Lance on Apr 07 2008 | Filed under: Economics, Investing, Lance's Page
Personally I think we have been negative since November. Given the large positive number in the third quarter, the barely above break even number in the fourth quarter virtually guarantees that the economy went negative sometime in November and December. However, if we are not, it is highly likely coming. Here is a graphic which [...]
Lance on Feb 25 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, Investing, Lance's Page, regulation
Regular readers know that I have been harping on the likely collapse in housing since this blog began. At this point I am hardly an outlier in being concerned, which means now the politicians and experts are ready to ride to the rescue. Proposals to increase regulation, bailout mortgage insurers, banks and even homeowners are [...]
Lance on Feb 02 2008 | Filed under: Economics, Investing, Lance's Page
The Fourth quarter GDP numbers came in this week, and then the Fed went ahead and cut rates further. That is 125 basis points in about a week.!
I have a roundup of news, related opinion and other reactions at Risk and Return.
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Lance on Jan 26 2008 | Filed under: Investing, Lance's Page
(cross posted at Risk and Return)
So, we now have a new record for trader fraudulently losing billions on bad trades. Nick Leeson will soon join the 1972 Dolphins as great, but behind by the numbers. Just like then I have a niggling thought in the back of my mind, and so does Adam at Adams [...]
Lance on Jan 25 2008 | Filed under: Economics, Investing
As I noted earlier, Dale Franks was curious about how Harley Davidson (HOG) would do on its latest earnings release:
One earnings report to watch this week, though, is Harley-Davidson (HOG). It’s a solid company with a loyal customer base—I’m one of them actually—but, motorcycles are a luxury item. For every guy [...]
Lance on Jan 23 2008 | Filed under: Investing, Lance's Page
(Cross posted at Risk and Return)
This is a very cool look at the market carnage of the last few days geographically from the Wall Street Journal. You can go from one day to the next and watch how the markets in various places rose and fell*. Hat tip: James Hamilton (who has interesting observations on [...]
Lance on Jan 23 2008 | Filed under: Economics, Election 2008, Investing, Lance's Page
Richard Rahn pushes for the indexing of capital gains due to inflation as part of the stimulus.
Accounting for inflation in this way has the advantages of producing more short-term revenue to the Treasury as long-term gains are “unlocked.” Furthermore, lowering the cost of capital would stimulate investment and the stock markets, and would increase the [...]
Lance on Jan 22 2008 | Filed under: Economics, Investing, Lance's Page
From The New York Times:
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Reserve, confronted with a global stock sell-off fanned by increased fears of a recession, cut a key interest rate by three-quarters of a percentage point on Tuesday.
Quicker and larger than expected. I am curious whether investors will, at the margin, consider this a move to celebrate [...]
Lance on Jan 22 2008 | Filed under: Investing, Lance's Page
From the New York Times:
Heavy selling hit each Asian and European stock market as soon as it opened. Some of Asia’s easternmost exchanges, which had closed on Monday before the sharpest declines occurred in India and then Europe, suffered particularly steep drops.
The Japanese stock market dropped 5.7 percent, for the worst two-day loss in [...]
Lance on Jan 18 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, Investing, Lance's Page, regulation
(cross posted at Risk and Return)
Ben Bernanke gives Congress and the President the green light to take steps to stimulate the economy along with a warning:
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Lance on Jan 18 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, Investing, Lance's Page, regulation
Chris asked what he thought the Federal Reserve could have done differently. I gave him an answer, but there was more to be said. My full answer is here. Scroll around, there is a lot more on the what could have been done, what might be done, and the general risks which now surround our [...]
Lance on Jan 15 2008 | Filed under: Economics, Investing, Lance's Page
(cross posted at Risk and Return)
Paper Economy has taken a close look at what it will take to get inflation adjusted housing prices in Massachusetts back to trend over a five year period. It should be noted that for this to happen sooner the decline would have to be deeper (due to inflation doing less [...]
Lance on Jan 15 2008 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, Investing
Alea notices that a widely cited paper claiming that Democratic Presidents are better than Republican presidents for the stock market doesn’t hold water:
This paper shows that the statistical tests applied by the authors of the study were wrong, and that, once corrected, the difference in stock market returns under different presidential regimes is not meaningful.
The [...]
Lance on Jan 11 2008 | Filed under: Baton Rouge, Economics, Investing, Lance's Page
We have a number of things in the works over the next few days here at A Second Hand Conjecture. We will let you know more over the next couple of days. I can only say I am extremely excited.
That is my picture, the scruffy 40+ year old, beer drinking, female ogling, punk/alt rock loving, [...]
Lance on Jan 11 2008 | Filed under: Economics, Investing, Lance's Page, Media, Technology
A fascinating look at the development of the iPhone and its impact upon the structure of the telecom industry. More than being a snazzy and popular device, the iPhone has changed how the relationship between players in the telecom industry works. There are long term economic, and yes, investment ramifications in this change.
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Lance on Dec 05 2007 | Filed under: Economics, Humor, Investing, Lance's Page
I think this explains it better than I have, at least it is more entertaining:
Technorati Tags: housing, investing, economics, hedge funds, mortgage debt, crisis, humor
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Lance on Oct 14 2007 | Filed under: Economics, Investing, Lance's Page
Elise Ackerman gives us the rundown on the cascading effect of Google’s IPO and growth:
A Mercury News analysis of company documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission provides a rough estimate of the wealth that erupted from the famous search engine, spreading throughout the Bay Area and far beyond.
From 2004 through 2006, the most [...]
Lance on Sep 04 2007 | Filed under: Investing, Lance's Page
Returning to an old subject we haven’t discussed in a while, I suggest this article on a couple of funds run by Islamic principles. Given the difficulties the financial sector is having a fund which avoids them (because they profit from interest) probably looks pretty attractive right now, especially given the funds stellar performance. I [...]
MichaelW on Aug 31 2007 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, History, Investing, Libertarianism, MichaelW's Page
Does the blogosphere make history more relevant? Is it possible that Santayana’s famous admonishment is made less likely by bloggers routinely wielding history as a foil to those arguments favoring actions proven desultory in the past? And that’s not to mention how blogs go about correcting historical inaccuracies trotted out by our betters. [...]
Lance on Aug 23 2007 | Filed under: Economics, Investing, Lance's Page, regulation
From Robert Lawson:
I hopped on the Chipotle website the other day looking for nutritional information on my favorite meal (carnitas burrito, rice, black beans, mild, hot, and green salsa, lettuce). But thanks to the nanny state, THEY CAN’T TELL ME!.
Unfortunately, for the time being Chipotle can no longer publicly post calorie and nutritional information on [...]
Lance on Aug 15 2007 | Filed under: Economics, Investing, Lance's Page
One of the sure signs that problems are a pretty likely outcome is when risk is priced at levels which are unlikely to pay enough to adequately reward investors over time. When the world gets a bit too complacent, conditions seem perfect and volatility is low, we tend to project that into the future. Thus, [...]
Lance on Aug 10 2007 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, Investing, Lance's Page
Mickey Kaus gets it right:
“My people have been in this game for 25 years . . . They are losing their jobs”: I thought Wall Streeters were paid big money because they took big risks. Capitalism, etc. But when those risks actually materialize, and the Wall Streeters are actually threatened with large losses that might [...]
Lance on May 24 2007 | Filed under: Investing, Lance's Page
Dave Leonhardt asks the question in the New York Times:
Last year, the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index jumped 14 percent, while the average hedge fund returned less than 13 percent, after investment fees, according to Hedge Fund Research in Chicago…Since 2000, the average hedge fund hasn’t done any better, after fees, than the market as [...]
Lance on May 13 2007 | Filed under: Environment, Investing, Lance's Page, Technology
To get rich is glorious in China nowadays. Scientists are no exception.
A top home-grown inventor, 41-year-old Ma Xin, is currently engineering a reverse takeover of a small Singapore-listed investment company, Rowsley, in a deal worth 2.7 billion Singapore dollars ($1.6 billion) that would bring a small part of his high-tech corporate empire, Sinocome Group, to [...]
Lance on May 09 2007 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Investing, Lance's Page
I think I am going to be sick. Luckily Tom Maguire chose being clever instead:
Left unreported by the AP - John Edwards built his 28,000 square foot home to learn about homelessness in America, and he got a $400 haircut to learn about the emerging baby-boomer crisis of male pattern baldness.
Lance on May 01 2007 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Investing, Lance's Page, Media
I can’t tell you what will come of this, or if it should really matter any more, but Carl Bernstein is publishing a book about Hillary that is promised to shed light on a number of controversies and Hillary’s less than forthcoming and deceptive explanations for them.
Drawing on a trove of private papers from Hillary [...]
Joshua Foust on Apr 24 2007 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, Foreign affairs, Investing, Military Matters, social science
Cross-posted at The Conjecturer.
The Pentagon
James Clapper, the UnderSecDef for Intel, wants the TALON database scrapped. This is because it recorded not just legitimate threats to U.S. bases, but information on civilian protests and anti-war marches. In other words, it had morphed into a tool for the abuse of power, and Clapper is right to want [...]
Lance on Apr 15 2007 | Filed under: Developmental economics, Domestic Politics, Economics, Foreign affairs, Investing, Libertarianism
According to BRIC Consulting, by the year 2040 The BRIC Countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China) will have surpassed the combined GDP of the G-6 (US, UK, Italy, France, Germany, Japan) as of the year 2050:
The US will of course do rather well according to this study, especially on a per capita basis:
Massive populations plus growing [...]
Lance on Apr 03 2007 | Filed under: Economics, Investing, Lance's Page
One of the real points of contention amongst those concerned with economic policy is the increased stability of economic growth and why it has occurred. It is also an area of real concern for investors, for economic stability has some interesting affects. My interpretation:
Increased stability leads to less risk aversion, thus an increase in valuation [...]
Lance on Mar 13 2007 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, Investing, Lance's Page, Law, Libertarianism, Media
I may surprise some of you, but I am generally not fan of regulation. … What? No gasps of incredulity?
So why? Too many reasons to count, but I’ll suggest this is a good example of one of them. Thus I will steal an entire post from jk at Three Sources:
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
The Democrats are in charge and [...]
MichaelW on Feb 20 2007 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, Investing, Law, MichaelW's Page
As the “Scooter” Libby trial draws to a close, speculation abounds as to the final outcome. According to Chicago Boyz (HT: Insty), the Intrade betting market sets the chances of Libby being convicted at around 70% for.
Despite wishful thinking by some conservative pundits, the odds that Libby will be convicted, as reflected [...]
Keith_Indy on Jan 16 2007 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, Investing, Keith's Page
Michael said the other day:
Even so, it’s getting harder and harder for Democrats to lay any fiscal irresponsibility at the feet of tax cuts, when such cuts are at least partially responsible for the increased revenues, and federal spending continues to grow, albeit at a slower rate. Ratchet down the spending side (sharply) and we [...]
The Poet Omar on Jan 11 2007 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, Investing, The Poet Omar's Page
This is an interesting take on the new Dem Congress from Real Estate Broker and “The Apprentice 3″ winner, Kendra Todd. I’m hardly an expert on matters of real estate speculation, but I’d like to examine this brief articles contentions in a bit more detail.
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Lance on Dec 22 2006 | Filed under: Economics, Humor, Investing, Lance's Page, Music
Yields are low throughout the world, and despite the rising equity markets low yields on equities mean low long run returns on them as well as bonds. So we may actually be facing an end to the decade characterized by growth punctuated by either choppy to low returns on financial assets or a massive bubble [...]
Lance on Nov 09 2006 | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Economics, Investing, Lance's Page
Slate has pointed me towards information that we have never before had access to on the political class. The Center For Responsible Politics has been crunching the financial disclosure forms of our dear leaders. One interesting aspect to me (go figure) was the composition of the assets in their portfolios:
The nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics [...]
MichaelW on Oct 11 2006 | Filed under: Economics, Foreign affairs, Investing, MichaelW's Page
Following up on my previous post (”The Bomb Heard ‘Round The World“), in which I proposed no solution, a rather insane idea occurred to me last night that I will now share with you.
First Premise: The generous giving of private individuals in the aftermath of a crisis is truly astounding, and often surpasses [...]
Lance on Aug 21 2006 | Filed under: Culture, Domestic Politics, Economics, Foreign affairs, Investing, Lance's Page, Religion and theology, Uncategorized
Tyler Cowen over at Marginal Revolution had a reader ask him which philosophers he would recommend she should read. The discussion was interesting; I decided a good starting point would be Hayek, Popper, Quine and Hume. I also suggested Plato along with Aristotle’s Ethics, Merleau Ponty to cover the phenomenologist’s, skip Bertrand Russell except for [...]
Lance on Aug 17 2006 | Filed under: Economics, Investing, Lance's Page
(Listening notes: Veruca Salt- I watched Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory tonight. Just me, no kids, I don’t want to hear any snickering from you people;)
Economist: That looks like a $20 bill lying on the ground over there.
Other Economist: It couldn’t be. If it were, somebody would have picked it up already.
Or so one [...]
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