Triple Hash

The British Are Coming!

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 16:53:00 +0000

The British are coming, the British are coming!

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

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Obama to Limit Executive Pay

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 13:06:00 +0000

From a Bloomberg article Obama to Limit Executive Pay to $500,000 a Year Under New Rules:

Feb. 3 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama will announce tomorrow that he’s imposing a cap of $500,000 on the compensation of top executives at companies that receive federal rescue funds, an administration official said.

Any additional compensation will be in restricted stock that won’t vest until taxpayers have been paid back, said the official, who requested anonymity.

Now, let's go and sit in the wayback machine. In the 80's during another recession, companies had to cut back on salaries and switched their compensation to company stock. And then as the recession ended, company's stock boomed and made these executives huge sums of money. Then, the American public out-cried that these companies boosted their stock price in the short-term to benefit these stock holding executives. We then wanted some kind of government oversight to stop this abuse.

So now we want to tell the banks to pay with stock and not money since it appears the money for pay and bonuses is coming from bailout funds. What's really ironic about this is that with fractional reserve banking, the bank can create the money out of thin air and pay back the government for the bailout. As the recession (depression) ends, their stock will boom and they'll be rich. Man, what a plan.

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AP Investigation: Banks sought foreign workers

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 21:16:00 +0000

From this article there is no surprise that the banks who are in bailout mode chose to hire from abroad through the corrupt H1B program.

The dozen banks now receiving the biggest rescue packages, totaling more than $150 billion, requested visas for more than 21,800 foreign workers over the past six years for positions that included senior vice presidents, corporate lawyers, junior investment analysts and human resources specialists. The average annual salary for those jobs was $90,721, nearly twice the median income for all American households.

As the economic collapse worsened last year - with huge numbers of bank employees laid off - the numbers of visas sought by the dozen banks in AP's analysis increased by nearly one-third, from 3,258 in the 2007 budget year to 4,163 in fiscal 2008.

Check out the rest here.

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Congressman Paul Kanjorski Explains the Reason for the TARP

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 18:54:00 +0000

This should scare the pants off you...

Rep. Paul Kanjorski In referring to September 15th...

Here's the facts. And we don't even talk about these things. On Thursday, at about 11:00 o'clock in the morning, the federal reserve noticed a tremendous draw down of money market accounts in the United States to the tune of $550 billion dollars was being drawn out in a matter of an hour or two. The Treasury opened up its window to help, they pumped $105 billion dollars into the system and quickly realized they could not stem the tide, we're having an electronic run on the bank. They decided to close the operation, close down the money accounts, and announce a guarantee of $250,000 per account so there wouldn't be further panic out there, that's what actually happened. If they had not done that, there estimation was that by 2:00 o'clock that afternoon, $5,500,000,000,000 ($5.5 trillion) would have been drawn out of the money market system of the United States, would have collapsed the entire economy of the United States, and within 24-hours the world economy would have collapsed.

Wow. Yet, nobody really looks at why the "system" works like this. We just assume that our monetary system built on debt is the norm. That's what needs to be fixed.

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Iraqi Shoe Sculpture Gets the Boot

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 20:56:00 +0000

Thanks to Mike Tennant at the Lew Rockwell blog for covering this. The shoe sculpture that represents the shoe thrown at bush has been removed. (See my earlier post here.)

From Mike Tennant:

As Dwight Johnson, who informed me of this development, wrote: "Good to know that the death of all those Americans to bring democracy (including surely freedom of speech) to Iraq is working so well for them. Great lesson in free speech for these school children."

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GM Takes TARP Money and Spends it in Latin America

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 04:39:00 +0000

Can you believe this? GM is going to take $1,000,000,000 of their TARP money and further invest it in one of their Brazil operations. Read the article here.

General Motors plans to invest $1 billion in Brazil to avoid the kind of problems the U.S. automaker is facing in its home market, said the beleaguered car maker.

According to the president of GM Brazil-Mercosur, Jaime Ardila, the funding will come from the package of financial aid that the manufacturer will receive from the U.S. government and will be used to "complete the renovation of the line of products up to 2012."

So much for spreading the wealth around us here in the U.S.

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Statue Dedicated to Man Who Threw Shoe

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 01:01:00 +0000

You can't make this stuff up...

From the Daily News: Saddam's hometown unveils statue dedicated to man who threw shoe at President Bush

If you notice the woman in the picture has her thumb up. In Iraq that is a sign of contempt for the person you're flashing this gesture too and it generally means, "Up Yours". If you didn't already know that fact, now picture in your mind 2003 when our troops are driving down the streets of Baghdad with their thumbs up and all the little kids laughing and making the same gesture right back at them!

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The Star Wars Trilogy Explained

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 16:44:00 +0000

For all you Star Wars fans. The first (IV, V, VI) trilogy explained...

Star Wars: Retold (by someone who hasn't seen it) from Joe Nicolosi on Vimeo.

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The Mini-Madoff Scams

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 00:24:00 +0000

In this New York Times / Yahoo! story (Troubled Times Bring Mini-Madoffs to Light) we hear of more Ponzi schemes that are going bust all over. Just another sign of as the market dives everyone gets exposed.

Their names lack the Dickensian flair of Bernie Madoff, and the money they apparently stole from investors was a small fraction of the $50 billion that Mr. Madoff allegedly lost of his clients’ savings.

But the number of other people who have been caught running Ponzi schemes in recent weeks is adding up quickly, so much so that they have earned themselves a nickname: mini-Madoffs.

Some of these schemes have been operating for years, and others are of more recent vintage. But what is causing them to surface now appears to be a combination of a deteriorating economy and heightened skepticism about outsize returns after the revelations about Mr. Madoff. That can scare off new clients and cause longtime investors to demand their money back, which brings the charade tumbling down.

“There is no way for a Ponzi to survive given the large number of redemptions and a lack of new investors,” said Stephen J. Obie, the head of enforcement at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

The agency has experienced a doubling of reported leads to possible Ponzi schemes in the last year, and its enforcement caseload has risen this year.

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Dennis Kucinich: Put The Federal Reserve Under Government Control

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 04:51:00 +0000

Dennis Kucinich says he's going to propose legislation to put the Federal Reserve under the Treasury. No more borrowing money from China to pay Kiewit to build a bridge here in Nebraska. Finally, someone with some sense in Washington DC!

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The DOW is Distorted

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 18:06:00 +0000

Over at the The Big Picture, James Blanco talks about how the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) is not balanced any more due to the tanking of a few stocks listed in the average.

For instance if all the sub-$10 stocks listed above, all the financials listed above and GE opened at zero, the DJIA loses 528.63 points. To repeat if C, BAC, GM, AA, JPM, AXP and GE all open at zero, the DJIA loses 528.63 points.

Now, I'm no ace trader and I'm not about to tell you what to do, but if you believe that we can't go down any further from here, or that the downside is roughly 500 points, then you in effect have a floor. So, the floor on the current DJIA is around 7500.

The flip side of this is that if the banks do in fact go to zero, things are even worse then we thought and a drop of 90% from our all time highs may still be in the cards. Remember that major downturns in the market result in 90% loss of valuations. Oh, and never forget that if the banks go to zero that would represent a huge reduction of money supply since money equals debt. No new debt, no money in the system.

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Ron Paul the Daily Double

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 05:22:00 +0000

Wow, Ron Paul is the Daily Double question on Jeopardy...

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Imagine, the Abortion Video for Obama

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 19:04:00 +0000

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Light a Candle for Barry

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 06:03:00 +0000

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Obama to Continue Library Snoop

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 04:43:00 +0000

So all you democrats out there who were upset at Bush and the republicans for passing the Patriot Act, let me get this straight. It is bad for Bush and Company to snoop at what books you read at your local library, but when Barry wants to find out, it is okay?

See this SF Gate article "Under Obama, feds may still snoop library files"

What's ever more sad about this is that republicans will yell, "See, Bush was right, we need to see what 84 year-old, Mrs. Whipple is reading, she might be a terrorist!" And the democrats will respond with some goobiligook that Barry and Crew can be trusted where Bush and Co. couldn't.

Oh, please. Would someone stand-up and tell both sides that this country was built on FREEDOM!

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Colbert Nation: Niall Ferguson

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 19:58:00 +0000

Niall Ferguson on the Colbert Report talking about his book The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World"...

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Niall Ferguson

Colbert at Christmas
Colbert Christmas DVD

Green Screen
Bill O'Reilly Interview

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PBS: The Ascent of Money (Financial History of the World)

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 19:56:00 +0000

As seen on PBS this week, a very good program about money and credit throughout history and into today...

Go to PBS directly for the full video (Watch full program: THE ASCENT OF MONEY).

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Zimbabwe to print first $100 trillion note

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 17:47:00 +0000

We could use this kind of inflation don't you think?

From CNN: Zimbabwe to print first $100 trillion note

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Why More of the Same?

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 15:36:00 +0000

My next letter to the editor...

We're being told that our only answer to solve the problem of high unemployment and a market crash is to spend more. This idea is being told to us by both Republicans and Democrats. Add to this the idea that World War II got us out of a depression and we all seem to think that the government has the answer and the ability to cure our economic ills.

Someone should ask how in the world we could be heading into a depression? With our so called knowledge on what it takes to get out of a depression, there really isn't any reason for us to be having trouble now. Why? Over the last 8 years we've added $5 trillion to the national debt. Isn't that enough "stimulus" for our economy? And if that wasn't enough, then what about the two wars we are fighting? I thought war cures depressions.

Based upon the old "stimulus" ideas of increased government spending and fighting wars we've done everything already to keep us out of a depression. So, why do we think that more of the same will be the answer?

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They Bit Their Own Tale (Oil and Real Estate Collapse)

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 16:57:00 +0000

In this 60 minutes segment we learn about how the price of oil was manipulated as it increased to $147 a barrel in summer of 2008. What we learn is that brokerage companies like Morgan Stanley own companies that are able to physically store oil while also managing trading platforms to help boost trades that impact the price of oil.

What is ironic about this oil speculation is that it occurred at the same time as the housing bubble was growing. Even further the housing bubble bust was helped by the rise in gasoline prices. It is shown in real estate studies that the farther out from city center you go, you see the worse fall in housing prices. And that makes sense from the idea that people could not afford $4 a gallon gas for their SUV while commuting 30 miles to work each day.

Put these two together and you see that the companies that were building up the credit default swaps and mortgage loan industry were the same characters pumping up the price of oil. You then understand that they bit their own tale and caused them to consume themselves on the way down as they de-leverage from both the falling price of oil and real estate.

The problem now is that we the tax payer are bailing them out!

Watch CBS Videos Online

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OS X: Navigate Web Pages Without a Mouse

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 19:53:00 +0000

Yes, this is a blog of political and economic things. But, every once in a while I come across tech stuff (I am a tech guy, btw) and I have to share this tip.

One of the pet peeves of a Mac (there aren't many, I assure you) is that the tab order on web sites that have forms is all screwy. Actually the problem is that when tabbing through the page, the dropdown boxes are skipped. Making you lift your hands off the keyboard and dragging the mouse over to the skipped dropdown.

Alas, here is the fix. The video mentions Firefox, but this is a system preference so it should work for all browsers and software you run on the Mac.

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Like Riding a Tiger - Satyam

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 17:20:00 +0000

News came out today that the fourth largest Indian computing outsourcer has overstated its cash position by 50.4 billion rupees ($1.03 billion). See more here.

“What started as a marginal gap between actual operating profit and the one reflected in the books of accounts continued to grow over the years,” Chairman Ramalinga Raju said. “It was like riding a tiger, not knowing how to get off without being eaten.”

There is so much I could say right now, but will not, instead trusting that Satayam is one incident and is not an epidemic of other foreign outsourcing companies.

What I will say though is that as in the Madoff scandal as the market crumbles more of these financial problems will appear. You can only holdup a failing financial situation for so long before the cracks turn into a major collapse during market downturns.

Now, from a macroeconomic concern, what you're seeing is that over the last 20 to 30 years, the US has outsourced inflation while deflating here at home. We've moved jobs and real things (manufacturing, warehouses, products, etc.) abroad while lowering prices all the way (deflation). Everything that went off our shore though represented inflation in the economies that accepted the responsibility for what we used to produce.

During this time our net worth has gone down especially in relation to 3-5% price inflation. Add to this the rapid creation of credit that has been applied to booms in stocks and real estate, our real net worth is built on a false reality. The time has come for this tower of credit to fail in this country. Since we have stopped borrowing (which may be forced on some people) this is net deflationary in our own country. Any country that received our credit dollars felt inflationary effects, and now they too are going to experience real deflation. Satayam is one of those companies abroad that is suffering from these effects. The governments of the world will do what they can to help prop up their economies but if there isn't any real wealth behind consumers and businesses their efforts will be of no use.

I'm not sure where we go from here, but we've seen that many bubbles have broken. It took a couple of years after a major market crash in the Great Depression to truly find the bottom for the economy. We (the government) tried to stop that from happening, but nothing worked.

There is a saying that "the market makes the opinion". The government can make the opinion better (we'll hear plenty of rhetoric by Obama), but in the end, markets don't listen to opinion anyway.

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Democrat or Republican

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 03:56:00 +0000

Time to play our favorite game, democrat or republican. Watch the below video and tell me if these demonstrators are democrat or republican...

Before you answer, recognize that the 110th Congress that just left and the 111th Congress that just started today are democratically controlled.

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It's Not MY Debt

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 17:10:00 +0000

If you look at history, at times of financial ruin, people begin to wake up and realize that they don't know where their money is going to. A tax payer rebellion comes out of these times. Maybe, we're on the verge of such a time...

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Falling World Market Valuation

noreply@blogger.com (Triple Hash) — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 17:12:00 +0000

Came across this article (Journal of a Plague Year: Faith in Markets Cracks Under Losses) in Bloomberg that talks about the year in the market and all that went wrong. They mention that $30.1 trillion dollars of market valuation was knocked out. Here is a chart of the world market valuation over the last 5 years:

Uploaded with plasq's Skitch!

Now, for those of you that still don't believe that we live in delfationary times, what about the chart do you not understand?

I'm looking for a chart or some statistics for long-term world market valuation. If you know of any, drop me a email or comment.

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