Bits Bucket for June 6, 2015
Post off-topic ideas, links, and Craigslist finds here.
The Housing Bubble
Examining the home price boom and its effect on owners, lenders, regulators, realtors and the economy as a whole.
About Me
Name:Ben Jones
Location:Northern Arizona, United States
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Edward Snowden
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/05/opinion/edward-snowden-the-world-says-no-to-surveillance.html
“Ending the mass surveillance of private phone calls under the Patriot Act is a historic victory for the rights of every citizen …”
But there is now way of knowing if the surveillance has really been ended or not.
If it hasn’t been ended and you are in a position to know that it hasn’t been ended and you tell somebody it hasn’t been ended then you will (if you are really lucky) get to live in Moscow with Snowden.
“now way” = “know way”
The PTB cannot allow Snowden to slide because the PTB needs to send out to any future Snowden a message.
“No way” (and if we can agree to this spelling , I can agree with your point)
Coffee. Or lack of.
Know (thy) worries.
No thy self.
No coffee?!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CIX_yZAkblI
Hungary,port,Argentina,Poland1/3
Stole everyone’s savings
Better get active
Our savings are being stolen (slowly) with ZIRP.
Better buy a howse and some stawks if you want to preserve your capital, or so we are being told by the PTB.
it works just the opposite. Dollars are increasingly valuable.
Relative to other central-bank debased currencies, but not in true purchasing power.
With the deliberate price fixing and bottlenecking of the economy, it’s difficult to arrive at that conclusion.
Demand for dollars has never been higher.
In Europe countries it’s less shuttle,the gov just steals your 401k
Free hc is expensive
FWIW, this is only happening in the basket case countries like Hungary and Portugal. No one’s retirement plans are being forced to invest in government bonds in Germany, France, Holland, Denmark, the UK, etc; all countries with national health plans. And since when are those plans “free”? My European colleagues pay a tax to fund their healthcare systems, and those taxes are much smaller than what a policy costs in the USA. Mine cost $18,000 last year. When I share that little fact with my Euro colleagues they think I’m joking.
I love that equity!
Enjoy it while it lasts!
Hmmmm … A new soft drink called “Equity”. Lemming flavored.
I like it.
Steamboat Springs, CO Housing Prices Fall 14%
http://www.zillow.com/steamboat-springs-co/home-values/
Marketwatch dot com
Market Pulse
Treasury yields soar after strong U.S. jobs report
By William L. Watts
Published: June 5, 2015 9:55 a.m. ET
U.S. Treasurys tumbled Friday, pushing up yields, after a stronger-than-expected May jobs report reinforced expectations the Federal Reserve will deliver its first rate hike in nearly a decade later this year. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note TMUBMUSD10Y, +4.44% rose more than 10 basis points, or 0.1 percentage point, to 2.409%. Yields rise as bond prices fall. “Bond markets are reacting with higher yields because they see a sign of improving economic growth. That is a normal cause for rates to rise,” said David Kotok, chief investment officer at Cumberland Advisors, in a note.
…
“… reinforced expectations the Federal Reserve will deliver its first rate hike in nearly a decade later this year.”
What? No punch bowl?
(But, but, but … the children. What will happen to the children?)
“first rate hike in nearly a decade”
Good luck with that.
IMO what we have been experiencing for the past decade is a controlled depression - a depression that hasn’t been allowed to run its course, meaning it’s still there.
If the inflation rate goes up 1/2% and the interest rate goes up 1/4% has there been a rate hike or a rate reduction?
need coffee, raise interest rate .25.
If interest rates go up then the cost of borrowing goes up.
You can argue that the “real” rate of interest dropped if the inflation rate rose higher than the amount the interest rate rose (and I am not saying you are wrong) but nevertheless the increased cost created by the rise in the interest rate would still be there. And the cost of a transaction is a major determinant that decides whether or not the transaction takes place, and this cost includes the interest rate if the money for the transaction is money that is borrowed.
In a how-much-a-month world the how-much-a-month cost to a buyer is directly tied to the interest rate - adjusted for inflation or not.
Raise the rate and you raise the monthly payment, and this is especially true for transactions that involve interest only loans.
If the PTB wants to keep the party going in this how-much-a-month world then they will have to keep the cost of monthly payments down.
Keeping monthly payments down allows prices supported by monthly payments, such as houses, to rise.
Rising house prices translates to rising house values. Rising house values in turn translates to rising equity, and equity that has risen is something that can be cashed out and spent, which is considered to be a wonderful thing to happen in a consumer-based economy.
If the PTB wants to keep the party going in this how-much-a-month world then they will have to keep the cost of monthly payments down.
If inflation is increasing then most likely nominal wages are also increasing, people rush to buy a home to avoid future price increases and pay the mortgages will their inflated wages. You actually are seeing that in some areas and Denver is one of them.
Combo as you have said we are reaching the end of a credit expansion cycle and we need a reset. You have always argued that what will occur is massive defaults and the debt going poof. While I have said that is always a possibility, I have always said there is another way and that is for government to create inflation and make debt go poof. If a bond is paying 1% and selling for $1000 in theory just going to 2% should wipe out half the value of the bond and someone should be able to buy the same debt for $500, in the real world is doesn’t quite work that way because people will hold before they will accept such a loss but it is not far off. But it is very easy to see the US government wiping half its long term debt off its books by creating inflation.
“… I have always said there is another way and that is for government to create inflation and make debt go poof.”
“Create inflation” is something the Fed is trying to do but up to now it has been experiencing questionable success.
If you are going to make a lot of debt go poof then you are going to take out a lot of money along with the poof and that’s because one person’s debt is another person’s money.
Check out Detroit. A lot of debt is about to go poof, which means a lot of somebody’s money - money that is promised or otherwise - is about to go poof.
Somebody is going to get hosed. The fight is about just who is going to get the hosing.
Add to this …
Lots of people who just had their money go poof are not going to become great spenders of money, and this is not a good thing to occur (or not to occur) in a consumer-based economy.
“Create inflation” is something the Fed is trying to do but up to now it has been experiencing questionable success.
If they want inflation they need to let Joe Sixpack have access to some of that “free money” that is available. How about a car loan or a credit card that PAYS YOU interest and are EZ Qualify? That’ll get the broke rabble to spend.
I know, I shouldn’t joke, they might actually do that.
War or infrastructure spending are probably the only way to not only increase inflation and gdp For a prolonged period. all the other tricks have been used
Workers bargained for higher wages now that is gone. Spouses were sent off to work can’t use that again. Savings were spent. Finally dept was used. All these things allowed for increased gdp w inflation. Further money printing will just shift spending from wants to needs unless they use it to increase paychecks.
“If they want inflation they need to let Joe Sixpack have access to some of that “free money” that is available. How about a car loan…”
Un-kay…
ft dot com
On Wall Street
May 29, 2015 10:22 am
Banks plumb lower depths of subprime auto
Ben McLannahan
Credit markets heat up as lenders push into murkier areas
DAGENHAM, ENGLAND - JANUARY 13: Cars are prepared for distribution at a Ford factory on January 13, 2015 in Dagenham, England. Originally opened in 1931, the Ford factory has unveiled a state of the art GBP475 million production line that will start manufacturing the new low-emission, Ford diesel engines from this November this will generate more than 300 new jobs, Ford currently employs around 3000 at the plant in Dagenham. (Photo by Carl Court/Getty Images)
©Getty
When Santander Consumer USA sold a $1bn pool of subprime auto-loans this week, it made no pretence that the loans would be paid back in full. So confident was SCUSA that a big chunk of the money would not be coming back that it said it would shield investors in the lowest-rated tranche of the deal from the first 19 per cent of losses.
That is a lower level of protection than the Spanish bank’s US securitisation vehicle provided in its first trip to the lower reaches of subprime auto lending in March, when it offered “credit enhancement” of 25 per cent on the worst-ranked bonds.
It is a sign that things are heating up again in this much-maligned corner of the credit markets. Seven years on from a crisis blamed on an explosion in subprime lending, investors remain very keen to back loans to people least capable of handling them.
Definitions vary, but subprime normally means people with scores below 620 on the spectrum run by FICO, the biggest credit-risk scorer, which rates consumers from 300 to 850. “Deep” subprime — which is where SCUSA was dabbling this week — often means FICOs of 550 and below, implying people with patchy credit histories and low or irregular incomes.
For investors desperate for yield — any yield — getting exposure to this class of consumers is not as easy as it used to be. Buying shares in a bank is not the best way to do it: many of the biggest lenders are still paying penalties for mis-selling mortgage-backed securities in the run-up to the crisis, and have wound down their subprime businesses or sold them off altogether. The market for new subprime MBS has still not come back. And bonds backed by subprime credit-card balances are growing about as fast as prime.
But in auto, the good times are still rolling. Securitisations of subprime car loans have risen every year since 2009 and topped $21.8bn last year, up from $21.6bn in 2013, according to Asset-Backed Alert, an industry newsletter. Chris Donat, an analyst at Sandler O’Neill in New York, says that investor demand this year has been sustained by a combination of high employment and low gas prices — both strong supports for subprime.
New entrants have flooded the market in recent years, and many of them are now pushing out loan terms to as long as seven years, from the previous standard of six. To keep up, established lenders are going longer too — even though they know that means the borrower may owe more than the car is worth for much of the life of the loan.
“We are very aware of the downside with longer terms, but we’re balancing this against the competitive landscape,” Jeffrey Williams, finance chief at America’s Car-Mart, told analysts last week on a quarterly earnings call. The New York-listed company, which runs used-car dealerships in ten states across the south and Midwest, now stretches subprime loans to an average of 30.2 months, up from 29.7 last quarter, increasing the risk of defaults.
Others lament sloppier underwriting standards. “There are people out there . . . who are waiving proof of income, and just doing a few things that we’d never do,” sighed Charles Bradley, chief executive officer at Consumer Portfolio Services, an Irvine, California-based subprime lender backed by Fortress, the hedge fund, on an analyst call last month. “It certainly gets the dealer’s attention when they don’t have to worry about whether their customer is making any money.”
Where will it end? In the same place it always ends, says Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, as lenders extend more credit than people can cope with.
…
controlled depression
I think we need a new word to describe this phenomenon; may I suggest “suppression”?
suppression
noun
1) a depression that is of significantly extended duration, due to the fact that extreme attempts were made to suppress the effects, in the process extending the duration.
Or sufpression.
Suffer + depression = sufpression.
“economic suppression”
Sounds about right.
Economic suppository.
IMO what we have been experiencing for the past decade is a controlled depression - a depression that hasn’t been allowed to run its course, meaning it’s still there.
Oh—and I forgot to say: +infinity on the description of what we have been experiencing, and why.
Marketwatch dot com
Market Snapshot
Stocks close lower as jobs report stirs rate-hike worries
By Victor Reklaitis and Barbara Kollmeyer
Published: June 5, 2015 4:48 p.m. ET
Greek concerns hit European markets
Bloomberg
The stock market is digesting Friday’s much-anticipated jobs report.
The U.S. stock market finished mostly lower Friday as an upbeat jobs report raised expectations for an interest-rate hike this fall.
But the main indexes ended off their session lows as the economic strength signaled by the jobs report somewhat offset concerns about a rate hike, which would lure some investors out of stocks and increase companies’ borrowing costs.
…
Yields on my bond funds are increasing a bit and of course the NAVs of them are falling a bit.
Dividends hardly budge. It’s nice to have steady income from bonds, as a “little person” but the big institutions think differently.
I suppose if half you income is from bonds, you would not care so much about interest rate hikes. Your income won’t go up any. But in my case only 8% of my income is from by bonds.
This is precisely why I have to insure my assets with precious metals.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/next-great-bull-market-gold-114233825.html
Bill - do you have I-series savings bonds?
I checked mine yesterday and learned that the interest rate got a haircut due to a negative inflation rate adjustment in the calculation.
Yeah. You will see some of your I-bonds current yield of 0%! This happened before. It was last year or the year before. Even some of the bonds with fixed rate of more than 0% are yielding 0%.
I corrected and reworked my bond crash illustration posted late last night. The correction was for a stupid mistake: I forgot to divide the yields by 100 to convert to decimal form. I also added a couple of refinements, including an assumption of the same coupon rate for the entire comparison period plus daily interest accrual to make the comparison “fair” to the later data points (i.e. if yields had not changed, the value of the investment would increase at the rate of interest for the passage of time).
The upshot is that after the revision, the drop in thirty-year Treasury value is a merely a somewhat disappointing 15%+ correction.
Here is the ‘R’ code:
# Compute values of 30-year T-bond at constant maturity, assuming
# a coupon rate at the lowest yield so far inn 2015
i <- Yld30yr/200
# Test case for constant yield over the period
#i <- rep(min(i),length(Yld30yr))/200
c <- min(i)
v <- 1/(1+i)
# t = fraction of 1/2 year period that has elapsed
t <- as.numeric(dates-dates[1])/(365.25/2)
#B <- c*(1-v^60)/i+v^60
# The version on the next line reflects daily interest rate accrual
B <- (1+i)^t*(c+(i-c)*v^60)/i
# Index to maximum value in 2015 = 100
IDX <- 100*B/max(B)
P.S. If any of the programmer types on this board are interested in learning how to write code in ‘R’, I recommend the (free) John Hopkins University course on Coursera dot org.
P.S. >
Yld30yr
[1] 2.69 2.60 2.52 2.52 2.59 2.55 2.49 2.49 2.47 2.40 2.44 2.39 2.44 2.46
[15] 2.38 2.40 2.40 2.29 2.33 2.25 2.25 2.37 2.39 2.42 2.51 2.52 2.58 2.57
[29] 2.58 2.63 2.73 2.70 2.73 2.73 2.66 2.60 2.56 2.63 2.60 2.68 2.71 2.72
[43] 2.71 2.83 2.80 2.73 2.69 2.69 2.70 2.67 2.61 2.51 2.54 2.50 2.51 2.46
[57] 2.50 2.60 2.53 2.55 2.54 2.47 2.53 2.49 2.57 2.52 2.53 2.61 2.58 2.58
[71] 2.54 2.55 2.56 2.51 2.56 2.58 2.66 2.63 2.62 2.61 2.68 2.76 2.75 2.82
[85] 2.88 2.90 2.98 2.90 2.90 3.03 3.02 3.07 3.03 2.93 3.02 3.05 3.06 2.98
[99] 2.99 2.89 2.88 2.89 2.88 2.94 3.02 3.11 3.03 3.11
This data is made freely available to the public by Uncle Sam.
I’m having a hard time understanding that long run of numbers, PB. What is it saying?
Sorry for the cryptic data…those are the daily 30-year Treasury yields from Jan 2, 2015 through June 5, 2015.
Up and Down Wall Street
A Liquidity Time Bomb in the Bond Market?
Bond ETFs and mutual funds are underpinned by much less liquid assets. That, Nouriel Roubini warns, is a recipe for disaster.
By Randall W. Forsyth
June 5, 2015 9:45 p.m. ET
Water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink.” Substitute “liquidity” for “water” and Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s famous lines aptly describe the financial world.
The global financial system is awash in liquidity, created by central banks as they have driven short-term interest rates to zero (or even below) and expanded their balance sheets by the equivalent of trillions of dollars. And so the world is swimming in cheap money.
At the same time, liquidity is said to be at a low ebb in the financial markets, especially for bonds. Even for the most gilt-edged securities of the strongest and biggest economies, which serve as the financial world’s benchmarks, U.S. Treasuries and German Bunds, liquidity appears to be lacking. As a result, transactions that once didn’t cause prices to budge now send them lurching from trade to trade.
This apparent paradox was deftly described by New York University Prof. Nouriel Roubini, aka this century’s Dr. Doom, in a piece published last week with a characteristically understated title, “The Liquidity Time Bomb.”
Even with billions in excess reserves sloshing around the banking systems in the U.S. and abroad, and paying zero—or having a negative interest rate imposed on banks for the privilege of stashing their cash with central banks in Europe—this lack of liquidity in the capital markets became starkly evident last week, as yields on Bunds and Treasuries surged. And the advice from central bankers on both sides of the Atlantic about this new volatility? Get used to it.
So what accounts for what Roubini describes as the odd combination of “macro liquidity and market illiquidity”? Among the factors he lists:
In the equity market, the increased prevalence of so-called high-frequency traders, driven by computer algorithms, results in “herding behavior.” Volume is concentrated at the open and close of the day, worsening liquidity during the rest of the session. (But given the continued low level of equity volatility as indicated by the VIX, the so-called options fear gauge, the impact of the algos remains an open question.)
It’s in the fixed-income arena where the illiquidity has grown and become more worrisome. Unlike equities or commodities, where myriad buyers and sellers trade standardized instruments on an exchange, fixed-income consists of highly heterogeneous securities. To buy a bespoke bond, somebody must sell it, which is where dealers come in. Historically, they would “make markets”—that is, buy and sell securities for their own account, presumably making a profit on both sides of those trades. But in the postcrisis regulatory environment, banks’ market-making has been curtailed. New regulations and capital charges have induced them to shrink their securities inventories—which serve as the buffer between buyers and sellers. The result is greater volatility, as Roubini writes, a point on which virtually all fixed-income pros—whether institutions on the buy side or Wall Street banks on the sell side—agree.
…
It has been a rough ride for global benchmark bonds
Published: June 5, 2015 5:13 p.m. ET
It’s been a rough time for bond traders.
By Ellie Ismailidou
Markets reporter
Looks like bond-guru Bill Gross was right, after all. The former Pimco boss declared German bunds “the short of a lifetime” back in late April and ever since that pronouncement benchmark bonds have been experiencing one of the most tumultuous trading stretches since the 2013 “taper tantrum.”
European Central Bank President Mario Draghi didn’t help matters much either.
Earlier this week, the ECB chief stoked a rout in bonds after he told investors Wednesday to “get used to periods of higher volatility,” confirming one of bond traders’ biggest fears: the extreme price swings in global bond markets could get more common and the impact of reversals more severe.
The chart below, which shows 10-year benchmark bond yields for the U.S., Germany and Japan since the start of the year, provides a good look at the volatility that has buffeted bond traders:
Wild ride for global benchmark bond yields 1/01/2015 to 6/05/2015
Market watchers can’t say they haven’t been warned. Besides Gross — who ended up admitting that he executed his own recommendation poorly — many have been pointing to the possibility of a correction after prices soared, pushing yields lower, as the ECB’s bond-buying program got under way in March. Bond prices move inversely to yields.
It took 102 trading days for the yield on the benchmark 10-year German bond (TMBMKDE-10Y, +1.21%) known as the bund, to decline by 61 basis points from 0.68% to an all-time low of 0.07% on April 20. But it took only about a third of the time to jump back 77.8 basis points to 0.851%, where yields stood Friday.
The recent yield correction started in the eurozone’s bond market, where yields had been at historical lows including a significant part of the market trading at negative yields.
But quickly it spilled over to the U.S. Treasury market, where the 10-year benchmark yield (TMUBMUSD10Y, +4.44%) gained 54.7 basis points since April 17. But what is perhaps more interesting is the fact that the biggest part of these gains were made in sharp selloffs: 32.3 basis points between April 24 and May 5, and 27.1 basis points between May 29 and June 3.
Similarly, the 10-year benchmark Japanese bond yield gained 20.9 basis points from April 24 to June 4, following the selloffs in Europe and the U.S.
As central banks’ influence on asset prices grows, corrections are becoming more common, a Bank of America report noted, and can take the form of “seismic moves” in government bond yields. This echoes Draghi’s volatility warning on Wednesday.
At the same time, the backdrop of negative yielding assets in Europe has changed significantly, according to the report. The peak of negative yielding eurozone government debt was just over €2.8 trillion at the end of March. But this has now declined to €2 trillion. In other words, Europe has lost almost €1 trillion of negative-yielding assets in the past month.
“What has been even more concerning has been that government bonds such as German Bunds seem to have lost their safe haven status,” Gary Jenkins, chief credit strategist at LNG capital, said in a note.
The reason is that “bond investors were faced with not only owning low-yielding bonds, but low yielding and more volatile bonds—a toxic mix,” Jack Kelly, investment director of global government bonds at Standard Life Investments, said in a note.
As a result, risk controls forced investors to sell, particularly hedge funds, which became more active sellers, Kelly said, creating even more volatility in the past weeks’ chaos.
…
I found the German bund yield data online.
Stay tuned for a similar analysis of price moves to what I put together for 30-year Treasurys, if I can figure out how the bonds work.
Germany 10-Year Bond Yield Historical Data
Time Frame:
01/01/2015 - 06/06/2015
Date Price Open High Low Change %
Jun 06, 2015 0.851 0.848 0.851 0.848 0.24%
Jun 05, 2015 0.849 0.854 0.919 0.822 2.04%
Jun 04, 2015 0.832 0.903 0.998 0.813 -5.02%
Jun 03, 2015 0.876 0.707 0.887 0.697 25.32%
Jun 02, 2015 0.699 0.545 0.702 0.545 31.39%
Jun 01, 2015 0.532 0.497 0.532 0.473 8.79%
May 31, 2015 0.489 0.489 0.489 0.489 0.00%
May 30, 2015 0.489 0.489 0.489 0.489 0.62%
May 29, 2015 0.486 0.508 0.526 0.484 -9.16%
May 28, 2015 0.535 0.530 0.546 0.512 -2.01%
May 27, 2015 0.546 0.545 0.579 0.516 -1.09%
May 26, 2015 0.552 0.589 0.603 0.530 -8.46%
May 22, 2015 0.603 0.637 0.639 0.589 -5.04%
May 21, 2015 0.635 0.624 0.681 0.603 1.28%
May 20, 2015 0.627 0.608 0.630 0.571 2.45%
May 19, 2015 0.612 0.652 0.652 0.555 -5.56%
May 18, 2015 0.648 0.651 0.671 0.624 1.41%
May 15, 2015 0.639 0.683 0.692 0.632 -8.71%
May 14, 2015 0.700 0.758 0.774 0.680 -2.91%
May 13, 2015 0.721 0.685 0.724 0.599 5.87%
May 12, 2015 0.681 0.668 0.740 0.642 13.69%
May 11, 2015 0.599 0.534 0.619 0.520 9.91%
May 08, 2015 0.545 0.575 0.636 0.526 -8.56%
May 07, 2015 0.596 0.614 0.796 0.579 1.53%
May 06, 2015 0.587 0.528 0.601 0.513 13.32%
May 05, 2015 0.518 0.455 0.535 0.406 14.60%
May 04, 2015 0.452 0.379 0.455 0.362 24.18%
Apr 30, 2015 0.364 0.284 0.386 0.273 28.17%
Apr 29, 2015 0.284 0.168 0.291 0.165 74.23%
Apr 28, 2015 0.163 0.161 0.173 0.141 -0.61%
Apr 27, 2015 0.164 0.144 0.174 0.134 8.61%
Apr 25, 2015 0.151 0.152 0.152 0.151 -4.43%
Apr 24, 2015 0.158 0.163 0.182 0.148 -2.47%
Apr 23, 2015 0.162 0.158 0.173 0.133 1.25%
Apr 22, 2015 0.160 0.104 0.164 0.090 55.34%
Apr 21, 2015 0.103 0.078 0.107 0.067 33.77%
Apr 20, 2015 0.077 0.071 0.082 0.063 -2.53%
Apr 17, 2015 0.079 0.081 0.086 0.049 -7.06%
Apr 16, 2015 0.085 0.108 0.111 0.072 -22.02%
Apr 15, 2015 0.109 0.141 0.146 0.105 -22.14%
Apr 14, 2015 0.140 0.146 0.156 0.130 -10.83%
Apr 13, 2015 0.157 0.154 0.171 0.142 -1.87%
Apr 12, 2015 0.160 0.160 0.160 0.160 2.56%
Apr 10, 2015 0.156 0.168 0.172 0.144 -1.27%
Apr 09, 2015 0.158 0.161 0.169 0.140 -5.39%
Apr 08, 2015 0.167 0.174 0.174 0.156 -10.70%
Apr 07, 2015 0.187 0.183 0.197 0.175 -4.10%
Apr 03, 2015 0.195 0.189 0.195 0.189 6.56%
Apr 02, 2015 0.183 0.173 0.190 0.160 6.40%
Apr 01, 2015 0.172 0.186 0.201 0.152 -7.03%
Mar 31, 2015 0.185 0.204 0.218 0.177 -13.55%
Mar 30, 2015 0.214 0.206 0.214 0.178 2.39%
Mar 28, 2015 0.209 0.209 0.209 0.209 0.00%
Mar 27, 2015 0.209 0.212 0.239 0.201 -4.57%
Mar 26, 2015 0.219 0.227 0.233 0.204 -0.45%
Mar 25, 2015 0.220 0.223 0.238 0.206 -5.98%
Mar 24, 2015 0.234 0.215 0.240 0.197 6.85%
Mar 23, 2015 0.219 0.180 0.230 0.171 18.38%
Mar 20, 2015 0.185 0.185 0.198 0.168 -1.60%
Mar 19, 2015 0.188 0.172 0.208 0.171 -3.59%
Mar 18, 2015 0.195 0.271 0.280 0.191 -30.60%
Mar 17, 2015 0.281 0.268 0.291 0.265 1.08%
Mar 16, 2015 0.278 0.251 0.294 0.250 7.34%
Mar 15, 2015 0.259 0.259 0.259 0.259 0.00%
Mar 14, 2015 0.259 0.259 0.259 0.259 0.00%
Mar 13, 2015 0.259 0.249 0.281 0.236 4.44%
Mar 12, 2015 0.248 0.201 0.256 0.187 21.57%
Mar 11, 2015 0.204 0.226 0.243 0.192 -14.29%
Mar 10, 2015 0.238 0.314 0.320 0.230 -22.73%
Mar 09, 2015 0.308 0.397 0.398 0.308 -21.83%
Mar 07, 2015 0.394 0.394 0.394 0.394 -1.50%
Mar 06, 2015 0.400 0.345 0.404 0.330 11.73%
Mar 05, 2015 0.358 0.381 0.429 0.322 -6.04%
Mar 04, 2015 0.381 0.380 0.387 0.359 4.38%
Mar 03, 2015 0.365 0.355 0.373 0.342 2.82%
Mar 02, 2015 0.355 0.326 0.360 0.314 9.91%
Feb 28, 2015 0.323 0.323 0.323 0.323 -0.31%
Feb 27, 2015 0.324 0.306 0.346 0.304 7.28%
Feb 26, 2015 0.302 0.323 0.324 0.284 -9.04%
Feb 25, 2015 0.332 0.364 0.369 0.320 -11.23%
Feb 24, 2015 0.374 0.359 0.393 0.359 2.19%
Feb 23, 2015 0.366 0.385 0.395 0.358 -1.61%
Feb 20, 2015 0.372 0.382 0.393 0.336 -2.36%
Feb 19, 2015 0.381 0.372 0.404 0.357 -0.52%
Feb 18, 2015 0.383 0.379 0.409 0.365 3.51%
Feb 17, 2015 0.370 0.351 0.382 0.317 5.71%
Feb 16, 2015 0.350 0.352 0.365 0.339 -1.41%
Feb 14, 2015 0.355 0.355 0.355 0.355 1.72%
Feb 13, 2015 0.349 0.328 0.363 0.326 7.38%
Feb 12, 2015 0.325 0.352 0.382 0.318 -9.22%
Feb 11, 2015 0.358 0.366 0.377 0.353 -3.24%
Feb 10, 2015 0.370 0.368 0.401 0.349 4.52%
Feb 09, 2015 0.354 0.371 0.380 0.324 -5.09%
Feb 08, 2015 0.373 0.373 0.373 0.373 0.00%
Feb 07, 2015 0.373 0.373 0.373 0.373 -0.27%
Feb 06, 2015 0.374 0.361 0.387 0.337 -1.06%
Feb 05, 2015 0.378 0.330 0.391 0.325 3.56%
Feb 04, 2015 0.365 0.365 0.380 0.336 5.19%
Feb 03, 2015 0.347 0.310 0.357 0.307 11.94%
Feb 02, 2015 0.310 0.316 0.323 0.299 1.97%
Feb 01, 2015 0.304 0.304 0.304 0.304 -2.88%
Jan 30, 2015 0.313 0.358 0.367 0.306 -12.32%
Jan 29, 2015 0.357 0.334 0.367 0.329 0.56%
Jan 28, 2015 0.355 0.398 0.424 0.350 -7.79%
Jan 27, 2015 0.385 0.388 0.401 0.372 -2.04%
Jan 26, 2015 0.393 0.354 0.398 0.342 7.38%
Jan 23, 2015 0.366 0.444 0.446 0.346 -19.38%
Jan 22, 2015 0.454 0.530 0.584 0.430 -12.52%
Jan 21, 2015 0.519 0.449 0.525 0.443 15.08%
Jan 20, 2015 0.451 0.446 0.463 0.432 2.27%
Jan 19, 2015 0.441 0.460 0.472 0.433 -3.71%
Jan 16, 2015 0.458 0.466 0.473 0.438 10.36%
Jan 15, 2015 0.415 0.450 0.454 0.402 -3.94%
Jan 14, 2015 0.432 0.458 0.466 0.424 -9.43%
Jan 13, 2015 0.477 0.479 0.488 0.456 -0.62%
Jan 12, 2015 0.480 0.493 0.513 0.466 -0.41%
Jan 09, 2015 0.482 0.506 0.527 0.479 -5.86%
Jan 08, 2015 0.512 0.485 0.516 0.474 8.47%
Jan 07, 2015 0.472 0.464 0.486 0.432 4.19%
Jan 06, 2015 0.453 0.507 0.514 0.442 -11.70%
Jan 05, 2015 0.513 0.499 0.522 0.492 3.01%
Jan 02, 2015 0.498 0.546 0.555 0.493 -7.95%
For starters, here is a figure showing yields. Will try to post bond prices later (currently have to take some kids away from home to preserve wife’s sanity…).
Check out some info on recent German 10-year bund moves:
Prev. Close 0.850
Price 96.762
Coupon 0.500
Day’s Range 0.822 - 0.919
Price Open 96.723
Maturity Date 15 FEB 2025
52 wk Range 0.049 - 1.445
Price Range 96.130 - 97.010
1-Year Return -40.16%
1-Year Return -40.16%
YOW-zaaa!!!!!
Gross Says Bond Rout Scary as Hell Even Without Bear Market
by Wes Goodman
June 4, 2015 — 6:23 PM PST
Updated on June 5, 2015 — 3:05 AM PST
Treasury prices are falling enough to spook even market veteran Bill Gross.
The turmoil has sent U.S. government securities maturing in 10 years and longer down 7.4 percent since the end of March, heading for the biggest quarterly loss since 2010, based on Bloomberg World Bond Indexes. The decline is part of a global selloff, led by German bunds and fueled by what traders say is a lack of liquidity.
“I recognize the tremendous liquidity problems and the ups and the downs on a daily basis — or even on a minute basis — and it scares the hell out of me,” Gross said in an interview Thursday. “But I don’t think we’re in for a bear bond market just yet.”
Gross, who runs the Janus Global Unconstrained Bond Fund and is the former manager of the Pimco Total Return Fund, also said Treasuries have fallen to fair levels. He co-founded Pacific Investment Management Co. in 1971, according to the Janus website.
The benchmark Treasury 10-year yield rose three basis points, or 0.03 percentage point, to 2.34 percent at 6:56 a.m. New York time, according to Bloomberg Bond Trader data. It reached 2.42 percent on Thursday, the highest since October, having climbed from a year-to-date low of 1.64 percent.
Gross said 2.30 percent is “fair value.”
Volatile Market
Treasury market volatility climbed to a three-month high this week, according to the Bank of America Merrill Lynch MOVE Index. The gauge increased to 91.81 Wednesday, from as low as 70.99 on April 27.
“People’s faces are within inches of their screens, eyes are glued to the screens, to the news sources, to the price action,” said Craig Collins, managing director of rates trading at Bank of Montreal in London. “You see the market move and it’s ‘what’s out, what’s out?’ Risk appetite is very, very low with the liquidity in the market being very low and that’s made for this really choppy price action.”
…
Project Syndicate
Opinion: Pushing Greece out could be Europe’s final act
By Joseph E. Stiglitz
Published: June 5, 2015 11:57 a.m. ET
Shares 72
MarketWatch dot Com
Complacency about Grexit is like complacency about Lehman, Stiglitz warns
Bloomberg
Germany’s Angela Merkel takes on Greece’s Alexis Tsipras.
NEW YORK (Project Syndicate) — European Union leaders continue to play a game of brinkmanship with the Greek government. Greece has met its creditors’ demands far more than halfway. Yet Germany and Greece’s other creditors continue to demand that the country sign on to a program that has proven to be a failure, and that few economists ever thought could, would, or should be implemented.
The swing in Greece’s fiscal position from a large primary deficit to a surplus was almost unprecedented, but the demand that the country achieve a primary surplus of 4.5% of gross domestic product was unconscionable.
As markets grasp that a vicious downward spiral is structurally embedded in the euro, the consequences for the next crisis become profound. And another crisis in inevitable: it is in the very nature of capitalism.
Unfortunately, at the time that the “troika” — the European Commission, the European Central Bank, and the International Monetary Fund — first included this irresponsible demand in the international financial program for Greece, the country’s authorities had no choice but to accede to it.
The folly of continuing to pursue this program is particularly acute now, given the 25% decline in GDP that Greece has endured since the beginning of the crisis. The troika badly misjudged the macroeconomic effects of the program that they imposed. According to their published forecasts, they believed that, by cutting wages and accepting other austerity measures, Greek exports would increase and the economy would quickly return to growth. They also believed that the first debt restructuring would lead to debt sustainability.
The troika’s forecasts have been wrong, and repeatedly so. And not by a little, but by an enormous amount. Greece’s voters were right to demand a change in course, and their government is right to refuse to sign on to a deeply flawed program.
…
Any thoughts on the chance the Fed will accidentally create higher-than-expected inflation, due to endless liftoff postponement?
For starters, would it really be an accident?
in my area lots of young engineers are getting 5% raises and promotions. Meanwhile boomers are retiring or wages are stagnant to try to get them to budge to retire.
I have to travel for most of the next two weeks for business. I never really enjoyed business travel and the older I get the less I like it. That was why I joined my company and got out of consulting. And here my company sends me out again. Grr! Wanted to stay put in California and Arizona.
Inflation is happening. It has not been happening to my wages but it’s happening to younger people who I know. They are in fat city. So I am starting to think the QE is going to end suddenly.
Where I work young and old pretty much get the same raises: zilch. When I look around for other jobs, everyone wants you to jump ship, but without a raise.
that zerohedge link RKH put up is interesting. Young people’s wages going up. Mostly foreign born. The ones I know are U.S. citizens but could still be foreign born. For the rest of us that stagnant wage chart rings true.
Outsourced jobs still taking the toll. I bet a lot on outsourced jobs. They are bad for my own personal career but good for my investments.
For starters, would it really be an accident?
No, it is there policy. See my question above, the Fed intends to raise the inflation rate from 1.5% to 2% and then raise the interest rate 1/4.
Their
Dan,
What are your losses on that shanty you financed in 2010?
I hate to confuse with the facts, but it is actually more valuable and I have saved a bundle on income taxes.
We know all about your ‘facts’ Dan.
What are your losses to date?
Is the shanty worth about 7% more every year?
Any thoughts on the chance the Fed will accidentally create higher-than-expected inflation, due to endless liftoff postponement?
The Fed’s debasement of the currency through its deranged money printing will inevitably result in a loss of purchasing power and consequent inflation.
Except that everyone else is debasing their currency even more, on purpose.
Good morning…
CraterRage Animation Of The Day
http://goo.gl/TRxMgR
LEMMING
Cheer up Poet. Don’t let your ravaged wallet get you down.
Springfield, VA(DC metro) Housing Prices Fall 5%
http://www.movoto.com/springfield-va/market-trends/
Happy Chinese due to the Chinese version of Reaganomics:
http://www.shanghaidaily.com/business/finance/Shares-end-over-5000-at-new-7year-high/shdaily.shtml
I was traveling to my favorite bubble place in the world - DENVER.
Friends who bought there say their housing is going up in value by $5,000 a month. So much new equity to use!!!
Other friends want to buy as soon as possible - before prices go up even more. Bidding wars… Letters to sellers…. all the insanity is back. Bid on a house in the AM - quick - more than a dozen others have seen it already and are preparing bids!!!
There is no logic any more with endless QE and endless deficits. There is ALWAYS more money (debt).
No matter that the ratio of housing prices and average wages make no sense
That no one has a down payment
That one little hiccup will send it all into a tail spin
That wages are stagnant and health care and college cost eat up more and more of what is left.
And the greatest irony? Looking at a $500,000 new spec house (cheap as crap with floors and walls on 24 inch centers) and that you can literally touch your neighbor from a window on three side…
You can see hundreds of and hundreds of square miles of undeveloped land from the driveway…
Ladies and Gentlemen - I present the obama housing bubble 2.0
We have LEARNED NOTHING.
We know the real reason you like going to Colorado. C’mon, fess up.
Cheap seats for Rockies games?
Cheap seats are probably plentiful since the Rockies are in last place.
No, what I’m referring to is the assumption some people make that any tourist visiting Colorado is going there just for the mary jane.
There is a ski run named Mary Jane, in Winter Park:
http://www.winterparkresort.com/the-mountain/mountain-stats-and-history/mary-jane.aspx
Viva the Rockpile!!
“I was traveling to my favorite bubble place in the world - DENVER.”
This was Denver in 2007:
http://picpaste.com/denver_map.jpg
Why is it then whenever democrats take power - the number one and only priority is to RAISE TAXES by record amounts?
Is there no other solution???
————–
Pa. House says no, 193-0, to Gov. Wolf’s tax plan
AP - June 5, 2015 - Brad Bumsted
HARRISBURG — House Republicans called up Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf’s tax-shifting plan on Monday, and the House shot it down by a unanimous vote.
But Majority Leader David Reed, R-Indiana County, said the vote gave the Wolf administration what it wanted: a vote on the entire tax package in his budget, rather than breaking it into pieces for individual votes.
“I think today is an accurate reflection if you consider the governor’s budget” presented in March, Reed said.
Rep. Seth Grove, R-York County, said members based the vote on language built “word for word, sentence by sentence” on Wolf’s budget proposal.
Wolf proposes taxing the extraction of natural gas from the Marcellus shale, raising cigarette taxes and taxing cigars and snuff. All told, GOP members said, it’s a $4.7 billion tax increase.
“As has often been stated, this tax proposal encompasses everything from the cradle to the grave,” said Gene Barr, president of the Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry, who supported the House vote.
The test vote on the Wolf budget was voted down 193-0.
Wolf wants to raise the income tax from 3 percent to 3.7 percent and the sales tax from 6 percent to 6.6 percent. He would expand the sales tax base to include a host of items such as diapers, newspapers, funeral services, legal work, textbooks, college room and board, and nonprescription drugs, Adolph said.
Democrats certainly love taxes as long as it’s not their own. So they have very little income (Warren Buffet) and their capital gain taxes are low as it is. I don’t see them calling for an end to tax free municipal bonds or lower capital gain taxes than income taxes.
Their idea that rich people have income is baloney. Rich people do not have income. The gullible poseur “lieberals” don’t get it and chant the slogans of the Hillary Clintons and E Warrens and the ones really holding the bag are the middle class. Always.
Exactly. Buffett is a buy and hold guy he does not even have to pay capital gains taxes. Now put a wealth tax on billionaires and watch him squeal like a pig.
Their idea that rich people have income is baloney. Rich people do not have income.
That must make life difficult when the bills have to be paid every month.
Um…savings account? Hello?
Their idea that rich people have income is baloney. Rich people do not have income.
They don’t have “earned income”, but they sure do have income.
Hillary Clinton rakes in $200K in Greenwich
Neil Vigdor
Updated 11:36 pm, Friday, June 5, 2015
Hillary Clinton literally covered the waterfront Friday from Greenwich to New Haven.
Heavy on domestic and foreign policy talking points — some aligning her with President Barack Obama (the Affordable Care Act) and others distancing her (the Middle East) — Clinton huddled with an elite network of contributors to her presidential campaign at the bygone yachting retreat of Boss Tweed.
ADVERTISEMENT
The 13-mile trip from Chappaqua, N.Y., to Greenwich paid handsome dividends for Democratic contender, who netted $200,000 for her White House bid from about 85 supporters that included the Empire State Building’s controlling partner and a retired hedge fund manager as the event host, Hearst Connecticut Media has learned. The reception, held at the $29.7 million Roman villa of Malcolm and Carolyn Wiener, was closed to the media.
Clinton’s campaign declined to comment on her fundraising trip to Connecticut.
Clinton commanded $2,700 a ticket at the Greenwich reception, where the guest list included Peter Malkin, controlling partner of the Empire State Building; U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., U.S. Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn.; Secretary of the State Denise Merrill; Susan Bysiewicz, Merrill’s predecessor; state Rep. Caroline Simmons, D-Stamford; and Selectman Drew Marzullo, Greenwich’s top elected Democrat. Malkin is Blumenthal’s father-in-law.
Hitching herself to Obama on the Affordable Care Act, Clinton rhetorically asked whether Republicans would undo protections established under the law for policy holders with pre-existing medical conditions. She also wondered if those in favor of repealing Obamacare would revert to allowing insurance companies to charge women higher premiums.
Clinton subtly tried to distance herself from Obama on foreign policy, telling her contributors that with Russia’s Vladimir Putin trying to redraw the borders of the world, the U.S. needs a comprehensive strategy on international affairs rather than a reactionary one.
1 Comment
pfalexla Rank 137
Perfect location.
Tweed prayed on the hearts of immigrants to corrupt NYC politics and Greenwich.
We had gotten over that until 1960’s when Yale fails and Northeast dribblers took aim at the integrity of our Government.
This is that ilk’s last gasp at spreading organized corruption worldwide.
Fonda Hillary Movement needs to be flushed out.
Read the Naomi Klein bible and see what is really up for a vote.
They are counting on the Gruber Method.
One of the few unfaked Chinese economic metrics, its containerized freight index, is collapsing. Look out below!
http://wolfstreet.com/2015/06/05/china-containerized-freight-index-ccfi-collapses-shanghai-containerized-freight-index-scfi/
This comment to the article says it all:
Chip
June 5, 2015 at 11:21 pm
the cost of shipping indicates very little….we need the number of containers to determine changes in amount of commerce. wolf..,can you find those numbers? Chipper
http://www.shanghaidaily.com/business/economy/Economic-data-for-May-to-signal-stability/shdaily.shtml
Excerpt from today’s Shanghai article, btw China is adding lots of service jobs, how much iron ore does an attorney or a hairdresser need, I have never ordered any iron ore, is there a hairdresser out there that can tell us how much iron ore he or she uses a month? :
CHINA’S trade, manufacturing and consumption may post an improvement in May while deflationary pressure is set to ease, indicating a stabilizing economy, analysts said before the release of the key data next week.
“We expect May’s data will signal a tentative stabilization,” said Wang Tao, an economist at UBS.
Tang Jianwei, an economist at the Bank of Communications, said nearly all activity data, including trade, industrial production and retail sales, are likely to show an improvement.
“Chinese authorities have introduced a series of supportive policies, and it is time for the policy effects to filter through the economy,” Tang said.
He projected that exports will shed 2 percent from a year earlier in May, an improvement from April’s drop of 6.4 percent. Imports are seen to fall 10 percent in May, compared with the slump of 16.2 a month earlier.
Deflationary pressure is also likely to ease because the Consumer Price Index, the main gauge of inflation, may hover around 1.4 percent, basically flat as in the previous three months. The Producer Price Index, the factory-gate measurement of inflation, may see a narrower contraction for the first time this year, Tang said.
He expected May’s industrial production to grow at a faster pace of 6.1 percent, above the 5.9-percent gain in April.
But fixed-asset investment may disappoint, Tang said, as he predicted it to add 11.8 percent in the first five months, 0.2 percentage points slower than that in January to April.
Zhou Hao, an economist at Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd, is optimistic that a further downside risk of China’s economy might be limited as the government unveiled a more active fiscal policy and monetary policy conditions have eased.
To bolster a cooling economy China has cut both interest rates and bank reserve requirement ratio in the past few months and unveiled other fiscal stimulus.
In the first three months, China’s economy rose 7 percent year on year, making it the weakest quarterly growth in six years.
China has set this year’s official annual growth target at around 7 percent, down from the previous goal of 7.5 percent.
“GDP is manmade”. Even their premier doesn’t believe it.
The taxes will increase until the economy improves…
We can tax our way to prosperity…
——————
The Hartford Way: Keep Raising Taxes In Connecticut
IBD | June 5,2015 | EDITORIAL
So now several of the largest corporations in the state, including Yankee mainstays such as insurance giants Aetna and Travelers, as well as General Electric, are threatening to leave and get out of this abusive relationship.
GE’s CEO Jeff Immelt told his thousands of Connecticut-based employees that he has put together a team to evaluate a move to another state with “a more pro-business environment.”
He says the company’s state taxes have increased five times since 2011 and the new hike would impose “significant and retroactive tax increases for businesses.”
Aetna complained that it already pays $65 million a year in state and local taxes and under this budget its burden rises another 27%.
What has infuriated Connecticut taxpayers is that in a state that already has the third-highest state and local taxes in the nation, income taxes are headed up yet again. Doubly infuriating is that Dan Malloy, the liberal Democratic governor, pledged in his re-election campaign last year that “there will not be a tax increase.”
The Northeast state was once one of the richest places in America, and now it’s losing out to the rest of America in nearly every category — jobs, population and income. A state that ranks in the bottom five in nearly every ranking of economic climate has just labored to make things even worse.
Yeah, just ask people in Kansas.
The furlough notices went out today
Deemed “Not essential”: Parole officers, Prison Guards, all the Science researchers in all the state universities and their support staff, 2/3rds of the DOT employees, half of the athletic departments.
DOT cuts will mean that damaged roads/guardrails will be repaired, but mowing grass will stop, along with removal of dead animals, unless they pose a “hazard”
“Kansas……..you can just smell the tax cuts”
Privatize the roads. The road companies would do the maintenance.
Tax cuts are the answer to everything. Yeah, just ask people in Kansas.
The furlough notices went out today……actually it was bass ackwards. The people determined to be essential got a call or e-mail. If you didn’t get called, you are furloughed.
Deemed “Not essential”: Parole officers, Prison Guards, all the Science researchers in all the state universities and their support staff, 2/3rds of the DOT employees, half of the athletic departments, etc. etc.
Summer school at the state universities has been put on hold.
The good news is that the big money-generators (DMV Tag offices and Drivers Licenses) will be fully staffed.
The marriage license and birth/death certificate offices will be shut down.
DOT cuts will mean that damaged roads/guardrails will be repaired; but mowing grass will stop, along with removal of dead animals, unless they pose a “hazard”
“Kansas……..you can just smell the tax cuts”
Yeah, just keep cutting those taxes to zero and furlough all of the employees. Drown that Kansas goobermint in the bathtub. Then just sit back and wait for that trickle down miracle to create that shining city on the hill.
Meanwhile, what will really happen is companies will avoid Kansas when they figure out the schools stink, the roads stink, the infrastructure is shot to hell. Kansas will become the new Mississippi.
Wisconsin is playing catch up w Kansas,
If you want to live in a red state, you better get used to the smells.
The Northeast state was once one of the richest places in America, and now it’s losing out to the rest of America in nearly every category — jobs, population and income.
It’s still one of the richest states.
Yaay, I hope they all move out here to Vegas!
For the Elon Musk bashers here on HBB. The new energy storage products are taking off. (I’m not sure the residential battery pack will be popular; it’s the industrial storage that is taking off):
“In a research report published today, Dougherty & Co. analysts were optimistic over Tesla Motors Inc’s (NASDAQ:TSLA) new energy arm, as they reiterated a Buy rating and raised the price target of Tesla stock from $325 to $355. ($249 yesterday’s close).
Dougherty had discussions with many companies and experts, and it also conducted a countrywide survey of 30 solar panel installers. After carrying out researches on Tesla’s energy arm, the research firm believes that Tesla’s entry into the utility storage market is likely to disrupt it, as the EV giant’s “primary advantage is in offering a turn-key solution, at scale and at favorable cost.”
According to Bloomberg, Tesla received orders worth approximately $800 million for its batteries in the first few days, following its launch. On Thursday, Advanced Microgrid Solutions announced that it has agreed to buy 500 Tesla Powerwall batteries…”
‘they reiterated a Buy rating and raised the price target of Tesla stock from $325 to $355.’
249.14
52wk Range: 181.40 - 291.42
EPS (ttm): -3.18
Div & Yield: N/A (N/A)
http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=tsla&ql=1
Some of the best returns I’ve ever had were on growth stocks that had negative earnings. $10k invested in Amazon in 2010 is worth over $30k today — and the whole time they never turned a profit.
“… and the whole time they never turned a profit.”
The potential, sell the potential, the possibility, the promise of turning a profit.
If they turned a profit then its worth, its value, could be logically measured.
But if there is no profit then its worth, its value cannot be logically measured hence something else (the price rise, maybe) needs to be used to determine its worth, its value.
If you are going to measure the value of something determined by, say, fundamentals and the value of the fundamentals do not vary all that much then you should not expect the value to vary all that much.
But if you are going to measure the value of something by price instead of by fundamentals then this “value” can drastically and radically and rapidly move up and down because the value will be tied directly to the price and the determination of the price is something that is decided by at root are votes.
Votes cast by voters who may or not be of sound mind.
‘I’m shocked by one aspect of the story of the guy selling $30 hot dogs to tourists near the World Trade Center — shocked that he was fired.’
‘As for that other detail — selling a hot dog for considerably “more than it’s worth,” so what? Apple makes a huge profit on every device it sells. Does anyone think Apple is guilty of “price gouging”? Moreover, a hot dog is guaranteed not to shatter when it falls on the sidewalk, and I’ve never had to reboot my sauerkraut. No hot dog has ever been rendered obsolete by a new model that has a slightly thinner bun.’
‘Hot-dog guy Ahmed Mohammed — let’s be accurate and call him Hot Dog Hero — was simply exercising his right to sell stuff in the marketplace for whatever he can get for it. Why begrudge him a large markup if he took advantage of the fact that some people are stupid? Taking advantage of stupidity is an important driver of the economic engine.’
‘Without taking advantage of stupid people, how would haute-couture designers sell a couple yards of shiny fabric for $2,000? Without taking advantage of stupid people, how would the New York State Lottery rake in $3 billion in profit? Without taking advantage of stupid people, how would the Franklin Mint have sold off millions of dollars worth of plastic copies of Jackie Onassis’ plastic pearls? If the stupidity were ever wrung out of the system, our economy would be the size of Bangladesh’s.’
‘All of these stupid people are exactly what Hot Dog Hero’s “victims” were — willing customers. There was no coercion. No one was being lied to. What your mother said when you were talked into doing something dumb still applies: “Did anyone hold a gun to your head?” At worst, HDH was guilty of a little nontransparency, but if that policy were consistently enforced the courts would be overloaded with restaurant operators who don’t publish their cocktail prices on the menu.’
‘Sorry, tourists, if you feel you were “ripped off.” Let’s look at what you got for your $30. You got a) a tasty snack; b) enough bacteria to inoculate you against any number of diseases; c) a stellar anecdote about American capitalist depravity to take back to Düsseldorf or Lyon; d) a useful lesson that there’s a sucker born every minute — such as the minute listed on your birth certificate.’
http://nypost.com/2015/05/22/the-30-hot-dog-guy-is-a-capitalist-hero/
Except food vendors are supposed to post their prices by law.
Instead mad Mo acts like the American health care and college industry….
Charging whatever they feel like and the max you can pay. Especially gouging the weakest and ignorant.
Combotechie: “But if there is no profit then its worth, its value cannot be logically measured hence something else (the price rise, maybe) needs to be used to determine its worth, its value.”
The key to the stock game isn’t what the company is worth, it’s what investors think the company is going to be worth.
Wasn’t the Dot.Com era fun? No need for research other than seeing if a stock had a “dot.com” imbedded in its name somewhere.
If it had it then buy it. If it didn’t have it then it was old school or rust belt or something else that was … was repugnant.
No earnings? Who cares? No sales? Who cares? No PRODUCT even? Again, who cares?
What mattered was the price, or rather what the price was doing.
Is the price going up? Yes? Then that’s a buy signal. No need to look any further.
Easy money.
They got your $10k.
How many batteries would sell without massive subsidies?
I don’t know. How much oil would Exxon sell if they didn’t get their massive subsidies like free military protection, exploration write-offs, etc.? How much corn would Big Ag sell if they didn’t get their huge subsidies?
The subsidies numbers for big oil are as phony as the AGW data and put out by the same people. The green crony capitalists who could not exist without the subsidies and their allies in government.
I was reading about those house batteries the other day. Bloomberg had a guy saying they don’t make sense financially. But I got to thinking about land prices. Supposedly a full-on system would be $100k. But if you wanted an off-grid house on a lot of acreage, the $100k could be more than made up by lower land costs.
I wish him well and hope some way to store electricity becomes more doable. But saying a money loser will go up a bunch more seems like a pant load.
Readers react to Elon Musk’s $4.9 billion in government subsidies
By Jerry Hirsch
June 1, 2015
Readers reacted strongly to a Times story this weekend reporting that Los Angeles entrepreneur Elon Musk’s companies — Tesla, SolarCity and SpaceX — have benefited from an estimated $4.9 billion in government support.
The figure comprises a variety of government incentives, including grants, tax breaks, factory construction, discounted loans and environmental credits that Tesla can sell. It also includes tax credits and rebates to buyers of solar panels and electric cars.
http://www.latimes.com/…/autos/la-fi-hy-elon-musk-subsidies-comments-20150601-story.html - 148k -
Next round on the war on cash will be a doozy:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-06-05/next-round-war-cash-will-be-even-more-aggressive
So what can you do?
Don’t save cash in safe deposit box. You can store it in a safe of your own, but be sure to have it inside zip lock bags (squeeze all the air out, then seal) and add dessicant. Open the safe every few weeks and lay out the cash to dry out any moisture.
Another tactic: buy tenth ounce gold coins and store those in a safe deposit box. Keep stacking.
Another tactic: Buy a set amount of crypto currency every week. Maybe $10 per week, maybe $50 per week, whatever amount is comfortable: Bitcoin, Litecoin, DarkCoin, Dogecoin, etc.
“Another tactic: buy tenth ounce gold coins and store those in a safe deposit box.”
Yes, place your trust (and your gold) with your local banker.
Keep in mind:
“Local, state and federal law enforcement agencies can access your safe deposit box. If the appropriate court can be persuaded that there is “reasonable cause” to suspect there is something illegal in the box such as stolen cash, explosives, guns or drugs, the box can be forced open.
“The Internal Revenue Service can place a hold on your safe deposit box. If there is a dispute with the IRS, the contents in your safe deposit box are considered assets. The IRS can freeze your assets until the dispute is resolved.
“Private Individuals can also put a freeze on the assets in your safe deposit box. This can be done by going before a judge and proving there is a legal dispute pertaining to a debt.”
And here’s more:
http://www.dinarrecaps.com/our-blog/safe-deposit-box-laws-rulesregulations-tipswarnings
Cops can break into your residence anytime they like with a “probable cause.” Your home is not your castle. No safer than a bank safe deposit box.
Hide your stuff.
Get yourself a safe but do not put your valuables in the safe - maybe some stuff but not the good stuff; The good stuff you hide somewhere else.
When the cops or whomever break into your house then they will focus their attention on your safe and if they take the stuff that’s in your safe they will think they took what is most valuable to you.
Q. When you are searching for something at what point do you end your search?
A. When you find whatever it was you were searching for.
If somebody breaks into your house searching for valuables then make the search easy for him by providing him with a safe for him to find and maybe break into or even steal.
You reminded me of my all-time-favorite personal example of this principle.
Back when I was single and lived in an apartment, I was part of a professional wedding band. As luck would have it, the one time that I had $30,000 worth of musical instruments and equipment sitting in my living room ready to schlepp to an evening engagement was when a burglar broke into my place during the day, while I was away at my day job.
When I arrived home, I noticed something was amiss, as evidently somebody had rifled through my personal belongings, including the musical instruments (mine and my colleagues’). The cases had obviously been opened, but the instruments and other musical equipment were all still present.
On entering my bedroom, I noticed the shiny chrome piggy bank my parents gave me as a young child sitting open and empty on my dresser top, devoid of the $15 in change that I had saved away inside. So far as I could tell, this is the only thing the burgler decided to steal.
What about “illegal gold”. Could authorities access your safe deposit box if they suspected you may be hoarding The Precious inside?
I think I would suspect over 50% of the safe deposit boxes have precious metals in them.
The real question is this: Is it really going to make an impression on cutting the debt if all the precious metals owned by Americans is confiscated? Particularly different now is that we had decades of fiat currency, while in 1933 almost every American worker was paid in gold and silver.
I submit that most savings in 1933 were in the form of gold and silver. And yes by golly, confiscation of the gold made a difference.
But in 2015 I ask where most of the American savings are. $4.5 trillion. Hello? http://www.americanbenefitscouncil.org/documents2013/401k_stats.pdf
Why would the Feds piss off every American by going door to door and busting in to steal gold or busting their safe deposit boxes when they can electronically take 10% of everyone’s holdings in defined benefits and pay $450 billion of the $18 trillion debt?
Does anyone here really think the American public holdings in gold is anywhere close to $4.5 trillion?
Bill has a safe deposit box at the local branch of the First National Bank of Quaker Oats.
Good for their environment and good for our platinum investments:
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/motoring/2015-06/05/content_20917854.htm
Zero Hedge = shills for gold dealers. Undermine confidence in currency, sell gold.
You did not read the article, FDR-fetishist. It did not discuss gold. I did.
“FDR-fetishist” <– LOL, good one
You’re right I didn’t read the article nor do I read any Zero Hedge article. I do welcome reasonable analysis, whether bullish or bearish, but it’s got to be sober and well-grounded. I find ZH to be over the top amateurish clap-trap. At ZH they’ve been saying the world is going to end tomorrow for several years now.
For the pure joy of irritating a mindless DNC shill, I hereby post a ZH story about who most of those newly-created, low-wage jobs are going to (hint: the tidal wave of enlistees for Comrad Pelosi’s permanent Democrat Supermajority).
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-06-06/illegal-immigrant-recovery-presenting-most-stunning-number-may-jobs-report
Yup, yup, and yup! Stagnant wages for the older workers.
By the way, my sister’s rent in San Rafael increased by 10%. She just moved in a year ago. Her wages have gone nowhere. Eventually she will be economically forced out of California.
Zero Hedge = shills for gold dealers. Undermine confidence in currency, sell gold.
Yes, we should all have unbounded faith and confidence in green pieces of paper printed in their trillions by the Fed and backed by…nothing.
Ben has a YT channel?
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCr0kVPTPfgQ9WHYvA4qB04g
Yeah, I’m going to get a few more done before I start publicizing it more. I’m still learning about the editing, etc. What really got me interested was this camera that came with my phone. I watch a lot of YT and decided this was a good time to put some energy into it. (I wish YT had been around in 2005). I’m planning to go on the road starting this summer. I’m getting an HBB mobile, really gonna track this thing down and show it to people. Maybe Canada too, maybe Australia and China, who knows?
“Maybe Canada too, maybe Australia and China…”
Looking forward to seeing your posts from the Great Wall. Maybe you could take some ideas from what these guys did.
It needs more cowbell.
“I’m getting an HBB mobile”
SCHWEEET! I want to see this rig Jonesy.
Don’t get too excited, it’s just going to be a little truck. But after driving two used vehicles to Toyota Heaven, making 250k and 165k miles, I’m going to try a new one. I can cover more ground without worrying about breaking down in the desert. Plus, I haven’t had a truck in a long time and I need one.
Nice choice. And yeah… Being far from home with a rig that has >100k on the dial is a risk I wouldn’t take.
‘ “I’m getting an HBB mobile”’
I read that first as ” get to the HBB mobile” . Like, get in the choppa.
Ben may follow that Super Size guy with exposes. God, hope he doesn’t turn out like Adam Sandler.
“I’m planning to go on the road starting this summer.”
+1 The HBB… where the rubber meets the road!
And now for some Native American music
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvqMvxdZTVE - 366k -
Time to update your musical tastes, PS.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fd6aXM8WHGw
What happened to the guy’s head?
“What happened to the guy’s head?”
Looking at the actual lyrics I think this guys head is trying to talk some girls head into doing something that if he were a white guy that belonged to a Fraternity instead of an American Indian would probably have some group protesting on a campus if it happened today.
Hey (hey) What’s the matter with your head? yeah…
Hey (hey) What’s the matter with your mind and all your sighing?
And-a ooh-ohh
Hey (hey) Nothin’s a matter with your head, baby, find it
Come on and find it
Hell, with it, baby, ’cause you’re fine and you’re mine
And you look so divine
Come and get your love
Read more: Redbone - Come And Get Your Love Lyrics | MetroLyrics
“Time to update your musical tastes, PS.”
Update what?
Spoon didn’t open this 2014 movie.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NacorzSwf0M - 232k -
Although I have never actually seen the movie the green chick looks pretty hot.
It’s a fun movie. Very clever.
Remember the 2014 predictions for a stock market correction? Seems like they didn’t pan out; any thoughts on the reasons?
Stockman’s Best of the Week, Stockman’s Corner
The Implosion Is Near: Signs Of The Bubble’s Last Days
by David Stockman • July 18, 2014
The central banks of the world are massively and insouciantly pursuing financial instability. That’s the inherent result of the 68 straight months of zero money market rates that have been forced into the global financial system by the Fed and its confederates at the BOJ, ECB and BOE. ZIRP fuels endless carry trades and the harvesting of every manner of profit spread between negligible “funding” costs and positive yields and returns on a wide spectrum of risk assets.
Moreover, this central bank sponsored regime of ZIRP and money market pegging contains a built-in accelerator. As carry trade speculators drive asset prices steadily higher and fixed income spreads steadily thinner—- fear and short interest is driven out of the casino, making buying on the dips ever more profitable and less risky. Indeed, the explicit promise by central banks that the money market rate will remain frozen for the duration and that ample warning of any change in rate policy will be “transparently” announced is the single worst policy imaginable from the point of view of financial stability. It means that the speculator’s worst nightmare—–suddenly going “upside down” due to a sharp spike in funding costs—-is eliminated by central bank writ.
Stated differently, ZIRP systematically dismantles the market’s natural stability mechanisms. One natural deterrent to excessive financial gambling, for example, is the cost of hedging a speculator’s portfolio of “risk assets” against a broad market plunge. In an honest market environment, hedging costs consume a high share of profits, thereby sharply limiting risk appetites and the amount of capital attracted to speculative trading.
By contrast, an extended regime of ZIRP, coupled with the central banks’ perceived “put” under risk assets, drives the cost of “downside insurance” to negligible levels because S&P 500 put writers are emboldened and subsidized to pick up nickels (i.e. options premium) in front of a benign central bank steamroller. This ultra-cheap downside insurance, in turn, attracts ever larger inflows of speculative capital to the casino.
This corrosive game has been underway ever since the Greenspan Fed panicked on Black Monday in October 1987 and flooded the stock market with liquidity. It is now such an endemic feature of Wall Street that it is falsely assumed to be the normal order of things. But, then, would anyone have been picking up nickels in front of the Volcker steamroller?
This dynamic is evident in the chart of the S&P 500 since the March 2009 bottom. The dips have gotten shallower and shallower as ZIRP and other pro-risk central bank policies have eroded the market’s natural defenses against excessive speculation. As of mid-2014, therefore, it can be fairly said that fear and short interest have been extinguished almost entirely. The Wall Street casino has thus become a one-way market that coils dangerously upward, divorced completely from the fundamentals of earnings and cash flow and real world economic conditions and prospects.
…
I expected the market to tumble in 2013. 2014 was an election year. Maybe that is why it did okay.
Again when you need to tap your assets and convert to cash, sell the biggest gainers. The last of my former company stock is a couple hundred shares I bought for $2. Now priced $38. I sold about 1500 shares of that batch at $30. Bought that batch in March 2009. Proceeds of course keep my credit card balance at $0, and I have been buying two year notes.
Did someone here lose their ass?
“Stray donkey wanders dirt roads, hee haws all hours and gets frisky”
http://www.newsherald.com/news/news-of-the-weird/stray-donkey-wanders-dirt-roads-hee-haws-all-hours-and-gets-frisky-1.475921
Disclose your losses!
Speaking of……
Falling prices Poet….falling prices.
New documents prove Hillary Clinton censored YouTube video
Hillary aide contacted CEO of Google about blocked video
by Andrew Demeter | Minds | June 6, 2015
In response to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s usage of her private e-mail account to conduct State Department business, 15 pages of correspondence between Clinton and others were released online via the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) late last month.
One such document, with the inconspicuous subject line “Google and YouTube,” reveals one of Clinton’s staffers forwarding the personal contact information of Google and YouTube’s CEOs to the Office of the Secretary, whom just one hour later responds, “the block [on the unknown video] will stay through Monday.”
However, none of this should be surprising. Just last month, veteran journalist Luke Rudkowski was censored by Google for posting a video about — you guessed it! — Hillary Rodham Clinton. This incestuous relationship between tech companies and the federal government is no longer conspiratorial hearsay, given that Clinton also recently hired a longtime Google executive to manage her upcoming presidential campaign.
Despite this addition to Clinton’s growing laundry list of scandals, she’ll likely be voted right into office by an uninformed American public.
Maintenance guy did a very good job on my pipe repair on Thursday.
http://postimg.org/image/43s63dv2b/
I don’t know who did the replastering Friday,
http://postimg.org/image/jbsigxi0d/
but the guy who repaired the copper pipe did the painting today:
http://postimg.org/image/ji2mq335n/
He did a very good job. I’m sure I would have botched the deal myself.
My cost? $0.00
Renting is freedom
See? Nice. Good you photo-document that stuff. Just in case.
Did they use polybutylene for that repair?
i don’t know.
I Guess not.
Other piping materials not to be confused with PB:
PEX (pictured at right): Common in radiant-heating systems, this cross-linked polyethylene can be black, blue or red. It is more easily coiled and more flexible than PB. It can withstand higher temperatures than polyethylene.
Anyway, looks like the dude did a nice patch job, orange peel and splatter is a little tricky with a hopper.
This is the first time I ever hear of PEX. Yeah the red colored tubing. Interesting.
PEX is what you install in your rental home in Detroit.
Worth absolutely nothing to the scrappers. Make sure to put a large sign on front of house telling what kind of pipes are inside.
phony scandals
Hillary