Christopher S. Penn's shared items in Google Reader

Distressed CRE Up 100% to $108B

2009-07-08T21:48:30Z

Ouch!

“Commercial properties in the U.S. valued at more than $108 billion are now in default, foreclosure or bankruptcy, almost double than at the start of the year, Real Capital Analytics Inc. said.

There were 5,315 buildings in financial distress at the end of June, the New York-based real estate research firm said in a report issued today. That’s more than twice the number of troubled properties at the end of 2008.

Hotels and retail properties are among the most “problematic” assets following bankruptcy filings by mall owner General Growth Properties Inc. and Extended Stay America Inc., according to the report. The scarcity of credit is causing property defaults in all regions and among every investor type, Real Capital said.”

-Bloomberg, Distressed Commercial Property in U.S. Doubles to $108 Billion

Is Goldman Stealing $100 Million per Trading Day?

2009-07-09T10:02:32Z

Here’s something to give the conspiracy buffs a total breakdown: Combine these stories from Bloomberg, Daily Kos, and Zero Hedge, and you can reach a rather unsavory conclusion:

• Goldman Sachs’s $100 Million Trading Days Hit Record

• FBI Arrest Opens Goldman-Sachs’ Pandora’s Box

• Intraday Observations

• “Incredibly Shrinking Liquidity” as Goldman Flushed Quant Trading

What is the inference of potentially illegality here?

“That Goldman Sachs may just possibly have used security access codes and built a system to acquire trading information PRIOR to transaction commit time points at NYSE.

The profitability of this split-second information advantage would have been and could have been extraordinary. Observed yielding profits at $100,000,000 a day. [summary to address complaints with respect to complexity.]

GS has special access inside the system from its status assisting the Working Group on Financial Markets (colloquially the Plunge Protection Team) created by Presidential Order two decades ago. GC also acts as Special Liquidity Provider for NYSE.

With 60% dominance of NYSE program trading, what’s good for Goldman defines what shows as overall market performance.”

There is likely to be more info about this trickling out over the coming days and weeks. Stay tuned . . .

Hat tip Bill King

Sources:
Goldman Sachs’s $100 Million Trading Days Hit Record
Christine Harper
Bloomber, May 6
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a7HGVAn8w73Y&

FBI Arrest Opens Goldman-Sachs’ Pandora’s Box
bobswern
Daily Kos, Jul 06, 2009
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/7/6/750420/-Breaking:-FBI-Arrest-Opens-Goldman-Sachs-Pandoras-Box

Intraday Observations
Tyler Durden
Zero Hedge, JULY 8, 2009
http://zerohedge.blogspot.com/2009/07/intraday-observations.html

“Incredibly Shrinking Liquidity” as Goldman Flushed Quant Trading
vets74
Daily Kos, Jul 07, 2009
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/7/7/750786/-Incredibly-Shrinking-Liquidity-as-Goldman-Flushed-Quant-Trading

Tell Wells Fargo, Bank of America, JP Morgan, and Citigroup to Go to Hell

2009-07-07T18:00:00Z

As banks and credit unions stop accepting California IOUs, a market for the securities has sprung up on eBay and Craigslist.

Not so fast... California Sets Terms on IOUs as Questions Arise.

As California continues to issue "IOUs", more controversy is brewing over their use.

On one side, IOU recipients are beginning to trade them like currency, forcing the California state treasurer's office to issue guidelines if they are sold through eBay (EBAY), Craigslist or other means.

California's treasurer is telling recipients of the IOUs that if they sell them to third parties, they will be redeemed by the state treasurer's office only if accompanied by a notarized bill of sale signed by their listed payee.

"We are in the process of contacting officials of eBay and Craigslist to post a notice of the policy on their sites," the statement said.

Speculation is rising over whether California's tax-exempt IOUs, technically registered warrants, can be bought, sold and traded.

The Securities and Exchange Commission must first determine if the IOUs are securities to regulate them, said Ernesto Lanza, general counsel to the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board, adding that the board was not working directly with the commis—sion on that decision.

"It looks like it has all the hallmarks of a security," Lanza told Reuters. "If they are securities, I think they're pretty clearly municipal securities."

At least one website aims to offer a platform for selling the registered warrants. Obed Dorceus, owner of ioumarket.com, said he sees a potential secondary market for the IOUs — and potentially other government promises to pay.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting Big Banks Don't Want California's IOUs

A group of the biggest U.S. banks said they would stop accepting California's IOUs on Friday, adding pressure on the state to close its $26.3 billion annual budget gap.

The group of banks included Bank of America Corp. (BAC), Citigroup Inc. (C), Wells Fargo & Co. (WFC) and J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (JPM), among others. The banks had previously committed to accepting state IOUs as payment. California plans to issue more than $3 billion of IOUs in July.

Ms. Mills of the CBA said some banks were concerned that there aren't processes in place to accept IOUs, and also worried about fraud issues. She noted that not all banks have set a July 10 deadline, and that dozens of credit unions in the state will keep accepting IOUs.

Wells Fargo's head of community banking, Lisa Stevens, said: "We're very disappointed, as are many Californians, that California has taken the unfortunate step of issuing IOUs in lieu of payments to some businesses and individuals."

State officials said they were disappointed by the banks' decision. Garin Casaleggio, a spokesman for Mr. Chiang, said: "We don't want anybody to suffer who can't redeem them when they need cash."

Big Banks Cutting Own Throats

Big banks are cutting their throats by not accepting IOUs, unless of course they have an inside information that the IOUs will go worthless, something I highly doubt Obama would let happen.

Recipients of IOUs will be looking for some place to deposit the securities and small savings and loans or credit unions that will cash them will get the business.

Every one of those blood sucking banks was bailed out by taxpayers (California taxpayers too) and now will not take an IOU from the State of California for the citizens of California. This is disgusting.

If you have an IOU that the big banks will not cash, I recommend closing your accounts and putting them someplace that will. Please tell Wells Fargo, Bank of America, JP Morgan, and Citigroup to go to hell.

Addendum

Bear in mind I am not supporting California's Issuance of these IOUs. California needs to balance its budget so it can pay its bills. I have talked about that a dozen times at least. The two actions are separate and distinct.

However, I am willing to put myself in the shoes of a contractor with employees who needs to cash to pay his employees and subcontractors. There is going to be one massive domino effect of defaults and business closures if people are not paid.

Bear in mind there is no mechanism for states to declare bankruptcy. They must balance the budget somehow and therefore they will. This means the banks will get paid for the IOUs.

It is the California legislature, primarily Democrats, who simply refuse to balance the budget. Contractors and state employees are legitimately owed that money for services rendered. I am all in favor of axing jobs, whatever it takes to balance the budget. I am not in favor of holding businesses and consumers hostage for services already rendered while it is done.

To the extent that banks' refusal to cash IOUs pressures the legislature to act, the refusal may appear to be a good thing. However, two wrongs do not make a right, and if I had a bank account at any of those places and they refused to honor IOUs from the state I would move my account to someplace who would. So should any thinking person.

Addendum II

Aaron Krowne at ML-Implode writes:

It is very interesting that the big banks have reversed. This confirms my suspicion that, despite the bailouts, the banks are intensely in pain for cash to meet their obligations, and cannot make themselves further illiquid by accepting IOUs.

As far as secondary markets, this whole situation reminds me a lot of Continentals.

However you feel about this situation, one thing is for sure. This is a gigantic mess that is getting worse by the day.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List

Mike "Mish" Shedlock is a registered investment advisor representative for SitkaPacific Capital Management. Sitka Pacific is an asset management firm whose goal is strong performance and low volatility, regardless of market direction. Visit http://www.sitkapacific.com/account_management.html to learn more about wealth management and capital preservation strategies of Sitka Pacific.

The fall of goblinism 2

2009-06-29T05:00:00Z

I've already faced something that obvious according to the goblin philosophy, yet does not work: PuGing. Theoretically the most time-effective way to do an instance is "LFM n people wanting the same". Practically you won't be able to do anything due to the swarm of useless M&S swarming to your group.

The other fall of goblinism is bigger. As most readers noticed I'm a big supporter of ideas similar to Ayn Rand's. Too bad it doesn't really work in the real life, despite no logical faults are included.

I found the reason it cannot work in WoW. Maybe we should get all the IMF people play WoW and they don't screw up more developing countries.

The fundamental question is: "why can't WoW be a fair game, like baseball. I mean "fair" as the rules are set, and the field is even. The outcome of a baseball match depend only on your "skill", your ability to run, catch and hit. If you are worse than the other, you'll lose.

Many people claim about nerfs that "it's just a game, why not?". Baseball is also a game. Other computer games are also games, yet they are more fair and consequently are considerably harder. If you die, you'll get death penalty. That ranges from "round over" to XP loss. The tasks cannot be performed by scripted bots. Other games are far less popular than WoW.

WoW is already easy, not penalizing losing (no death penalty), or actually rewarding losing (honor and badges for lost PvP match). But it's not enough. WoW is nerfed again and again, making content and items easier to get by every patch. Why? The commenters were all correct on my Welfare Epics posts, that without it, large playerbase would leave.

There are fair games, like Half-life counterstrike or even Blizzard's Starcraft. My zergling is just as good as yours, and you get no welfare-ultralisk if you are half as strong as me in the midgame. There is no instant-get max-level research building for the "casual player" (who plays 40+ hours/week BTW). So fair games can exist, just much less popular.

Commenters use to write "you must give welfare to the real world poor or they revolt". I found it silly and used to handle it with "make sure the cops have enough ammo". I meant it literally. My guess was that the RL M&S who are too skilless to do any jobs, are a little minority, like 10%. Let the cops handle them, they won't be missed.

Not anymore.

I see now, that they are many more. Remember the wowprogress data on Ulduar raiding? It said, 32% did Siege of Ulduar. 32% of the playerbase did Siege of Ulduar? No, 17150 guilds, approximately 680K people did Siege of Ulduar in the US and EU. That's less than 10% of the playerbase. 32% of those guilds who ever bothered raiding did that. OK, it's a game, let's say that everyone else are PvP-ers and RP-ers, and 6 hours/week casuals. Let's believe it and stick to 32%.

68% of the people who wanted to raid failed to clear the first 4 bosses of Ulduar in the easiest modes. What else can we call these people than M&S?

OK, they are M&S. So what? The "so what" is the "goodbye free-market". If we form a free-market economy, a fair game, these M&S will fail the same way as they failed to get out of light bomb. They will take and give subprime loans, buy stocks of companies having subprime loans, give their money to banks that will use it to handle out even more subprime loans. And they are very-very surprised when it goes down and all start whining: "we are innocent victims, save us Mr President, QQ"

Blizzard can give the M&S nerfs. Blizzard can give the M&S welfare epics. It's just a keypress for them. The real world cannot be nerfed and the real world welfare needs to be supported by taxing the non-M&S.

The success of the completely unfair, M&S catering, always-nerfed WoW over Starcraft, EVE, Darkfall is the ultimate proof that most people are just too stupid for a free-market system.

All the economic books start with something like "the economic actors are following only their own interest". In the real world it's not true for 70-80% of the population. They are just too dumb to recognize their interests. After all, which is harder:

to properly approximate the changes of the interest rates in the next 25 year before signing a mortgage contract, finding out how our paying power will change during this period (coming from the average changes in the industry you are in, your approximated health changes, the number of competing employees coming to the same field, the recession/boom rates of the whole economy and your ability to compete with peers)
standing out of a big, bright red fire while DBM shouts "run away!"

The problem with the different "free-market" philosophies is not that they are elitist. They should be. If all monkeys would be mediocre, we'd still be on the trees.

The problem is not that the useless M&S would starve. They wouldn't be missed.

The problem is that in the current level of education and the cultural value of learning, the useful/useless boundary is simply too high. You cannot discard 20-30% of the population and you cannot let other 40-50% live in low wages. They won't accept it and they are just too many to handle by cops.

PS: if you think this will change me into a socialist, you couldn't be more wrong.

19 Presence Management Chores You COULD Do Every Day

2009-06-29T07:20:24Z

If you’re looking to establish your online presence, and build relationships, it’s not the kind of project where you show up, build your profiles, friend a few people, and call it good. It’s a lot like tending the farm. Here are seven particular “chores” you could do every day that should prove beneficial to your online interests.

Twitter

Find seven things worth retweeting in your general feed and share.
Reply to at least five things with full responses (not just “thanks”).
Point out a few people that you admire. It shows your mindset, too.
Follow back at least 10 folks. (I use an automated tool, but this is a personal preference. If you want such, I use SocialToo.)
10 minutes of just polite two-way chit chat goes far.

Facebook

Check in on birthdays on the home page. (Want a secret? Send the birthday wish via Twitter or email. Feels even more deliberate.)
Respond to any comments on your wall.
Post a status message daily, something engaging or interesting.
Comment on at least seven people’s status messages or updates.
Share at least 3 interesting updates that you find.
If you belong to groups or fan pages, leave a new comment or two.

Accept any invitations that make sense for you to accept.
Enter any recent business cards to invite them to LinkedIn (if you’re growing your network).
Drop into Q&A and see if you can volunteer 2-3 answers.
Provide 1 recommendation every few days for people you can honestly and fully recommend.
Add any relevant slide decks to the Slideshare app there, or books to the Amazon bookshelf.

Blogs

Visit your blog’s comments section and comment back on at least 5 replies.
If you have a few extra minutes, click through to the blogs of the commenters, and read a post or two and comment back.
While on those sites, use a tool like StumbleUpon and promote their good work.
Write the occasional post promoting the good work of a blog in your community.

It’s Not Easy

Maintaining your online presence takes time. If you look at all I’ve listed above, that’s easily more than an hour of work. But it depends what the value of that presence is to you, if you’re doing this as an individual, or to your organization, if you’re doing this on behalf of a brand or product.

We’ve traded dollars for time, in lots of these equations, as we see the return on our advertising spend diminish. It’s your choice whether you want to maintain an active online presence, or if you want to get away with a bit less.

What do you think?

Embrace Deflation - It's The Cure, Not The Problem

2009-06-27T07:00:00Z

Concern over Japanese deflation is increasing. Please consider Japan Succumbs to Deflation as Consumer Prices Fall Record 1.1%.

Japan’s consumer prices fell at a record pace in May, adding to the risk that deflation will become entrenched and hamper a rebound from the nation’s worst postwar recession.

Prices excluding fresh food slid 1.1 percent from a year earlier after dropping 0.1 percent in the preceding two months, the statistics bureau said today in Tokyo. It was the sharpest decrease since comparable figures were first compiled in 1971.

Bank of Japan Governor Masaaki Shirakawa said last week that price declines will accelerate through the middle of the fiscal year as demand slackens and crude oil continues to trade lower than last year’s record. Retailers including Aeon Co. are cutting prices to attract customers as falling wages and the worsening job outlook damp spending.

“Profits fall, then wages come down, then consumers stop shopping,” said Junko Nishioka, chief Japan economist at RBS Securities Japan Ltd. in Tokyo. “And because people aren’t shopping, companies lower prices. That’s the process that we’re starting to see. It isn’t easy to break out of.”

“With demand deteriorating, companies are finding it more difficult to sell goods and services and are turning to discounting,” said Azusa Kato, an economist at BNP Paribas in Tokyo.

Some 47 percent of 775 Japanese retailers surveyed by the Nikkei newspaper plan to lower prices in the year ending March 2010 to spur sales, up from 9 percent a year earlier. Aeon, Japan’s second-largest retailer, this week started a discount campaign for confectionary, drinks and mayonnaise.

Consumers, whose spending accounts for more than half of the economy, may delay purchases if they expect goods to get cheaper. That would erode profits and force companies to cut wages, which have already slid for 11 months. Japan only escaped from a decade of deflation in 2005.

Japanese Deflation Deepens

As Japanese deflation deepens, Japanese Bonds Complete 2nd Weekly Gain.

Japan’s bonds gained for a second week as a government report showed consumer prices fell at a record pace, adding to signs deflation will hamper the economic recovery and boost the value of the fixed payments of debt.

Ten-year yields touched the lowest in almost three months after the statistics bureau said yesterday prices excluding fresh food fell 1.1 percent in May from a year ago.

“The drop in consumer prices may accelerate to about 2 percent in the summer,” said Yuichi Kodama, chief economist in Tokyo at Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance Co., Japan’s third-largest life insurer. “The 10-year yield may decline to 1.3 percent or below as the market needs to prepare for deeper deflation.”

An “extreme” slump in demand and production are causing the drop in prices, Finance Minister Kaoru Yosano said yesterday. “We continue to monitor developments in prices and need to carefully manage the economy to avoid a deflationary spiral.”

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development this week urged the Bank of Japan to keep pumping cash into the economy “until underlying inflation is firmly positive.” Since it cut the key interest rate to 0.1 percent in December, the central bank has been buying corporate debt and increased government bond purchases from lenders to revive growth.

Japan Fighting Deflation For Decades

Notice the misguided advice by the OECD about pumping cash into the economy. Japan has been doing this for 15 years and all they have to show for it is massive national debt and bridges to nowhere.

Will Deflation Derail A Japanese Recovery?

Jun Saito, a top Japanese economist says Deflation May Derail Japan Recovery.

Deflation “will exert a significant amount of downward pressure on the recovery,” Jun Saito, an adviser to Economic and Fiscal Policy Minister Kaoru Yosano, said in an interview yesterday in Tokyo. “An increase in deflationary expectations will raise real interest rates and that will restrain business investment.”

“Declining prices will mean lower profits, less investment and wage cuts that will weaken consumer spending further,” said Hiroshi Miyazaki, chief economist at Shinkin Asset Management Co.

According to Saito, who quantifies the risk of deflation by using government data and figures from the International Monetary Fund, the risk of persistent price declines climbed to the highest level since 2003 and almost doubled since last year.

“I think there’s a risk we may slip back into deflation,” Saito said, adding that he defines it as a sustained decline in prices.

Japanese companies cut spending at the fastest pace in 54 years in the three months ended March 31. Wages have dropped for 11 months and households reduced spending for a record 14th month in April.

Falling prices are a blow to households who borrow money because it makes it harder to repay debt, Saito said. Consumers will cut back spending if entrenched price declines push up their borrowing costs, he added.

Deflation Misinformation

There is so much misinformation in the above articles it's hard to know where to begin. For starters, inflation and deflation are monetary measures not price measures. However, let's talk about prices for a change.

The idea that "Falling prices are a blow to households who borrow money because it makes it harder to repay debt" is preposterous. When prices fall, consumers have more money and they can pay off debts faster, provided of course they have a job. Falling prices reward the fiscally prudent, which is the way it should be.

Falling home prices do encourage more mortgage walk-aways which is another matter. However, home prices must drop to the point of affordability before a recovery in housing can begin, so even falling home prices are desirable. The sooner home prices fall to the point of affordability, the better of everyone will be.

In general, falling prices are good for consumer balance sheets. Imagine the problems we would have if prices were soaring with the unemployment rate approaching 10%.

Profits are falling along with prices because demand is returning to some sense of normalcy that businesses did not plan for. In the meantime, cash strapped consumers spent recklessly for decades and need to save. They are. Proof is easy to find: US Savings Rate Hits 6.9%, Highest In 15 Years.

This saving is not bad for business as Keynesian clowns believe. Savings provides capital for businesses to expand. For more on this as well as a rebuttal to the ridiculous concept callled "Paradox of Thrift", please see Families Start Saving; Does This Aggravate The Nation's Woes?.

The only reason it appears that savings is bad is after decades of loose credit and monetary expansion by the Fed the world is awash in overcapacity. Now is payback time for misguided Fed polices and reckless consumer spending.

This recession and a rising savings rate are both necessary ingredients to restore fiscal sanity. Deflation should not be feared; deflation should be embraced. What should be feared is the reckless expansion of consumer and corporate credit made possible by Fed policies under both Greenspan and Bernanke. Deflation is not the problem, it is the cure for those reckless policies.

Ironically both Greenspan and Bernanke encouraged Japan to write off bad debts as the means to return to normalcy. However Bernanke Suffers From Selective Memory Loss and cannot follow his own advice.

Addendum:
The Fed likes to portray itself as being an "inflation fighter" when the ONLY source of inflation is the Fed itself. Because of rising productivity over time, the natural state of affairs is actually deflation.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List

Iran Tries to Pacify Protesters With Lord Of The Rings Marathon

2009-06-25T17:28:00Z

Iranian state television's Channel Two is playing a Lord of the Rings marathon in an attempt to keep people inside watching hobbits and not protesting in the streets. Normally people in Tehran are treated to one or two Hollywood movies a week, but with recent events the government hopes that sitting through a nine hour trilogy will take the fight out of most. Perhaps this was not the best choice in films if you want your people not to believe that "even the smallest person can change the course of the future."

Jesus turned water into wine, well I turned an entire student loan into beer! Your move Jesus! (thx 2 my friend Blair 4 the laugh this morn)

2009-06-25T13:25:20Z

Jesus turned water into wine, well I turned an entire student loan into beer! Your move Jesus! (thx 2 my friend Blair 4 the laugh this morn)

Is everyone a possible valued customer?

2009-06-17T05:00:00Z

While I usually don't answer several comments as I find it pointless to argue with people with completely different point of view, I do read every comment carefully, seeking for ones that have unique ideas.

I got a comment "Can't you can make an argument that it's useful to treat EVERYONE as a potential valued customer?"

It made me think a lot. And I think answering this question is much bigger than itself. It's answering "why do socialism must fail?"

Socialists claim that the idea is still great and the most humane: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need". They claim that the existing socialist states and movements are all twisted by greedy power-hungry or simply pitiful men who were unworthy to form the Utopia. With proper people, the Utopia could exists.

I never believed it could. But I never could disprove it. Many claim that the socialist Utopia is unfalsifyable as it requires the non-exisiting "soviet man" who gives according his abilities without reward for himself, and all failure can be blamed on the real people not being soviet men.

I think I can falsify the Utopia.

We already pay tax according to our abilities, without reward. Not because we are soviet men, but because otherwise we would get into jail. If you earn 2x more, you pay 2x more or even more with progressive tax. You pay this tax or you go to jail.

Granted, one can decide (and I did) to work less than he could, therefore earn less, pay less tax. This way he can optimize against his valuation of time vs money. With higher taxes this event could go rampart. However there are methods for forced labor and controlling people via Big Brother systems and the socialists never had problems using them. With the current technical equipment, the total control of the state could be achieved, therefore to comply to the Utopia enforced. North Korea does it more or less, but it does not look like a prosperous Utopia.

The problem is not with the greedy people who want more for themselves than the others. They could be forced. The problem is not with the lazy people who simply don't care. They could be forced. The problem is with the morons, whose abilities are low. They are unable to provide for the society, therefore cannot be forced.

Let's imagine the Utopia where everyone are soviet men who happily give his best to the state and it distribute the values according to needs without corruption. If X% of the population are morons, then at least X% of the GDP is wasted by giving to them. "at least" because the moron has the tendency of getting into trouble, therefore having higher needs. The fat smoking guy needs more health care than I do. Let's call the "increased needs because of dumbness" factor Y. So the productive, working guys of Utopia can only use (100-X*Y)% of the GDP they produce. On the other hand, in the goblin utopia the morons starve to death, and all GDP remains in the use of the working guys.

We need resources for existence and also to invest in the future. Of course the working people of the second system has more resources left for reinvestment, progressing their system faster.

That's why the imperfect socialist utopia (real socialist country) have much less GDP than the imperfect goblin utopia (real capitalist country). And that's why I cannot treat everyone as possible valued customer. He is simply too stupid to plan a long-term cooperation with him. I must take all his money now, because he will waste it by tomorrow one way or another. Don't leave money on the table!

When you find a wallet next to a rock, you can't split the money with the rock for a perspective of a long-term relationship. The rock cannot provide you further wallets as it is unable to produce them. It obtained its first wallet by blind luck. It's a piece of rock for God's sake!

When you encounter with a piece of rock, don't get fooled by irrelevant circumstances like this rock has two legs, arms, nose. A plastic doll in the fashion shop or an ape have all these stuff too.

You can only get a long-term relationship with intelligent creatures. And they are pretty rare nowadays, exactly because socialist thinking does not reward the often "not fun" process of "learning" that changes a piece of meat into a human being.

ECB Shells Out €1,437 Per Eurozone Citizen to Banks

2009-06-24T18:23:00Z

If your small-time loan you need for your kid's bracelets is denied by your bank's customer representative, you have every right to go berserk.
The European Central Bank (ECB) came up with one of their ominous "innovations" on Wednesday that essentially is nothing else than a new form to print still more money. With a record tender of €442,000,000,000 (that is €442 billion) the ECB has showered Eurozone banks with €1,437 for every Eurozone citizen in its first tender with a 371 day maturity, accepting all bids at the fixed official rate of 1%.
BTW how much does your bank charge you for an overdraft? I presume it is closer to 10%, leaving the banks with a hefty profit that makes me understand why even the bible discusses usury.
These figures show that ECB president Jean-Claude Trichet and all the governors on the ECB's council have been publicly denying what cannot be overseen anymore: The Eurozone system is broken beyond repair. Check these posts where the (expletive) central bank(rupt)ers have told us since the onset of the crisis in August 2007 that all is well and contained. My god, I yearn for the good old times of the subprime crisis when I could enrage myself about lousy €50 billion quick tenders. Check my archives since August 2007 for more chronology of the subprime crisis mutating into a full blown global banking crisis.
These Numbers Promise More Hyperinflation
With the latest "innovations" in the process of digitizing new fiat money the ECB basically does the same what it has done since the onset of the crisis: Creating more new money, only with longer maturities and less regard for the quality of collateral, whose rules it softened last year.
Only yesterday Austria's central bank governor Ewald Nowotny had told a champagne drinking crowd at the annual self-celebration of Austrian bankers that the worst is yet to come; an abrupt U-turn after he developed a 100% wrong track record since he took office last year.
The inofficial sounds that reach my ears fully agree with this bleak outlook. The Eurozone's cross border banks had gone completely mad in Eastern Europe. Or what would you call €800,000 condos in Sofia/Bulgaria where the average net monthly income is €300?
Bulgarian tax authorities are now checking all Bentley owners - and there are lots of them - from where their cash stems. Small hint: from foreign banks hallucinating when they pushed loans onto people, charging them 16% interest and more.
Lets not forget that this will blow up the ECB's balance sheet next week, propelling it again over the €2 TRILLION mark.
All this happens at a time when all consumers in the old world have gone into standby mode, deferring everything but the most important items like food when they go out shopping.
I notice more and more shops selling luxury items (like balsamico vinegar and Dijon mustard ((the original producer company went bankrupt last year)) that now glue ads into their windows, offering discounts between 10% and 50%.
Being used to bazar methods from my many years in Asia I can now immediately claim the status of a "regular" customer, getting huge discounts the first time I frequent a store.
A story in the Bubble Street Journal (WSJ) has more details on Europe's way into hyperinflation. From the WSJ:

Euro-zone banks borrowed the one-year funds, the largest amount the central bank has ever dispersed at a single shot, at the ECB's current key rate of 1%. Much of the total likely substituted for amounts banks had been borrowing from the ECB for shorter time periods, so the net stimulus to the economy is less than it appears at first sight.
The novelty lies more in the length of time over which the ECB is prepared to offer unlimited funding, reflecting a desire to bring longer-term money-market interest rates down to where it thinks they should be...
Analysts said the high demand for the funds reflected the problems some banks are still having in funding their businesses.
At the same time, it also reflected expectations that the euro zone's economy will start to recover later in the year and that ECB interest rates are unlikely to fall further. ECB policy makers have signaled they are not inclined to cut their key rate -- now at the lowest level in the central bank's 11-year history -- again unless the euro-zone economic outlook darkens substantially. Analysts expect the key rate to hold steady at 1% through year end.
"We are nowhere near the beginning of a tightening cycle, but we are getting closer to the end of the easing one," said Lauren Mutton, a strategist with Margin Stanley in London....
The Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said Wednesday in its latest forecasts that the ECB still had scope to cut its key rate further.
At the peak of the crisis, banks were using over €1 trillion in short-term funding from the ECB. As fears of a complete meltdown of the financial system have eased, that has fallen to around €618 billion.
During the worst of the crisis, banks were forced to live from week to week, always anxious about access to liquidity. In response, the ECB offered money first for three, then six and now 12 months to give banks greater clarity in their operations, hoping the certainty of longer-term funding from the ECB would encourage them to lend again to the real economy.
"This should reassure the banks that they have adequate liquidity for the next 12 months," ECB governing council member Lorenzo Bini Smaghi said in a speech to a university in Rome Wednesday.
By promising a full allocation of all bids on Wednesday, the ECB has effectively passed responsibility for any easing of policy to the banks themselves, giving complete license to any institution that thinks it can lend the money out profitably into the real economy.
"They must pass it along," Mr. Bini Smaghi said.

This is exactly the problem that has not been solved in the last 22 months and will also not be solved by creating pan-European watchdogs for the financial industry: Banks are not willing to lend unless you present them with 200% collateral. As always, credit is only around for those who don't really need it. Anybody wagering a bet that Europe will recover within the next 12 months. I'd love to take the other side.

PPC / SEM Analytics: 5 Actionable Tips To Improve ROI

2009-06-15T08:43:15Z

A very wise friend, ok Craig, once said this to me: “Paid Search is like playing chess with a Supercomputer.”

At that moment I think my reaction was something like “meh!”. Of course Craig was right.

Search Engine Marketing (Organic + PPC) continues to be a huge part of any company’s acquisition strategy on the web. Like other online channels it is targeted, it is effective and it is accountable. Perhaps its most unique asset being the ability to hyper-target relevant customer intent.

It would be fair to say that Paid Search it has also gotten very complex (Search Long Tail anyone?).

Your campaigns and ads are impacted by the many shiny buttons and pretty dials provided by search engines, complex algorithms that determine if your ad shows up (or not), and a bunch of cool things that search engines are doing (like Universal Search).

Given that context measuring impressions and clicks and click thru rates (CTR) and cost per click (CPC) and conversions are now merely price of entry, in fact you focus on those in the first couple days and then very quickly have to elevate your game.

Yet with our tools like Omniture or WebTrends or Google Analytics etc that is kind of all we end up focusing on as Analytics Professionals. Partly because of the limitations of the data available in the tools, partly because most Web Analysts don’t have the required deep understanding of what Paid Search is all about.

In this post I wanted to share five cool, “non-normal”, analyses that you can do to get a much better understanding of your Paid Search performance. The reports are all inspired from analytical principles I have advocated for quite some time on this blog.

All the analyses been created using the ClickEquations PPC Platform’s ability to do impressive deep analysis with its ClickEquations Analyst tool. [Disclosure: I am on the ClickEquations board of advisers.]

Here’s how I think of CQ Analyst: Take one part data from all search engines, one part unique custom metrics, one part custom database front end integrated into excel and the resulting ménage à trois combines to produce incredibly powerful insights.

Here are five that we’ll cover here:

#1: Identify Keyword “Arbitrage” Opportunities.

#2: Rock Your World, Focus on “What’s Changed”.

#3: Analyze Visual Impression Share, Compute Lost Revenue.

#4: Embrace the ROI Distribution Report [Identify: Lovers, Friends, Losers].

#5: Zero in on the Actual User Search Query (and Match Type).

Let’s go rock it!

#1: Identify Keyword “Arbitrage” Opportunities.

Most web analytics tools dutifully report on search engine data, which ones sending how many visits and what not. They also have a report for keywords. And surely by now you know that you can drill down from the search engine report to look at keywords for that search engine.

Now here is the reality : The ranking of search engines by traffic to your site is fairly well settled. Has been for a long time. It does not change month over month, or changes very little.

What does exist in your data is a different how one keyword performs across search engines! Thanks to the difference in algorithms for both organic and paid search in each engine.

Lookie here, my ClickTracks report….

See what I mean? The heatmap shows you how even my humble blog is optimized for different keywords in different engines. This allows me to look for “arbitrage” opportunities (focus on selective keywords for each search engine).

You can do this exactly same thing for your paid search keywords with ClickEquations Analyst, i.e. look at side-by-side performance rankings by clicks or conversions.

In this example, we see that the keyword dog boots is generating huge traffic on Google (1,309 clicks) but almost nothing on MSN or Yahoo. Why? Are we not buying this delightful keyword on those engines? Is our bid too low or our ad copy ineffective?

Questions you want to answer quickly before your once a year annual huge sale is over and you are left with tons of extra dog boots (heaven forbid!).

Sorting by clicks-per-keyword in another engine, Yahoo in this case, we see that our top traffic terms there are ones where Google is under-performing.

More opportunity!

Let’s bring this puppy home, switch to conversions for the same keywords across different search engines. . . .

It is pretty clear now where immediate opportunities exist (in case you did not notice, the frowny faces : ) and where you are doing ok.

In our case the keyword that is our second highest performer in terms of bringing home the bacon (conversions!) is doing great on Google but is we are getting eggs on AdCenter (or is it Bing now?) and YSM.

It highlights a possible Sales / Revenue opportunity and gives you marching orders to investigate. Remember you already know that this is working on Google, why not on the other engines?

#2: Rock Your World, Focus on “What’s Changed”.

While we obsess about our brand terms and our top ten key phrases the reality is that the long tail of search means that our organic and search campaigns focus on tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of keywords.

One effective strategy to deal with this purely data problem is to focus on what’s changed.

No more data pukes. Just looking at things that need attention.

[imagine whip being cracked, politely]
You must do this to stand a decent chance of making ROI on your Search Campaigns.
[/imagine whip being cracked, politely]

The focus of your What’s Changed reports is to show campaigns, ad groups, keywords that are gaining more impressions, getting more clicks, producing more revenue (or not!) compared to a prior relevant time period.

Here’s the report:

[Click on the image for a higher resolution version.]

Here’s your schedule: Wake up. Take shower. Review major “rises” and “drops” in Gross Profit. Press buttons. Take action. Get coffee. Drive to work to receive praise for a job well done!

Notice the focus is not on Clicks or Visits (not that there’s anything wrong with that), its on money baby!

Here’s one more very useful example, focusing on Avg CPC’s, as you figure out what dials to move. . .

Every line in these reports begs a simple question: Why?

What is causing that ad-group’s revenue to soar 498% above what it did last month?

How come that keyword is down 74% in the number of impressions yesterday vs the day before?

Why did the cost per click for doghouse pets boulder suddenly shift that much?

The biggest problem with paid search, or web, analytics is that you don’t have starting points. These reports, and metrics, give you that. You can then go investigate the hot leads. Perhaps your competitors have sprung into action. Maybe your quality score has taken a dive. Who knows, the boys in the warehouse may have run out of stock.

The nice thing about the ClickEquations Analyst is that you can easily use the delta feature to set the am out of change between two time periods for any paid search metric.

You can create customized Top X modules of what’s changed and literally you have a living breathing dashboard that highlights the most important, and it never gets auto deleted by the HiPPO’s!

#3: Analyze Visual Impression Share, Compute Lost Revenue.

Did you read my post about Google’s Search Based Keyword Tool ?

One of the really cool things that SbKT offers is Ad/Search Share (8th picture in that post). It tells you how often your ad shows up when someone searches using a specific search query (for both paid and organic).

It is very useful in understanding what share of shelf you have (think shampoos in walmart). It is surprising that only the most hard core PPC folks seem to focus on this metric.

You can also get Impression share for your own keywords portfolio from the Adwords Campaign reports. You want to know how many people who are searching for a keyword that you are bidding on are not seeing your text ads (no see = no click = no honey!).

The CQ Analyst helps you visualize the impression share metric very efficiently, even your HiPPO will understand the story!

The impression share, Exact, report showing “share of voice” for queries matching your keywords. . . .

[Click on the image for a higher resolution version.]

Orange = Yea! Green = Ouch!

Need more motivation to work harder to improve your impression share? Here you go, missed clicks and revenue. . .

[Click on the image for a higher resolution version.]

Orange: Cause (ouch!). Green: Effect (ouch! ouch!).

The ClickEquations Analyst report is showing above the lost revenue in green, and the orange line shows why that is lost revenue (lost impressions).

It takes the average revenue per click from the impressions you are getting from your campaigns (so the real conversion data from your site) and extrapolating it out to show how much revenue the lost impressions represent.

In the above real customer example the lost impressions alone (without doing anything else) represents revenue growth opportunity of 30%.

Remember this is using your actual current clicks from ads when you do show up (impressions) and your actual current conversions.

Winning those missing impressions would require either a budget increase, or more likely some significant improvement in bids or quality score – but knowing that potential exists offers a clearer view of specific expansion opportunity than paid searcher usually see.

This is a superior understanding of the opportunity then what you’ll get out of standard web analytics reports. Superior because you are truly bringing deep AdWords data together with your site’s outcomes data.

#4: Embrace the ROI Distribution Report [Identify: Lovers, Friends, Losers].

If you are a Analysis Ninja prepare yourself for a minor orgasm. This is so cool.

Remember the 80/20 rule?

80% of ROI comes from 20% of your Campaigns. Replace ROI with revenue, profit, your favorite metric.

Step One: Specify your ROI goal and your minimum acceptable ROI.

Step Two: Run Report. :)

The report tells you how many of your campaigns, adgroups and keywords fall into three performance bands: Great (exceeds expectations), Good (meets expectations), Poor (sucks!). Or: Lovers, Friends, Losers.

[Click on the image for a higher resolution version.]

You’ll see the raw numbers, the cost vs revenue breakdowns, and the comparative percentage contributions.

So what’s happening here?

8% of the AdGroups are responsible for 54% of the revenue (!). Checkout the Avg ROI contrast.

Or more visual. . .

Its not even 80/20, more like 90/10!

It’s a ruthless way to determine which elements are hurting you, and which are actually helping.

This type of analysis allows you to take a very close / critical look at exactly how many of your keywords are really profitable, and which ones are sucking wind.

It should lead to a complete reevaluation of your keyword selections, match type settings, bid choices, ad copy, and campaign organization. Or in other words, the baby and the bath water.

This analysis is super cool because you end up with a prioritized to-do list of campaigns or keywords that require your full attention.

#5: Zero in on the Actual User Search Query (and Match Type).

While the entire business of Paid Search revolves around keywords, often there is not enough attention being paid to the role Match Types play in determining which search queries (the words the search engine user actually types) trigger your paid search ad.

We sadly make far too many decisions based on keywords we bid on.

In our campaigns we use Broad, Phrase and Exact match types to ensure we are showing up for relevant user searches. Hence most of our campaigns include key words which use all or some of these Match Types.

One of the simplest report you can create using the ClickEquations analytics platform helps you analyze the impact of these different match types on performance. . . search query by key word by match type. . . .

Column 1 is what was typed into the search engine. Column 2 is the keyword that was in your paid search campaign. Column 3 was the Match Type used.

And here is a report that will really solidify the Match Type concept in your mind: The match type report is for the keyword wellness cat food and the actual user search query. . . .

Impressed at the creativity of users who search?

The analysis you should do right away is to understand the performance of individual match types with the user search query for a clump of specific keywords you have bid on.

This analysis will instantly spark ideas for:

1. Match Type promotions (keywords and search queries that you are now buying in Phrase or Broad Match but could and should be in Exact Match)

2. Search queries that are matching your Broad Match keywords but should themselves by Phrase Match keywords

3. (of course) A list of negative keywords that you should add to efficiently stop buying unqualified traffic

If you pause and think about it for a moment this search query report is perhaps the ultimate keyword research tool you could get your hands on. And it is free! Use it!!

The Analysis Ninjas amongst you won’t stop there.

No sirree, bob!

You will want to understand performance of various Match Types across your entire account! You’ll take three steps up and try to understand the forest view first.

A typical expectation would be that Exact Match keywords, which are very precise targets carefully chosen, will perform better than Precise and certainly Broad Match.

So is it?

The first report in ClickEquations Reporting gives you the top level analysis of your Match Type distributions.

It answers fundamental questions such as: What is the result of all your hard work in finding and promoting keywords to Exact Match? What about your plan to conquer the earth and moon and pluto to increase the % of revenue you get through Broad Match?

Here you go. . . . Happy Fathers Day. . . .

[Click on the image for a higher resolution version.]

In one nice view (come on you can’t argue with a pie and a bar chart on the same page!) the information you need at a glance to understand performance, all the way down to Revenue / KW.

Let’s drill down on that to look at it more clearly. . . .

Revenue Per Keyword from Exact Match is much higher than Broad and much much higher than Phrase. That validates our hypothesis and it provides nice support for all the effort we have put into creating highly targeted Exact Match keywords

Do even more of that, while you shift to leveraging Phrase and Broad more strategically.

My favorite view is perhaps to look at the bang for the buck of keywords based on match type. Outcomes sweetie, outcomes!!

The complete picture, Cost -> Revenue -> Gross Profit -> Net Profit by each match type. . . .

Niiiice?

For this specific client it turns out that every dollar spent on Broad Match is yielding a much lower return when compared to Phrase or Exact Match types.

Immediate work needs to be done on negative keyword expansions to further optimize spend.

Each company is unique, your picture might look like this. . . .

By focusing on Cost in addition to the four layers of Outcomes (revenue, gross profit, net profit) you are able to see a multi dimensional picture.

Digging deeper, as in the first part of recommendation #5, will help you then make changes to your match types and campaigns to optimally utilize the opportunity in front of you.

Happy?

Five sweet recommendations you can follow tomorrow, or today!

Paid Search has changed dramatically over the last few years. Yet we tend to report and analyze like we did during the days when hotmail was cool (!).

The stories we have shared today show that taking a different approach to the data already available gives you super awesome insights that lead to immediate cost savings / revenue improvements.

And it is not that hard is it? You need a bid management software like ClickEquations with built in advanced analytical capabilities, you need some awareness of AdWords / YSM / AdCenter and you are on your way.

Ok now your turn.

What do you think overall of this approach? Have you done any of the above five types of analyses? Got any other favorites that you would care to share? What do you use to do your Paid Search Campaigns analysis? Any tips or horror stories you want to share?

I would love to hear from you. Thanks.

PS:
Couple other related posts you might find interesting:

PPC / SEM Analytics: 5 Actionable Tips To Improve ROI

Talk About Iran And Other Worldwide Conversations

2009-06-21T12:41:31Z

My friend Tony from LifeChurch.tv has released something truly useful. BabelWithMe is a chat application that does instant in-line translation of chat from its original language to the language of your choice.

I don’t really have to tell you how useful this is and will be for our larger socially networked world, so instead, I’ll show a pic, and then encourage you to visit.

Here’s a quick snip of it in action:

Now, check out BabelWithMe and invite some friends who speak other languages to chat.

See the world changing? I do.

YOU Are the Revolution

2009-06-16T16:21:12Z

rev⋅o⋅lu⋅tion [rev-uh-LOO-shuhn] –noun

Sociology. a radical and pervasive change in society and the social structure

a sudden, complete or marked change in something

dictionary.reference.com

Back in the days when High Orbit was a weekly show, I named the spaceship the UTF Revolution. In those days there was an air of excitement, even fanaticism, about podcasting and downloads and new technology. The discovery that people could make and deliver content beyond the confines of TV, radio, and newspapers electrified the internet crowd. We called it a revolution. If the revolution started in 2004, it’s only beginning to come to a head now.

Revolutionary Communication

If you’re reading this, chances are good you’re a fan of my music. You didn’t hear me on the radio, you didn’t see me on some prime-time contest show. You heard me on a podcast, in a virtual world, or on live video. I am doing nothing special; I am merely putting my music out there wherever I can. It is you who drive the revolution every time you use these channels. You make the choice to spend your time outside the pre-fab information streams set up by Rupert Murdoch and Robert Iger.

The past five years may have made this revolution seem… well, less revolutionary. After all, we’re not as jazzed up about the miracle of flight now that we can hop a shuttle from NY to Boston for less than a hundred bucks. Make no mistake about it, however, you are committing an act of rebellion with every new channel you support. The record labels and major networks are starting to realize they cannot make money anymore. Soon they will realize the nagging truth that some of us have been shouting from the town square for years: The artists and the fans no longer need them.

Revolutionary Thinking

Is that true? Are record labels obsolete? The answer isn’t a matter of sales figures or Billboard charts. The future of the revolution is in your mind. You must understand that as long as the old-media channels still claim a foothold in your brain, they are controlling you.

Here’s a revolutionary question:

If you’re a fan of my music, are you wondering when I’m going to get “discovered” by a record label?

If so, those record labels still control your brain. You are still chained down by a world where big companies decide what music is legitimate and what music is “just indie”. As the mon once said, “emancipate yourself from mental slavery.” Good videos don’t need a TV network, good news doesn’t need radio towers, and good music does not need a record label.

YOU are my record label. Yes, you. Do you like my music? Then my music is legitimate. I don’t need some guy in a crisp suit to own 80% of my artwork to make it good. All I need is for you to understand that as soon as you become a fan, you become part of my record label.

Revolutionary Action

That’s right, you’re part of my record label. You are also your own TV and radio network. You are working for the best media conglomerate ever created; you contribute only what time and effort you see fit, you cannot be fired, and you are part of something truly revolutionary. In fact, depending on your iTunes playlist, you probably work for so many different record labels right now that your resumé should be 40 pages long. This revolution, however, cannot survive without action.

If you want to keep the revolution fueled, you have a few responsibilities (I’m not going to call them a manifesto, that’d be beating a dead analogy at this point).

Evict the corporations from your mind.
They aren’t the ones buying the music, YOU are. You are in control.
Small sacrifices must be made.
Have you bought an album? Picked up your favorite show’s official shirt/mug/chia pet? Congratulations, you are now a shareholder in the revolution.
Grab your bullhorn.
The #1 thing you can do to support your favorite artists and shows is spread the word about them. Whether they’re on a major label or not, all musicians need that key action from their fans.
Show up for the battles.
For musicians, it’s about live concerts and release parties. For podcasters, it’s the live recording events. Whatever division of the revolution you’re fighting with, they need warm bodies to man the barricades.
Communicate, communicate, communicate!
The artists, producers, and revolutionaries are only as good as their supporters make them. Talk to them. Comment on their blog posts, post your photos/videos in their Flickr group or Facebook page. Tell them what you like, what you don’t like, and most importantly where you want this revolution to go.

The Revolution Grows

Some of us have been a part of this revolution for years. Some of us just discovered yesterday that you can turn a Mac Mini into an entertainment center (yes, that’s a link to a how-to video). However long you’ve been a part of the revolution, make no mistake: the battle rages on. Until we’ve completely killed the notion that a show, artist, or band needs a major corporate partner to be considered “legitimate”, we are still subject to an oppressive regime.

Make the change happen. Take action, and long live the revolution!

A decline in Chinese Treasury holdings

2009-06-16T16:53:00Z

Brad Setser over at the Council on Foreign Relations offers the following illustrative graphic along with three quick points about the April decline in treasury holdings by the Chinese:
While the net decline of some $4 billion is not all that significant in the scheme of things, there has been a dramatic change to the "second derivative" of their U.S. debt accumulation in recent months (a "rate-of-change" yardstick that has been increasingly popular lately), a development that is well worth noting.

This report in CHINADaily adds a few insights:

For the first time in 11 months China's holdings of US Treasury bonds fell - to $763.5 billion in April, US government data showed.

The figure, down from March's $767.9 billion, was the lowest since June 2008.

They do not include US Treasury bond holding in Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, which climbed to $80.9 billion in April from $78.9 billion the previous month.

The decline in the China holding "seems to stem from net selling of Treasury bills," said Chirag Mirani of Barclays Capital Research.

Now, those are not words that any U.S. policymaker wants to see appearing in the same sentence - "net selling of Treasury bill" and "China".

It's all about funding our huge deficits to perpetuate life as we've all come to know it...

As the largest holder of US Treasury bills, which are crucial to funding Washington's multi-trillion-dollar recovery plans, China had expressed concerns recently over what it called the safety of its dollar-linked assets.

US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner traveled to Beijing about two weeks ago to reassure Chinese leaders, saying their money is "very safe" despite the US budget deficit, which he pledged to cut.

There's been lots of intrigue in FOREX markets lately, with the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) meeting today without the U.S. even in an observer role and recent comments from China citing concern about the greenback with a Japanese finance minister voicing strong support for the dollar.

Most puzzling are comments from Russia where they first sided with the Chinese, then showed support for the U.S. currency at last weekend's G8 meeting. Today, according to this AP report, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said the world needs new reserve currencies.

ooo

Showdown in California: Schwarzenegger vs. Democrats

2009-06-12T16:30:00Z

The showdown is on in California between the Democrat controlled legislature and governor Schwarzenegger. The battle shapes up like this: Democrats do not understand basic math and Schwarzenegger is not giving in. The end result is California seen missing budget deadline again.

Barring a miracle, California lawmakers will miss their June 15 deadline for passing a balanced budget -- a staggering challenge with the state facing a $24.3 billion shortfall amid the worst drop in state revenues since the Great Depression.

Observers of the most populous U.S. state's political scene laugh at the idea of a budget deal by Monday.

"It's about as likely as me being named MVP of the Stanley Cup final," said Dan Schnur, director of the Unruh Institute of Politics at the University of Southern California.

Citing the state's weak economy and double-digit unemployment rate, the movie star-turned politician has ruled out new taxes, which has raised his standing with the legislature's unruly and anti-tax Republican minority.

Schwarzenegger also urged Democrats to ignore lobbying by their union allies against sharply lower spending levels to help balance the state's books.

"Do they want to protect the workers that provide the services, or do they want to protect the people that get those services? The choice is up to them," he said.

His blunt talk came as the Service Employees International Union launched an advertising campaign against his budget plan, a threat to many of its 700,000 members in the state.

State Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg has said spending cuts are inevitable, but he opposes Schwarzenegger's plan for scrapping state programs. Instead, he wants to tap reserves in the governor's plan to maintain the programs.

Understanding Negative Numbers

Tapping "reserves" is idiotic because California has negative reserves of $24 billion. Do the Democrats or the unions understand the concept of negative numbers?

Unfortunately the answer is a resounding "No". Some might think this is a reason to keep the education budget intact. However, the odds that the legislature or unions sign up for much needed remedial math education classes is zero. Therefore, saving taxpayer money must take precedence over spending that will not go to where it is most needed.

Schwarzenegger Threatens To Shut Down Government

If a deal is not reached Schwarzenegger threatens to shut down state government.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vowed Wednesday to let California government come to a "grinding halt" rather than agree to a high-interest loan to keep the state afloat if he and the Legislature do not close the yawning budget gap in coming weeks.

Schwarzenegger said that emergency borrowing would be too expensive and that his threat to block it was necessary to prod lawmakers into swift action.

A loan would only "give them another reason why we don't have to do it now," the governor said. "What we need to do is just to basically cut off all the funding and just let them have a taste of what it is like when the state comes to a shutdown -- grinding halt."

The comments, made in an interview with The Times' editorial board, represent the governor's latest salvo in the battle over California's budget. An emergency loan -- not routine short-term borrowing but a longer-term, higher-interest loan -- would require the governor's approval but not that of the Legislature, unlike his proposed budget solutions. He approved the initial step for such borrowing last year and can revoke it at any time.

Clearly alluding to labor unions that oppose the cuts, the governor said: "Do they want to protect the workers that provide the services, or do they want to protect the people that get those services? The choice is up to them."

"We will meet the July 1 deadline," Senate leader Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) said in an e-mail to The Times.

If lawmakers fall short of that goal, as they have many years, Schwarzenegger's refusal to borrow would leave the nation's most populous state with no way to pay its bills.

In the Senate, Democrats have sketched a counter-proposal that would drain the state's reserves and rely on hopes for a rosier economic future to hold off the deepest of the cuts. Their plan would resolve up to $20 billion of the projected $24-billion deficit.

The governor called that approach "hallucinatory" on Tuesday and "irresponsible" on Wednesday. "We have not hit the bottom" of the economic crisis, he told The Times.

Eliseo Medina, SEIU's national executive vice president, said the governor "ought to be worrying about trying to maintain services instead of trying to kill the messenger."

Eliseo Medina and the SEIU are two of the many reasons California is bankrupt.

California Math

1) California is broke
2) Taxpayers are fed up
3) Union pension plans are bloated to the gills
4) Union workers are overpaid
5) No one can afford to pay for the services the SEIU wants to deliver at the price the SEIU wants everyone to pay

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List

The Reality Is Altogether Different

2009-06-12T01:21:47Z

While the self-serving and delusional real estate industry keeps talking about a rebound in the property market -- see "A Nascent Recovery" for just one example -- the reality is altogether different.

Aside from the fact that inventories remain near historic highs, the crumbling economy is reducing the pool of eligible buyers by the day, and banks are loaded to the gunwales with foreclosures that they need to get off their books, there are also other storm clouds brewing.

For a start, as the Wall Street Journal notes in "Rate Rise Clouds Recovery," the demand side of the equation is being further undermined by a dramatic change in the financing environment:

Rising interest rates threaten to dim prospects for a housing recovery and choke off a refinance wave that was a major plank of the Obama administration's economic-stimulus efforts.

On Wednesday, rates on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages climbed to 5.79%, up from 5% two weeks ago, according to HSH Associates. That jump will cut roughly in half the number of borrowers with an incentive to refinance, according to FTN Financial.

Refinance activity at J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. is already "really down" since rates began rising, a spokesman says. A rate of 4.75% "seemed to be the switch" that turned on refinance activity, he says. Now, rates are a full percentage point higher.

"Mortgage rates at these levels will hobble the [housing] recovery, and it was just the beginning of the recovery," says Kenneth Rosen, chairman of the Fisher Center for Real Estate and Urban Economics at the University of California, Berkeley.

Investors have been anxiously watching bond yields climb over the past few weeks, pushing up mortgage rates, which normally track 10-year Treasury notes. The yield on the those briefly hit 4% on Wednesday afternoon for the first time since mid-October before ending the day at 3.937%.

Many policy makers see the rise in Treasury yields as a sign that investors are optimistic that the economy is on the mend. But many market participants say higher long-term bond yields indicate investors are increasingly worried about inflation.

The Federal Reserve stepped into the market Wednesday to buy Treasurys and announced it will make another round of purchases in a week or so. But the moves seemed to have little effect on rates.

Higher mortgage rates are a blow to borrowers who were looking to refinance and reduce their monthly mortgage payments. Earlier this spring, mortgage rates had fallen below 5%, the lowest in 50 years, unleashing a wave of refinancing activity and spurring housing sales.

The rise in rates represents a setback for the Obama administration's program to help borrowers refinance their mortgages. In March, the government rolled out the Home Affordable Refinance Program, or HARP, to allow certain homeowners who owe between 80% and 105% of their home's current value to take advantage of the low rates. The administration estimated that the program could help four million to five million borrowers refinance.

Underwhelming Response

But Wall Street analysts say refinancing activity under the program was underwhelming, even before rates began to rise. Payoffs were flat last month on loans that would have seen the biggest benefit from the program, including loans originated in 2006 and 2007 with high loan-to-value ratios and high rates, according to Barclays Capital.

The HARP program is limited to loans owned or guaranteed by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, the housing-finance giants now controlled by the federal government. So far, some 12,710 refinancings have been completed through the program, according to the Treasury Department. Those figures don't include refinancings that have been completed by banks but not yet delivered to Fannie or Freddie. Bank of America Corp., for instance, says that it has completed 17,000 refinancings. By refinancing, borrowers on average have been able to reduce their mortgage rates by 1.3 to 1.5 percentage points, saving around $2,500 annually on a $200,000 loan, according to Freddie Mac.

The program was designed to help borrowers like Mike Gallante who weren't late on their payments but couldn't benefit from lower rates because they didn't have enough equity to refinance. Mr. Gallante, a 45-year-old who works in law enforcement, has a 6.5% rate on his $400,000 mortgage, which is owned by Fannie Mae. But his five-bedroom home in Glendale, Ariz., was appraised at $325,000, putting him above the 105% loan-to-value limit. He paid $530,000 for the home in August 2007.

"It's horrible," he says. "They have a paying customer, and they're not going to do anything to help unless I stop paying." Mr. Gallante, who says he's never missed a payment, says he's so frustrated he's considering buying a new home and walking away from his current one.

A Treasury Department official said the administration is considering a range of tweaks to the program, including extending the program to borrowers with loan-to-value ratios as high as 125%. Freddie Mac on Friday announced changes designed to make its program easier to use.

Leif Thomsen, chief executive of Mortgage Master, a mortgage banker, says higher mortgage rates are putting a damper on applications. "We have seen the daily volume go from approximately $45 million...to about $20 million," he says.

His firm typically handles about 150 loans per day. Usually, no more than about seven of those applications have been from borrowers seeking to refinance under the Obama program. "I think the intentions of the government were really good," he says. "But it just hasn't worked that well."

Jill Richardson, a mortgage broker in Atlanta, says her office has tried to put at least 30 loans through the program, but hasn't been able to refinance a single one. Among the reasons, she says, are appraisals that have come in too low, second mortgages on the properties, and extra charges levied by Fannie Mae on borrowers who have little equity, low credit scores, or who live in markets where home prices have been falling.

Slow Going

Some lenders have been slow to implement the program or have been backed-up with other refinance applications. They may be picking the best loans to do first, some analysts say.

Chriz Dally, a freelance grant writer, tried to refinance the $340,000 mortgage on her two-bedroom home in Martinez, Calif., which is backed by Freddie Mac. Ms. Dally says a loan officer at J.P. Morgan Chase, her mortgage-servicing company, agreed that her loan was backed by Freddie Mac and that she met other criteria for the program. But after making several calls, Ms. Dally says, the loan officer told her that J.P. Morgan at the time was not doing these refinances for Freddie Mac mortgages.

A J.P. Morgan spokesman says the bank refinances loans backed by both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that qualify under the program. There may have been "a misunderstanding by the customer, or [the customer was] talking to an employee who was confused," he says.

Richard Bernotas, a respiratory therapist in Winchester, Calif., says he has been trying to refinance his $240,000 mortgage with Bank of America for about three months. "One of the issues is that I have mortgage insurance," says Mr. Bernotas, whose current interest rate is 6.75%. Bank of America has told him he needs to wait for "phase two" of the refinance program, which will address loans such as his.

"We are not yet up and running to serve customers with mortgage insurance," a Bank of America spokesman says. "We believe we are a few weeks away."

In addition, as Bloomberg reports in "Option ARMs Threaten U.S. Housing Rebound as 2011 Resets Peak," the available supply is set to mushroom as a wave of current mortgage-holders finds that their once affordable mortgages have become a ticket to the poorhouse:

Shirley Breitmaier’s mortgage payment started out at $98 when she refinanced her three-bedroom home in Galt, California, in 2007. The 73-year-old widow may see it jump to $3,500 a month in two years.

Breitmaier took out a payment-option adjustable rate mortgage, a loan popular during the housing boom for its low minimum payments before resetting at higher costs later.

About 1 million option ARMs are estimated to reset higher in the next four years, according to real estate data firm First American CoreLogic of Santa Ana, California. About three quarters of those loans will adjust next year and in 2011, with the peak coming in August 2011 when about 54,000 loans recast, the data show.

Option ARM borrowers hit with unaffordable monthly payments are another threat to the housing recovery and the economy, said Susan Wachter, a professor of real estate finance at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School in Philadelphia. Owners who surrender properties to the bank rather than make higher payments for homes that have plummeted in value will further depress real estate prices and add to the inventory of properties on the market, she said.

“The option ARM recasts will drive up the foreclosure supply, undermining the recovery in the housing market,” Wachter said in an interview. “The option ARMs will be part of the reason that the path to recovery will be long and slow.”

Option ARM recasts will mean more pain for California, the state with the most foreclosures in the U.S.

$750 Billion Problem

More than $750 billion of option ARMs were originated in the U.S. between 2004 and 2008, according to data from First American and Inside Mortgage Finance of Bethesda, Maryland. California accounted for 58 percent of option ARMs, according to a report by T2 Partners LLC, citing data from Amherst Securities and Loan Performance.

Shirley Breitmaier took out a $315,000 option ARM to refinance a previous loan on her house.

Her payments started at 3/8 of 1 percent, or less than $100 a month, according to Cameron Pannabecker, the owner of Cal-Pro Mortgage and the Mortgage Modification Center in Stockton, California, who is working with Breitmaier. The loan allowed her to forgo higher payments by adding the unpaid balance to the principal. She’ll be required to start paying principal and interest to amortize the debt when the loan reaches 145 percent of the original amount borrowed.

Hoping for Help

Breitmaier, who has been in the home for 45 years and lives with her daughter, now fears she will lose the off-white stucco house that’s a hub for her family.

“I wish the government would bail us out like the banks and the car businesses,” she said. “I’d like to go from here to the grave next to my husband.”

Paul Financial LLC originated the loan and it was sold to GMAC, Pannabecker said.

“This loan is a perfect example front to back, bottom to top, of everything that has gone wrong over the last five to seven years,” Pannabecker said. “The consumer had a product pushed on them that they had no hope of understanding.”

GMAC is working with Breitmaier and will review all of her options, said Jeannine Bruin, a spokeswoman for the company. Bruin declined to be more specific, citing the firm’s customer confidentiality policy.

Inexpensive Payments

Peter Paul of Paul Financial, based in San Rafael, California, said he wasn’t familiar with Breitmaier’s loan agreement but disagreed with Pannabecker’s characterization.

“The problem is, real estate values went down,” Paul said. Paul said he’s winding down the company and hasn’t made any loans since the fall of 2007.

Option ARMs typically recast after five years and the lower payments can end before that time if the loan balance increases to 110 percent or 125 percent of the original mortgage, according to a Federal Reserve brochure on its Web site.

These home loans were primarily marketed to people with good credit scores, said Dirk van Dijk, director of research at Zacks Investment Research in Chicago. They were also sold to the elderly and immigrants who were lured by inexpensive payments, said Maeve Elise Brown, executive director of Housing and Economic Rights Advocates in Oakland, California.

Refinancing is impossible in many states given the nationwide drop in prices. In California, the median existing single-family home price dropped 37 percent in April to $256,700 from a year earlier, according to the state Association of Realtors.

Late Payments Soar

“Once you start amortizing that loan, the payment is going to shoot up,” said David Watts, a London-based strategist with research firm CreditSights.

The delinquency rate for payment-option ARMs originated in 2006 and bundled into securities is soaring, according to a May 5 report from Deutsche Bank AG. Over the past year, payments 60 days late or more on option ARMs originated in 2006 have almost doubled to 42.44 percent from 23.26 percent, Deutsche Bank said. For 2007 loans, the rate has climbed from 10.1 percent to 35.25 percent.

“We’re already seeing much higher levels of delinquencies of these option ARM loans even before you reach the point of the recast,” said Paul Leonard, the California director of the non- profit Center for Responsible Lending.

The threat of soaring payments has counselors at Housing and Economic Rights Advocates busy.

“There’s a level of hopelessness to the phone calls now,” said Brown.

A perfect storm in midair

2009-06-04T22:45:22Z

They might have split up or they might have capsized
They may have broke deep and took water
And all that remains is the faces and the names
Of the wives and the sons and the daughters.

— Gordon Lightfoot, from “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald”

A storm on Lake Superior drowned the Edmund Fitzgerald. From the way it looks now, a storm over the Atlantic destroyed Air France Flight 447 earlier this week.

A book and a movie nailed the “perfect storm” meme in our heads, and I suppose the label might apply here. Flight 447 was crossing through a region known to weather professionals as the intertropical convergence zone. Storms rise quickly there, and concentrate in a band that runs around the Earth like a broad equator of roiling clouds. While lines of thunderstorms familiar to those of us in temperate zones can run for hundreds of miles along a weather front, these intertropical mothers are different in several senses, not the least of which is that it’s harder to avoid getting tossed around while weaving through them in an airplane — especially in the middle of the night over the middle of an ocean. This is due partly to the widespread and rapid-forming nature of the storms themselves, and partly to the absence of navigation guidance from the ground.

There isn’t any ground underneath. The nearest radar is far beyond the horizon. And, in some cases, such as Flight 447’s, guidance from the air is also lacking. According to that first link (a Bloomberg piece by John Hughes), less than one flight per hour takes the route flown by Flight 447, which was last heard from at 2:14am, local time, over the Atlantic appoximately midway between South America and Africa.

That also puts it over the broad Mid-Atlantic Ridge, a mountain range that runs like a baseball seam between tectonic plates. It’s mountainous down there. Go to 3° 34′ 39.72″ N, 30° 22′ 27.84″ W (3.5777, -30.3744) on Google Earth, drop about 12,500 feet below the surface, and you would see approximately this –

– if it were not also the blacker than the darkest night down there. Good luck finding the flight data and voice recorders. Or anything else that doesn’t float.

My guess is that our best guesses will narrow to some combination of known facts. Chief among these is that the plane was passing through a region of big thunderstorms that had also shown up quickly. I’m guessing that the pilots did their best to avoid the worst of what they could see with their instruments, and failed. Here is a summary of final messages from the plane.

Whether the plane broke up at altitude (we know it depressurized) or went out of control and crashed intact, the terminal moments of the flight must have been frightening beyond description for those on board.

I’m a frequent flyer who loves aviation. I’ve flown enough to be jaded and calm. But thunderstorms still creep me out. One pilot friend told me a few days ago that the last thing you want to do is go through a “hole” between two thunderheads, because turbulence there can be even worse than inside the clouds themselves. When you see thunderheads building, the expansion itself is a kind of wind, and so is what happens to the air pushed aside as the head builds its visible parts.

One wonders if any decisions will be made, based on what we learn from the crash of Flight 447. Will similar Airbus planes be given a new caution? An upgrade to avionics or reporting methods? A new procedural guide for times when scary storms suddenly materialize? Dunno yet. We’ll see.
I’ll be flying back and forth to London next week. I’m looking forward to the flight as well as the work — as I always do. But, like many travelers, I’ll not be quite as calm about the weather.

btpntc

2009-06-04T04:00:18Z

Bring the player, not the class.

Or in the case of the PuG I hit up this past weekend, Bring the player, not the spec. A group was starting up for a heroic Naxx. They were almost filled, and needed another DPS. Unsurprisingly, their trade/lfg channel msg included the phrase “must be good dps, pst with achievement.”

“need ranged? I’m a mage.”

“spec? DPS? achievement?”

“frost, ~3k DPS. [Sapphiron's Demise]“

I’ve cracked 4k before on Sarth, but I downplay my abilities by listing a 3k average. Essentially, I’ve done everything but KT, and I’ve killed him on my Resto Druid.

“…sorry, I need good DPS.”

(What the frig? Whatever.)

I rejoined lfg, trying to find a pug that accepts frost mages. I ran into an old friend from Arygos who also made the jump to Winterhoof. He’s a hotshot resto Shaman, decked out in T8 and stuff.

“Hey, looking for a naxx pug?”

“Yeah.”

He invited me to his pug, which happened to be the same pug from before, since I see his name in raid chat. We started pulling mobs in construct quarter, in an attempt to DPS check on patchwerk. I pop my water elemental on the first abomination. Someone types out in raid chat,

“lol, who raids as frost anymore?”

He was a melee DPS DK, go figure. I didn’t let the comment get to me, I just let my performance speak for itself. As a DK, I reasonably expected not to beat him, but at least aimed to beat the other mages. There were two others, one arcane and one frostfire. Both with the Champion of the Frozen Wastes title. Big deal.

We hit patchwerk, and I narrowly beat both of them. Heroism on perfectly timed Water Elemental plus coldsnapped double Icy Veins brought me to about 3.6-3.7k for the fight, easily besting their low 3k.

And the DK? Died to hateful strike. I laughed inside.

He didn’t say anything for the rest of the night. We proceeded to one/two-shot everything. I ended up with The Turning Tide and the T7.5 Helm from KT. And I got my achievement.

I honestly don’t take it personally when people scoff at frost mages who try to PvE. While it’s true that they don’t have the same DPS capabilities as the other three specs, they can at least hold their own against other classes, specifically in a pug setting.

Sure, I don’t expect to be accepted into bleeding-edge guild runs as a frost mage anytime soon. But in a casual setting, I always look forward to competing with similarly geared dps classes, and taking pride whenever I outplay them. It only further supports the notion that success is limited by the player piloting the character, not the class of that character.

Personally, all that’s left is Malygos, Oculus, and Old Kingdom (why haven’t I done this one yet? I have no idea!), and Champion of the Frozen Wastes is mine!

A title definitely fitting for a die-hard Frost Mage.

Posted in Bashertin

The American People Want Sex, Not Hummers

2009-06-03T19:33:55Z

Dear President Obama,

If you haven’t already enlisted Jon Stewart and P.J. O’Rourke to become cabinet-level advisers, please consider it. P.J. just made a hell of a lot more sense on a comedy show than you did explaining why I now own 60% of General Motors.

Sex on Wheels

The reason we’ve always had a love affair with big, strong, powerful cars is simple: They represent a fantasy, a virility, that mortal men simply do not possess. It’s the same reason idiots buy tigers as pets.

So please, Mr. President, instead of purchasing a company that has ignored common sense and built bigger, more gas-sucking (and generally sucking) scrap heaps, can we purchase something that will reinstate our vicarious virility? To belabor the sex-appeal analogy, buying GM is like getting a boob job for an 80-year-old woman.

Why can’t we make Tesla Motors our new girlfriend? They’re not just an American car company, they’re making electric vehicles sexy. Like 0-60 in under 4 seconds sexy. Like fast enough to tear your clothes off but quiet enough not to scare the neighborhood sexy. In fact, I have only one question:

Which would cost the taxpayers more?

Paying for GM to design better cars, retool all of its factories to make better cars, wait while they take the time to make a new fleet of cars, and then hope they can actually sell enough of those cars to become profitable again.
Pay for Tesla to hire most of the old GM employees and subsidize battery costs for cars they’re already making and selling right now.

I await your answer, Mr. President. Whether or not we’d see any short-term profit from owning most of Tesla, I can guarantee we’d redefine what American car enthusiasts see as “sex appeal”. This is the new girlfriend we need, and she smells a lot prettier than her predecessor.

Sincerely,
Matthew Ebel
Taxpayer

Update: Apparently Tesla IS getting some money from the bailout.

The Local Business Center dashboard opens its doors

2009-06-02T14:23:00Z

If you're a local business owner, it's likely that Google plays a role in helping customers find you. And we're not just talking about your website — thanks to Google Maps and Google Search, you may also be getting a lot of online traffic to your business listing. You've probably seen one of these listings before:

You also probably know how they tend to work: A potential customer does a search on Google.com or in Google Maps, comes across your listing, clicks on it to see your reviews and details, and then gets directions to your location.

Now, imagine if there were a way for you to get a better understanding of how those customers are finding you. Did they search for "pizza" or "pasta" to get to the listing for your Italian restaurant? Do they live across town, but drive miles for your great selection of camping gear? What happens to traffic to your new dental practice when you start advertising in the local paper? With information like that, you'd be able to make better informed decisions on how to drive more traffic to your listing and attract more customers.

Later today, you'll be able to do just that, thanks to a new dashboard feature we're launching in the Local Business Center (www.google.com/lbc). The LBC is a free tool that enables business owners to control the content of their business listings as they appear in Google Search and Google Maps. All you have to do is claim your listing in the LBC and go through a quick verification process to get access to the following kinds of data:

Impressions: The number of times the business listing appeared as a result on a Google.com search or Google Maps search in a given period.
Actions: The number of times people interacted with the listing; for example, the number of times they clicked through to the business' website or requested driving directions to the business.
Top search queries: Which queries led customers to the business listing; for example, are they finding the listing for a cafe by searching for "tea" or "coffee"?
Zip codes where driving directions come from: Which zip codes customers are coming from when they request directions to your location.

The new dashboard will also let you dig into that data using all kinds of lists, maps, and graphs like this one, which measures impressions and actions for a hotel's business listing:

When you sign in to the LBC today, you'll find that we've already populated the dashboards for claimed listings with data from the last 30 days. After that, new information will be added every day, so you can check in often to see how things are going. We're also working hard to add more historical information, and to make this available for businesses outside the U.S. All the data we share through the dashboard will be anonymous and aggregated, to protect the privacy of Google users.

We're really excited to be able to open up this data to local business owners. Before now, you could track usage metrics on your website using a tool like Google Analytics, but data about how customers found you in other ways never got back to you. That all changes today, and we think business owners will really get a lot out of this new information. So if you're a local business owner and you feel the same way, be sure to check out this new dashboard.

To learn more about accessing and using the dashboard, take a look at the video below and then visit the Lat Long Blog for a more in-depth overview.

Posted by Amer Shahnawaz, Software Engineer, Local Business Center

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The Local Business Center dashboard opens its doors