Risk and Return

I do believe we should be doing something as a nation, through our government, to avoid the not insignificant chance of a total financial meltdown. I have seen several things proposed that I find interesting, and I will get into them and other longer term issues in coming days. I had hoped to address this [...]

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Thanks to Barry Ritholtz I found this analysis from Vladimir Klyuev at the IMF,  What Goes Up Must Come Down? House Price Dynamics in the United States.
While I have been of the opinion we have a good ways to go, I think these charts are pretty telling. I don’t see anything here to make me [...]

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You may remember the website we discussed back in January. Dale Franks just discovered their program, because they now are on Television. He asks the obvious question:
So, should the mortgage companies get off scott-free from facing the results of their poor business decisions when it comes to the loans—loans they shouldn’t have made in the [...]

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Anybody see a bottom when this kind of thing is happening?
“Luxury builder Toll Brothers Inc (TOL), hurt as many buyers to try to get out of contracts for new homes amid falling prices, says a member of its founding family is trying to walk away from an agreement to buy a new condominium.
The daughter of [...]

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Jeremy Grantham echoes a few themes here at Risk and Return in this interview with Barron’s:
Secondly, this occurred at a time of what I believe is the first global bubble in pretty well all asset prices, so there is a much greater degree of broad-based vulnerability.

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From the Financial Times:
Global spending on IT goods and services is expected to grow … 6 per cent … according to Forrester Research … This represents a significant slowdown from 12 per cent growth last year.
…
“Our forecast is premised on a mild recession in the US economy in the first two or three quarters of [...]

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(Cross Posted at Risk and Return)
Of course prices have just started to decline. First you have to have sales volume decline and inventory build up:
Sales of existing homes fell in December, closing out a horrible year for housing in which sales of single-family homes plunged by the largest amount in 25 years. The median home [...]

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Reader ChrisB asks in response to yesterdays link to Anna Schwartz’s comment on the Federal Reserve:
In retrospect, what should the fed have done differently?
Risk and Return is really about implications for investment policy, and thus identifying which factors have implications is key. Pumping for particular policy choices really isn’t our role. Still, in identifying what [...]

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Can I ask for some applause for this from Crossing Wall Street?
I have to agree with Frederic Mishkin of the Fed:
I think there is too much focus on what decision will be made about the federal funds rate target at the next FOMC meeting. What is important for pricing most financial assets is the path [...]

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Barry Ritholtz, Andrew Ross Sorkin, Dottie Herman, Noah Rosenblatt and Nouriel Roubini debate the housing market and its impact on the economy.
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Hat tip: Barry Ritholtz
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