“The U.S. credit-card industry may pull back well over $2 trillion of lines over the next 18 months due to risk aversion and regulatory changes, leading to sharp declines in consumer spending, prominent banking analyst Meredith Whitney said.
The credit card is the second key source of consumer liquidity, the first being jobs, the Oppenheimer & [...]
Simon Duke
UK Daily Mail
Goldman Sachs is on course to pay its top City bankers multimillion-pound bonuses - despite asking the U.S. government for an emergency bail-out.
The struggling Wall Street bank has set aside £7billion for salaries and 2008 year-end bonuses, it emerged yesterday.
Each of the firm’s 443 partners is on course to pocket an [...]
by Tanya Cariina Hsu
Global Research, October 23, 2008
I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. (Thomas Jefferson, US President; 1743 - 1826)
America is dying. It is self-destructing and bringing the rest of the world down with it.
Often referred to as a sub-prime mortgage collapse, this obfuscates the real reason. [...]
With defaults on credit card debt spiraling amid a global financial downturn, banks already reeling from the mortgage crisis are losing billions more from unpaid credit card bills.
Big banks have formed an unusual alliance with consumer advocates to urge the government to allow huge portions of credit card debt to be forgiven, a turnabout from [...]
By Barry Grey
27 October 2008 “WSWS” — In an unusually frank article published in Saturday’s New York Times, the newspaper’s economic columnist, Joe Nocera, reveals what he calls “the dirty little secret of the banking industry”–namely, that “it has no intention of using the [government bailout] money to make new loans.”
As Nocera explains, [...]
1. Fri morning Oct 10 was the morning the market sold off so heavily. That was also the day of the Lehman CDS auction.
2. The auction settled at .09 cents on the dollar for CDS contracts. That means that whoever was covering the CDS contracts for Lehman is on the hook for around $ [...]
The worst financial crisis since the Great Depression is claiming another casualty: American-style capitalism.
Since the 1930s, U.S. banks were the flagships of American economic might, and emulation by other nations of the fiercely free-market financial system in the United States was expected and encouraged. But the market turmoil that is draining the nation’s wealth and [...]
NEW YORK (Dow Jones)–Steep losses Monday in bank stocks reflect the dire straits
the banking industry may face if politicians reach no agreement on the financial
rescue package.
“All of us are just numb,” said Frank J. Barkocy, the director of research at
Mendon Capital Advisors Corp. Asked if he fears more big banks might not pull
through the crisis, [...]
Insurance giant American International Group, beset by a record stock slump and a possible cut from ratings agency Standard & Poor’s, said Friday it was reviewing its businesses and that “everything was on the table,” suggesting it might sell assets to raise capital and avoid a crippling downgrade.
“The markets are skittish and very tight,” [...]
Gold underperformed during the deflationary 30s as did stocks, and real estate. Gold is usually a crisis hedge and inflation hedge. Inflation tears a fiat currency apart so as it become less valuable, gold’s value increases. I believe some of the reasoning is it has always had value and has a finite supply where as [...]
Monster Employment Index Rises in April
April 2008 Index Highlights: — Index climbs seven points, continuing a
three-month upward trend, but remains down six percent year-over-year — Online
job demand surges in the accommodation and food services industry, reflecting
intense seasonal hiring — Financial services sector sees a degree of
stabilization, despite highly publicized layoffs in the banking industry –
Government [...]
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