This is what is killing this country.  Nobody can get honest numbers anymore.

The Fed has some numbers...2 trillion or so.  The Treasury throws out their numbers.
Some expert testifies to Congress we are in the hole for $24 trillion.

If we could just know the real, honest to God, numbers...we'd all be better for it.

this thread will not die.

i am not buying a gold

I put this at the end of the last page. I'll just add it here.


ETA...Excerpt from a good article dated last week...


The Ginnie Mae MBS market surged to $640 billion at the end of 2009's first quarter from $450 billion at the end of 2007. During the same time, Fannie Mae increased to $2.855 trillion from $2.259 trillion, while Freddie Mac grew to $1.819 trillion from $1.727 trillion, according to Arthur Frank, director and head of MBS research at Deutsche Bank Securities in New York.


Officially Ginnie Mae is the only one backed by the Gubmint. I can see the assholes bailing out the other two...

Full article...

FHA article on amounts


Chris

Top gear on Dish...

Sorry...

Chris

Now is the best time to buy a house in decades.  It won't be this good again for a long, long time.

As far as buying for a rental, depends on the market.  I'm ready to snap another one up, if I find one that fits my business plan.

I don't think so. The Case-Shiller index is still about 20% above where it was for most of
the 1990's. Nationally it's down to about the 2003 price level, and prices were already seriously
out of control by then.

The Alt-A and Option ARMs issued in 2005/2006 at the peak of the bubble are just beginning their reset
cycle. Locally I still see a ton of overprices houses in the mid-to-upper price range; the low
end, mostly foreclosures, are at least arguably rationally priced. I think as the mid-to-upper
prices fall they'll put more pressure on the low end.

So, just for grins and giggles....23% of 5 trillion is 1.15 trillion in default?

1.15 trillion possibly in default !!!

Look at it this way...someone has to be the knife catcher.


Chris

Not that y'all don't already have enough to keep an eye on, but this suspected terror plot out of New York seems to have legs. One story said the good guys think the bad guys were arranged in 4 groups of four each. So far, 3 have been arrested, leaving 13 on the loose by my math, and each day, the news has the .gov seeming a little more worried about it.

An attack will move the markets, and probably jam communications too.

Some markets are on thin ice. Others might be ripe for a buy-in.

Just a head's up, and now, back to finance.

Thank God we don't waterboard anymore!

Obambi better pray to his Allah that the FBI finds the rest of these terrorists through whatever means necessary. An attack of any magnitude will not bring this country together like 9/11, well, it will bring this country together against someone alright.

I fear  Mumbai style attacks in and around the Nation's heartland.  

The leitmotif of Obeyme's administration has been the magician's ruse of concentrating the public's attention on what is going on in one aspect of government, while quietly socialising another.

The health care "crisis" is entirely manufactured.  Many have quite reasonably speculated that it is an attempt to simply take over the health care sector of the economy.

But I suggest that it is telling that we have heard virtually not a peep out of him about all of the mortgage defaults –– which does constitute something of a national economic crisis.

Are the socialists quietly structuring what would be essentially an economic coup of the housing and even commercial real estate industry?

The public is not desperate enough right now to jump aboard the socialised medicine scam.

Meanwhile, many if not most, middleclass households are gnawing their own limbs off over mortgage and credit cards payments.

"Sweeping reforms" (aka socialism)  in the nature of the consumer  and commercial credit market itself could "alleviate" that anguish.

I have one neighbor considering a short sale of their house while another just had a car repo'd. The short sale is going to end up defaulting I bet with a family of 10 heading home to live with relatives.



Even considering that they placed themselves in this position I feel bad for them because they are good hearted hard working people.



If there is money to be made in this market I'm thinking cleaning suppplies/vaccine producers are a great short term investment. The market is moving still it's just having the insight and a few extra clams to play in it.



I'll be glad if I still have a job come end of 3rd quarter.

From: New York Times
by Stephen Labaton
09.21.09

http://market-ticker.denninger.net/archives/2009/09/22.html

Lol, I wish, we would at least fight back once it got started.  Initially we would be in trouble but with or without the police we would push back hard as soon as the phone calls started to go out.



What I fear every day is Beslan.  It would take nothing to accomplish this and we have guaranteed as a nation that no one will be fighting back...  Once that happens we will be at war with our own government because their answer will have nothing to do with punishing the attackers.
 

Is it about time to take my spare money out of my bank account?

Others may suggest abruptly drawing out large amounts of cash, and there is no real reason not to do so.  (Provided, of course that you keep it physically safe, and that tends not to be a problem with the folks in this thread)

Personally, I have always advocated drawing out a "reasonable-looking" amount of cash every week, and keeping it squirrelled, all the while keeping a steady, responsible, very boring flow of money into and out of checking.  It's the money other people would use for eating out and frivolous purposes.

There is no real, legal reason *not* to go draw your money out.  You're sure not going to miss the interest it might have been drawing, that is for sure.

I just have some sort of gut instinct against making sudden large withdrawals.  That's what it is, and all it is:  Gut instinct.

We never know when, by whom, and why our bank records may come under scrutiny some time in the future.

Nonetheless, tinfoil aside, it is always a good plan to have cash on hand for floods, tornados, storms, earthquakes, etc.

I think the reference was to the proposed Health Bill that is coming, there is an IRS provision in there to examine your financial records in "near real time".



 

I am old enough to remember when all banking records were kept on paper.

Then they were computerised, but it would have taken some extraordinary situation and a warrant to examine them.

Now there is very real discussion of health care records linked to financial records.

Who knows what might be next?  The answer it:  None of us.  Period.

Is there any legal reason not to suddenly withdraw all of one's money from banks?  No, none whatsoever.

I am just paranoid enough to believe that THE most valuable thing one can maintain for the future is a very tediously boring, easily documentable, no *blips* on the screen kind of paper trail.  Off radar –– in plain sight.

$.02 cheerfully refunded, minus shipping and restocking fee.

That was not the focus of my post, but I would ask:  Is it ever wise to have anyone, anyone at all, knowing that you are carrying any large amount of cash around, and probably taking it home with you?

The big question that comes to my mind is:
are you ready?
I'm not...........

I have prepared as much as can afford, but I will never be ready for what is coming. :(

There are ways around that. have a separate no fee savings account that only has money in it when you are going to transfer it out and as soon as money comes in, move it someplace else. Sorta like a PP account that is tied to a bank account.

Gentlemen, I tend to believe that a little more than a year from now, when we keep our rowdy election night vigil here...

... and the results start streaming in with Democrats and a few Rinos unseated in "upsets", that we may sigh something of premature relief that the worst is over.

The worst of the fear will be over.  But the rest will just be hard times.

Hard times we can do, easily and with a smile.

It is fear that erodes the soul... or refines it.

buy food instead––-best insurance plan around!

I fear a Beslan style attack.

If it happanes though, there needs to be a whole bunch of lynchings taking place immediately.  Muslims know they have a problem with the radicals in their own community.  They know who the radicals are.  They know they are up to something.  And they do nothing.  They need to be more afraid of what an average US citizen will do to them than what a terrorist will do to them IMHO.

Nice way to get a little *blip* by your name, somewhere it does not need to be.

Pranks like that were fun back when little ripples of tax protest were treated with dry humor.

Nowadays, the Thug in Chief's goons game the system so the law is on their side.

You'd be fine if you just stuck with importing underage sex slaves to live in gubmint funded housing.  

Keep this moving forward.

Random notes.

Fed's thinking about backing off MBS purchases, maybe tapered, maybe an abrupt shut-off, maybe no change in policy till next year. Detalis in Fed statement this afternoon.

Palin's in China. Noteworthy comment: "If you want real job growth, you cut txes and reduce marginal tax rates on all Americans...Cut payroll taxes, eliminate capital gains taxes, slay the death tax," she said. "Get federal spending under control, then you step back and you watch the US economy roar back to life."

The terror warning to NYC yesterday has been expanded to all US cities and now includes stadiums, hotels and banks. Threat is backpack IEDs using hydrogen peroxide explosives.

Gold at $118 and rising, Euro very close to a one year high against the dollar, all currencies continue to gain on the dollar, folks this IS inflation, no matter what the Fed or anyone else says, your dollars are losing purchasing power by the day, 3.5% in the last three weeks. It's risky to extrapolate this far from a three week trend, but that works out to an annual inflation rate of 60.5 %. Sudden deflation is still a threat with the numerous economic problems we face, but this inflation is no longer a threat, it is occurring right now, in realtime.

Finally, I am hesitant to advise a long series of small cash withdrawals from bank or brokerage accounts. If the objective is to get liquid, numerous small withdrawals accomplish that objective just the same as a few large ones. Either approach will incur risks.

Both approaches risk governmental attention, computers these days are highly tuned to cash withdrawals in quantity, for both anti-drug and anti-terror reasons. One large withdrawal will draw federal scrutiny, but it is easily documented if the need arises. Numerous small withdrawals are less easily documented, and when isolated, by computer, look precisely like what they are, an attempt to move into cash while avoiding federal withdrawal notifications.

With other risks, notably, alerting low level bank employees that you may be holding cash in qualtity outside the security of a bank vault, the smaller withdrawals at dispersed bank locations will draw much less attention. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

One approach, if you haven't already acquired physical holdings in precious metals, is the direct transfer , wire transfer, or cashier's check to purchase physical metals in quantity. This will attract governmental attention, especially in any future attempts to conficate metal holdings, but you have to remember to compartmentalize you risk assessemnts.

For example, one recent consideration of mine was the withdrawal of FDIC guarantees for money market fund assets on 9/18/09. In an attempt to spread out the risk among several banks, those too small to have large MBS exposure and those too big to fail, I found myself weighing the relative merits of money market holdings versus short term CDs. The CDs "won" that risk assessment because they are backed by FDIC, where MM funds no longer are.

But eventually logic emerged...if the threat is an overwhelmed FDIC, and therefore cash needs to be diversified across many banks to protect against one or more bank failures the FDIC is unable to cover, then FDIC guarantees on CDs mean nothing.

By the same token, if you decide to increase physical currency holdings to mitigate risk in a general economic meltdown, a meltdown in which FDIC, and the "full faith and backing of the US government" mean little, then by definition, your risk from federal scrutiny of your withdrawals must be correspondingly less. Not much, but it's something.

In my opinion, the greatest risk in either small or large withdrawals, would be seizure of the assets, where you are forced to prove innocence before retrun of your property. By definition, on withdrawal you have negated much meltdown risk, leaving government intervention the single primary threat. Much better, IMO, for the governemt to entangle you legally, while YOU have access to those funds, than it is for THEM to be holding them while you try to prove innocence without the backing of your own money.

I worry about hot soldering irons not at all. Long before the feds get around to torturing me out of my insignificant currency caches, they will target big fish, at which time I plan to step well beyond their reach, into the backcountry, the below the radar homeless community, offshore, and/or E, all the above.

I don't know why this a)isn't getting more news coverage, and why b)it seems that there is no sense of urgency amongst those who have the job of preventing such attacks.



I'm in condition orange. AR, mag carrier, 5 loaded mags, vest, G21 and 3 additional .45 mags.



We have become too complacent.  We have become weak.  We have forgotten. We will be forced to remember.



 

The liberals own the plainly stated policy of minimalizing terror threats, remember "man made disasters?" Liberal =MSM, too. Just enough coverage for them to CYA after the fact, and not one ounce more.

Lol, your orange SOP matches "yellow" here. Not going to orange, I'm rural and at little risk. I am already cocked and locked while travelling, but that's just because I am spending much more time at the range these days, and am too lazy to keep loading and unloading the truck, outside of the actual weapons themselves. I will, however, stop carrying my easier to conceal summer peashooter, in exchange for the G-21 though.

Something to add to random notes...Massachusetts legislators have agreed in principle to allow the governor to appoint an interim successor for Kennedy. Days or hours for them to jump thru the paperwork hoops, and a US Senate vote on healthcare could follow within hours, in worst case scenarios. On the plus side for us, there were reports yesterday of another Dim senator's physical collapse, updates on that situation could mean them dims still lack the necesary votes to kill a fillibuster by one.

(Not even the appearance of fair play out of these sleazebags, is there? Mass passed a bill to explicitly prevent a Repub governor from appointing  and interim successor, then turned right around and passed an explicit bill to allow a Dim governor to do the exact same thing. Shades of "it depends on your definition of sex" all over again, as far as I'm concerned.)

or alternately, the threat doesn't really exist except to help someone's poll numbers or to achieve some objective that furthers the lie.
 

Can't read?


SOME

Yes, some markets will take till then to get back to their huge bubble levels.

Most, the VAST majority will not need that long.

When we look back, we will see this will have been the best time to buy a home (in most areas) to live in, this century.

If you think the pre-recession housing market was not a bubble, then get busy flipping houses.

Let us know how that works out for you.

DXY in sub 76 territory around midnight, now hovering at about 76.15...

Thanks Ben Bernancke!

Really??? WTF.......Are you planning on heading to your nearest stadium/hotel at the first sign of violence? You gonna go all Rambo on the mofo's?

While I do advocate being "prepared", there is a limit my friend. Be ready, but don't go overboard.... Just a thought.

DXY is ?

Now why would I do that?  Now I do worry about civil unrest, I also worry about being caught in a situation and think to myself "gee all of those guns in the safe would, and I don't have a single one of them near me right now, when I need them the most."



Having a truck gun isn't going overboard.





 

it's not "overboard" until he says "I'm here to kick ass and chew bubblegum, and I'm all outta gum."

Shit, I'm no chick little and I have 4 loaded gun near me just about all the time.

Except mine aren't for the economic collapse.  They are for when the extraterrestial invastion begins.