Archive - Jul 16, 2009 - Story

Troubled mattress maker Simmons announced that it did not make it scheduled July 15th bond payment of $7.9 million. The company's bondholders who are hoping for some hail mary bailout as millions of unemployed people upgrade from a hard floor to a memory foam king size are due for a big surprise, even with the extended forbearance they have granted the company. One can hope that the "certain conditions" to be met by July 31 include a clause of 100% equity conversion as that is the only return hopeful investors may hope to extract from the company.

Highly informative C-Span interview with Janet Tavakoli to go with the morning coffee.

Look elsewhere for green shoots... and CNBC's favorite commodity - hope.
1.9 Million foreclosure filings in the first half, 889,829 in the second quarter, with 336,173 in June alone, bringing the second quarter total to the highest number since RealtyTrac has been following these data. And this all is happening while various foreclosure moratoria and other national and state mitigation efforts are still in play. One can just imagine the bottom really falling out of the market once California and others stop pretending they can control this accelerating train wreck.