Posted on 08/20/2009 11:08:59 PM PDT by FromLori
Edited on 08/21/2009 6:29:45 AM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
When does the willful blindness in terms of bank fraud taking place daily in the so-called "marks" on housing-related loans stop?
The non-seasonally adjusted delinquency rate increased 64 basis points from 8.22 percent in the first quarter of 2009 to 8.86 percent this quarter.
(Excerpt) Read more at market-ticker.denninger.net ...
They have lumped every problem with a mortgage from one payment behind through foreclosure into the same bucket. That doesn’t tell us a lot.
So... is our economy basically just one big ponzi scheme?
That's how it looks to me.
The system is bankrupt and we MUST clear it of these non-performing loans. We have spent two years playing "extend and pretend", believing that somehow the economy will imminently turn and thus all these "bad assets" will suddenly become good, even though statistically once you miss two payments the odds of you "curing" that delinquency - due to the fact that you would have to come up with BOTH overdue payments plus the current one - are near zero.
In Japan, NPLs were continued for much longer, and did eventually unsour in large numbers. I suspect that our policymakers are using that eventual recovery as a basis. Certainly they have been reaching for tools from the BOJ's tool set.
However, this isn't Japan. Using its lessons as to how to effectively fight massive deflation and NPLs might not work so well.
The tally so far: quantitative easing has worked here in the U.S. (and I would say also apparently in Britain). We haven't really done the zero-interest rate policy, nor do I expect to us to do so. As Mr. Denninger notes, NPLs are to some degree being tolerated --- certainly far more than I would have ever expected here in the U.S., and as might be ascertained from my postings from past years.
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