Economic failure impacts even kiteboarders

[Sonny]

FDIC haha!!! That sign at your bank -- you believe that s*&t?

I guess you should take your money out of the bank and put it between the mattress where it will be very safe.

[davewsail]

Jono, everyone is entitled to their opinion. Maybe you'll be proven right and the world will end as we know it. My money is betting against you. Since when does the press go out of their way to be positive? In my experience they are looking for the juiciest stories which are almost always negative and over the top.

Oh, and you are wrong about the bailouts. They are being done to stabilize the system. To not do it would be far worse for everyone and might have resulted in the scenario you are worried about. The national debt is around $10 trillion. The total value of loans on the books of Fannie/Freddie is $5 trillion. You really think that every home owner in America is going to default and then that all the real estate they own will be worth $0?

Read this about the Fannie/Freddie bailout... http://www.slate.com/id/2195308/

If you want to worry about something, I suggest you read this... http://www.investorsinsight.com/blogs/f ... -bomb.aspx

The real problem is in the mindset of the American people wanting something for nothing. That is the thing I'm worried about, not the Fed trying to save us from the current financial crisis. This will pass-- I'm confident.

Anyway, all this has nothing to do with kiteboarding.

[zgur]

Best line of the whole thread "....Anyway, all this has nothing to do with kiteboarding. "

Amen brother!!!

[windhorny]

Well, if we go broke then we cant afford new kite gear!

[jono]

Or, if we all get fired, we can kiteboard ALL WE WANT!

That's how this thread started -- the guy who got laid off saying he was going kiteboarding. Banks failing may not be all bad .

[jjm]

Or, if we all get fired, we can kiteboard ALL WE WANT!

That's how this thread started -- the guy who got laid off saying he was going kiteboarding. Banks failing may not be all bad .

hey, wait, if I lose my job, I can kiteboard all I want? Can someone please help me sell this to my wife?

[dpca10]

There was a great economic talk on NPR today by Greenberger I think it was. Anyway, sounds like we can always fall back on socialism, looks like a tax increase is in the future.

Found the link, worth a listen:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... &ft=1&f=13

[jono]

Yes, the NPR story explains the whole story very well. It explains why when the Fed bails out AIG (as someone thought was a good thing) isn't a good thing at all, why credit default swaps are so evil, why I'm pissed about these bailouts and don't believe the headlines (beware of headlines from press releases -- that is news from a company and is obviously bias).

It also explains just how deep of a problem we have right now. My goal in bringing all this up (now that it's gone all econ) is to ensure people I know, care about, or respect all have their eyes open as this thing hits. Too many of us believe the press releases and headlines without understanding the background and that's a large part of how we got into this mess.

Dave:

The bailout of FNM doesn't require that the value of homes go to 0 -- there's much more to it than that. FNM along with other banks use a fractional reserve system (I'm sure you know this) so they loan out WAY MORE than capital that actually have -- so, FNM doesn't have to have homes go to 0 to go bankrupt, they just need to exceed their reserves n bad debt -- which is what I understand happened and caused the need for bailout. The fact they hadn't balanced their books in something like 4 years prior to this hinted pretty well that something strange was afoot.

Here's a couple other bits of "real" news, not press releases from the FED or banks, etc.:

S&P says pressure building on U.S. "AAA" rating
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUKN1752966920080917

Is the U.S. Going Broke?
http://www.forbes.com/business/forbes/2 ... 9/034.html

Gold prices post biggest 1-day gain ever
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080917/gold_prices.html

This is the cost to insure US Treasury debt -- the bottom line, the man, the paper, "the full faith and credit of the US Government" -- it just doubled. Insurance rates tripled when risk increased. This means Treasury is considered a much greater risk than it was 2 months ago. That's intense. The other thing is that CDS are insuring this -- this is WRONG. It should be gold like it once was .

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUKN1752966920080917
Today:
Ten-year credit default swaps, or CDS, on Treasury debt widened 3 basis points to 26 basis points, according to data from CMA DataVision. This means it costs $26,000 per year to insure $10 million of U.S. Treasury debt against default.

July 17, 2008:
The cost to insure Treasury debt with credit default swaps jumped to 16.5 basis points, or $16,500 per year for five years to insure $10 million in debt, from 8 basis points on Thursday, an analyst said.

[eag]

we all actually should have bought gold when this thread started. It went up 11% yesterday.

[windhorny]

If things get really bad I think all of us kiters should pool our money and skills and build a really big house at the delta. Paul can help with the crops, Jono can make us fuel, Russ can give us capital to build, Ramsey can do all the fiber optic lighting, Adam and clint can engineer it, Ollie can shingle the place, greg can paint it, I'll take care of the structural and ornamental steel, josh,chris,etc can set up the wi-fi, kirk/gunnar/dr. sue can be onsite medics.......point made, I think we could cover ourselves if we had to.