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Please use the comments to demonstrate your own ignorance, unfamiliarity with empirical data, ability to repeat discredited memes, and lack of respect for scientific knowledge. Also, be sure to create straw men and argue against things I have neither said nor even implied. Any irrelevancies you can mention will also be appreciated. Lastly, kindly forgo all civility in your discourse . . . you are, after all, anonymous.

24 Responses to “Wednesday Reads”

1. franklin411 Says:
   April 7th, 2010 at 5:13 pm

   Blogosphere ruminating on the possibility of Larry Summers’ departure:

   http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2010/04/is-larry-summers-leaving/38602/

2. Barry Ritholtz Says:
   April 7th, 2010 at 5:13 pm

   franklin411

   I have to give Charlie Gasparino props on this one — he was right — and ahead of the curve on this one:

   Larry Summers to Leave White House ? March 29th, 2010
   http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2010/03/larry-summers-to-leave-white-house/:

3. Mike in Nola Says:
   April 7th, 2010 at 5:14 pm

   Nothin about Greece? ZH features it every other post. While they are the equivalent of the NY Daily News, there is something there:

   Banks are facing a run: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/edbfc18c-4268-11df-8c60-00144feabdc0.html

   Spreads blowing out: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/d449047c-426b-11df-8c60-00144feabdc0.html

   http://www.ft.com/cms/s/3/6b132c8a-4220-11df-9ac4-00144feabdc0.html

   While theyu

4. Mike in Nola Says:
   April 7th, 2010 at 5:14 pm

   Damn keyboard. Can’t wait to get mine back.

5. Michael M Says:
   April 7th, 2010 at 5:17 pm

   Municipal finance datapoint of the day, Latvia edition

   “Municipalities have incredibly high wealth-to-sophistication ratios, which makes them prime targets for banks such as Deutsche, which contrived to collect a whopping 46% of the total expense of the bridge in Riga as interest payments. All too often, as in for instance the rules about who is and isn’t allowed to invest in hedge funds, or count as a Qualified Institutional Buyer of fixed-income instruments, the main criterion is not sophistication but wealth. And while banks love rich clients, they love unsophisticated clients even more, and when they get both in one package, they are willing to do things like pay Goldman Sachs $3 million to stop competing for a certain client’s business.”

   http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2010/04/07/municipal-finance-datapoint-of-the-day-latvia-edition/

6. callistenes Says:
   April 7th, 2010 at 5:25 pm

   Here’s something juicy concerning Bob Rubin that you should check out.
   Apparently he was very well warned about Citi’s sub prime fiasco in the making.
   Where are the damned clawbacks for that last 100 mil bonus???????????????

   http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aCI4kcTsGd14&pos=6

7. mikderby Says:
   April 7th, 2010 at 5:40 pm

   How about this link to astronomical house prices in Vacnouver? A million dollars on average???? With the loonie at par with the USD – this is serious coin!

   http://news.sympatico.ctv.ca/Canada/ContentPosting?newsitemid=CTVNews%2f20100406%2fvancouver_100406&feedname=CTV-NATIONAL_V3&show=False&number=0&showbyline=True&subtitle=&detect=&abc=abc&date=True

8. MRegan Says:
   April 7th, 2010 at 5:46 pm

   Xstrata to Invest $7 Billion to Boost Copper Output (this means figure out how to buy Peruvian sovereign debt, imho)

   http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601086&sid=apQn_8C2UcbY

   Read up on Antares Minerals. For example:

   http://incakolanews.blogspot.com/2010/04/what-do-subscribers-get-from-ikn-weekly.html

   Also, I recommend becoming familiar with remote sensing of environment subject matter.

9. MRegan Says:
   April 7th, 2010 at 5:48 pm

   @callistenes

   I saw something by Felix Salmon on this as well. Worth a read:

   http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2010/04/07/citi-the-mortgage-underwriters-tale/

   Excerpt:
   “Bowen sent an email to Bob Rubin and other senior Citi executives in November 2007. It had the subject line “URGENT — READ IMMEDIATELY — FINANCIAL ISSUES”, and it explained that Citi had yet to recognize enormous mortgage-related losses. I’m looking forward to the commissioners asking Bowen for some tips on what questions they should put to Rubin tomorrow. That testimony is going to be very interesting indeed.”

10. HarryWanger Says:
    April 7th, 2010 at 6:51 pm

    From the “Recession’s Over” article:

    “The recession is over. The last piece has fallen into place, with the BLS announcement that employment rose in March.”

    I guess that means we started the double dip already.

11. OkieLawyer Says:
    April 7th, 2010 at 7:02 pm

    Re: Falling Water

    I visited the real Falling Water when I worked in SW Pennsylvania in the fall of 2008. I also visited Kentuck Knob, another Frank Lloyd Wright house which is right down the road near Ohiopyle. I suggest you visit it if you get the chance. And if you are lucky enough to be there in the fall, you might be able to partake of the Buckwheat Festival they have there every year.

    If you have never had them, buckwheat pancakes are taste sour, are thinner, but are supposed to be healthier for you than regular pancakes.

    Some of the nice employees where I stayed took me around and showed me all of the local fair. I have very fond memories of my time there.

12. Mr.E. Says:
    April 7th, 2010 at 7:26 pm

    For the You have to be kidding me file …

    “Airline considers fee for lavatory use”
    http://www.cnn.com/2010/TRAVEL/04/07/ryanair.lavatory.fee/index.html?hpt=T2

    A sure sign the pendulum has swung a bit far. Can’t wait to see how they deal with (a) the ill-prepared passenger with the unexpected need, (b) coin jam.

13. torrie-amos Says:
    April 7th, 2010 at 7:29 pm

    michael m,

    good link, investors in low rate environments reach for yield, muni’s and states reach for the appearance of lower debt while still building there dreams……you know it’s rampant, one day the governments will have enough once they all realized they have been fleeced

14. The kabuki of government « Mercury Rising 鳯女 Says:
    April 7th, 2010 at 7:57 pm

    [...] by Charles II on April 7, 2010 Via Barry Ritholtz, a very interesting article with lessons on how governments really work by Paul Jackson titled, [...]

15. Mr.E. Says:
    April 7th, 2010 at 8:17 pm

    If you like the flickr piece on falling water, suggest you check out the CG movie by Cristóbal Vila, from his website:
    http://www.etereaestudios.com/docs_html/fallingwater_htm/fallingwater_movie_index.htm#

    It’s truly a stunning piece of work.

    If you like that check out his other works
    http://www.etereaestudios.com/docs_html/general_index_htm/works_01.htm

    I am a fan of Nature by Numbers – watch the Fibonacci series unfold.
    http://www.etereaestudios.com/docs_html/nbyn_htm/intro.htm

16. Mr.E. Says:
    April 7th, 2010 at 8:18 pm

    Oops Fallingwater

17. call me ahab Says:
    April 7th, 2010 at 9:31 pm

    I will 2nd Okie’s advice on seeing Falling Water in PA-

    it was built in 1936- and it’s interesting the the size of rooms- especially the kitchen. Nowadays kitchens are ginormous- but the kitchen in this house is tiny-

    but I guess it was the denizen of the servants so was irrelevant to the the owner’s as long as their food could be prepared-

    the kitchen was definitely not there to impress

18. jeff in indy Says:
    April 7th, 2010 at 10:33 pm

    from the Calculated Risk site:

    http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/04/report-bofa-to-increase-foreclosures.html

    and this is just for BAC.

19. How the Common Man Sees It Says:
    April 7th, 2010 at 11:27 pm

    This is bizarre. What if you took a real truck and set it up to be driven in third person perspective like a video game?

    The Videogame Car

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nIRUavithF8&feature=player_embedded#

20. Jim Fickett Says:
    April 8th, 2010 at 2:08 am

    There’s been a lot of talk about the local government funding vehicles in China — you probably saw Victor Shih’s stuff about how local governments have greatly increased debt, indirectly through these vehicles, in order to fund the investment boom.

    Winnie Wu of BofA ML went to the trouble of reading the detailed holdings of over a hundred of the LGFV, and wrote an eye-opening report entitled, “LGFV: the sub-prime trap for China?” Despite the title, and despite expecting serious losses, she expects the losses to be smoothed over and socialized, and to result in decreased demand and a slower economy, rather than an overt financial crisis. The timeframe is somewhere between soon and 2013, depending on how the central government reacts.

    The report is posted on a Chinese-language version of scribd, at http://www.docin.com/p-47466373.html (ht Tracy Alloway at FT Alphaville). And in case you don’t read Chinese, the button at the upper right corner of the document window gives you a more readable full-screen view. The document is, of course, in English.

21. torrie-amos Says:
    April 8th, 2010 at 5:47 am

    jeff in indy,

    ahhh, no surprise, all those option arms, second and third homes, people with jobs hold on until the numbers are unworkable, it’s all part of the grand plan, zirp only so long, they are stable enough to now take the hit

    i think america needs a new brand, we should become the retirement community of the world, we have easiest travel, diverse climates, best military, stores, and health care

    u just have to be over 60 and a good net worth, and you’re in, also u get visa’s for direct family members so they can travel to visit often

22. swag Says:
    April 8th, 2010 at 11:07 am

    I was just watching the theatrical trailer to Plunder. Having read your book, some of these concepts were familiar:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDnoxBT675U

23. jeff in indy Says:
    April 8th, 2010 at 4:09 pm

    @ torrie

    i hope the tax losses they purchased when swallowing Countrywide were enough to pay for the collection efforts they’re about to embark on. if i recall, more than half of C/W’s portfolio was in CA. Don’t know how much of that was option ARM’s, but i suspect a large number.

24. chrispycrunch Says:
    April 8th, 2010 at 10:50 pm

    The waterfall post was a good side post. It’s one of the reasons I come back to visit this site.