Futures are down early AM - why, I don't know. No news.
If you are looking for a good newspaper, I recommend the Financial Times. It's now really a lot better than The Wall Street Journal, which has declined in value a lot in the past few years, becoming a bit like a business version of "People" magazine with these endless descriptions of how one person is dealing with an issue. Ugh.
The Financial Times has real writing and covers the world really well. Also, its non-business stories are quite advanced and cultured. So try it if you want a newspaper and can get it delivered same day. A one year subscription is really cheap - $99/year.
See http://www.ft.com/home/us. Also, the web site is good and has free content if you register.
Markets
Short interest is very high in the markets and growing as these double short ETFs and moronic 130/30 funds gain popularity.
Word of the Day
"Razzia" - noun [$100] this is an Algerian word that was absorbed into French in the 19th century. The initial "a" is short as in "act" and the stress in on the first syllable.
Razzia means a plundering raid.
Sentence: Will the beefers* take a vacation this summer or will they try a few razzias to make some fees before the end of the quarter ?
*beefers = big evil funds.
About Me
- Bunkerman
- I have a pioneer mentality. My wife & I live in the woods - neighbors aren't visible except slightly in winter. Our "bunker" - hehe, really a fine home & barn - has plenty of security. We have four dogs: Krypto (age 9, Kelpie), Ava (age 13, Rat Terrier), Sky (Kelpie, age 5) and Lucky Star (age 1, kelpie). I don't take crap from anyone anymore, having enough resources & gear stocked up to survive in any circumstance. I have three degrees from Harvard including a Ph. D. in a physical science, and an MS in Management from MIT. I worked as an investment banker for about 25 years, mainly in secured finance, at three major Wall Street firms and for the last 17 years with my partners at our own firm. I'm semi-retired now, managing some private corporations and business interests and doing my own trading & investing. This is not to boast, but to give you an idea I know a little about some subjects from experience. The photo is my 1943 M16 half-track which I am restoring. These armored vehicles were ubiquitous in the US Army in World War II and Korea. It's driveable.
26 comments:
OK ISM mfg. number.
you must have really ticked off the bunker boys with that morning post.
I didn't have a lot to write about today.
I did like my word of the day, though.
Hmmm I could have written about the sheep herding trial we went to on Saturday. Fascinating.
Bunkerman...that XLF close under 24.50 today...take a look at the tea leafs, you see spiddy 1080 coming?
Bud how many fingers am I holding up son?
Google seems to be having trouble with the server today.
Can't get on much.
Pimco's Bill Gross provides detailed analysis on what most Americans already know: The government's "official" data understates inflation.
Gross' treatise focuses on how CPI is compiled -- with hedonic adjustments and "owners' equivalent rents" -- in a way that's unique in the industrialized world. Such adjustments and a focus on "core" inflation -- or "inflation excluding inflation" as Barry Ritholtz calls it -- help explain why the Fed is far less concerned about inflation than central bankers in other parts of the world.
If the financial markets were to "readjust" to actual inflation, the stock market would lose 10% of its value and the bond market 5%, Gross says.
Gross, whose firm manages more than $800 billion in mostly fixed-income assets, fails to explain why stocks (and real estate, for that matter) will suffer more than bonds in this hypothetical "readjustment of investor mentality."
The other part of the story Gross omits is that the government has an incentive to suppress inflation, since Social Security and veterans benefits, along with government wages and other items, are pegged to CPI.
In the accompanying video, Henry and I rail about how America's political leaders continue to pander vs. showing any true leadership on the issue of energy policy and inflation generally.
But Pimco's Gross suggests Americans are getting the "leadership" we deserve: "Alternative energy discussion takes a bleacher's seat to the latest foibles of Lindsay Lohan or Britney Spears and then we wonder why gas is four bucks a gallon," he writes. "We care as much as we always have -- we just care about the wrong things."
i know i know. we r wrong and the pce deflator and the bls have it right. the problem is NO ONE believes that data, except the ivy leaguers.
man i should have gotten a better SAT score 1110 didnt fly. 700 math, 410 verbal.
bman u clearly got over a 1500. frosty probably in 1500 hundreds. bud probably 1300ish. spin 13 to 1400. mav probably 1400. mfl went to penn, so 1275?
i grad hs and college with exactly a 2.0. all u kiss asses got well over 3.5 in hs and at least 3.0 to 4.0 in college.
i feel retarded amongst u cats. but then i look around here in my office or go something on the weekends. and i just listen to people, and know deep down inside, 80 to 90% of this country is full of ignorant idiots, not worthy of even casting a vote.
after watching recount, the question must be asked, after 2000, how can florida be a ANOTHER huge land mine for the dems.
i guess like bud, the dems down here get played by the bible thumpers into just doing stupid thing after stupid thing.
now can mccain scare enuff idiots into thinking the world will end if barrack is president?
truth is mccain or barrack, the world has equal chances of blowing up in the name of religion.
we shud get it over with and start with the glass making. its gonna happen. we mite as well start it!
;-)
The other part of the story Gross omits is that the government has an incentive to suppress inflation, since Social Security and veterans benefits, along with government wages and other items, are pegged to CPI.
bill gave me no props. this is clearly my idea
;-)
chosen and graphed by Ed Hyman and ISI, have averaged nearly 7% inflation for the past decade, while the U.S. has measured 2.6%.
IMVHO, ed hyman is the best economist around. ISI gave me the correct information in 99 that helped load up on the nazz going into y2k.
still living off that call!
http://www.pimco.com/LeftNav/Featured+Market+Commentary/IO/2008/IO+June+2008.htm
there is the link to the entire article.
ENJOY!
that looks like 2 fingers
coincidentally the number of wins for the scarlett knights football team will have in 08
fix your f'ng email frosty!!!!
or get a real provider
sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesh
"too much money sloshing around in hedge funds"
huh?????
out of all the ridiculous entries in Bman friday post
that was the stupidest
PS......ask Harvard for a tuition refund......you are clearly entitled
After 12 months of an endless primary campaign barrage, for instance, most of us believe that a candidate’s preacher – Democrat or Republican – should be a significant factor in how we vote. We care more about who’s going to be eliminated from this week’s American Idol than the deteriorating quality of our healthcare system. Alternative energy discussion takes a bleacher’s seat to the latest foibles of Lindsay Lohan or Britney Spears and then we wonder why gas is four bucks a gallon. We care as much as we always have – we just care about the wrong things: entertainment, as opposed to informed choices; trivia vs. hardcore ideological debate.
It’s Sunday afternoon at the Coliseum folks, and all good fun, but the hordes are crossing the Alps and headed for modern day Rome – better educated, harder working, and willing to sacrifice today for a better tomorrow. Can it be any wonder that an estimated 1% of America’s wealth migrates into foreign hands every year? We, as a people, are overweight, poorly educated, overindulged, and imbued with such a sense of self importance on a geopolitical scale, that our allies are dropping like flies. “Yes we can?”
liking the cut of bills jib. he needs to face reality, however.
bill for gods sake shave your head! you r an insult to the rest of us folicily challenged, who have the balls to walk around without the combover, and guess what?
and u will look younger!
uh ... mern ... I already demolished the Bill Gross article. See last Monday's post.
check that: Tuesday May 27.
demolished him - disintigrated - vaporized, etc.
it was total crap.
some airhead Z-er must have written it for him.
Sheesh Bud, my comment was so obvious. Any thinker person knows it.
Trillions in trading funds ... parasites feeding on the fear and greed of stupid rich and causing trouble for the common man.
They need regulated.
I suppose today qualifies as a razzia ... those rotten beefers ...grrr.
All those trillions are unproductive investments...
BKX breaking down....rumor...Ben emergency rate cut tonight....LMAOOOOOO
um, i still have access to ISI's data just becuase i keep in contact with a beefer that still uses him.
ISI has mucho anecdotal data that crushes your thesis from last week.
they wrote a 30 page book about it, all with real data.
u may want to look at that. im sure u wud agree that when talking about economists, most sux, but ISI is the best or very close.
bill gross aint bad either. u dont get to manage 800 billion by accident. u r clinging to an antiquated model, that does not work, in the real world. maybe in harvard but not on main street, no way!
question for bob. no tongues allowed in answer. straight up frost man. do we hold here? do we test and hold the MLK lows? or do we test, break and usher in a "real" bear market?
even though i am not involved a new bear market wud make it harder for JPM not to blow up more employees. so i guess we hold, but my gut says your post about selling in may and staying away will be proven very right this yr.
was out and about all weekend. waterholes, wmt, tgt, petco. had ears wide open and eyes wide open. A, restaurants were EMPTY! waitstaff telling they were going to quit, i suggested getting 2 jobs.
B. everyone and i mean everyone in the check out lanes bitching and moaning about inflation.
c. i almost got into a fight over the NBA. i was willing to bet some jerk 100k that david stern prayed at nite for a celts lakers final. he thought i was crazy. then he asked "seriously how much wud u lay on that?"
i said 100k.
he then says how u gonna prove it?
"well for 100k i wud hire a PI, and take pics of him praying at nite"
then he told me to walk home, as he got into his car after drinking 3 pitchers of beer.
americans r DUMB!
hmmm isn't "anecdotal data" an oxymoron ?
Maybe close to one.
There are so many anecdotes that prove my thesis is correct.
There are lots of ways companies cut pay effectively: cut health benefits, cut retirement, add work loads, lay off older, higher paid people, replace skilled labor with unskilled + a machine, on and on.
That's why people feel poorer. It's been going on for years.
u just described stagflation.
it is what it is
STAGGER LEE is a mad man and he shot my billy d.
they dont feel poorer they R POORER.
this one really surprised me. people running out of gas is like at an all time high, in america.
i have never run out of gas, ever, even in hs or college when the gas meter read E that was ENUFF gas for the weekend.
u have to be really retarded to run out of gas. u have to be pretty retarded not to fill up totally, in vein to save time.
my wife puts 20 bucks in at a time. and i was like Y? u r wasting TIME, filling up every 3 days. i fill up once every two weeks. i know the cheapest place around and stop there every other monday before work.
she retorted in the time and stress it took to figure all that out, i probably cut a few days off my life span stressing about it.
she is type b
im am type AA
i guess if u r not in the upper class, that means u r in the lower class and maybe u cant afford to fill up everytime u pull up. middle class gone, no use in discussing them.
and if inflation is so under control y did paulson spend all weekend trying to figure out how to get inflation under control????????????
do u have any idea how much SS benefits wud go up, if the CPI was 7%? they cant afford to do that, dc.
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