Main Street’s view remains very different than Wall Street’s
As we celebrate the one year birthday of the current bull market, a key characteristic that still looms one year in is the lack of conviction and confidence in the economic outlook for those on Main Street versus the more optimistic view of those who work on Wall Street. I mentioned earlier today that in the Feb NFIB small business optimism index, those small businesses that “expect a better economy” fell to the lowest since March ’09. Those that think its a “good time to expand” fell to the lowest since June ’09. Those that “plan to increase inventory” fell to within 1 pt of the lowest since March ’09. Also today, the March Investors Business Daily Economic Optimism index (which claims a “good track record of foreshadowing the UoM and Conference Board confidence #’s) fell to its lowest level since March ’09, falling 1.4 pts from Feb. The Personal Financial Outlook component fell to the lowest since Feb ’09.
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March 9th, 2010 at 11:38 am
I for one had a thriving home remodeling business and invested in commodities and stocks. I lost my entire nest egg overnight in the commodities market in Oct 08 about the same time the housing market crashed. Without work i entered the stock market as a stay home job. I lost another $50,000 there because no one seemed to know or want to say at that time that the game was rigged and the market was just for suckers that donate to Goldman Sachs and their kind. Now everyone knows it and just plays along.
It reminds me of the movie “The Magic Christian” where people like traders who put money above all else dive into a pool of raw human sewage to retreive the $100 bills that were thrown in. There always has to be someone on the other side of the trade you know.
Im now looking for free health care, mortgage, and maybe go on welfare. If its good enough for the banks , its good enough for me . You know the little guy they crushed and then got on the biggest corporate welfare program ever devised. I think everyone should go on a government program. Why are these programs reserved for the ultra rich? We paid for them and their bonuses.
March 9th, 2010 at 12:26 pm
Phoney up the main street to keep up appearancesLOL.
Check out this video at
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March 9th, 2010 at 12:27 pm
I would be much more confident, too, if I knew that The Beard would hand me, at zero interest, any amount of money necessary to compensate for any clusterfuck I might happen to create.
The rest of us don’t have the margin of so much as an error in judgment.
4 legs good, 2 legs bad.
March 9th, 2010 at 3:10 pm
The reality of things are so distorted by the vested interests which include our Govt captive of Financial Oligarchy, the line between right and wrong, true and false, fair vs foul play is hardly exists! No wonder people are confused! Only the ones, who set or changing the rules at their whims are the winners in this rigged market.
I will not surprised if there are chain of explosive and violent events secondary to Social unrest, already in motion which may make 9/11 insignificant. I hope I am wrong!
March 9th, 2010 at 4:43 pm
[...] – “As we celebrate the one year birthday of the current bull market, a key characteristic that still looms one year in is the lack of conviction and confidence in the economic outlook for those on Main Street versus the more optimistic view of those who work on Wall Street,” Peter Boockvar writes. [...]
March 9th, 2010 at 7:51 pm
@TLG: Hear you. Been there done that more than once.
Years ago I had “inside” information on aspartame approval. Bought in. Bought options. Interest rate was 20%. Sold options.
The real insiders flushed out the others. And then aspartame got approved.
At least I was inside the dot.come bubble and knew what a fraud that was, and got out. Some of my closest friends did not listen and got burned terribly.
What’s going on now is a fraud again.
BR got in early. Took the ride. And is smart enough to get out soon. He’s as much as said that. Just has not said when. And that’s fair.
OPM. It’s a casino. Investing? What the F is that?
March 9th, 2010 at 8:39 pm
Our country is split between the privileged institutions for the privileged, including Wall St, and declining institutions, including employment and income, for the rest of us.
The rest of us are irrelevant to the privileged and to Wall St. We are not needed for increased prosperity for the privileged. Our nation is governed, even with a Democratic administration and Congress, with a bias toward increasing the wealth of the privileged. The right wing is our permanent government due to lobbyists, campaign money, fear of disruption for the privileged and passive acquiescence by the rest of us in our decline.
We are moving further toward a temporarily successful empire waging perpetual war and a permanently declining democracy. God help the US, its governance so close to Mexico’s, so far from Canada’s.