28JAN09:
Q1-09 DOW: 8900
Q2-09 DOW: 7250
Q3-09 DOW: 5810
Q4-09 DOW: 3960
CITI NATIONALIZED
OBAMA GETS SICK 27AUG09:
Mini Crash 21SEP09 Predicted correctly:
Bailout=Bonuses
Demise of Bear Stearns
Demise of Lehman Bros.
Demise of AIG
Subprime would cause problems
Date of 2007 crash
CRAs were to blame
G20 riots were a party
Northern Rock run
Northern Rock Nationalization
HBOS and RBS demise
UBS really was Useless
Last night I watched the Knicks being slaughtered at Madison Square Garden and a fire breathing LeBron James sporting more tattoos than skin, wow the crowds. As a Brit, and only used to watching proper sports, it was intriguing to watch the adulation adorned upon a netball [Editor: Basketball] player. In times of uncertainty, the simple things in life become more important and heroes are in great need.
Normally we turn to our leaders but they appear not to be up to the job. Instead sports gods, movie stars and blog gurus are the new heroes of our time. The responsibilities heaped onto a simple blogger can be onerous and without us the world would be a place of propaganda feeding hacks with political and personal agendas. Instead we get of egotistical loud mouths who are open to abuse but live and die by the hits they get.
Blogging is capitalism at work. If you don't like what is said you walk away and create a facebook group and make a mock up you tube clip and the blog ends very quickly. For some strange reason, FiNTAG goes from strength to strength. The spelling is as bad as ever, the arguments do not scan and the cartoons are very bad. Which brings me onto Christmas.
For yes, I am looking to publish a collection of my 2008 crap cartoons that depict badly what has happened in this one in a life time event of carnage and tax increases. I am hoping to have some news shortly. So if you are thinking about buying the ultimate gift and cannot work out how to print the cartoons from Flickr, it could solve all your needs.
Anyway, back to market volatility. As usual, good news on the wires spells a massive spike and vice versa if the news is bad. No longer do markets reflect long term sentiments. But I don't care. Knitting and dissing my loyal readers are my new black.
Parkcentral Capital Management, an investment firm that manages money for the family of Ross Perot, is liquidating a fixed-income hedge fund because it is “no longer viable.”
This year through October, Parkcentral Global Hub's assets fell as much as 40 percent, to $1.5 billion. The fund is selling its remaining holdings to pay creditors, Eddie Reeves, a spokesman, said Tuesday. Mr. Perot and members of his family were the fund's biggest investors ...
Fintag says Ross Perot ...everything he ever touches falls to pieces.
WEALTH MANGERS URGED TO IMPROVE COMMUNICATIONS WITH CLIENTS
The need for wealth management institutions to improve their client communication on investment risk and provide more systematic, structured advice on asset allocation to protect and enhance the performance of their investments, especially when the markets are unsettled, is one of the conclusions in a white paper* produced by Odyssey Financial Technologies. The white paper points out that asset allocation services, often the reserve of very wealthy clients, will become essential in the aftermath of the financial crisis. They may be made available to a larger number of clients. This applies to execution-only clients.
Fintag says Imagine that. Talking to your clients. Shocking news.
The Federal Reserve is injecting $800bn (£518bn) more into the troubled credit markets in its latest high-stakes attempt to end the drought of mortgages, car finance deals and student loans that has pushed the United States into recession.
With three new plans announced yesterday, the Fed is massively increasing the scale of its intervention in the markets and inflating the size of its balance sheet. "Millions of Americans cannot find affordable financing for their basic credit needs," said the Treasury Secretary, Hank Paulson. "And credit card rates are climbing, making it more expensive for families to finance everyday purchases. This lack of affordable consumer credit undermines consumer spending and as a result weakens our economy."
Fintag says Sorry, but I am losing count of these press releases. It seems like every day more bail out funds, liquidity pumping and tax spending. Why don't the Fed just say they are printing a trillion of USD, put them into a fund and invite people to take what they want - first come, first served, eat all you can.
They could nominate a Citi ATM outside Penn Station and put the pin number on scratch cards in the New York Post?
(HT to hf-implode.com) prison planet says " Paulson Changing TARP Program for the FIFTH TIME "
Business leaders believe that Gordon Brown's decision to raise the top rate of income tax marks a return to "Old Labour", according to a poll for The Independent.
Some Blairite MPs are privately worried about the surprise move to bring in a 45p-in-the-pound tax rate on incomes of more than £150,000 from 2011. They fear it could alienate voters by suggesting Labour is reverting to type, after consistently opposing an increase in the 40p top rate under Tony Blair.
The Government will be forced to defend its mini-Budget in an emergency three-hour Commons debate today. In an unusual move, the Speaker, Michael Martin, granted a request for a debate by the shadow Chancellor, George Osborne, who accused Labour of "running away from the arguments because they are losing the argument". He said the pre-Budget report was so significant that it amounted to a full Budget, which is normally debated over five days and voted on.
Fintag says Well this business leader [Editor: Surely a mistake?] has been telling you that Socialism is back since the man was unelected to be leader.
I love paying tax. But only small amounts. So I have cut my salary back to GBP20,000 to provide me with some pocket money and will be bartering my skills. You may ask what they are? Well let me finish my knitting for beginners course and we shall see. Look out on Craigs List or Gum Tree for the services I shall be exchanging.
telegraph says " David Cameron accuses Gordon Brown of 'planning secret VAT bombshell' "
SPITZER'S WIFE JOINS HEDGE FUND METROPOLITAN CAPITAL
The wife of former New York Gov. (and Sheriff of Wall Street) Eliot Spitzer is going to work on Wall Street.
Silda Wall Spitzer, who endured the humiliation of her husband's resignation amidst a prostitution scandal in March, has joined hedge fund Metropolitan Capital Advisors (which is technically on Madison Avenue), New York Magazine reports. The $300 million firm is run by CNBC personality Karen Finerman, whose husband, Lawrence Golub, is a longtime friend of Eliot Spitzer and contributor to his campaigns.
Fintag says You couldn't make this up could you. For those of you in two minds about buying my Crap Cartoons: The Credit Crunch Edition, here is my most popular by downloads (last count: too many):
A new EDHEC survey has found that investors are not at all convinced that hedge fund replication products work the way they're intended to or that hedge funds can be replicated in the first place.
The report found that although asset managers agree on the two main advantages of hedge fund replication—high liquidity at relatively low cost—criticism outweighs praise. Many investors believe that the behavior of hedge fund managers is not replicable, and consequently that any replication product is unlikely to replicate any managerial skill.
Fintag says And who has been saying the same thing since they came out?
NEW STAR SUSPENDS TRADING IN FLAGSHIP INTERNATIONAL PROPERTY FUND
New Star Asset Management suffered a further blow on Tuesday when its flagship international property fund was forced to suspend trading after redemptions by institutional investors left it dangerously low on cash.
Shares in the company tumbled a further 33 per cent at 16p on news of suspension of the £470m fund, which has seen about £75m pulled by institutions looking to cover their own losses in the past few weeks.
The closure of the fund, the only UK-domiciled international property vehicle of its kind open to UK retail investors when it launched last summer, marks another setback for New Star.
Fintag says Wow. Some of these investors are slow off the mark. The UK commercial property market has been in free fall for 18 months. No wonder our pensions always perform so badly. Late to the party and last to leave - as usual.
Several companies reliant on four US hedge funds face collapse because the funds cannot access shares and loans held at the London arm of Lehman Brothers, the collapsed bank.
The four funds - whose names were kept secret in a High Court ruling this week - claimed that they were likely to close in mid-December if they failed to get access to information about their assets frozen at Lehman. The funds made an unsuccessful effort to force the administrators of Lehman, four PwC partners, to give them details of their assets and how much they owe to Lehman.
Fintag says Thankfully my exposure is small - and it is not even an exposure, just some trades I did that are stuck in the Enron like mess that is Lehman. Expect the lawyers to be very busy indeed ...and why not sue Paulson too for saving AIG and not Lehman.
SPARX TO CLOSE U.K. OFFICE, RETREAT FROM SOME U.S. BUSINESSES
Sparx Group Co., Asia's biggest hedge-fund manager with $8.8 billion in assets, will close its U.K. office and some U.S. operations as it cuts costs to cope with investor withdrawals and declining earnings.
Sparx will close London-based Sparx Asset Management International Ltd. and retreat from U.S. operations except its mutual fund businesses, according to Shuhei Abe, president and chief executive officer, of Sparx. The Tokyo-based firm plans to cut fixed annual costs to 7.8 billion yen ($82 million) from the current 10.2 billion yen, according to Abe.
Fintag says Such nice people at Sparx, London. I will miss them.
Life insurance companies, nervous over massive investment losses that could ultimately threaten their viability, are hoping they are next in line to get a piece of the U.S. financial bailout.
They argue federal funds could stabilize their trillions in investments and warn that any failure of a life insurer could dry up a key source of corporate financing.
But U.S. officials are not convinced.
Fintag says I was taken to the netball game last night [Editor: You are turning into Jeremy Clarkson] by an Insurance Broker. He seemed to be very bullish. But insurance people always are when times are bad? Watch Groundhog Day again and see what I mean.
It's a simple truth: when times are good, individuals and nations are happy to work together. Many differences and distortions get papered over by the prospect of plentiful jobs, gushing profits, and the dream of prosperity for all.
When the pendulum swings the other way, however, people become defensive, suspicious and selfish. They are wary of giving up something now in exchange for future rewards because souring economic conditions means those promises are less likely to be honored.
Fintag says Human nature eh? That is why I love my quants. They never complain however much I beat them.
VIKRAM PANDIT'S GOT "ONE MORE SCREW UP" LEFT. WHAT WILL IT BE?
"Nothing is happening just yet. One more screw up and he is definitely gone. Based on what I'm hearing, it's fluid. Does this mean Pandit's out? Probably not, but maybe so. He's got like half a mistake left. Unless the board gives him more leeway. I don't know; I'm not in the board meetings." -- Charlie Gasparino, CNBC, 11/25/08
Fintag says I am sure he will find something. I am looking forward to a new logo, a new screen saver or another memo that extols the virtues of his leadership.
Warren E. Buffett has long been an proponent of transparency and a critic of murky financial instruments. Now, as his investment firm's stock takes its worst beating in years, America's avuncular prophet of capitalism is promising to shed some light on his own opaque investments, The New York Times's Michael J. de la Merced writes.
Shares of Mr. Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway, a sprawling empire of companies and stocks with the highest possible credit rating, have tumbled 36 percent since Oct. 1. And the cost of protecting Berkshire against default — a measure of investor confidence in a company — has doubled over the past two weeks, reaching levels more often associated with debt ratings near junk status.
Fintag says I thought he didn't do derivatives. Another amateur getting caught up in the hype.
Some of the nation's universities are trying to sell chunks of their portfolios privately as their endowments swoon with the markets.
Among institutional investors, school endowments aggressively embraced private equity, real estate partnerships, venture capital, commodities, hedge funds and other so-called alternative investments over the last few years. Endowments with more than $1 billion in assets reported 35 percent of their holdings in these types of investments on average last year, a much greater portion than big public pension funds, for example.
Fintag says Academics eh?
27 comments
Civil Servant said ...
Good to see no public sector bashing.
26 Nov 08 - 08:02 gmt
anonymous said ...
no comments today. looks like your blog is dead. goodbye,
26 Nov 08 - 08:40 gmt
Shane Warne said ...
Quoted in City A.M. today Fin.......there is a new banner for the Blog.
Fintag "as seen in City A.M."
26 Nov 08 - 09:33 gmt
anonymous said ...
Alistair Darling and Mervyn King hinting darkly at the possibility of nationalisation of the remaining privately owned banks as a possible remedy for the bank lending strike.
26 Nov 08 - 09:54 gmt
Syed said ...
What will happen to Dubai's financial market?
26 Nov 08 - 10:39 gmt
anonymous said ...
@Syed: why are you worried?
26 Nov 08 - 11:27 gmt
Syed said ...
;-)..because i have been offered a job..wondering shall i take it or look into saudi.
26 Nov 08 - 11:30 gmt
Abdul the bull bull said ...
Dubai does not and never did have a fiancial market of its own.... it is Abu Dhabi cash, and mis-guided foreign real estate investment..
26 Nov 08 - 11:32 gmt
Abdul the bull bull said ...
Dubai is screwed..... Syed. If you are domestic to Dubai, leave for Geneva.... the whole place is one big sub prime time bomb
26 Nov 08 - 11:34 gmt
Abdul the bull bull said ...
With all the money being spent on Ethiad and hotels.. where is this prince/sheik going to turn to for more cash.. we all know ADIA has had no new cash for almost two years.. they can't, wont bail out Dubai.. even if they never challenge to be the "top state" in the emirates... Dubai has no oil...
there is a problem building castles on sand you know...!!
26 Nov 08 - 11:40 gmt
Local Council Diversity Outreach Co-Ordinator said ...
I love paying tax too, but this 45% tax on my £150k earnings is unfair! I didn't sacrifice 9 months studying media studies in Merseyside Polytechnic to be punished like this...
26 Nov 08 - 12:33 gmt
Num said ...
Fun Dubai exercise of the day
1) Go to the DIFX website 2) 2 Count the number of shares listed 3) Count number of shares traded.
then have a wee giggle...
26 Nov 08 - 13:14 gmt
Sheep's testicles said ...
Actually it's Nasdaq Dubai now, so get your facts right NUMpty
And have you seen the list of memeber dealers...read and weep nimrod!
26 Nov 08 - 13:50 gmt
Sweet & Sour said ...
@Local Council Diversity Outreach Co-Ordinator Did you go to Harvard? Do you associate with known 1960's era domestic terrorists? ...Thought not
26 Nov 08 - 14:21 gmt
BENnies said ...
@NUM: What are you talking about? 56 is still more than you get dollars for a barrel of oil.
@Fintag: Replicating HF performance is super easy. Go long anything and use a lot of leverage. Make random trades into crowded securities. Use a "stop-loss" that gets triggered if you are down 20% from Dec 31st. At that point double your bet. If you go -30% unwind the positions 10% a quarter. That should give you "managerial skill" component.
26 Nov 08 - 14:46 gmt
KONG said ...
@Local Council Diversity Outreach Co-ordinator
It's no longer Merseyside Poly, it's now the Cosmopolitan University of North Tranmere and Stanley. Or C.U.N.T.S. for short.
26 Nov 08 - 15:25 gmt
Alpha60 said ...
LOL...v good KONG...didn't all the liverpool WAG's study there? lol
26 Nov 08 - 15:48 gmt
Local Council Diversity Outreach Co-ordinator said ...
Hey, I provide valuable outreach services to wide range local stakeholders so they can enrich their key sustainable development opportunites!
26 Nov 08 - 15:54 gmt
Tradebot said ...
ha ha ha. very good KONG. in words of
26 Nov 08 - 15:58 gmt
Num said ...
Forgive me, it only rebranded as NASDAQ Dubai this week. But to the point at hand. After 3 years the NASDAQ has 19 listed equities. Only 2 of which trade. 1 of which was a magic company made up by the Gov (DPW) There have been 65 trades in the whole eq market today. Its a joke. You don't need a stock exchange for that, you need a filing cabinet. For comparison in October trades per day at that titan ofOMX Copenhagen averaged 303,881
26 Nov 08 - 16:35 gmt
anonymous said ...
@Local Council Diversity Outreach Co-ordinator...I am in charge of Equality and Cohesion with a specific remit for interfaith single mothers who don't have any disabilities and are therefore discriminated against. Shall we get £250K funding and do a workshop
26 Nov 08 - 18:12 gmt
Moron said ...
ladies....i continue to short this joke of a rally ...for whatever it is worth:))
26 Nov 08 - 19:29 gmt
AthenaDelphi said ...
And now that you've mentioned your intentions, Finbar, I must tell you that I absolutely feel all tingly that I've been dissed by you! Since I'm a lady, I won't mention where I'm feeling ~tingly~.
27 Nov 08 - 00:15 gmt
AthenaDelphi said ...
@Moron - short it all you want, I'm going taking the trade. Then we'll see what the landscape shows, since its Dec. 1st and most mutual funds close their books Nov. 30th. Since no one is around to sell their shares, the MF's are doing window dressing. I'm cutting free by Friday at half time.
27 Nov 08 - 00:20 gmt
AthenaDelphi said ...
Sorry Moron, my english syntax was awful in my reply. The phone rang and I was multi-tasking. Let me restate: Short all you want, I'm going to take the long trade until Friday at half time, then look at the world scene as well as the BabsonChart, see how high the tech retracement could be, and then make the decision as to sell or keep "all in".
27 Nov 08 - 00:36 gmt
anonymous said ...
Finbar, with India having hotel problems, please don't use the subways in NYC while you're visiting. Thank you and if you're still in America, Happy Thanksgiving.
27 Nov 08 - 00:38 gmt
Hanky Paulson said ...
Did you find the Green Card I left for you? Yes, it was at the snack bar.
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