The Housing Bubble

I dunno. She may have a bright career marketing to Wall St.

Screw the b*tch that screwed Spitzer.

There would be a market for that. I have a sick imagination. LOL

I don’t know about anyone else, and I don’t know anything about her personally, but I think the Mrs. is a nice looking gal. If she was what I had to look forward to when I got home, I sure wouldn’t complain.

Blano,

The older (and farther away from 25-year-old hormonal delusions) I get, the more I have to question the wisdom of assuming that attractive spousal packaging implies a happy union.

Agreed, PB. Getting pretty far away from 25 myself.

I was just pointing out that, assuming at least a somewhat happy union, I wouldn’t feel the need to look elsewhere if she was at home.

“I wouldn’t feel the need to look elsewhere”

Let me restate my question. What combination of craven desires and unfulfilled dreams compel D-ratic climbers to look beyond their own bedrooms for jollies?

Maybe he wasn’t getting any at home.

“Let me restate my question. What combination of craven desires and unfulfilled dreams compel D-ratic climbers to look beyond their own bedrooms for jollies?
”

It suggests untreated mental illness.

Elmer Gantry?

The older (and farther away from 25-year-old hormonal delusions) I get

When exactly does that happen? Mid 40s leaves some of us still fairly deluded.

“Maybe he wasn’t getting any at home.”

Exactly! Same with Bill Clinton too.

I expect to see this young woman’s plumbing soon on every news stand as she’ll likely get the $1,000,000.00 offer to show and tell.

I do feel sorry for these wives though since they have to endure the media frenzy. Why do these kind of women attach themselves to type-A men?

Man-out here in Seattle, she qualifies as hot, but then again, I need to move!

Was Marylin Monroe a skank?

But a better response is: Why do Republican presidents always have man-wives?

I don’t have a good answer for that, PB.

Compared to Republicans who like men?

” Why do these kind of women attach themselves to type-A men? ”

MONEY !!!! Birds of a feather flock together.
These women stand right next to their “man” becuase they are the same and they just can’t believe their fantasy world is about to crash

Like Barney Frank?

I didn’t know Barney Frank was trolling for minors like Mark Foley, or picking up undercover cops in public restrooms like Larry “Widestance” Craig! Thanks for the heads-up!

No, Barney only lived with a male prostitute, who ran the business out of ol’ Barn’s townhouse.

Lots of boo-hoo ing from Democrats on here about their fallen hero.

Not defending any of these clowns.

Whatever affiliation.

I guess its too much to expect guys in office not to break the law. Rich guy, prosecutor that has probably ruined many guys lives with prostetution stings get busted!

Gotta love the karmic retribution.

Drew the 10 of swords.

I don’t expect much from politicians. They are mostly social butterfly type people and they are going to be the ones that get in trouble with the ladies.

However, I draw the line at breaking the law.

imo, $1000 was her cut. she gets 20% and the house gets 80%. I was just wondering how many hidden cameras are in a whore house to ensure future business. Keep coming on back or we will out you.

Only 1000 bucks?

Quoth Louis Black: “At these prices, you can’t afford NOT to have sex with them!”

Love Lewis Black.
His new special is hysterical and exposes W for the liar/thief he is. And other funny stories.

With all due respect Ann, I don’t think Mr. Spitzer was looking for quality conversation.

Excuse me but I have to say this…
it is just like going to a dentist and they ask questions when they have their “hands” stuffed into your mouth..
so banteringbear is correct. lol

speak for yourself i am a “hottie”

If Spitz net worth is estimated @ $500 million and he paid her $5,000 that would be the same as a person with a net worth of 1 million paying $10.00.

kckid, you have forgotten income taxes! After-tax NY incomes of (?) $16M and $50K. Thus the rich guy’s $5K is the other guy’s $15.

And HER take certainly was NOT 5k. I don’t know what She got for pay, but it certainly wasn’t 5k.

It goes back to what we keep saying over and over..
“you want WHAT for that house, hahahahah”….
Same thing different financial “vehicle”.

um, no.

Clark Gable paid women to leave. Eliot Spitzer paid women to come, errrh, “arrive.”

amen

You’re right. I’m truly sorry for even commenting. I should know better.

throwing stones is what people must do. They have a nice story about it in John 8:7

Ah yes, right before the “Blessed Are the Cheesemakers” line.

That’s funny

Oh, thank you for giving me that opening.

“Let he who is without sin, cast the first rock, and I will smoketh it”

-Tyrone Biggums

Nonsense–txchick is hardly the only someone on this blog without sin! In fact, it seems that all HBBers are trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, reverant, and HELOC-free.

Don’t you have an ambulance to chase?

TX-CHICK

chapelle fan? i never knew
i like you even more now

Nope.

Justin, like many do, confuse stone throwing with beliefs and opinions in order to puff themselves up. Nice try.

Comment by aimeejd
2008-03-13 07:37:32
Nonsense–txchick is hardly the only someone on this blog without sin! In fact, it seems that all HBBers are trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, reverant, and HELOC-free.

Well, I am brave and HELOC-free. And clean, sometimes.
That’s about 23%, right? And thrifty! More points! Whoo hooo! I’m gettin’ up there!

Yes, Giuliani used taxpayers money for everything,his own personal skank/now wife.
And he was being considered seriously for our pres? goodlawdy.

She is not a Geisha, a woman trained in the art of love.
She is not a member of the Kama Sutra, trained from childhood to please royalty.
Spatz, is a perve, he could have had an accomplished women and he picked her.

It’s pervy to want a juicy piece of young tush? What a rough world this is turning into for a poor guy. Accomplished has its appeal, but it’s not necessarily hot!

“She is not a Geisha, a woman trained in the art of love.”

A real Geisha, or Geiko, is a woman trained in the art of entertaining her clients - usually through conversation, traditional dance, and musical instruments. Very rarely was “love” ever involved as part of the job description. Don’t believe everything you see in the movies.

By the way, I’m sure my banks send a report to the gov’t every time I transfer a chunk of money from one bank to another bank just to get a better interest rate.

i betcha her rates just went up.

I hate to tell you guys this, but…….

EVERY Woman in America’s “rates” just went up.

Damn, I guess the price on some things does always go up!

I hope I’m not priced out forever . . .

I’ve been priced out forever………
Too bad my personal code of conduct won’t let me be a “bitter renter”

I hate to tell you guys this, but…….

EVERY Woman in America’s “rates” just went up.

It’s all expensive but some are more expensive than others.

i just don’t understand why she didn’t buy real estate when she found herself flat broke ,aren’t those the people lenders like to lend to .

Bingo Bill.

In the mean time, how many of our soliders died this week in Iraq and Afghanistan?

How many of the big boys on wall street are still breaking laws and running off with the money?

How much is gas this week?

How many cities and counties are going broke?

How many bridges and roads need repairing?

Bread and circuses indeed…

Now I’m wondering why this high price hooker didn’t get arrested also. Does the hooker get off the hook on a deal like this or what ?Did the hooker trade jail time for testifying . Also,what is going to happen to that high priced pimp joint she was operating out of that took a 80% cut ?

I’m interested in how they prosecute the entire case including how they deal with the clients list .

She’ll be interning at the white house when / if Bill and Hillary return.

this thread is too funny

ben sorry i brought it up

but the comment about her being a realtor before this was priceless kudos for late afternoon almost 500 comment bits bucket

Bill,

You are so right. That is the point of the circus–to keep us distracted. Now, in NY, we will have a new governor, and deficits as far as the eye can see. Well maybe not the new governor’s eyes. IMO the circus is just getting started. This story is just a warm-up for the main event.

LOLOL

LOL NYCityBoy! For the same reason, I can’t watch Cramer…

I happened to catch Cramer a few weeks back when he had Spitzer live on the phone talking about who knows what. Ol’ Eliot was just the greatest thing next to sliced bread in Jimmy’s eyes. Sucking up never looked so amusing.

that show has the saddest cast of wanna-bes … in fact, the Brooklyn bunch, believe it or not, includes a a boy who was a classmate of my kids at public school pre-K in the fall. Mom did stand out a little in her leather pants. Guess she pulled out her little darling to send him somewhere classier! Saw the whole bunch schlepping around in Met Foods the other day on Smith St. Too funny.

I had to just look and see if they’d be as trashy as the Orange County housewives. Then I needed a shower.

I can’t wait until digital cable technology improves enough that they can automatically gauge the REAL ratings of shows. For everybody, not just Neilsen participants. Have you ever read about how they measure Neilsen ratings? The numbers are pretty much a complete fabrication, hardly any basis in reality as far as what people are actually watching or how many are watching it.

Even the “official” ratings of most major network and cable shows have been declining in recent years…I can’t wait until there’s a way to tabulate the real numbers of viewers, with no b.s., because I think they would be far lower than advertisers have been told all these years.

Aside from the FIRE sector, another totally fake basis of our economy is advertising, which adds nothing of value to society and may not even be that effective. Once they find out nobody is actually watching these shows…goodbye multi-millionaire advertising executives!

Did you bathe in ass’s milk?

Neilson ratings are a hooey. Brother/wife were picked last year, in one month “the Neilson box” was removed.
My brother/wife are from SanFran and dont’ watch crap. If any tv at all.
So, Neilsons dont’ care what real people watch.

I used to be on a dumbass local TV show in DFW that also ran in the midwest on cable. No one knew the ratings. Then I happened to get an Arbitron questionnaire about my week’s viewing habits and of course I put our show in and my favorites. A couple months later the owner of the show announced we had 6 million viewers and I knew it was really just me LOL.

What is often forgotten is most of the poor are working, so no it is not easy to leave work and decide to move to another city.

In Tampa Bay, many of “the poor” were relocated during the bubble from certain areas of St. Pete and Tampa to other parts of Hillsborough County as some of the investor owned development went Section 8. It was a sort of forced relocation, so to speak. I had a chance to speak to a couple of working poor who were trying to get new jobs around here because they didn’t have cars to get to their old jobs. One lady was desperately trying to figure out the Hillsborough County bus system to get to her job from an area she is not familiar with. It is very tough on the working poor.

In my experience - it’s not that people are not *able* to move - it’s that people are not *willing* to move. The two should not be confused.

Not *able* to move is because you have a terminal or near-terminal illness, with specialist doctors who know your case working on you.

Pretty much anything else is *unwilling* to move.

If the impetus is saving money - pretty much anyone can rent or borrow a truck, pack up their stuff, and move to a place that’s cheaper. They’re just not willing to because they want to be close to family or friends, or are just too lazy to move, or whatever.

Katrina was a different case - apples and oranges. Evacuating with a few hours notice, and having to fight traffic jams, is different than having to move - where you have months or years of notice and no traffic jams.

pretty much anyone can rent or borrow a truck, pack up their stuff, and move to a place that’s cheaper. They’re just not willing to because they want to be close to family or friends, or are just too lazy to move, or whatever.

Sorry, this is really patronizing. If you’re living check to check (or running out of money at the end of the month), you can’t afford the moving van, the first month’s rent and security deposit, the utility hookups, and all the other expenses of relocating to another town, especially if you don’t know where the next check is coming from.

“…the angry crowd.”

Their sense of entitlement is breathtaking.

Desperation breeds anger.

“Sorry, this is really patronizing. If you’re living check to check (or running out of money at the end of the month), you can’t afford the moving van, the first month’s rent and security deposit, the utility hookups, and all the other expenses of relocating to another town, especially if you don’t know where the next check is coming from.”

Living paycheck-to-paycheck is a choice. You can choose not to spend as much money as you do, in order to save up a few paychecks.

Even if you can’t afford a moving van (they’re only $29.95 for goodness sake) can ask a friend with a pickup truck, or that kind of thing.

For security deposit - you should be getting that back from the place you’re moving out of. Utility hookups - come on, they’re not that expensive. Most utility companies allow you to prorate these over a period of months.

If you’re truly moving to an area where it’s less expensive to live - then you can afford these things by virtue of the savings you’ll encounter.

My point is that people who feel like they’re “stuck” in their current location are generally so because they lack the will to acquire the resources necessary to move, not because the resources aren’t available.

“Living paycheck-to-paycheck is a choice.”

This is very easy to say. As more good paying jobs move abroad, I think more people will find out if it is a choice. Yes, you can choose not to eat, not to pay for shelter, etc. and then you don’t have to live paycheck-to-paycheck.

I’m not saying these people are model citizens, by any means, and some of them may indeed be worthless…BUT…c’mon!

“They’re just not willing to because they want to be close to family or friends, or are just too lazy to move, or whatever.”

Yes, god forbid you let something like the desire to stay close to your family interfere with capitalism! By gawd, they should be willing to drop everything, abandon family and friends, and move somewhere else just so they can take another crappy low-paying job to help a corporation make more money!

I am always amused how “conservative, family values” types, always urging hard work and personal responsibility, never seem to draw a connection between the breakdown of the values they profess to support and the unfettered exploitive capitalism that is the REAL emphasis of the Republican worldview.

If only American’s would be more like the Mexicans - willing to leave their homelands to take whatever work they can get, and not make a fuss about having health insurance, workplace safety, or being paid a decent wage. That’s done wonders for many Mexican families, and really helped them become better Christians.

rant off.

I have to agree with you. I’ve heard many GOP friends complain about Dems and their class warfare. Unfortunately, they never tend to tie some of their own comments to class warfare as well…just blaming a different side of it.

Read ‘NICKEL and DIMED’ then look around.

The guy who made the movie, SUPERSIZE ME also made another movie that for 30 days he and his gf had to get a job, apt, and didn’t have a car in order to rely on Pub trans, it was very very interesting and eye opening. The Americans that aren’t/can’t get good paying jobs can get jobs that pay min wage but to just rent a ugly apt/in bad nabe is a 2 ft min wage job and that doesn’t include food and bus which they have to get up at 4am to travel around town on pub trans.
Good good movie.
Nickel and Dimed is the book.

I am always amused how “conservative, family values” types, always urging hard work and personal responsibility, never seem to draw a connection between the breakdown of the values they profess to support and the unfettered exploitive capitalism that is the REAL emphasis of the Republican worldview.

I have always been puzzled by Evangelicals embrace of social darwinism, while rejecting its biological counterpart.

http://www.dwell.com/homes/new/8603547.html

hey did you manage to get the rental you were looking for?

As for decorating a room, what type of space is it? The nature of the space itself generally determines what direction to go. For me, anyway.

Also, what do you like? You have to live in it.

Thanks, txchick. It’s a little too cubical for my taste, but interesting nonetheless.

P-gal — it’s mostly my home office I’m thinking about. I’ll catch up with you off-line about the rest.

I’ll take a photo of my living room, when I get home, and then you’ll know exactly what to do, because mine is just right. You should get a few Persian carpets–I inherited an Arab from my grandma, after she spent time in Kuwait, and exciting story, but if you haven’t inherited an Arab, you’ll have to buy one online, a Persian carpet I mean–by not incredibly expensive or historically ones because after all you’ll be walking on them and you want to do it freely, and you need bookcases stuffed full of books, and a woodstove with a glass door so you can see the flames, and a squashy leather couch, an old one that has been trained for maximum comfort, and some antique wooden tables. Or, you could build yourself a table from pallets and scrap wood, and then you get to paint them exciting colors and hammer little metal bits into them.
There you go.

How far do knives fall before they hit the ground? (This is the flip side of the question of how large do bubbles inflate before they burst.)

Anyone who can answer either of these questions is too wealthy to post here…

Is it possible to directly trade gold for US real estate and other assets currently going on fire sale, or does one need to first convert the gold to $US, and pay a pesky transactions fee?

If the proceeds from the sale are not owed to the bank, then you can probably pay gold for a property. Otherwise, the bank will only want $$$.

With respect to fiat currencies… in the long run the falling knife makes them worthless. If you want to hold $US then I recommend holding it in nickels. Buy a $100 bag of nickels and you get $135 worth of metal. You are hedged against hyperinflation AND deflation. You can go into any bank and get $100 box of brand new nickels. Act now before they change the metal content.

“…in the long run the falling knife makes them worthless.”

In the long run we are all dead. For better or for worse, I expect Uncle Buck will outlive me personally.

“I expect UNcle Buck will outlive me personally”…

Fiat currencies have a way of dying suddenly. Foreigners are already giving up on the dollar so it will soon lose its “reserve status”. This will cause a rapid fall in demand for the dollar.

Think of the dollar as property and foreigners as First Time Buyers. Without foreigners willing to accept the dollar in exchange for real wealth, we will have to rely on “house swaps” here at home and the value of the dollar will fall dramatically.

If you have a list of things you want to do before you die, I suggest you get started because the dollar does not have much life left in it.

Name one fiat currency with the circulation of USD that suddenly died.

Dan, you should read this book, pal…

By suddenly I mean over a period of 1 year.

There are no other currencies with the circulation of the USD so there is no historical precedent to support a claim that “large circulation” can overcome the fate of every of fiat currency in history. Large circulation does not provide immunity to the government printing presses!

To put it another way: name one empire with the strength of the U.S. that suddenly died.

That book, “Fooled by Randomness”, seems to accurately describe what I think of chart analyzers like TxChick (no offense, I am glad you make money in the short term).

If you are implying that I see a “pattern” with inflation / fiat currencies where “none” exists and that their failure is entirely random then I must object.

There is a definite cause/effect between increasing the money supply (via government spending) and inflation/hyperinflation. There is always the “random” chance that people in charge will stop printing money, but that is not a bet I will take.

If anything, I think you need to reconsider your bets on the dollar based upon this book. From the link:

“Example: a 99:1 bet where you almost always win, but when you lose you lose all your savings. You can easily be fooled by “I won this bet 50 times”. Per Taleb: “Option sellers, it is said, eat like chickens and go to the bathroom like elephants” (option sellers earn a steady small income from selling the options, but when a disaster happens they lose a fortune).”

You are betting that because the dollar has been relatively stable for the past 40 years since we left the gold standard completely that it will be stable for the next 40. If you are wrong you will lose everything. So I hope you have at least hedged your bets with some physical gold/silver.

I see that you may think that betting on inflation continuing is the same kind of bet, but I am not betting on more of the “same”, I am betting on a rapid increase in inflation. I am also not basing my predictions solely on “past inflation”. I also take my own advice and hedge my PM with $$ so that any increase in the $$ offsets a loss in the PM or loss in the $$ is offset by a gain in the PM. I slightly bias my savings toward PM/commodities because my future earnings are defined in dollars.

Anyone who places a bet solely on historic trends and statistics is a fool.

Your argument of Cause/Effect is still based solely on historic trends, just a glorified statistic by another name.

Tresho… some will argue that all of life and the universe was random; therefore, everything is random and subject to random departures from historic trends. There comes a point where you need to take an engineering approach instead of a scientific approach. Engineers only care if things work, scientists only care about why things work.

There are no sure bets and the odds are constantly changing. The only thing we need to make sure we do is not base future odds solely on past odds without factoring in changing conditions.

The cause effect of money supply and prices is almost purely mathematical if you assume a 1:1 mapping of supply of money to demand for goods and does not need any “trends” to predict the consequences.

So the only historical trend that I am betting on is that power corrupts and that absolute power corrupts absolutely. Therefore, I bet that those in power will seek more power because they already have more money than any one individual can use. Based upon that assumption and the assumption that those in power have average or above average IQ, then I predict that they will act intelligently to accomplish the goal of increased power. It is far easier to predict an intelligent opponent when you know their goals than it is to predict an incompetent individual while assuming the incompetent individual ultimately cares about society.

Of course there is always the saying: “Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.” I reserve this saying for situations where the concentration of power does not come in to play. Inherently stupid people do not get into positions of power because smarter power-hungry individuals will out maneuver them.

“Foreigners are already giving up on the dollar so it will soon lose its “reserve status”.”

I’m curious what you think will replace the dollar as reserve currency? Euros? Yen? Swiss Franks? “New Dollars” with Obama’s pic on the 5 spot? In the event of a dollar collapse every other world currency is going to fall as well. I’m not being a troll, I really want to know what you think would happen should a massive dollar devaluation occur.

Bub Diddley,
You ask a very good question that highlights the true world-wide nature of this problem. Historically, when one country goes through hyperinflation, they adopted the dollar as the unofficial currency. We don’t have a ready backup fiat currency in the US.

The world doesn’t need a “reserve” fiat currency, it needs a stable/universally marketable store of value. The dollar has been that for a long time due to our historic gold standard. It became the reserve currency because we had the gold and it was originally backed by gold. So when losing the reserve status of the dollar each country can adopt what ever asset it believes will remain marketable with a stable or increasing value.

This would likely involve stockpiling commodities because no country will want to be in the situation where a foreign central bank/government can devalue the countries reserves! The world use to “trust” us, but once that trust is gone there will be a world-wide run on the dollar to pull out what value they can before it decreases more.

US citizens will be the last to react. If you want to know the direction a currency is going you have to look at foreign opinion as a leading indicator.

“I really want to know what you think would happen should a massive dollar devaluation occur”

…he’s said it already: he’s playing such an outcome by being long gold

fuBarrio

How can you store value when it keeps changing?

Just a thought.

“If you are implying that I see…”

VTD —

I meant to suggest that you are overconfident in the assumptions which underpin the scenario which you seem certain will play out. If all the assumptions you make (explict & implicit) turn out to be correct (as in not undermined by unforseeable developments), then I am sure you will look like the smartest guy in the room when the dust settles.

I personally am never sufficiently confident in my assumptions to become overly fond of a single future scenario.

“You are betting that because the dollar has been relatively stable for the past 40 years since we left the gold standard completely that it will be stable for the next 40.”

Wrong. Read your history. The 1970s-early 1980s were not stable.

Here is one book you should read.

I get a kick out of the “Forex made easy” infomercials.

Forex accounts are so-2007…

I see a trend which ain’t HC’s friend.

I anticipate large-scale revision of the rules-of-the-game within the next decade.

There’s a Volcker speech floating around somewhere where he talks about how they were “tossing and turning” about this back in the 70’s.

Now, that’s foresight.

Completely unlike this current batch of mouth-breathers!

PB Stucco, I hope this is one of your rhetorical questions.

As I’m sure you know, an investor group would need at least $4 mil in cash equity to start even a small bank. Plus you need a charter as Brian points out. If you outline the above business plan in your charter application - I think you know what the answer would be. If you outline a real business plan and then do the above, you’d be shut down within 6 months.

It was rhetorical. I was pointing out (again) that there are special privileges conferred on those deemed too-big-to-fail.

We have been buying machines and parts from Europe for 13 years. In the last month I have had all the vendors call and tell us they will not sell to us anymore unless we wire funds in Euro’s (also had one say Swiss Francs). I asked them if they would accept pesos…they said they will get back to me.

They are called “dubs” in certain locales.

You guys are so 1968…….:)

I ordered some wheels from Tirerack and had some balancing issues with them. I called their helpline and got right in each and every time they were knowledgeable, friendly and extremely helpful. I would HIGHLY RECOMMEND THEM!!! They surpassed my expectations in every way. A true rarity in todays world!!

Just funning ya! We all are startled sometimes when we see what comes out at the other end of the typing.

That’d be great if pennies were still made of copper. Zinc though is only about 1/3 the price of copper; and would probably go down in price a lot more if they stopped making pennies.

No they got rid of them over 10 years ago. Ha’pennies, that is.

No room in today’s world for either the Farthing or the Groat, either.

Howesomeever, that (non-existent) ha’penny is worth more than a U.S. penny.

That’s what Australia did when I was there. They’d phased out pennies, and every transaction was rounded at the end to the nearest 5 cents. Worked fine. Sadly, it’s time for the US penny to fade away, but tradition is hard to push aside, so I reckon we’ll be stuck with cheap steel pennies for quite some time. And zinc will then maybe go to making so-called “nickels”.

lol.
We finally understand the purpose of the fiscal stimulus: Marital harmony.

Or more customers without one.

I had the career of BB’s predecessor in mind with my post. He was the greatest central banker in the history of the planet up until he retired, but let’s wait until we hear from future historians before we make up our minds…

To restate my point, one generally cannot assess a CB’rs career success while they are currently in office. It is only possible to properly conduct this assessment while looking out the rear view mirror.

He would seem to have the right background to be able to address the current crisis which, IMO, will end up being the greatest financial crisis this country has faced since the GD. However, he’s inherited a bad hand and the stakes are high. Even if he does most everything right, it may not be enough. A hire wire act in a hurricane isn’t noted for having a high success rate. I expect in 10 or 20 years, there will be detailed analyses of what was done right and what might have been done differently about the events that are currently unfolding. At that time, we should have a much better perspective on the job BB is doing now.

Maybe. I defer to those with better vantage points than my own…

Single White Females?

(Pole dancers probably want to bring back the $2 bill)

$1010 would probably be a good buy point, due to the resistance at $1000. As mentioned - once it breaks through $1000 it’ll probably jump up pretty good.

I could see lots of sell orders at $1000. Lost of people have sell orders *somewhere*, and it’s a lot more satisfying psychologically (for many people) to know that they sold their gold for $1000 and ounce and not $999 an ounce.

Glad you have it all worked out, Dan, and thanks for enlightening all of us who post and read here.

P.S. I never put that much faith in my posts; they are merely scenarios of what could happen, or questions about the assumptions that underlie the views offered here by others. Are you quite confident that you are able to accurately predict the future?

Professor Bear,
I am not confident in the ability to predict the future when it depends upon the actions of a small number of independent people in government/central banks. I can only comment on the “rational” decisions I expect these people will make in order to accomplish what I believe are their “irrational” goals. For example, if I were in charge of the central banks / government and was selfishly craving more power then I would organize a hyper-inflationary crash in order to bring in a world wide currency and create a more dependent population.

I have a tendency to be very direct and assertive and it gets me in trouble, particularly in writing. The reality is I welcome all debate and have appreciated the views of those who promote deflation because they force me to rethink my evaluation of the facts. So, please read all of my posts from the perspective of seeking debate vs implying that I think I know everything. This blog has taught me many things with the back and forth debate of those with strongly opposing positions.

“Past Performance is No Guarantee of Future Results” — PB’s posts reflect that, VirginiaTechDan’s posts don’t.

pb,

your insights and sentiments have been appreciated over the years. can’t understand if you believe there is something dan posted that is false or “avoidable” or you just think some “black swan” will intervene and “stick save” the dollar.

are you trying to play a short term bounce relative to other currencies or you really think this is the *bottom* relative to commodities for this cycle?

you could be right in the short term but it reminds me of the people telling me how i was going to be “crushed” when oil was at $53/barrel and “clearly in a bubble”.

i don’t live in the states anymore. are housewives pooling funds yet to speculate in junior gold mining shares?

if not, i’m standing by the call i made 3 years ago. gold to $3k/oz. it won’t happen all at once….just slow and steady…..pretty soon we’ll be like the crazy old men we remember from our childhood reminescing about $.05 candy bars…..

if you’re curious where this speculative furvor is coming from, you should read about gold and mining shares and the governments policies towards holding bullion during the (deflationary) GD.

fuBarrio

Trasho, you assume I draw my conclusions by assuming past performance will predict future performance. PB’s posts appear to reflect a different fallacy, that consistent past performance increases the likelihood of different future results. (This is just a straw man, I am quite sure that PB has intelligent reasons to back his conclusion that were not expressed in the short posts. It is those reasons that we need to debate.).

The only thing that can be said is that past effects (price changes) are not the primary causes of future effects (price changes). We must always look at the causes of past effects in order to predict the future effects of current or likely future “causes”. Our success in predicting the future of the market will depend entirely upon how well we make connections between causes and effects.

Therefore, all further debate needs to focus on questions such as:

1) Does increased government debt / spending cause the devaluation of the dollar? Yes.

2) Defaulting mortgages and reduced private lending shrinks the money supply. Will this cause be stronger than the government spending cause? Not necessarily, the government can with a flick of a pen print as much money as they want while they are in office. Will central banks monetizing these losses negate the deflationary effects via “a rolling loan gathers no loss”? Quite possibly.

3) Does the desire for power cause politicians/central bankers/media to be more likely to increase spending and bail out banks? Yes

4) Does falling world wide demand for the dollar cause the dollar to lose value? Yes. Is this falling demand greater than the falling supply due to mortgage loss? Quite possibly.

5) Does deflation in the US cause foreigners to lose faith in our banking systems? Yes. Does it cause foreign demand for the dollar to fall? Yes. Does deflation cause the national debt to grow in real terms? Yes. Does a larger national debt in real terms increase the debt as a percentage of GDP? Yes. Does the larger real debt necessitate printing money to avoid default? Yes.

Once we have a conclusion about the relative probability of causes then we can come to fairly accurate conclusions about the probability of future effects (assuming we can agree that A causes B).

Based on the above it should be quite clear that I do not predict future inflation based upon past inflation.

Try to keep it down to just a post rather than an essay!
I nod off..

‘…or you just think some “black swan” will intervene and “stick save” the dollar…’

Neither. I actually see method in the actions of the former Chair of the Princeton Dept of Econ and the former CEO of GS which some posters here may be missing. But I would not want to spoil the fun by sharing my views. I will give a retrospective in a couple of years if I am still posting and anyone is still interested.

Your comment was funny Sr. Blano.

We all should know that the world will more likely end from a ‘particle accelerator mishap’. The odds of getting hit by a life ending meteor are 1:10MM ; the odds of an accelerator mishap are substantially less.

I am fishing, I went long this morning one US financial stock.

The dollar got hit with 20 lb shells last night, based on the dollars activity the market should have been down 500points or more. Since it stopped going down immediately, I bought. I would not get long the BAC, C, WFC, JPM, or any of the large money center banks, but there are some interesting bank stocks.

Yes I took some of my position off in Yen (still short Euros) and shorted Treasuries. The Yen rallied to far to fast. The risk/reward ratio favors short Treasuries (or in your case long the reverse index). The Yen this year rallied from 114 to 99 that is an incredible move. even though the fundamentals say 85 (maybe 81), a failure to get a retracement of the yen is not realistic. I will get long the Yen again. I will not get long the Euro above 120.

That makes me feel in good company, because I also bought one financial. Of course me buying could be a sell signal for you.;)

Paul,

Only if you were the buyer for Mr. James Cramer.

“(or in your case long the reverse index)”

Still thinking about it, but every time I am about to pull the trigger, we have another day like today… (course unlike TIPS, there is a hard nominal floor of 0 pct on l-t T-bond yields…)

its always Voz’s turn to buy.

My guess would have to be Jackson Pollock.