housing-director-fired-20170801-story.html

That was enough.

Comment by Montanagal
2018-01-17 19:34:49

Ooh we had a corrupt HA guy booted here in Missoula 10 years ago. He had the old nonprofit halo up til then.

Comment by Karen
2018-01-17 21:42:52

They’re all corrupt.

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Comment by azdude
2018-01-17 13:38:06

dont fight the FED! they know whats best for you.

Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-17 14:23:26

they know whats best for you.

 
 
Comment by Senior Housing Analyst
2018-01-17 15:03:31

Parker, CO Housing Prices Crater 10% YOY On Surging Housing Inventory

https://www.movoto.com/parker-co/market-trends/

 
Comment by cactus
Comment by Drater
2018-01-17 22:31:45

I thought you lived in Kraproom?

 
 
Comment by drumminj
2018-01-17 15:53:12

For those wanting a better HBB experience on mobile devices, check out the latest version of the JoshuaTreeExtension for Firefox (sadly, Chrome doesn’t seem to support extensions on mobile).

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/joshua-tree-extension/

It tweaks the site layout to be mobile-friendly and easier to read

Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-17 16:50:20

Nice. Unfortunately I’ve switched to Chrome because it synchs between devices and therefore my home computer knows which posts I already read that day at work and vice versa.

Do you know if Firefox has that capability yet? As of about a year ago or so I believe they did not synch the extension data between devices.

Comment by drumminj
2018-01-17 17:41:01

Do you know if Firefox has that capability yet? As of about a year ago or so I believe they did not synch the extension data between devices.

The API has it, but it was broken a while back (endpoint was present, but just generates errors if you try to use it). I haven’t tried in a while, but will poke at a while and see if maybe they got it figured out. I agree it’s a nice feature.

Still, mobile Chrome doesn’t support plugins anyway, so it wouldn’t be any worse using Firefox to get the better layout :)

Comment by drumminj
2018-01-17 18:15:39

Pretty sure I figured it out, but going to have to “test in prod” unfortunately (don’t have a way of loading a dev version of the extension on multiple devices).

v3.1.2 theoretically will support syncing on Firefox. Will post back here once I can test.

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Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-17 18:34:42

OK cool. I would be interested in trying the phone for reading the blog. I’m only a couple of items away from not needing to use a full computer outside of work on a regular basis. One less thing to have to carry around when traveling.

 
Comment by drumminj
2018-01-18 11:01:05

Well, it appears to be working, at least to some degree, if you want to give it a shot. I haven’t tested with a mobile device (the docs seem to imply that Firefox on Android may not sync), but seems to work across laptops.

If you give it a try, let me know!

 
Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-18 12:38:15

OK thanks. I’ll try putting Firefox plus the plugin on my iPhone X and see if it synchs across everything in the next couple of days.

 
Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-18 14:24:30

I did load up Firefox on the phone but when I went to try to get the extension it’s still telling me that add ins aren’t supported on iOS and won’t give it to me.

 
Comment by drumminj
2018-01-18 14:27:17

:sad-trombone:

Firefox for iOS supports the native iOS extension ecosystem right now, but doesn’t (yet) support JavaScript add-ons like Desktop or Android Firefox.

Sorry Carl!

 
Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-18 15:45:37

No problem, if you hear of that changing let me know :-).

 
 
 
 
Comment by Professor 🐻
2018-01-17 20:02:25

Thanks… you’re awesome.

 
 
Comment by ncstevem1
2018-01-17 16:59:53

Ben,

Hope you don’t mind my using your blog to solicit opinions from those who frequent your blog. Will try to keep this concise.

Lived in Charlotte since 1993 until May last year. Moved to suburb of Charlotte in SC for my wife’s new job (pediatrician - first job out of US residency).

Renting my Charlotte home for $2500/mo. It’s a 3/2 brick ranch, 2000 SF - little closet/storage space built 1956 - no mortgage -desirable neighborhood MV ~ $400K. Good possibility my wife will take a job in June with one of the large medical systems back in Charlotte.

I see my RE possibilites as:

1. Move back in my home and add a master BR for more room/storage.

2. Buy a second home (wife wants something newer that won’t need an addition) and either sell or continue to rent the original home.

If I sell I use proceeds as huge DP on new home.

If I continue to rent it means I have to take on a huge mortgage at 56 yo (wife is 51) which the rent will mostly cover but I’m debt adverse big time. The risk here is I’ve got a huge RE exposure with 2 homes if/when there’s a drop in the market.

Thanks for the feedback in advance.

Comment by azdude
2018-01-17 17:25:10

sell when you choose, not when u have to!

 
Comment by OneAgainstMany
2018-01-17 20:27:41

Are you empty nesters? Why exactly do you need more space? I would be leery of taking on any new debt (any debt). Get out of the rat race. If you can’t pay cash, don’t buy it.

 
Comment by BlueSkye
2018-01-17 21:13:39

“If I continue to rent it means I have to take on a huge mortgage…”

That has to be one of the most ironic statements ever written here.

Don’t buy what you can’t actually pay for today. Don’t buy when prices are three times replacement cost. Don’t go into debt. You figure this out and you will live the life of luxury.

 
Comment by aNYCdj
2018-01-17 21:21:28

why do you need so much space? think like a Noo Yorker…. Get rid of books cd’s lps videos flat screen on wall how about a captains bed some have 9 drawers underneath the bed that could easily get rid of 2 dressers, 2000 sq ft is a lot you just have it badly organized.

 
 
Comment by Tea Party Patriot
2018-01-17 17:30:07

The Fed Delivered $80.2 Billion in Profits to the Treasury in 2017
By BINYAMIN APPELBAUM
JAN. 10, 2018

WASHINGTON — The Federal Reserve’s economic stimulus campaign continued to generate large profits in 2017, helping to reduce the federal deficit, but the windfall is showing signs of tapering.

The Fed, which remits its profits to the Treasury Department, disclosed on Wednesday that its payments last year totaled $80.2 billion — about 12 percent less than the $91.5 billion in 2016.

The decline in profits reflects the Fed’s efforts, as the economy gains strength, to conclude the economic stimulus campaign it waged in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis.

The Fed has gradually increased its benchmark interest rate amid an improving economic picture and those higher rates increase what the Fed must pay on deposits that banks keep stashed at the Fed.

The Fed also began last year to gradually reduce the portfolio of Treasuries and mortgage bonds it acquired after the 2008 crisis, reducing the amount of revenue the Fed gets from interest payments on those securities. Those holdings are the source of most of the Fed’s revenues.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/10/business/fed-profits-treasury-2017.html

Comment by Ben Jones
2018-01-17 17:34:02

‘reducing the amount of revenue the Fed gets from interest payments on those securities. Those holdings are the source of most of the Fed’s revenues’

Yep, the government pays interest to the central bank and the central bank gives it back. The interest from the mortgage backed securities is paid to the central bank and they give it to the government. Any profits made by the GSE’s, back to the government. And to think these monies used to go to pension funds and regular savers, etc.

Comment by In Colorado
2018-01-17 17:54:56

And even with all those kickbacks we still run huge deficits.

Comment by azdude
2018-01-17 18:13:49

seems ponzilike

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Comment by Ben Jones
2018-01-17 18:21:26

The bigger the deficit, the more they make!

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Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-17 18:37:13

The bigger the deficit, the more they make!

Sweet. Why didn’t we figure this out during the great depression and fix everything back then?

 
Comment by azdude
2018-01-17 18:49:33

i dont think the public realizes that they are on the hook for the the big bailout by the FEd.

Once the bonds mature on the FEDS balance sheet they get their money back from the issuer of the bond. problem is that there is no money to pay them. so more bonds will have to be sold to pay them off the old ones.

 
Comment by OneAgainstMany
2018-01-17 20:53:35

Once the bonds mature on the FEDS balance sheet they get their money back from the issuer of the bond. problem is that there is no money to pay them. so more bonds will have to be sold to pay them off the old ones.

Well, the Fed created money to buy these securities in the first place, so saying that there is no money to pay them doesn’t really make sense. They (e.g. the Fed) already paid the previous holders (other banks, primary dealers, or the treasury issuance of new debt) of the securities with money they (e.g. the Fed) created.

The interest that the Fed collects on its investments is paid by the federal government, and then returned to the government. But this wash cycle still saves money because those interest payments would otherwise be made to the outside investors who would have purchased the bonds.

The Fed earns outsized profits on its investment holdings because it does not face financing costs. It buys bonds with money that it creates. But the Fed does have expenses, and they are rising.

The largest expense is a byproduct of the bond purchases. The Fed’s buying spree flooded the banking system with reserves — the Fed bought bonds from the banks, and paid them with reserves.

The only way this program would cost taxpayers money is if rates rise quickly and the excess liquidity has to be sopped up by paying even greater interest rates on the stashed reserves. If the funds the Fed pays banks to keep excess reserves on the sidelines (to keep inflation low) exceeds the bond payments on the Fed’s holdings, then there would be a small bailout. I doubt this will happen though. It’s pretty easy to make money when you can monetize securities from money created out of thin air.

The bailout is much more masked. By purchasing MBS securities and holding treasuries, the structure of production is impacted. This masks the true cost of certain projects and makes unprofitable activities seem profitable.

 
Comment by azdude
2018-01-18 06:16:36

where is the US treasury gonna get the money to pay back the FED when the bonds mature ? I dont give a sh@t where the money is or where it came from. The FED bought the bonds and they are on their balance sheet. they want to reduce it. That means either u sell the bonds or you let them mature. Eventually the US treasury is gonna have to pay somebody back when the bonds mature.

Thats what a bond is. You sell the bond, you get cash. The bondholder gets interest and eventually gets their principal back.

Where r they gonna get the cash?

 
Comment by OneAgainstMany
2018-01-18 09:16:39

That means either u sell the bonds or you let them mature.

The Fed only has to sell the bonds if they don’t let them mature. If they let them mature, then there is no paying back at the end of maturity. The treasury is already paying the fed for the the interest on the coupon, and the Fed is remitting this to the treasury. It’s a circular transaction.

Think of it like this. Imagine I lend you $100 at 5% interest over 5 years. I have to first have the $100 to lend to you. You pay me 5% interest plus principal. The only thing I have during this time is the note (e.g. the IOU) and each episodic, monthly payment from you of principal + interest. At the end of the 5 year period, you make the last payment to me and the debt is settled. No one has to pay any additional cash. This is analogous to the Fed/Treasury example. I would be the Fed, and you would be the treasury. The major difference being that I actually had to have the $100 to loan to you in the meantime, whereas the Fed simply created the $100 out of thin air to loan.

The worry about selling the Feds portfolio before maturity would be that it would flood the market with excess notes and drive interest rates higher since there would be an increase of supply of debt available to investors. Of course, the treasury will still have to continue financing its debts, so it’s possible that interest rates will go up anyway.

 
Comment by tj
2018-01-18 09:39:00

Fed simply created the $100 out of thin air to loan.

true, but interest is being paid that imparts value to the dollars created, so that little if any debasement in value is occurring even with more dollars being created.

dollar value is lost in several other ways.

 
Comment by OneAgainstMany
2018-01-18 09:59:53

dollar value is lost in several other ways.

Agreed. The liquidity is injected through quantitative easing, and then it is (hypothetically) retracted through quantitative tightening IF and when the Fed shrinks its balance sheets. We are only a couple of months into this process.

As I said in my previous post, the main distortion in this is that it alters interest rates and gives false signals about what is productive/non-productive economic activity. This ripples out through the economy in unanticipated ways. Hayek would call this monetary over-investment theory.

 
Comment by tj
2018-01-18 10:07:56

Hayek would call this monetary over-investment theory.

and i would simply call it criminal activity. like you, i also was thinking of QE as one of the ways the dollar is debased. it’s simply an attempt at price fixing and is strongly counter to a free market.

 
 
 
 
 
Comment by Apartment 401
2018-01-17 18:49:05

Parliament — Placebo Syndrome:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMmMuQcRooI

 
Comment by Senior Housing Analyst
2018-01-17 18:57:47

Hillsboro, OR Housing Prices Plunge 11% YOY On Cratering Housing Demand

https://www.movoto.com/hillsboro-or/market-trends/

 
Comment by Jill
2018-01-17 20:51:34

Idaho is a shithole can’t believe how many people are moving here I see plates from Arizona with Nevada stickers on them and are most likely from California. Rear wheel drive high end vehicles that could not pose handle snow

Comment by azdude
2018-01-18 06:17:45

I drove their there once, seems pretty rugged and mountainous. do u see a lot of flatlanders moving in?

 
Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-18 10:44:47

Rear wheel drive high end vehicles that could not pose handle snow

I suspect you are right that they are tax dodging Californians. Where is Bill these days anyway? But I will say that modern traction control systems are impressive. I still prefer AWD but modern traction/stability control will avoid 99% of the human error that normally puts RWD people off the road in slick conditions. And if you do go off the road it will most likely be gently and pointed forward where the airbag can save you if all else fails.

 
 
Comment by Professor 🐻
2018-01-17 22:14:21

‪Cryptocurrency‬
Did Bitcoin Just Burst? How It Compares to History’s Big Bubbles
The Bitcoin Bubble Is Not Going to Pop
There are bright days ahead.
By Bloomberg January 17, 2018

Bitcoin’s recent wobbles have given fresh urgency to a question that’s gripped market observers for much of the past year: Will the cryptocurrency go down as one of history’s most infamous bubbles, alongside tulipmania and the dot-com craze?

The magnitude of Bitcoin’s boom (before it lost as much as 50 percent from its Dec. 18 high) suggests investors have reason to be worried.

As the chart shows, the cryptocurrency’s nearly 60-fold increase during the past three years was truly extraordinary.

It dwarfed the Nasdaq Composite Index’s gain during the headiest days of the 1990s. Going further back, it comfortably outstripped the Mississippi and South Sea bubbles of the 1700s. It even topped the Dutch tulipmania of the 1630s, though that last comparison should be taken with a grain of salt given the scarcity of recorded tulip values. (The chart includes prices for just one varietal; consistent post-peak figures were unavailable.)

Bulls say that Bitcoin’s boom is far from over, and that there’s more to analyzing a market than just measuring price gains. While the recent tumble has alarmed some investors, the cryptocurrency has bounced back from several previous swoons exceeding 50 percent. If Bitcoin did become a widely-accepted form of digital gold, as predicted by Cameron Winklevoss of Facebook fame, it could have a lot further to surge.

Comment by Professor 🐻
2018-01-17 22:41:13

“If Bitcoin did become a widely-accepted form of digital gold, as predicted by Cameron Winklevoss of Facebook fame, it could have a lot further to surge.”

Even the Bloombergi are baboozled by the hype. What a bunch of idiots.

 
 
Comment by Professor 🐻
2018-01-17 22:34:36

Substitute “housing” for “Bitcoin” in the article below and you have a perfect explanation of how the Housing Bubble is destined to eventually end.

Buttonwood’s notebook
Tales from the crypto
The rise and fall of Bitcoin
Investors in Bitcoin are learning some very old lessons
Buttonwood’s notebook
Jan 17th 2018
by Buttonwood

THE great Sir Isaac Newton may have revolutionised our knowledge of the world but he still had his blind spots. He was sucked into the great mania of his day, the South Sea Bubble (pictured) and lost a lot of money. “I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies but not the madness of people,” he ruefully reflected. In retrospect, he should have pondered the popular saying that was used to define his law of gravity: “What goes up, must come down.”

Investors in Bitcoin are learning this old truth. The price of the cryptocurrency peaked last month at somewhere over $19,000 (there is a very wide spread, a problem in itself) but, at the time of writing (around 11am GMT), some exchanges now show a price below $10,000.

In the euphoria stage, people buy because others are buying and because they anticipate being able to sell quickly at a higher price. For a while, this trend is self-reinforcing. At some stage, however, doubts set in; some people decide to take their profits while they can. Bad news occurs; with Bitcoin, it seems to be reports that authorities in South Korea (where trading has been particularly active) are going to crack down.

Once the price starts to fall, the psychology changes. People who bought early and were counting their millions suddenly see a dent in their wealth (and it is worth noting that you are not really rich unless you have got into the asset class and out again). Other people may have bought above the current price and are bitterly regretting their mistake. Bargain hunters jump in and temporarily drive the price higher but it doesn’t last.

We have not yet reached the “distress” stage but we might be near it. Worries about the security of cryptocurrencies could be the trigger for another sell-off. At that point, the price could fall as quickly as it rose—as the saying goes “up like a rocket, down like a stick”. Investors may well reflect that Bitcoin had not become a means of exchange for day-to-day transactions, has not proved to be a reliable store of value and thanks to the proliferation of cryptocurrencies, does not really benefit from a limited supply. As Steven Englander of Rafiki Capital writes:

There are no barriers to entry on the crypto space, other than a good story about the niche that your coin is filling. The number of ICOs (initial coin offerings) tells you that it is easy and cheap. There are big incentives to get in on the ground floor of a cryptocurrency that has even moderate acceptance.

A digital asset that has no income stream is very hard to value. That makes it hard to designate a price target on the way up, but also hard to set a floor on the way down. But by the time people realise that, we will be in the “revulsion” stage.

Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-18 10:49:39

has not proved to be a reliable store of value and thanks to the proliferation of cryptocurrencies

I think this is a good point. They anticipated and tried to avoid this by limiting the supply of bitcoins on the assumption they would be the only game in town. I doubt they were thinking at the time that they would be so successful that instead the demand would be filled by competitors.

 
 
Comment by CryptoNick
2018-01-17 22:52:11

Who Is CryptoNick? Bitcoin Price Fall Blamed on Cryptocurrency ‘Scammers’ Promoting Bitconnect ‘Ponzi Scheme’
By Anthony Cuthbertson On 1/17/18 at 1:23 PM
Bitcoins are seen in this illustration picture taken on September 27, 2017. Some investors in the cryptocurrency are blaming the current cryptocurrency market crash on “scammers.” REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration
Tech & Science
Bitcoin
Cryptocurrency

As the price of bitcoin continues to tumble, the finger of blame is being pointed everywhere from South Korea, to shills accused of promoting cryptocurrency “Ponzi schemes” for personal gain. One particular scapegoat for investors seeking answers to the market crash is the YouTube personality CryptoNick.

Along with several other popular Youtube accounts, CryptoNick promoted—and was sponsored by—the cryptocurrency lending and exchange platform Bitconnect. The collapse of the platform on Tuesday, January 16, has been seen as a key factor in causing the price of bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies—including ethereum and litecoin—to crash.

 
Comment by azdude
2018-01-18 06:21:35

you guys have to be thinking about this by now. If low to zero interest rates are so great for the economy why haven’t we been doing this all along?
Why even raise rates if it is so awesome?

I read an article yesterday about the two different types of bubbles. one was a narrative bubble , like a game changing technology or something new.

The other was a bubble driven by credit. Author says we are in a credit driven bubble and it wont end until the punchbowl taken away.

Comment by BlueSkye
2018-01-18 07:40:23

game changing technology…

Sustainable.

Credit Bubble is not sustainable. It corrupts society until collapse. Sane people do not intentionally collapse their own society.

Comment by Carl Morris
2018-01-18 10:51:45

Sane people do not intentionally collapse their own society.

Unless they are so afraid of the eventual consequences that they give up on the future just to keep now going a little longer?

Or they have a big ranch in Paraguay?

 
 
 
Comment by Mr. Banker
2018-01-18 07:05:35

The best part about being homeless is you get to go camping every day.

https://youtu.be/zvCGtxeknSg

Comment by azdude
2018-01-18 07:31:02

sh@t jobs + high rent= homeless

I assume they didnt have any stocks and homes , aka risk assets?

 
Comment by jeff
2018-01-18 10:24:34

Wow

I haven’t seen anything like that in SE Region IV or anywhere else for that matter.

Disclaimer

I have never been south of Key West, north of Maine, west of Iowa or more than a couple of miles off the east coast of the United States.

 
 
Comment by taxpayer
2018-01-18 08:43:27

10 yr 2.6
at 3% you get mortgage meltup
and your county is raising taxes bigly

 
Comment by Tarara Boomdea
2018-01-18 12:54:19

A report from Las Vegas Now on Nevada…Robin…Camacho says it’s the land that’s worth so much, which is a sign of the demand. ‘Downtown is hot right now…’ Camacho said.”

I spoke to her way back in 2010-ish and got a few emails from her. She must have dusted off the old email list because I’m getting them again. Apparently it’s a great time to buy.

As for our rental, still nothing from the PM regarding the rent increase and the lease extension is only a year. It’s not a nice way to live. It’s a lovely neighborhood but we can’t stay here. In the last two years the prices have gone way beyond what we can afford. A new neighbor on nextdoor.com wrote about how much places in the neighborhood have sold for lately, even posted a spreadsheet. I don’t get the mentality - “I paid more than anyone else was willing to pay.” I am very sad about how everything has turned out, but what can you do…

Looked up my LL out of curiosity - three arrests: “Oper Veh W/Expired Reg/Plates”, “Deprive Animal of Sustenance/Shelter/Med Care”, “Child Neg/Endang, (1st), E/Cg”.

Oy.

 
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