>>The Fed might cut another .75 in a couple weeks.
The Weimar Money Machine(tm).**
**Batteries and Wheelbarrow not included
Posted on 03/02/2008 6:57:45 PM PST by PghBaldy
HONG KONG (Reuters) - The dollar fell to a record low against a basket of currencies on Monday, dragging Asian stock markets down and compounding worries about a likely U.S. recession and more write-downs in the global financial sector. ADVERTISEMENT
A sliding dollar boosted safe-haven bonds and sent gold to a record high in Asia.
The dollar fell as low as 73.551 (^DXY - News) against a basket of six major currencies, taking it to the lowest since the index was started in 1973. It ploughed below 103 yen as a sell-off in Wall Street last Friday spurred an unwinding of carry trades.
(Excerpt) Read more at biz.yahoo.com ...
this global economy can just suck real bad.
Well, let’s bail out more companies, borrow from China, and outsource some more jobs! That should fix ‘er right up!
What goes up must come down, and vise versa.
When I was in Taipei in July I could get NT$ 32.8 for $1, when I left yesterday (Taiwan time) the consumer rate was NT$ 30.35 for $1.
When this happened a few months ago the Dow was down early but made a full recovery. We will see what happens tomorrow.
The Fed might cut another .75 in a couple weeks. Ugh. Wild rides indeed.
Ben Bernanke, Mr. Ben Bernanke, please pick up the nearest white courtesy monetary phone.
Uncle Miltie is calling from beyond the grave.
**Batteries and Wheelbarrow not included
“Come on in, the dollar’s never been better!”
lolol!!!
What’s everybody’s morning plan?
Buy the futures dip...sell a dead cat bounce off the futures ....
I still have short positions but may add more now.
I seem to remember traders on TV talking about levels such as 80 and 76 (before it hit those levels). Is there a next level that may be significant, or are we in uncharted waters, since it’s never been lower?
Our real prices just keep going lower and lower and lower, and their real prices just stay right where they are, but are, alas, evaluated in terms of higher priced currencies.
We end up getting to export our inflation while taking advantage of vast productivity improvements (domestically), and improving our edge in world markets for high tech goods (not "boom boxes" guys).
No one has ever been in this fix before ~ maybe the first ironage people up against the bronze age.
It seems to me there's little advantage for the rest of the world to "dump dollars" because you still have to have them to buy into the lower prices here for top end manufactured goods.
To the degree we extend our domestic prices to foreign buyers we do not enhance our cash position. Maybe manufacturers should be "requested" to raise their prices on world markets to keep up with depreciation of the dollar against foreign currencies. Maybe do that with pharmaceuticals first!
Let it be a lesson to us. It’s not wise to plot a recession in order to bring oil prices down and the dollar up at a time like this. ...since the first of December, and it hasn’t worked. It’s not going to work, unless much more of our middle class is laid off (big SUV drivers and spenders). But that would lead to having Obama as our next president. We don’t want that.
Well.......it's looking like the fat lady may be taking the stage soon. I think I'll just continue to keep my eyes open....
The Federal Reserve's rescue has failed
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, International Business Editor
03/03/2008
The verdict is in. The Fed's emergency rate cuts in January have failed to halt the downward spiral towards a full-blown debt deflation. Much more drastic action will be needed.Yields on two-year US Treasuries plummeted to 1.63pc on Friday in a flight to safety, foretelling financial winter.
The debt markets are freezing ever deeper, a full eight months into the crunch. Contagion is spreading into the safest pockets of the US credit universe.
...
"We are becoming increasingly concerned that the authorities in the world do not get it," said Bernard Connolly, global strategist at Banque AIG.
"The extent of de-leveraging involves a wholesale destruction of credit. The risk is that the 'shadow banking system' completely collapses," he said.
For the first time since this Greek tragedy began, I am now really frightened.
Don't plant before May 20 ~ anywhere in the US this time.
Plan on a short season, so get 60 day corn and tomatoes that can be harvested green ~ a commercial canner variety maybe.
The rest of the world is going to be in far worse shape.
Spanish Lessons
William R. Hawkins
Wednesday, April 07, 2004
Spanish authorities continue to track down those involved in the terrorist attacks that killed over 200 commuters on March 11. The terrorists won a spectacular victory when enough Spaniards panicked after the train bombings to swing the national election against the ruling conservative People’s Party and into the hands of the underdog Socialist party whose anti-American foreign policy views are more in line with radical Muslim demands. Buoyed by this successful exercise in intimidation, Abu Dujana al-Afgani, who claims to represent the military wing of al Qaeda in Europe, has promised more attacks.
It is sad to see the once proud Spanish people so easily bullied by alien thugs. It may be hard for most people to imagine, but Spain was the first global Superpower. It gained this status as the defender of Europe against Muslim armies and by leading the West’s exploration of America. In 1492, the same year that Spanish-financed Christopher Columbus discovered the New World, the last Muslim stronghold of Granada was ceded to Ferdinand and Isabella to complete the Catholic Reconquest of the Iberian peninsula. With Spain as its political base, and gold and silver flowing in from its American colonies, the Hapsburg dynasty became the dominant power in Europe. It controlled rich parts of Italy through Naples and Milan, and Central Europe from the Netherlands through the Holy Roman Empire to Austria. In the 16th century it added the far distant Philippine islands to its empire. The Hapsburgs held off the Ottoman Turks, whose resurgent wave of Islamic conquest in the 16th century swept across the Balkans and nearly captured Vienna.
The Hapsburgs went into decline in the 17th century, and while any such momentous event has many causes, for our purposes the focus will be on the economic collapse of Spain, which not only sapped the empire of strength but served to build up the power of its rivals.
The demands of empire required a strong and growing economy, but Spain did not keep up with the economic expansion that was taking place in other parts of Europe. Madrid’s financial base fell out from under its empire. Spain could continue to consume in the short term because of the flow of precious metals from American mines, but it could not produce the goods it needed at home, which in the long-run proved fatal to its standing as a Great Power and as an advanced society.
Spanish imports were double exports and the precious metals became scarce within weeks of the arrival of the American treasure fleets as the money flowed to Spain’s many creditors. What industry there was, along with banking and shipping, was in the hands of foreign owners. As a modern historian, Jaime Vicens Vives, has concluded, “This was one of the fundamental causes of the Spanish economy’s profound decline in the seventeenth century, maritime trade had fallen into the hands of foreigners.” This, plus the “opening of the internal market to foreign goods,” produced a “fatal result.” Spain’s exports were at the same time under heavy pressure by competitors in third country markets. A nation that cannot control its domestic market will seldom be able to sustain itself in foreign markets, which are inherently less accessible and more unstable.
Yet, Spanish leaders were deluded by a sense of false prosperity. This is testified by the statement of a prominent official, Alfonso Nunez de Castro in 1675: “Let London manufacture those fine fabrics of hers to her heart’s content; let Holland her chambrays; Florence her cloth; the Indies their beaver and vicuna; Milan her brocade, Italy and Flanders their linens...so long as our capital can enjoy them; the only thing it proves is that all nations train their journeymen for Madrid, and that Madrid is the queen of Parliaments, for all the world serves her and she serves nobody.” A few years later, the Madrid government was bankrupt. The Spanish nobleman had foolishly elevated consumption, a use for wealth, above production, the creation of wealth.
Oh well...won't they be surprised?
In the meantime....
The ultimate sell signal: Part II
Commentary: Why does the FDIC need more bank examiners?
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. is planning to beef up its division of resolutions and receiverships, which handles failed banks, by 40% this year. The division currently has 233 employees. Considering that only three banks failed last year, why do they need more examiners?For now, the FDIC is looking to bring back 25 retired employees with experience in the bank closures of the 1980s and 1990s. No, it's not just a reunion of hard-nosed accountants who closed banks and savings and loans in notorious Friday night raids and liquidated their assets.
This is a real search for tough, experienced "lone rangers," who set upon a bank or thrift institution on a Friday to take over as much of the assets as possible and open the following Monday with full assurances for insured depositors and firm answers for uninsured depositors. The latter group will get 100% on their insured deposits, probably 50% on the uninsured portion and "well, we can talk about it, and we'll send you some more later."....
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