Joe
Loading...
Symbols:
Loading...
Symbols:
Hedge Fund Jobs
Job Seekers: Search jobs by category, get job alerts by email or live feed, apply online See full list of jobs »
Employers: See all recruitment options, get applications online or by email Post a job »
Trading Center
- Free E-Newsletters
- About Seeking Alpha
- About Us
- Contact Us
- What's New
- Readers Feedback
- Advertise With Us
- Contributors
- Contribute an Article
- Feature Your Book
- Our Contributors
- Anonymous Contributions
- Dispute an Article?
- Legal
- Terms of Use
- Privacy
- Copyright
Latest Comments17 Comments
Pricing Power: The Decline and Fall
The big box swindle by Tracy Mitchell
seems to make a lot of sense by now. Explaining not all, but quite a lot.
What Just Happened?
or is there also some banking crisis unfolding? Banks from Panama
to wherever.
What sort of assets are they having in their books? What are their
balance sheets like? And considering the amount of assets under
management in those countries and those banks couldn't they have
an influence on the world markets? Just like Iceland has, tiny as it is,
and not even a tax haven with lots of assets.
On Board the 'U.S.S. Titanic'
Here an article to that:
"Where was media when subprime disaster unfolded?"
rinf.com/alt-news/medi.../
It's a Bull Market in Government Intervention
In any case: some time ago a contributor to this introduced the book:
Confessions of a subprime lender. An insider's tale of greed, fraud &
ignorance ... by Richard Bitner / lendingsanity.com
I found it very interesting, informative, useful. And it probably was
useful for many others as well, those not taken by surprise.
While Iran Threat Keeps Oil Elevated, U.S. Stocks and Dollar Slip
Rupert Murdoch, Boss of News Corp made an interesting prediction
in 2003:
(articel in the UK Guardian)
Murdoch praises Blair's 'courage'
* Julia Day
* The Guardian,
* Wednesday February 12, 2003
....He said the price of oil would be one of the war's main benefits. "The greatest thing to come out of this for the world economy, if you could put it that way, would be $20 a barrel for oil. That's bigger than any tax cut in any country."
Mr Murdoch's comments come just a week after he told Fortune magazine in the US that war could fuel an economic boom.
www.guardian.co.uk/pol...
Help Wanted: Newspaper Classified Ad Sales Continue to Slide
there is a film clip on You Tube, done sixty or more years ago. It's
either an ad for becoming a journalist or the press were describing
themselves to general public, how they work, what they are doing.
Sense of humor?
The search word on You Tube - no typing mistake - /10.38 min:
"old skool journalism film"
(hope it's ok to point that out here)
The Brazilian Economic Miracle
Germany's economic miracle after "Adolf" (a complete national
bankruptcy), after 1945 (for whatever reason, as an example):
www.econlib.org/librar...
Newspapers: Not a Zero-Sum Game - A Minus-Sum Game
right now there only is talk of newspaper ad revenue. What is maybe
still to come are considerations or facts for whatever about the
total ad spending.
Consider for instance ad spending for the auto industry 2006:
$ 13,5 billion, not included car dealers.
Chrysler was bought for $ 7,4 Billion last year by Cerberus.
(I just lifted this from the net: a Nielsen report to that:)
www.nielsenmedia.com/n...
Ad spending all in all could be considered huge, irrespective of how
the economy is doing.
And this, also just lifted from the net, total ad for 2007:
adage.com/mediaworks/a...
Ironically formulated, ad spending is some sort of pagan religion
guaranteeing all sort of miracles, ranging from resuscitating someone
from the dead to healing all sorts of other illnesses, and certainly,
on top of that, ad spending works wonders in each and every
case for the advertiser. A company only has to spend sufficiently
and the success is guaranteed. (Just contact any of the big
ad agencies and you're in touch with the super-natural.)
And on not to forget the consumers who sometimes have the
habit of blocking, averting, skipping TV ad for instance, ot
shaking out all the fliers, etc. coming with a paper, before they
start reading it. ...
Somehow it is a matter of "conflict" and interest, of cost -
efficiency, of consumer habits and so forth. An open matter in
my opinion.
Considering Disaster
Just in case any interest in the exact opposite, namely the case of
a problem solution (might make above books even more interesting
reading):
Germany's economic recovery after 1945:
www.econlib.org/LIBRAR...
it's a couple of lucid web - pages, a case after chaos and disorder,
where everything was started from scratch
Real Estate and Financials: Sell the Rally
rather irrational behavior of the market; this has happened before,
in fall for instance and again early this year. At first problematic
stock went up, contrary to sound analysis - only to come down
a while later.
In other words, there might be some absolutely irrational players
in the market, real big losers, the bigger fools. What Jason is
musing about will get clearer only some not so distant future.
Breathtaking, time and again, are those losses run up by the
bigger fools. One explanation might be people in whatever position
addicted to wishful rather than rational analysis.
Some portfolio managers, banks managing portfolios, etc. have
lost big time and obviously continue to lose, behaving like
addicted gamblers. Don't forget opinion makers in the media,
internationally, telling their audience to do this or that, and actually gradually masterminded them into serious losses. Of course, opinion does not have any supra-natural power and is time and again over-
powered by the famous gang of facts.
Suggested case study: the role of the media in the 1929 crash,
as an extreme and easy example. Those who arrange the all too
obvious media frenzy, (time and again).
Newspaper Circ Numbers: Talking Quantity and "Quality"
of newspapers by googling:
+ad rates up circulation down+
A whole lot comes up, the first article dating from 2004, offering some clue:
Daily blues: Ad rates up, circulation down
(two Colorado papers)
"...the combined circulation at the two dailies was 483,740 copies ...
...That's down 11.6 percent from the same period the previous year.
...the price for a quarter-page ad to run in both papers has gone up from about $8,300 to $18,400 ..."
denver.bizjournals.com...
That is just one article. The papers for a long time pursued this
strategy. And considering that advertisers have, particularly since
the credit-crunch became effective, to be more cost-minded then
ever, it is no wonder the papers are running into trouble eventually.
Newspaper Circulation: WSJ, USA Today Manage To Buck Trend
change their media habits and consumption might be have to do
with this (in editor & publisher):
Where Was Media When Sub-Prime Disaster Unfolded?
If we were long on the edge of "disaster" with a "financial nuclear winter" waiting in the wings, why were American news consumers among the last to know?
"...A New York Times columnist even admitted that experts and advocates first warned them in 2001 that predatory lending practices were devastating poor neighborhoods but the issue was not covered in any depth for five years. ...
...the (NY) Times business section ... and the Washington Post
... stories explained that the downfall was sparked by the use of overly complex securities designed not to be understood. ..."
www.editorandpublisher...
(Now: who on earth needs papers that manage not to understand
on the highest (media) level; ironically speaking: some sort of "electrically lit barbarians" ?)
Financial Stocks: Where Will They Go Once Investors Sober Up?
extent geared only to something like gambling. Out of touch with the
actual commercial / producing world.
Visitors to casinos are said to arrive with $ 100 and leave it with
$ 60, 40& thus lost. That is the average casino calculation, it could
be even higher.
If one takes a look at "assets under management" in banks balance
sheets one gets sometimes a rough idea how the casino worked,
at what percentage, so to speak. I would suggest to have a look
at UBS, to name just one example for an idea how their wealthy
clients were doing. And yes, in the long it is possible that people
are sobering up. In the long run, depending on the learning curve.
What Is the ECB Smoking?
Before the Euro the Italian Lira was in permanent decline,
a symbol of long - term inflation. The constant Lira devaluation was
the useless attempt to undo, "transmogify"... all sins of politics
(scandals, scandals, ... incompetence, negligence, .. just name
it).
A glimpse on that can for instance be gained in entertaining
literature: Donna Leons' crime stories, all placed in Venice
(lucid reading).
The same attempts of cheating are correctly diagnosed in France.
Yes, yes, .. to all what is said above.
Why the Dollar Hit a Record Low
a) the trade deficit (listed here):
www.americaneconomical...
and
b) the US debt (ever since borrowing heavily abroad)
www.brillig.com/debt_c.../