Financial News
Madoff dishes in depo
Bernie Madoff has given a three day deposition, as part of civil suits in the ongoing liquidation… Bloomberg reports in Bernie Madoff: ‘I Always Wanted to Please Everybody’ the big reveal, which is that his core investors (Picower, Shapiro, Chais and Levy) knew from the start that he was a fraud… Although Bernie is not […]
Banco Popular deal symptom of ongoing reckoning in Europe
Gretchen Morgenson of the New York Times in her piece Lessons From the Collapse of Banco Popular reminds us of the continued perilous state of the European banking system, which never properly deleveraged after the Financial Crisis…Banco Popular, Spain’s fifth largest bank, was suddenly sold in a government-sponsored rescue to Banco Santander… This was the […]
Survey: US investors living in Lake Wobegon, where all returns above average
Lisa Abramowicz of Bloomberg Gadfly has a thought provoking article today: Stop Fooling Yourself About 8% Easy Returns… Legg Mason surveyed 900 investors in the United States, whose average expected rate of return was 8.64% (non-retirees had even higher expectations, at 9.27%)… The current dividend yield of the S&P is 1.9%, investment grade bonds yield […]
Manhattan mega foreclosure tops record
The largest foreclosure in U.S. history has been reported by Bloomberg… A Second, Even Bigger Foreclosure Reaches NYC Billionaires’ Row describes a $35 million loan made by Banque Havilland SA secured by a full floor apartment at One57, the one of the tallest residential buildings in New York City, located at 157 West 57th Street… […]
Has a belated bubble formed up north?
Canada missed the U.S. housing bubble of 2005 – 2007 because of tighter mortgage rules… As a result, Canadian housing sailed through the Financial Crisis… Subsequently, because of favorable demographics, including high immigration rates, Canadian housing has dramatically outperformed the U.S.… But markets adjust… Interesting essay by Ritholtz asset manager Ben Carlson entitled Canada’s Housing […]
Market left guessing by Beijing mandarins’ ‘systemic risk’ move
Chinese regulators have targeted three high-flying stocks as a “systemic risk”… The questions is whether this is a one-off disciplining of some now out-of-favor parties, or the start of a major new regulatory trend… The New York Times has the basics in its story Shares Plunge as China Voices Concern Over ‘Systemic Risks’ written by […]
When ‘Smart Beta’ gets crowded
Man Bites Dog… Burton Malkiel, the Princeton professor whose classic book “A Random Walk Down Wall Street” presaged in 1973 indexing as an improvement over active stock investing, has now embraced Smart Beta… James B. Stewart’s New York Times article, An Index-Fund Evangelist Is Straying From His Gospel, sets forth his case… One giant issue remains… It’s […]
How car loans are different in a foreclosure
Most (but not all) states in the United States have some combination of “anti-deficiency laws” or “non-judicial foreclosure” proceedings, which prevent a bank or other lender from getting a deficiency judgment against a homeowner who has been foreclosed on… These rules prevent the lender from continuing to seek principal, interest, fees and expenses after the […]
On Argentine long bond, question is not if, but when?
Argentina has re-entered the global bond market with a bang, $2.75 billion of a 100 year bond… The 7.125s of 2117 were issued at 90c to yield 7.917%… 100 year issues are rare, even rarer when rated B3… Argentina has been in default during 38% of its 200 year history, so this bond is almost […]
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