Ben Bernanke’s Unintended Consequences The good news? Ben Bernanke has confounded naysayers, and proven that The Federal Reserve really can resuscitate (levitate?) the stock market — now up 85% from The Crash of ’08 lows. How? By printing money — lots and lots of money — and driving interest rates into the toilet (and keeping...Read More
What’s an Investor to Do? [But] as long as the music is playing, you’ve got to get up and dance. –Former Citigroup CEO Chuck Prince Perplexed by a stock market that (inexplicably?) is once again on the rise — along with all manner of commodities (oil, gold, silver, etc.)? That, despite at best conflicting economic...Read More
July Housing Stats [Update. 10:30 am (CST): the official number is down 27.2%. Meanwhile, the market is up just a bit from where it opened, down 100. The takeaway? Nobody’s shocked.] The big number today is the imminent release of July housing sales (about a minute away). Judging by the stock market’s first 30 minutes...Read More
NOW They Tell Us Getting caught up on the various financial publications I try to at least skim regularly (The Wall Street Journal, Barron’s, Investor’s Business Daily, etc.), I’ve been struck by how many money managers claim they were nervous about the market this Spring, and re-positioned their funds to raise cash (and sell equities)....Read More
Real Estate as a Haven Conventional wisdom to date has been that a rocky stock market bodes poorly for upper bracket housing. That’s because, compared to other Buyers, upper bracket Buyers presumably have more exposure to stocks. When stocks take a hit, so does their purchasing power. Witnessing the latest stock market gyrations, I’m wondering...Read More
“Better Late Than Never” Dept.No, I’m not wishing that the stock market goes down. But at least it’s going down today for a “good” reason: it’s being pulled down by a sharp drop in the price of Goldman Sachs stock, which may now be charged criminally (it is already the subject of civil fraud charges)....Read More
