Archive - May 15, 2014 - Blog entry

Embargos as a rule rarely achieve their intended goal of overthrowing governments. Instead, embargos tend to deprive the poor of basic necessities, enrich government cronies while giving the government an excuse for why their economic policies are failing.

You would think that with all the surefire bets in housing that people would be dialing up their realtors and heading out every weekend to make those lustful multiple offers presented in PowerPoint format on properties. Yet the overall market data shows a different story. The house horniest of them all, investors, are clearly pulling out of markets including sunny and inflated California. Apparently home prices do matter when making investment decisions. Cash strapped hormonal buyers will keep on buying but housing prices are set on the margin. That margin is becoming razor thin on current volume. I find it interesting that the biggest housing supporter of them all, the National Association of Realtors is also somewhat tepid on this recovery. Why? Because home sales volume is pathetic. Keep in mind they make money on selling and buying. Volume is key. Their model doesn’t work so well with banks holding onto properties like Gollum holding onto the ring and the foreclosure process being dragged out like the forever college student enjoying year 10 at Santa Monica City College. You see this overarching trend occurring in many metro areas across the country. Investors have been propping up the market since 2008. They are now slowly pulling back. You are also starting to see a convergence of analysts putting out their predictions on how overvalued housing is and backing it up with mountains of data. The other side of the argument points to prices. Sure, they’ve gone up but value is created by actual price and that is sort of the point. The answer as always isn’t so simple but using your thinking cap it is important to understand that housing is not a “no brainer” decision in this market.

"I want this to be something that somebody else can use. Or that we could parlay into some kind of political—something, you know–’Hey wake up! The banks do lie, cheat, and steal. That’s the whole goal, you know.”

I never thought a visit to Omaha would trigger an appreciation of the role Icahn and other activist investors play in corporate America.

Starring Turbo Timmah "Geithner"

Francine Lacqua (Interviewer): Jim, you also have this new book out, right, saying "The Death of Money" and this basically argues that if a number of things come together, we could have financial warfare, deflation, hyperinflation, market collapse. And yet the markets are merrily going along. Are we in a fictitious world?

One allegation about price manipulation was made by the German regulator BaFin. That proves it, right? Not so fast.