Archive - May 4, 2010

This article was inspired by a conversation in January 2010 with fellow directors of the Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee: Chairman Bill Murphy, Secretary/Treasurer Chris Powell, and Directors Adrian Douglas and Ed Steer. In speaking about the growing role of the exchange traded funds in the precious metals market, it was clear that the disclosure that the precious metals ETFs described below were providing to investors was inadequate. However, was there a material omission under securities law? I found the issues complex. Understanding the commodities markets can seem daunting to someone like myself with a securities background. Meanwhile, the securities markets and related legal and regulatory issues can be unfamiliar to those with a background in commodities. I decided to ask my attorney to help me gather the relevant information into one document to make it easier for GATA supporters and other interested parties—whether from the commodities or securities markets—to examine these issues and to better understand and price these securities. - Catherine Austin Fitts, Solari Report

The latest RealPoint monthly CMBS delinquency report update is out and it continues to get worse and worse. In March, the total amount of delinquent CMBS increased by $3.2 billion to $51.5 billion, or 6.4% of the total notional outstanding. "Overall, the delinquent unpaid balance is up almost 268% from one-year ago (when only $13.89 billion of delinquent unpaid balance was reported for March 2009), and is now over 23 times the low point of $2.21 billion in March 2007. The distressed 90+-day, Foreclosure and REO categories grew in aggregate for the 27th straight month – up by $2.57 billion (7%) from the previous month and $30.31 billion (352%) in the past year (up from only $8.6 billion in February 2009)." And this data excludes the now defaulted Peter Cooper village which still remained current in March courtesy of its reserve. This loan will effectively go into real default in April or May at the latest, pushing the total delinquencies by at least another $3 billion. That's not the worst: RealPoint now sees the total delinquency rate surpassing 12% under a more stressed scenario, or double from here. Don't worry, the inability of the administration to delay the implosion of Commercial Real Estate is a victory of the bulls, and is just an indication of the "decoupling" of the CRE market fundamentals from the broader Alice in Lalaland parameters that set the everyday stock market.

We recently highlighed the words of Erik Nielsen who stated that the E110 billion Greek bailout package will simply not be sufficient, expecting that at least another 40 billion will be needed for an effective rescue operation. Today, the WSJ and German Bild, get on board this theme, likely causing further anguish for Greece and for the euro, as it once again highlights just how incompetentEuropean bureaucrats are. Ironically, in their attempt to lowball the rescue numbers, they may have just doomed the package, because we are confident German opposition (and you should see the cover pages of all German newspapers - there are 99 headlines blasting the rescue for 0.5 praising it) will use this disclosure to mount an attack on the "openendeness" of the what may soon turn out to be a neverending rescue package. And this does not even contemplate Portugal and Spain.

While the current economic data appears rosy, it won't be sustained without credit or rising wages or job growth. Much of existing spending is from a drawdown of savings and various transitory stimulus programs. These things won't last.

These are the definitive 2010 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting Notes. Almost 15,000 words. This is just about as close to an actual transcript as you are going to find. Enjoy!