In the parlance of Wall Street, today was a "risk on" event, erasing the losses from Tuesday with an injection of another $600+ million from the Federal Reserve in the form of another in a seemingly-endless POMOs.
Stocks just catapulted right from the opening bell. It's obvious that the stock market cannot go down prior to the elections - or maybe they will - because that would be an overt indication that the economy is not as good as CNBC and the rest of the brain-dead media want everybody to believe it is.
Dow 11,107.97, +129.35 (1.18%)
NASDAQ 2,457.39, +20.44 (0.84%)
S&P 500 1,178.17, +12.27 (1.05%)
NYSE Composite 7,523.81, +100.16 (1.35%)
NASDAQ Volume 2,042,942,750
NYSE Volume 5,598,244,000
Advancing issues decimated decliners, 4798-1685, and new highs bettered new lows once again, 410-43. Volume was moderate. Forget about yesterday. That was simply a profit-taking day for the insiders. Move along. Nothing to see here.
Commodities ramped right back up, with oil gaining $2.28, to $81.77. Gold was up $8.20, at $1,344.20, and silver tacked on eight cents, to $23.86.
Is this any way to treat your money, your retirement funds, your kid's college savings? Maybe, if you believe that everything is just fine, that the largest banks in the country don't have trillions in bad debt sitting off their books and that the Fed is on your side.
Good luck with that.
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
No POMO, Stocks Down; B of A Putbacks Slam Stocks
Playing the market has become so simple. If the Fed supplies liquidity, buy. If they don't sell, but you should do those things a day ahead of time, and, of course, there are no guarantees, as computers running complex algorithms control 70-80% of the trading and the other 20-30% is handled by crooks, swindlers, fast-buck operators and con men.
Today's slide was exacerbated by problems for America's favorite deceitful banking interest, Bank of America, as reports emerged that various parties, from PIMCO to the NY Fed's Maiden Lane entity, are seeking putbacks against the company for many of the bogus MBS it has floated over the years. In a nutshell, now that 20% or more of the loans in various mortgage-backed securities are non-performing and the bank can't keep up with foreclosures and reselling of properties, the investors want their money back.
A consortium has hinted at a lawsuit in a letter to the bank, with more lawsuits surely to follow from parties as diverse as class-actions on behalf of defrauded homeowners to state AGs from across the country in a smorgasbord of civil and criminal actions. BofA has turned from a lending bank to a punching bag overnight, though the process has taken years and was mostly self-inflicted. Of course, BofA is not alone, though they may be singled out for the bulk of the abuse. JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo and Citigroup have similar issues that will be called out in due time.
The hour of the banks final reckoning is upon us, finally, and the criminals are circling the wagons. Within days, we should see executives lawyering up, though Attorney General Eric Holder remains ominously silent and disgraced. Our federal Attorney General should be immediately forced to step down for he has allowed a criminal enterprise to flourish within the banking community without even the hint of an investigation or subpoena.
Dow 10,978.62, -165.07 (1.48%)
NASDAQ 2,436.95, -43.71 (1.76%)
S&P 500 1,165.90, -18.81 (1.59%)
NYSE Composite 7,423.65, -147.45 (1.95%)
Losers finished well ahead of gainers, 5335-1164. New highs came down quite a bit, but still led new lows, 253-30. Obviously, there was some bottom fishing going on, as the new lows number should have been at least double what it was. Of course, considering the abundance of reporting and statistical issues facing the markets, all figures must be viewed with extreme cynicism and skepticism. Volume was quite strong, not to the bulls liking, indicating that this downdraft might be just the first of an October surprise swoon which almost everybody - except the genius analysts on CNBC - has expected.
NASDAQ Volume 2,256,866,500
NYSE Volume 6,293,440,000
Equities were joined by many commodities in the sell-off. Crude Oil for November delivery fell $3.59, to $79.49, a nearly 4.5% loss. Gold was smacked back to reality with a $36.10 loss, to $1,336.00. Silver responded in kind, losing 63 cents, to $23.78.
The banks are walking face-first into a tsunami of lawsuits. High-powered class action lawyers are looking into the potential for a nationwide class action in which the major banks - JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America Wells Fargo and Citigroup - would be defendants.
This Bloomberg story details the sordid side of MERS, named in lawsuits across the country. MERS (Mortgage elctronic Registry System) is a computerized registry which avoids filing mortgage assignments in county offices. It was founded, funded and maintained by a consortium of major lending institutions as well as government entities, Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac.
Another story, this one from Salon, citing numerous sources, including University of Utah Law Professor Christopher Peterson in the Summer 2010 University of Cincnnati Law Review. Peterson isolates MERS and puts it squarrely at the root of the entire mortgage miasma, dating back to its roots in 1995. The company and its practices are largely behind the entire securitization process, which, according to Peterson, obliterates chain of title and among other rights, standing in foreclosure actions.
Fraudclosure continues. Here's Barry Ritholz and Chris Whalen on Larry Kudlow's show Monday night discussing various scenarios on how the situation will be resolved:
Today's slide was exacerbated by problems for America's favorite deceitful banking interest, Bank of America, as reports emerged that various parties, from PIMCO to the NY Fed's Maiden Lane entity, are seeking putbacks against the company for many of the bogus MBS it has floated over the years. In a nutshell, now that 20% or more of the loans in various mortgage-backed securities are non-performing and the bank can't keep up with foreclosures and reselling of properties, the investors want their money back.
A consortium has hinted at a lawsuit in a letter to the bank, with more lawsuits surely to follow from parties as diverse as class-actions on behalf of defrauded homeowners to state AGs from across the country in a smorgasbord of civil and criminal actions. BofA has turned from a lending bank to a punching bag overnight, though the process has taken years and was mostly self-inflicted. Of course, BofA is not alone, though they may be singled out for the bulk of the abuse. JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo and Citigroup have similar issues that will be called out in due time.
The hour of the banks final reckoning is upon us, finally, and the criminals are circling the wagons. Within days, we should see executives lawyering up, though Attorney General Eric Holder remains ominously silent and disgraced. Our federal Attorney General should be immediately forced to step down for he has allowed a criminal enterprise to flourish within the banking community without even the hint of an investigation or subpoena.
Dow 10,978.62, -165.07 (1.48%)
NASDAQ 2,436.95, -43.71 (1.76%)
S&P 500 1,165.90, -18.81 (1.59%)
NYSE Composite 7,423.65, -147.45 (1.95%)
Losers finished well ahead of gainers, 5335-1164. New highs came down quite a bit, but still led new lows, 253-30. Obviously, there was some bottom fishing going on, as the new lows number should have been at least double what it was. Of course, considering the abundance of reporting and statistical issues facing the markets, all figures must be viewed with extreme cynicism and skepticism. Volume was quite strong, not to the bulls liking, indicating that this downdraft might be just the first of an October surprise swoon which almost everybody - except the genius analysts on CNBC - has expected.
NASDAQ Volume 2,256,866,500
NYSE Volume 6,293,440,000
Equities were joined by many commodities in the sell-off. Crude Oil for November delivery fell $3.59, to $79.49, a nearly 4.5% loss. Gold was smacked back to reality with a $36.10 loss, to $1,336.00. Silver responded in kind, losing 63 cents, to $23.78.
The banks are walking face-first into a tsunami of lawsuits. High-powered class action lawyers are looking into the potential for a nationwide class action in which the major banks - JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America Wells Fargo and Citigroup - would be defendants.
This Bloomberg story details the sordid side of MERS, named in lawsuits across the country. MERS (Mortgage elctronic Registry System) is a computerized registry which avoids filing mortgage assignments in county offices. It was founded, funded and maintained by a consortium of major lending institutions as well as government entities, Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac.
Another story, this one from Salon, citing numerous sources, including University of Utah Law Professor Christopher Peterson in the Summer 2010 University of Cincnnati Law Review. Peterson isolates MERS and puts it squarrely at the root of the entire mortgage miasma, dating back to its roots in 1995. The company and its practices are largely behind the entire securitization process, which, according to Peterson, obliterates chain of title and among other rights, standing in foreclosure actions.
Fraudclosure continues. Here's Barry Ritholz and Chris Whalen on Larry Kudlow's show Monday night discussing various scenarios on how the situation will be resolved:
Monday, October 18, 2010
POMO Monday! Stocks Soar! BofA in the Clear!
The Fed executed a little $6.3 Billion POMO, which, as we have mentioned, is tantamount to giving the largest banks and brokerages free money with which to play the market. "Game on, dudes!" was heard in the offices of Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, et. al., about five to seven minutes into the session.
Gotta love that funny money! Let's dance!
Dow 11,143.69, +80.91 (0.73%)
NASDAQ 2,480.66, +11.89 (0.48%)
S&P 500 1,184.71, +8.52 (0.72%)
NYSE Composite 7,571.10, +50.50 (0.67%)
Up, up and away went the stock indices, with 80% of the trading being done by HTF "flash" computers using algorithms designed by NASA, DARPA or the CIA, no doubt. Advancers absolutely crshed decliners, 4249-2216. New highs bettered new lows, 440-56. Volume was on the wrong side of the toilet rim, but with the Fed pumping money into the system, and the computers all programmed to react to volume buying as a buy signal, there's almost no downside to this market, which, of course, is the whole big idea, anyway.
It's absolutely absurd, but, I would be remiss not to advise at least some jumping in at any level right now, but with the implicit understanding that stops have to be set very judiciously and that means just under your buy price. (Disclaimer: setting stops may alert the HTF computers to your trades and take them out with all due haste.)
NASDAQ Volume 1,642,727,625.00
NYSE Volume 4,996,276,500.0
It was a great day to own oil futures. The front-end contract flew ahead by $1.83 on no news or data, to $83.08. Late print on gold was up $3.40, at $1372.30. Silver also gained 11 cents, to $24.43.
Add this last bit of news to the "and you thought Usain Bolt was fast" file. Bank of America, which just announced a self-imposed halt to foreclosure proceedings in all 50 states last week, today announced that they would resume foreclosures in 23 judicial-foreclosure states. The bank says that they found NO ERRORS in the 102,000 cases they reviewed, but added that they would begin submitting new affidavits by October 25th.
Now, call me silly or just plain dumb, but why, if they found no errors, would they begin filing "new" affidavits. Just saying, if the old ones were OK, why do you draw up new ones. Incidentally, I wonder just how many people spent the last ten days reviewing these 102,000 documents, which, I'm assuming were scattered around offices in those 23 states?
If you had 1000 people reviewing those documents, they'd have to have done 100 apiece, or about ten per day. If it were 100 people, that would escalate to 100 pr day, and what kind of review could one perform at the rate of about 15 per hour?
As usual, that smells fishy to me, but what do I know? Well, I know that the nation's largest banks are rotten, crooked and exist only to separate Americans from their money and property, so excuse me if I don't buy BofA's argument that they've already undone some of their dirty work.
Not so incidentally, Bank of America (BAC) shares were up 0.36, or 3% on the day. Other major bank stocks, like JP Morgan Chase (JPM), Wells Fargo (WFC) and Citigroup (C), were up similarly. Wells Fargo and Citgroup both posted gains in excess of 5%.
Happy daze!
Late add: Just found this nifty publishing tool, which allows you to make animated movies. Here's today's post:
Gotta love that funny money! Let's dance!
Dow 11,143.69, +80.91 (0.73%)
NASDAQ 2,480.66, +11.89 (0.48%)
S&P 500 1,184.71, +8.52 (0.72%)
NYSE Composite 7,571.10, +50.50 (0.67%)
Up, up and away went the stock indices, with 80% of the trading being done by HTF "flash" computers using algorithms designed by NASA, DARPA or the CIA, no doubt. Advancers absolutely crshed decliners, 4249-2216. New highs bettered new lows, 440-56. Volume was on the wrong side of the toilet rim, but with the Fed pumping money into the system, and the computers all programmed to react to volume buying as a buy signal, there's almost no downside to this market, which, of course, is the whole big idea, anyway.
It's absolutely absurd, but, I would be remiss not to advise at least some jumping in at any level right now, but with the implicit understanding that stops have to be set very judiciously and that means just under your buy price. (Disclaimer: setting stops may alert the HTF computers to your trades and take them out with all due haste.)
NASDAQ Volume 1,642,727,625.00
NYSE Volume 4,996,276,500.0
It was a great day to own oil futures. The front-end contract flew ahead by $1.83 on no news or data, to $83.08. Late print on gold was up $3.40, at $1372.30. Silver also gained 11 cents, to $24.43.
Add this last bit of news to the "and you thought Usain Bolt was fast" file. Bank of America, which just announced a self-imposed halt to foreclosure proceedings in all 50 states last week, today announced that they would resume foreclosures in 23 judicial-foreclosure states. The bank says that they found NO ERRORS in the 102,000 cases they reviewed, but added that they would begin submitting new affidavits by October 25th.
Now, call me silly or just plain dumb, but why, if they found no errors, would they begin filing "new" affidavits. Just saying, if the old ones were OK, why do you draw up new ones. Incidentally, I wonder just how many people spent the last ten days reviewing these 102,000 documents, which, I'm assuming were scattered around offices in those 23 states?
If you had 1000 people reviewing those documents, they'd have to have done 100 apiece, or about ten per day. If it were 100 people, that would escalate to 100 pr day, and what kind of review could one perform at the rate of about 15 per hour?
As usual, that smells fishy to me, but what do I know? Well, I know that the nation's largest banks are rotten, crooked and exist only to separate Americans from their money and property, so excuse me if I don't buy BofA's argument that they've already undone some of their dirty work.
Not so incidentally, Bank of America (BAC) shares were up 0.36, or 3% on the day. Other major bank stocks, like JP Morgan Chase (JPM), Wells Fargo (WFC) and Citigroup (C), were up similarly. Wells Fargo and Citgroup both posted gains in excess of 5%.
Happy daze!
Late add: Just found this nifty publishing tool, which allows you to make animated movies. Here's today's post:
Friday, October 15, 2010
Bennie Talks, Angelo Walks, BofA Balks
Our markets are indeed funny creatures. After the Fed issued a $4.7 billion POMO, all the cumputers went out and bought shares of Apple (AAPL), the darling of the tech sector and the one stock - according to some estimates - that makes up 20% of the entire NASDAQ every day in volume.
Apple was up more than 4% on the day in anticipation of earnings which come out on Monday, Oct. 18.
Share of Google were catapulted into the stratosphere, up 60 points (11%) to just over $600 per share after the company reported earnings that beat aggressive estimates for the third quarter.
Otherwise, the rest of the market wasn't very impressed with Ben Bernanke's speech in which he almost gushed openly about QE2 and the need to re-inflate the economy. In other words, Ben simply can't wait to print up more money and debase the currency further.
One little problem - well, two - with Ben's strategy is that interest rates are already at record low levels and people are still reluctant to spend, and, that second little annoyance: unemployment continues to hang around the 10% level and isn't seen improving until sometime in... well, make your best guess.
So, besides the ultra-bubbly-looking NASDAQ stocks, the rest of the market drifted below the unchanged mark for almost the entire session. The Dow ended lower, the NASDAQ was on a launch pad and the S&P barely budged. What all of this is saying is that there's a great deal of dislocation between the stocks, the indices and investors. Divergence is usually a good harbinger for an impending crash, to which we alerted the world yesterday. We're still on that tack, but POMO, QE2, elections and jerry-rigging the markets aren't going to help achieve the desired unwind.
Angelo Mozilo, former head of former Countrywide Financial, settled his SEC case for $67 million, along with two of his henchmen, Eric Sieracki and David Sambol. The coverup and deceit of the federal agencies continues. There is still an open DOJ criminal investigation, but with the invisible man, Eric Holder, not particularly interested in prosecuting anybody for anything, the chances of it being dropped are approaching 100%.
As usual, nobody admitted any guilt and the odd twist is that Bank of America, which bought the company in 2007, will pay a good deal of the disgorgement and fines.
Prior to the Mozilo deal, BofA had already been downgraded by Standard and Poors, from a buy to a hold. The stock skidded all day, along with other bank stocks associated to the foreclosure fraud issues which continue to be played out, talked about and eventually likely will be extensively litigated.
Dow 11,062.78, -31.79 (0.29%)
NASDAQ 2,468.77, +33.39 (1.37%)
S&P 500 1,176.19, +2.38 (0.20%)
NYSE Composite 7,520.60, -25.99 (0.34%)
NASDAQ Volume 2,246,778,000
NYSE Volume 6,512,256,500
Despite the split decision in the indices, declining issues led advancers by an unhealthy amount, 3625-2778. New highs continued to dominate new lows, 607-65, though it is notable that the number of new lows is beginning to rise off absurd lows in the 20s, now up two straight days. Volume was very strong, though this being an options expiration day on top of the fat fiat money sent through on the POMO, that's not unexpected.
For a change, the major commodities were all lower. Oil lost $1.44, to $81.25. Gold fell $5.60, to $1,372.00. Even silver, which has been on a tremendous tear, shed 15 cents, to $24.29, still mighty pricey.
With elections just twelve trading days away, we anxiously await the essential "October surprise" moment. Will it be in the form of a market crash, a terror event or a political gaffe.
Ladies and gents, place your bets and have a nice weekend. Take the Jets!
Apple was up more than 4% on the day in anticipation of earnings which come out on Monday, Oct. 18.
Share of Google were catapulted into the stratosphere, up 60 points (11%) to just over $600 per share after the company reported earnings that beat aggressive estimates for the third quarter.
Otherwise, the rest of the market wasn't very impressed with Ben Bernanke's speech in which he almost gushed openly about QE2 and the need to re-inflate the economy. In other words, Ben simply can't wait to print up more money and debase the currency further.
One little problem - well, two - with Ben's strategy is that interest rates are already at record low levels and people are still reluctant to spend, and, that second little annoyance: unemployment continues to hang around the 10% level and isn't seen improving until sometime in... well, make your best guess.
So, besides the ultra-bubbly-looking NASDAQ stocks, the rest of the market drifted below the unchanged mark for almost the entire session. The Dow ended lower, the NASDAQ was on a launch pad and the S&P barely budged. What all of this is saying is that there's a great deal of dislocation between the stocks, the indices and investors. Divergence is usually a good harbinger for an impending crash, to which we alerted the world yesterday. We're still on that tack, but POMO, QE2, elections and jerry-rigging the markets aren't going to help achieve the desired unwind.
Angelo Mozilo, former head of former Countrywide Financial, settled his SEC case for $67 million, along with two of his henchmen, Eric Sieracki and David Sambol. The coverup and deceit of the federal agencies continues. There is still an open DOJ criminal investigation, but with the invisible man, Eric Holder, not particularly interested in prosecuting anybody for anything, the chances of it being dropped are approaching 100%.
As usual, nobody admitted any guilt and the odd twist is that Bank of America, which bought the company in 2007, will pay a good deal of the disgorgement and fines.
Prior to the Mozilo deal, BofA had already been downgraded by Standard and Poors, from a buy to a hold. The stock skidded all day, along with other bank stocks associated to the foreclosure fraud issues which continue to be played out, talked about and eventually likely will be extensively litigated.
Dow 11,062.78, -31.79 (0.29%)
NASDAQ 2,468.77, +33.39 (1.37%)
S&P 500 1,176.19, +2.38 (0.20%)
NYSE Composite 7,520.60, -25.99 (0.34%)
NASDAQ Volume 2,246,778,000
NYSE Volume 6,512,256,500
Despite the split decision in the indices, declining issues led advancers by an unhealthy amount, 3625-2778. New highs continued to dominate new lows, 607-65, though it is notable that the number of new lows is beginning to rise off absurd lows in the 20s, now up two straight days. Volume was very strong, though this being an options expiration day on top of the fat fiat money sent through on the POMO, that's not unexpected.
For a change, the major commodities were all lower. Oil lost $1.44, to $81.25. Gold fell $5.60, to $1,372.00. Even silver, which has been on a tremendous tear, shed 15 cents, to $24.29, still mighty pricey.
With elections just twelve trading days away, we anxiously await the essential "October surprise" moment. Will it be in the form of a market crash, a terror event or a political gaffe.
Ladies and gents, place your bets and have a nice weekend. Take the Jets!
Thursday, October 14, 2010
CRASH ALERT... BANKS ABOUT TO ROLL OVER AGAIN
As the headline suggests, Foreclosuregate has precipitated a front-running on the banks by investors who are rightfully scared that issues stemming from the rampant fraud, not only from foreclosure and robo-signing issues, but dating back to mortgage originations, bad paperwork, MERS, and the entire RMBS fiasco.
Proof was in the activity of the stocks that appear poised to take what amounts to a knockout blow: JP Morgan Chase (JPM), Citigroup (C), Wells Fargo (WFC) and the granddaddy of them all, Bank of America (BAC). Shares of these banks, which are the servicers of vast numbers of mortgages, many already in default or foreclosure, fell by 5-6% on the day.
On the other side of the sell-off are the monoline insurers, those companies which will gain from tranches of mortgages securities being "put back" to the banks as investors seek to be compensated and made whole at par for non-performing securities. Such entities such as AMBAC (ABK), MBIA (MBI), Radian Group (RDN) and MGIC Investment Corp. (MTG) were up anywhere from 5-18%. The smart money is already in, against the banks and on the insurers.
At issue are mortgages made and securities issued between 2005 and 2007, which were mostly securitized and sold by the Big Four banks. Many of the loans have already defaulted and are being put back to the banks, with litigation ramping up.
As for overall market reaction, stocks were down hard on the day on news that PPI increase 0.4% in September and new unemployment claims ramped up to 462,000, but is probably more like 475,000, as the BLS routinely understates these numbers and upwardly revises them the following week.
The Dow was down by as many as 72 points before the interventionists took aim at the unchanged line at 3:00 - their usual "happy hour" - and almost got there, perhaps leaving all of the indices in the red as a signal to those in the know that the massive sell-off was set to kick into high gear beginning Friday.
A market decline prior to the election is clearly in the cards as a message for Tea partiers and Republicans to carry into the elections as a repudiation of Democrat party policies. in case nobody noticed, equity options expire tomorrow, and the usual out-of-the-blue rally has gone missing.
Stocks are about to become very cheap, very soon, as a crash is well set-up by Fed pumping liquidity and enormous denial of reality on the part of the entire Wall Street scum crowd.
The Fed's QE2, attempting to "reduce disinflation," targeting a 2% inflation rate and an additional 0.5 to 1.0% improvement in GDP, is exactly backwards at this point. To say they are "pushing on a string" is like saying your son's high school football team has a good chance of beating the Baltimore Ravens.
The Fed will attempt to influence the economy by timed purchases of Treasuries and more bad paper in the MBS universe. They're going to get stuck with a load of bad paper which hopefully will cause their utter and complete collapse. Since the Fed is one of the major causes of financial pain in this country, it's about time they meet their maker and go the way of buggy whips, typewriters and people who think the banks are a good buy. Planning to purchase as much as $1.5 trillion of paper over the next 6-12 months isn't even going to raise an eyebrow on the slumbering economy. They'd need $20 trillion to unwind the mess the banks have created and continue to deny. It's OVER. Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Citigroup will FAIL. JP Morgan Chase may survive, as they hold a special place in American finance, but they will be impaired for many years.
Dow 11,094.57, -1.51 (0.01%)
NASDAQ 2,435.38, -5.85 (0.24%)
S&P 500 1,173.81, -4.29 (0.36%)
NYSE Composite 7,546.59, -14.91 (0.20%)
NASDAQ Volume 2,026,980,750.00
NYSE Volume 5,962,782,000
Declining issues outpaced advancers, 3706-2738, but new highs remained in favor over new lows, 610-58. Volume was slightly improved, but only because the volume on the bank stocks was so unusually high (about 4.5X normal on BAC and WFC alone).
In anticipation of the deflationary depression the United States is about to enter, oil backed off 32 cents, to $82.69. The alternative currency play in the precious metals remained very much alive, with gold hiher by $7.10, to $1,377.60. Silver was higher by another 50 cents, to $24.44, capping a 25% move from the beginning of September.
Make no bones about it, the US is heading right over the cliff. Whether anybody recognizes the fact or the media gives credence to it before the elections or before Christmas is just a matter of how well the power players in government can keep it under wraps. But it's here, and it's going to hurt for a very long time.
Proof was in the activity of the stocks that appear poised to take what amounts to a knockout blow: JP Morgan Chase (JPM), Citigroup (C), Wells Fargo (WFC) and the granddaddy of them all, Bank of America (BAC). Shares of these banks, which are the servicers of vast numbers of mortgages, many already in default or foreclosure, fell by 5-6% on the day.
On the other side of the sell-off are the monoline insurers, those companies which will gain from tranches of mortgages securities being "put back" to the banks as investors seek to be compensated and made whole at par for non-performing securities. Such entities such as AMBAC (ABK), MBIA (MBI), Radian Group (RDN) and MGIC Investment Corp. (MTG) were up anywhere from 5-18%. The smart money is already in, against the banks and on the insurers.
At issue are mortgages made and securities issued between 2005 and 2007, which were mostly securitized and sold by the Big Four banks. Many of the loans have already defaulted and are being put back to the banks, with litigation ramping up.
As for overall market reaction, stocks were down hard on the day on news that PPI increase 0.4% in September and new unemployment claims ramped up to 462,000, but is probably more like 475,000, as the BLS routinely understates these numbers and upwardly revises them the following week.
The Dow was down by as many as 72 points before the interventionists took aim at the unchanged line at 3:00 - their usual "happy hour" - and almost got there, perhaps leaving all of the indices in the red as a signal to those in the know that the massive sell-off was set to kick into high gear beginning Friday.
A market decline prior to the election is clearly in the cards as a message for Tea partiers and Republicans to carry into the elections as a repudiation of Democrat party policies. in case nobody noticed, equity options expire tomorrow, and the usual out-of-the-blue rally has gone missing.
Stocks are about to become very cheap, very soon, as a crash is well set-up by Fed pumping liquidity and enormous denial of reality on the part of the entire Wall Street scum crowd.
The Fed's QE2, attempting to "reduce disinflation," targeting a 2% inflation rate and an additional 0.5 to 1.0% improvement in GDP, is exactly backwards at this point. To say they are "pushing on a string" is like saying your son's high school football team has a good chance of beating the Baltimore Ravens.
The Fed will attempt to influence the economy by timed purchases of Treasuries and more bad paper in the MBS universe. They're going to get stuck with a load of bad paper which hopefully will cause their utter and complete collapse. Since the Fed is one of the major causes of financial pain in this country, it's about time they meet their maker and go the way of buggy whips, typewriters and people who think the banks are a good buy. Planning to purchase as much as $1.5 trillion of paper over the next 6-12 months isn't even going to raise an eyebrow on the slumbering economy. They'd need $20 trillion to unwind the mess the banks have created and continue to deny. It's OVER. Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Citigroup will FAIL. JP Morgan Chase may survive, as they hold a special place in American finance, but they will be impaired for many years.
Dow 11,094.57, -1.51 (0.01%)
NASDAQ 2,435.38, -5.85 (0.24%)
S&P 500 1,173.81, -4.29 (0.36%)
NYSE Composite 7,546.59, -14.91 (0.20%)
NASDAQ Volume 2,026,980,750.00
NYSE Volume 5,962,782,000
Declining issues outpaced advancers, 3706-2738, but new highs remained in favor over new lows, 610-58. Volume was slightly improved, but only because the volume on the bank stocks was so unusually high (about 4.5X normal on BAC and WFC alone).
In anticipation of the deflationary depression the United States is about to enter, oil backed off 32 cents, to $82.69. The alternative currency play in the precious metals remained very much alive, with gold hiher by $7.10, to $1,377.60. Silver was higher by another 50 cents, to $24.44, capping a 25% move from the beginning of September.
Make no bones about it, the US is heading right over the cliff. Whether anybody recognizes the fact or the media gives credence to it before the elections or before Christmas is just a matter of how well the power players in government can keep it under wraps. But it's here, and it's going to hurt for a very long time.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
