that as fads in investing go, they have historically avoided them. They didn't get caught flat-footed like so many others in the Russian ruble default of 1998. And I confess to being surprised their exposure to the sub-prime mess was as high as it was. I bet, and this is just an assumption, that if Phil Purcell was still around that might not have happened. Phil knew credit, if you recall Discover card was his baby.

^{“Is not our first thought to go on the road? The road is our source, our vault of treasures, our wealth. Only on the road does the ‘traveller’ feel like himself, at home.”
Ryszard Kapuscinski}

All of the CDO packagers wanted high-interest subprime & Alt-A (not quite so bad) loans desperately. MS leaned on Countrywide et. al. "I want 2billion a year!".

Forget it, Jake - it's AmnesiaTown

A one quarter percent cut in interest rates generates a gain in the stock market of minus 290 points...

Seems like those in the know are keeping the thing going while they slowly but surely inch toward the exit signs.

I did inhale.

Buy on the rumor, sell on the news;

and its reported the stock market wanted one half a point....

So a selling event & a disapointment.

1/4 of the way through. I put up in September.

I started by asking the Calcutta-born Australian [Satyajit Das] whether the credit crisis was in what Americans would call the "third inning." This was pretty amusing, it seemed, judging from the laughter. So I tried again. "Second inning?" More laughter. "First?"

Still too optimistic. Das, who knows as much about global money flows as anyone in the world, stopped chuckling long enough to suggest that we're actually still in the middle of the national anthem before a game destined to go into extra innings. And it won't end well for the global economy.

Anyone notice how 2005-2007 were banner years for taking companies "private"? That's usually polite-speak for Leveraged Buyout (LBO). Unfortunately, it's usually a case of a buyout done with good old US-type financing--you mortgage future earnings to pay for the buyout.

Many "private" companies thus formed are drowning in debt. Wait for the implosions...

eom

_{1."George Washington did not cross the Delaware for Capitalism," -Shmuley Boteach.
2.The Dems haven't punished the GOP enough, so you're going to reward the Republicans?}

I believe in Hong Kong.

^{“Is not our first thought to go on the road? The road is our source, our vault of treasures, our wealth. Only on the road does the ‘traveller’ feel like himself, at home.”
Ryszard Kapuscinski}