Archive - Feb 18, 2009 - Story

As you can see on the right side of the blog, assuming it doesn't crash your website, there is a live forum feature where going forward readers will be able to ask questions, express opinions, blow things up, vent or just say hi. Hopefully it works out... More of a beta idea for now. If readers enjoy it, it will be a regular feature

Japanese corporate CDS forming a line at the woodshed. G7 risk bloodbath continues

• CNBC makes headline news over every uptick in S&P futures, read all about it
• January housing starts drop to all time low (Bloomberg)
• Russia 2009 GDP forecast cut from -0.2% to -2.2% (Moscow Times)
• Police foils bomb attack at Citibank in Athens (Yahoo - hat tip reader Mike)
• Germany may be Europe's white knight.
  

Sometimes Mike O'Rourke pins the events of the prior day just that little bit better than anyone else. Today is a case in point. We present his letter to clients in all its unadulterated glory and hope he won't sue... One can only hide behind the whole DMCA thing so long...

• Emmanuel Rahm was paid $260,000 to be Freddie Mac director in 2000-2001 (NYPost)
• Hedge fund consolidation to heat up (Bloomberg)
• Doug Kass: Fear and Loathing on Wall Street (TheStreet)
• More brokerage mergers coming (

The only thing more amusing than the deranged ramblings of an insane lunatic, are the deranged ramblings of a whole lot of insane lunatics (i.e. the executive committee of General Motors)... and their numerous legal and financial advisors... for whose "efforts" it is of course taxpayers who end up footing the bill...

Last week's derisking continued, however at a more moderate pace, with $83 billion of net notional increase in CDS versus $138 billion last week. Only the healthcare and industrials sectors saw a rerisking, with industrials due for a substantial technical push wider after 2 weeks of rerisking.