Here is some interesting information regarding Europe and “toxic assets”.
On Feb 11, I read on the Drudge an article by the Telegraph stating that European banks were sitting on 16.3 Trillion Pounds of toxic assets. Since then the Telegraph has sanitized the article.
Here is the Telegraph article as it now stands:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/financialcrisis/4590512/European-banks-may-need-16.3-trillion-bail-out-EC-dcoument-warns.html
Here is the Telegraph article as it read on Feb 11.
http://forum.globalhousepricecrash.com/index.php?showtopic=47586
Here is an explanation by a sleuth of what happened:
http://www.creditwritedowns.com/2009/02/are-european-banks-sitting-on-163-trillion-in-toxic-assets.html
The last link is very interesting reading.
What interests me is the complete WORLD WIDE melt down. It’s not just Wall Street. If the original Telegraph article was correct, the EU is in worse straights than ever imagined. Singapore, Taiwan and South Korea are facing double digit GDP numbers. Japan is doing worse than expected. China is a basket case, as is Russia. It is unfortunate for the world that Children are running the Economy in the US.
If someone has a 12 step program to financially survive the next few years, I am all ears.
Cut back lifestyle, pay down debt, do not do anything that would increase your fixed personal overhead.
People were telling me I was a fool to pay off my mortgage instead of putting the money in the market. Well, no mortgage means that I can weather a bad financial storm better than most.