Black Friday Stampede At Wal-Mart - Merry Christmas

A Wal-Mart employee in suburban New York was trampled to death by a crush of shoppers who tore down the front doors and thronged into the store early Friday morning, turning the annual rite of post-Thanksgiving bargain hunting into a Hobbesian frenzy.

The throng of Wal-Mart shoppers had been building all night, filling sidewalks and stretching across a vast parking lot at the Green Acres Mall in Valley Stream, N.Y. At 3:30 a.m., the Nassau County police had to be called in for crowd control, and an officer with a bullhorn pleaded for order.

Tension grew as the 5 a.m. opening neared. Someone taped up a crude poster: “Blitz Line Starts Here.”

By 4:55, with no police officers in sight, the crowd of more than 2,000 had become a rabble, and could be held back no longer. Fists banged and shoulders pressed on the sliding-glass double doors, which bowed in with the weight of the assault. Six to 10 workers inside tried to push back, but it was hopeless.

Suddenly, witnesses and the police said, the doors shattered, and the shrieking mob surged through in a blind rush for holiday bargains. One worker, Jdimytai Damour, 34, was thrown back onto the black linoleum tiles and trampled in the stampede that streamed over and around him. Others who had stood alongside Mr. Damour trying to hold the doors were also hurled back and run over, witnesses said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/29/business/29walmart.html?_r=1&ref=business

Things To Anticipate Over The Next Year

• Net earnings on the S&P 500 to be $50.
  
• State and local governments will be reducing spending significantly unless they get bailed out.
  
• A $500 billion fiscal stimulus package that focuses on rebuilding the US.
  
• Whatever solution the Fed comes up with, they will overdue it, but not before it’s too late.
  
• The government will continue to react to problems instead of anticipate them.
  
• Markets usually bottom when there is absolutely no hope left.
  
• Retailers, homebuilders, mortgage insurers, insurance companies (think annuities), banks, casinos and car manufacturers all going bankrupt at the same time, their stocks and bonds go to zero, and they start over.
  
• Highly dilutive secondary stock offers of which the proceeds will be used to pay down debt.
  
• Home prices to continue declining
  
• Increased savings. Obviously you then have decreased spending.
  
• GDP to decline 5%
  
• Unemployment to rise to 9% (That is a HUGE number)
  
• No IPO’s
  
• No Private Equity buyouts
  
• Limited corporate bond issuance
  
• A secular shift towards frugality

Things To Anticipate Over The Next 90 Days

• Service industries (retail, restaurants, hotels and affiliated) that had job growth in 2008 will begin to show declines along with everyone else.
  
• If the decline in the financials continues at the pace of the last 30 days then the whole financial system will be tested again. The short sellers are very interested in finding out what happens.
  
• Oil prices to continue falling (Still way too much supply out there in the short run)
  
• 50 basis point Fed rate cut (Effective funds rate is already at 0.30)
  
• Automaker(s) going bankrupt.
  
• Significant amount of companies being downgraded, which will mostly affect on bonds.
  
• Declining bond prices (Especially CMBS)
  
• Some companies will not be able to afford to rollover their debt and that will bankrupt them
  
• Even with all these problems, expect the government to NOT intervene as they wait for the new administration to take over. Looks like the short sellers are counting on it.

IndianFM PakistanFM - What They Say???

CNN Report on Indian Terror Attack

Bloggers Express Shock and Disbelief

Mumbai Terror Attacks - Taj Hotel Burning Fire!

Mumbai Terror Attack - Taj Hotel - Times Now Coverage

Indian commandos fought room-to-room battles with terrorists in two Mumbai luxury hotels early Friday morning as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in effect blamed Pakistan for the attacks, reports the FT.

The rear of the five-star Taj Mahal Palace & Tower Hotel on Mumbai’s waterfront was on fire as India’s special forces worked through the 565-room building, freeing hostages trapped in their rooms. Explosions rocked the Taj and the Oberoi Hotel throughout Thursday. Police early Friday said terrorists were still holed up at both hotels along with an unknown number of hostages.

Below is the discussion thread from Google Finance.

http://finance.google.com/group/google.finance.983582/browse_thread/thread/d3a96080fda462eb/c6ed9cd4e8c23afb

Terrorist Attack India - Mumbai

Watch how terrorists enter into the Hotel. They Hijack police Sumo. They shoot at the police and Journalists.

India's political leadership to blame: Wall Street Journal

Mumbai Underworld provided arms and ammunition.

Pakistan ISI chief is coming to India on the request of Indian PM. India will provide evidences of Pakistan hand.

Arrested Fidayeen reveal terror route, LeT hand

Terrorist Attack India

Intelligence agencies around the world are scrambling to identify the source of this latest threat in view of the 'remarkable' coordination and sophistication.

More videos

http://meetglad.blogspot.com/2008/11/terrorist-attacks-what-analysts-have-to.html

Terrorist Attacks - What analysts have to Say.

Indian Government is bombarded by analysts on the terror attacks. Year 2008 was dreadful for India. Today's attacks were like US 9/11 for India. 

Terror attack in indian financial capital Bombay/Mumbai. Terror Attack on India. Its India 9/11. Attack on Taj, Trident, Oberoi Hotels. Taj hotel is the symbol of India.

Coordinated attacks on Mumbai India

Terror attack in indian financial capital Bombay/Mumbai. Terror Attack on India. Its India 9/11. Attack on Taj, Trident, Oberoi Hotels. Taj hotel is the symbol of India.

What others say about ZIRP??

FT: US and UK rates are negative in real terms – by at least 3% and 1.5% respectively – while eurozone rates are still positive by a whisker. So is the global economy headed towards zero interest rates? The answer is that, in real terms, it has already arrived.

CIBC: Cut the funds rate to zero, and there's nothing left to do. Not so. Central banks could move out the curve, buying longer-dated securities and forcing their rates down to zero. They could lend money in higher volumes directly to economic participants, as the Fed is doing in the commercial paper market.

Mishkin (via Thoma): One common view is that when a central bank has driven down short-term nominal interest rates to near zero, there is nothing more that monetary policy can do to stimulate the economy. That view is false. Expansionary monetary policy to increase liquidity in the economy can be conducted with open market purchases, which do not have to be solely in short-term government securities.

Goldman Sachs (not online): With riskless short-term interest rates now close to zero, conventional monetary policy is becoming ineffective. What are the alternatives? Three options with a relatively high likelihood of near-term implementation by the Fed: 1) a large-scale fiscal stimulus program, 2) more proactive use of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac for purchasing and securitizing mortgages, and 3) a precommitment by Fed officials to keep the federal funds rate low for a "considerable period"If these policies fail to result in an economic pickup, Fed officials might (4) purchase long-term Treasury and Agency securities. The Treasury might (5) decide to purchase risky assets outright, and this could again perhaps be financed by Fed money creation.

What Zero Interest Rates Means to us??

If the Fed funds rate did drop to zero, it would not mean free money for consumers or businesses. The zero rate would only apply to the reserves that banks are required to maintain and that they lend to one another. Customers would still have to pay some interest, but the rates could be extremely low for some business borrowers.

But there are psychological reasons why the Fed would prefer not to cut its rate below 1%. The closer the Fed gets to zero, the more likely that investors will worry the U.S. economy is facing a long period of misery on par with what Japan faced after its real estate markets crashed in the early 1990s.

0% interest will also mean that I will pull my money out if that's that I get keeping in the banks, and possibly invest in gold because it will fuel inflation and not growth, with economy deteoriating, no chances of artifical growth with 0%. however it might take away billions of $ of deposits that folks will pull out and possibly either buy hard real estate on 100% cash or buy gold, some will buy stocks. All in all, Banks will feel the pinch more because they will lose deposit and 10 times the leverage on every single $ pulled out. When economy was doing OK, 1% interest rate in 2001 fueled housing.

U.S. and Global Economic Conditions

The most recent set of events and the string of economic data are a clear sign that the crisis is not over, and the worst might very well be ahead of us. 

On the one hand, consumer confidence got a boost from falling oil prices and new leadership in the U.S. government. On the other hand, yesterday’s Conference Board report confirms that the economy is in a deep recession (the confidence index is still at the lowest level on record since 1975) and points to further consumer spending declines in the coming quarters. 

The release of preliminary Q3 real GDP growth in the U.S. (revised down to -0.5% from the initial -0.3%) displayed a downward revision to personal consumption from the original -3.1% down to -3.7%. 

Consumption is expected to be a significant drag on the economy for a while. Analysts estimate that the fall in energy prices – a reflection of falling U.S. demand and a by-product of the fact that this severe recession is a global one – will boost real U.S. income by roughly $200bn (1.5% of GDP) but it is also. On the back of this, U.S. home prices keep falling, equity prices may still be very far from the bottom and employment losses are mounting.

Dancing Obama

Funny Obama - video powered by Metacafe

Well someone is speaking true language - Sin Citi

Came across an article in portfolio. They say that the basic principle of equity, which is that the guilty will be punished and that he who causes pain will feel pain, is simply not a part of the equation in any of the bailouts of the big banks that have taken place this year.

Bailing out Citi is a bit like putting out a fire in the house of a very irresponsible fellow down the street who lets his kids play with matches while he's sleeping in a hammock out back. You'd be very happy to see his house burn down, preferably with him in it, but you're afraid that the flames will spread through his unraked leaves to engulf the entire neighborhood.

Is there anyone accountable for these bank failures.

This guy on portfolio has guts. 

Why Citigroup was bailed out???

Federal government agreed to rescue Citigroup by helping to absorb potentially hundreds of billions of dollars in losses on toxic assets on its balance sheet and injecting fresh capital into the troubled financial giant.

• Citigroup by the numbers: (WSJ Nov 24) 
Total Assets: $2.05 trillion
Off-balance sheet assets: $1.23 trillion (of which $667 billion in mortgage-related securities);
Market Cap: $20.5 billion
Q3 2008 Revenue: $16.68 billion
Dividend Yield: 10%
Share Price: $3.76  

• Dangers of a Citigroup Failure: The failure of a single major financial institution could result in losses to the OTC derivatives market of $300-$400 billion, a new working paper finds. What’s more, since such a failure would likely cause cascading failures of other institutions, the total global financial system losses could exceed $1,500 billion (Singh/Segoviano -IMF)
Background
• WSJ: As share price fell, Citigroup’s credit-default swaps, a measure of insurance against debt default, rose to reflect a cost of $470,000 to insure $10 million in bonds against default for five years
• Nov 19:  Citi agreed to acquire a further $17.4 billion of assets held by structured investment vehicles advised by the company. Citi was forced to bail out seven troubled SIVs in December, assuming $58 billion of debt out of a total $87bn, as a slump in credit markets eroded the value of their assets 
  
•  Fitch, Nov 6: Citigroup has indicated that Citi-branded net credit card chargeoffs could exceed their 1992 peak of 6.44% in coming quarters, particularly if the unemployment rate remains under pressure

Further reading.....

Citi’s $326bn bailout: overview

Joint Statement by Treasury, Federal Reserve, and the FDIC on Citigroup

America's Future Job Market

So get ready for the future IT job market guys....
ALL THE BEST!!!!

Whats next on Bailout??

FT found a bit of interesting detail: "Citi and the US government made it clear that the Citi arrangement would be extended to other banks that pose risk to financial system stability, if need be."

Which bank could be next? Bank of America (BAC), which took on billions of dollars of mortgages with its buyout of Countrywide, may not be a bad candidate. Neither is Morgan Stanly (MS), which analysts believe will lose $.80 a share in the current quarter.

Read more on http://www.247wallst.com/2008/11/does-bank-of-am.html

Timothy F. Geithner - Obama's Finance Minister

To run the treasury of the world's largest economy, President-elect Barack Obama is putting his faith in a person who got his elementary education in India. 

After already having named at least four persons of Indian origin in his transition team, Obama has zeroed in on Timothy Geithner as the next Treasury Secretary of the US, a position equivalent to the finance minister in many other countries. 

The US-born Timothy, at present President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, attended elementary school in the Indian capital New Delhi, before moving to many other Asian cities and back to the US for his graduation and master's. 

His father Peter F Geithner is an adviser to the Asia Center at Harvard University and a consultant to the Asia Pacific Philanthropy Consortium, Rockefeller Foundation, Sasakawa Peace Foundation, among others. 

Besides, Geithner senior also serves on boards of National Committee on US-China Relations, China Center for Economic Research (Peking University) and Center for the Advanced Study of India (University of Pennsylvania). 

Peter was engaged with The Ford Foundation for 28 years, and had held various positions in Asia, including a position based in New Delhi as Deputy Representative for India, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. 

Peter Geithner has also written a book titled 'Diaspora Philanthropy and Equitable Development in China and India' which was published by Harvard University Press.

Retailers fear it’s getting worse......

After the worst October for retail sales in 16 years, there is a fresh evidence that shop owners will face a worse November.

Short Selling Might be Banned Again

IOSCO Technical Committee meeting is convened on Monday, November 24 by teleconference to discuss urgent regulatory issues in the ongoing credit crisis. 

The Technical Committee meeting will consider:

• Short Selling — Consider the effectiveness of recent regulatory responses in reducing manipulative short selling without stifling legitimate short selling activity, and explore possible coordination on rules relating to naked short sales, in particular with regard to position reporting and delivery and pre-borrowing requirements
• Under-Regulated or Unregulated Products — Develop disclosure principles to promote transparency in OTC markets for derivatives and other financial instruments which will contribute to enhanced investor protection and mitigating systemic risk.

The meeting also will focus on:

• Credit Rating Agencies — Assess members' progress in adopting rules based on IOSCO's revised Code of Conduct, and accelerate work on developing a common examination module.
• International Accounting Standards — Ensure that the process of developing international accounting standards continues to take account of the interests of investors.

Source http://www.sec.gov/news/press/2008/2008-278.htm

What will be the trading range of Dow in Dec 2008?

What will be the trading range of Dow in Dec 2008?
	Between 8000 to 10000
	Between 8000 to 9000
	Between 7000 to 9000
	Between 7000 to 8000
	Between 6000 to 8000
Free polls from Pollhost.com

US Markets Dow Jones

Markets free fall is not going to end soon as we here news of deflation, depression. More pain is ahead. How low will Dow go by the end of 2009. Will post results in couple of days.

 

How low Dow will go in 2009?
	7500
	7000
	6000
	5000
	4000
	3000
	2000
	1000
Free polls from Pollhost.com

  

It’s Called a Depression

 Aleph Blog says many things are happening that are depression-like.  Here we go:

• Record high levels of total debt to GDP
• Many go hat in hand to the government.
• The spreads of the bond market are at record levels since the last depression, and maybe comparable.
• There is policy paralysis and confusion.  No one knows what to do (or leave alone), they act blindly or cower in fear.
• Ultrasafe investments have record low yields.
• Banks don’t trust each other.
• GDP is shrinking, and unemployment is increasing at a rapid rate.
• Financial businesses are failing and shrinking at high rates.
• The government comes in to “help” the markets, and ends up replacing the markets.
• The security of banks and other financial entities is open to question.

Tracking the $700 Billion Bailout

Dozens of banks and a handful of insurers have applied for funds from the Treasury Department as part of the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program. The Treasury has transferred capital to 30 of these companies and to A.I.G. More are expected to announce their participation in the coming weeks.





Source New York Times

MetaView lets you view the stock market in 3D

Lyle Andrews has released MetaView, a new application that lets you view stock market data in 3D. 

MetaView lets you group stocks to view in 3D. If you are grouping stocks you hold, you can enter the number of shares you have; MetaView will calculate the total value and display it in the main view. Yu can use a menu to view more information about individual stocks; save headlines and URLs of new stories for each stock; access Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings and graph them by date; and enter historical events and assign them to groups.

MetaView provides.

• What stocks parallel each other and under what conditions do they diverge?

• What stocks are dependent on others?

• To what degree do news stories affect stock prices, and do the prices change before or after the stories get published?

• Are there certain historical events that move entire markets simultaneously?

Currently MetaView does the the following:

• You can create groups of stocks to view in 3D, if you enter the number of shares you have of each it will calculate the total value and display it in the main view.

• When you are viewing a particular stock in MetaView you can use a menu to jump to view more information about that stock at any of the free financial news sites out on the web.

• You can then save headlines (and URLs) for news stories for each stock and graph when they were published on the price graph. 

• You can also access SEC filings and graph them by date.

• You can enter historical events and assign them to various groups, they will then be displayed as labels on the reference grid behind the stock charts.

• MetaView has a speech sythesis function that can give you an audible summary of each stock in a group as it automatically cycles through them.

• MetaView comes with a screensaver that shows the same view as the main window. It's eye catching and entertaining, as well as being informative, and tends to draw a lot of attention from friends and coworkers. The speech synthesizer can also be turned on and off while in screensaver mode.

• MetaView automatically downloads data for the U.S. market. You can schedule when this happens or use the default schedule. Because data is stored on your local hard drive rather than the net, access is very fast, and you can still use most of its functionality when you have no net connection.