Charlie Rose

colman  01/31/2011 09:34 AM Report

Thank God, this is changing. I found some more good news at this blog. http://wealthguards1.wordpress.com pretty cool stuff.

doodahdaze  03/25/2009 08:14 AM Report

I wonder if the mansions these pigs live in were built the same way that they "seem" to be "trying" to rebuild the economy? The answer - Not likely.

But that is the "risk" they are willing to take. It's called, buy the best, sell worst (but only for them). Because the "The Snob Culture" must be preserved by weeding out the uncoof... America, AMERICA!... Why do you make me cry?

doodahdaze  03/25/2009 07:38 AM Report

vanron -

Both, thought provoking, AND, thought provoking. Thank you.

vanron100  03/25/2009 02:08 AM Report

Krugman is right to despair...

Is this Wall Street's silver lining? You betcha!...now we know why the market is up...the Geithner's Plan means that the government owns the downside risks and investor's (wall street) own the upside profits...more champagne thank you.

The truth is that No Company or Country is 'to big to fail' (history is full of the 'bones' of both)...here's the problem...

The same people who got us in this mess are now tying to get us out...this is humanly impossible of course...they will, and have instead spent most of the time & money trying to cover-up the industry's underlining behavior. (normal human behavior).

That's why we need an elaborate system of rules & regulations with absolute 'transparency' throughout. Remember President Reagan's slogan re the Russians...'trust but verify'...that's means a system of verifications, checks & balances, and a whole lot of transparency.

What we've witnessed here and around the world in the financial sector (and most other sectors) is a complete collapse of most proper 'rules & regulations' and a surge of 'systemic corruption'.

Above all else, we the people need to be absolutely involved in the solutions...and for the first time in history we have the media/information tools to participate.

So lets start finally Restructuring (nationalize, fix, resell) these financial institutions, the FDIC does it all the time. Only 'Restructuring' can give us the necessary 'Transparency' to get out of this crises.

vanron100  03/25/2009 02:08 AM Report

Krugman is right to despair...

Is this Wall Street's silver lining? You betcha!...now we know why the market is up...the Geithner's Plan means that the government owns the downside risks and investor's (wall street) own the upside profits...more champagne thank you.

The truth is that No Company or Country is 'to big to fail' (history is full of the 'bones' of both)...here's the problem...

The same people who got us in this mess are now tying to get us out...this is humanly impossible of course...they will, and have instead spent most of the time & money trying to cover-up the industry's underlining behavior. (normal human behavior).

That's why we need an elaborate system of rules & regulations with absolute 'transparency' throughout. Remember President Reagan's slogan re the Russians...'trust but verify'...that's means a system of verifications, checks & balances, and a whole lot of transparency.

What we've witnessed here and around the world in the financial sector (and most other sectors) is a complete collapse of most proper 'rules & regulations' and a surge of 'systemic corruption'.

Above all else, we the people need to be absolutely involved in the solutions...and for the first time in history we have the media/information tools to participate.

So lets start finally Restructuring (nationalize, fix, resell) these financial institutions, the FDIC does it all the time. Only 'Restructuring' can give us the necessary 'Transparency' to get out of this crises.

winter  03/25/2009 12:19 AM Report

Why couldn't people afford their mortgages? Of course the

extreme example journalists cite is the 20K applicant attached to a 1/4 million dollar mortgage but I wonder how many mortgages default because of legions of underpaid employees. Noone wants to admit it but its been documented that real wages haven't kept up with inflation for years. Why? Because bonuses and raises are distributed disproportionately and increasingly towards the top. America still suffers from a remnant of slave trader mentality when the response to mention of unions is hostility. The best and the brightest feel entitled to compensations that depend on underpaid hostage employees whose incentives are keeping any job. Funny how whenever that notion manages to find its way into any debate the cry of "class warfare" or "socialism" crops up? Proof of the power to define the debate by elites is that ...somehow, the term Populism has become pejorative. Finally we have a President who actually seems to know what doing the right thing is.

IRISH  03/24/2009 05:58 PM Report

Great discussion by each guest participant. However,it is what lay between the lines that may be more important especially the political overhang on the bank-credit disaster.Congress is surely to blame.What needs to be done will not because of the mental midgets who warm the seats of Congress.

REMant  03/24/2009 03:43 PM Report

A very fine discussion, IMHO.

To the president I'd like to point out that it is only multi-pronged, because everyone is flailing around like drowning swimmers, drunken sailors, or amateur boxers, take your choice. I agree with the idea that Obama seems wishy-washy, BTW, like Lincoln was. Perhaps because only half of him is midwestern, and the other half pure Chicago. I have to say tho that I think Sorkin frequently trims this way as well.

The mkt only cares what others do, like lemmings, but if they have a reason for it, it is because they see the inflationary cycle blowing up again. I am not sure they are all that smart, however. I do think the main problem with these ppl is a confusion of price with real wealth instead of relative wealth.

Too, the inflationist argument stresses demand instead of supply and I know of no way that demand can create its own supply. That is the equivalent of saying a child will lead them, simple primitivism, or Progressive education, which ignores real education. If Obama believes in real education, and other such structural reform, then he should not be believing in this. And it is bound to be inimical to it. You spend your way into economic problems and you save your way out, not the other way 'round.

This is exactly, as Sorkin said, what created the problem in the first place. It ought to fill everyone with despair. But only a few days ago, Obama said the days of living off inflated housing values were over. Securitization is a problem in itself, because making illiquid things liquid also makes money, and this process encourages over-leveraging and pyramided debt. But real estate has been at the heart of the inflationary process that has brought about the decline of America over the past half-century.

The Geithner plan is, as Krugman says, the Paulson plan redux. Rather than have the holders of these bogus assets take the loss they richly deserve, the admin is trying to save them essentially by refinancing at longer terms with the govt being the bank and the taxpayers, the shareholders. The idea they have is that inflation is a necessary spur to stir up the demand they see missing and to what they call "economic growth." But if inflation raises the price of these assets, then the taxpayers lose, no matter. It is smoke-and-mirrors, just as the so-called growth of the last 8 years was smoke-and-mirrors. We would, like Japan, be better off to just write the whole mess off and consider it in the same light as bankruptcy or a lost war. In any case, even if there are buyers for them I don't see how it would make any difference to the economy, overall, who holds them.

There's no question that this is at heart a struggle over pricing, and who will take the hit, and the govt should not be on the side of the banks. As Nocera says, the mark-to-mkt discussion is the same.

The position ppl take on this issue reflects whether they think this crisis is a fluke, which business as usual had nothing to do with, just perhaps because of a few bad apples, and therefore the majority are in no way responsible for, so that they deserve the gain in prices; or whether they think exactly opposite, that it was caused by business as usual, is not a fluke, which those ppl are responsible for, and if the price is allowed, constitutes fraud.

But the market price is really irrelevant, because selling them is irrelevant. The desideratum, if there should be one, is to have the real estate and the securities held by the same, instead of, by different ppl. That will obviate the question of what either is worth. The builders and financiers of the real estate are the ones who should be responsible for it and no one else. It is that, which is casting a pall over the rest of the system, which is, itself, solvent, and could, I believe, carry on just fine without them, because I don't think this situation is the cause of the credit crisis, but that it was caused by the investment in the real estate in the first place. On one hand, no one wants to pay the current price for money, and on the other that the banks see no one they want to lend to. Personally, I think that's healthy, not a crisis.

I suggested over the weekend, that if ppl really want to deal with the problems of Citicorp et al, that the holders of the "toxic assets" pool them into a new bank, which in turn would buy up or otherwise acquire distressed properties, thus containing the problem, until it could be cleaned up naturally. If the govt wanted to aid in this, it might create a program to subsidize ppl in sub-standard or otherwise inadequate or undesirable housing, by buying them out so that they could afford some of the excess new stock.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/24/2009 03:32 PM Report

I am not surprised by today’s major currency news:

“China ‘Super Currency’ Call Shows Dollar Concern”

By Li Yanping

Bloomberg News – March 24, 2009

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=2361456#post2361456

.

doodahdaze  03/24/2009 03:19 PM Report

I guess geitner and summers are counting on the old cleeshay that, "in order for a business to be successful it has to be run by good people", NOT to be true in REALITY.

doodahdaze  03/24/2009 02:51 PM Report

To listen to this conversation, it's no wonder the "financial services" INDUSTRY has run this country into the ground. They play school yard games, they use their own language, inventing new words along the way as soon as someone outside their circle starts to catch on their true craft of lure and deception. It seems like the people of the "financial services" INDUSTRY want to "give back" the bailout money because the "rage" of the American people is interfering with them "ENJOYING" their GRAND "hush hush" "elaborate" SCHEME, the puppets in the woods are saying we is stone, immaculate.

Rose asked good questions though.

Krugman "seems" to have a similar view as a Robert Johnson.

If the "financial services" Industry wasn't SO FULL OF SHIT about virtually EVERYTHING, they wouldn't have any reason to be whining like a bunch of spoiled sissys. For instance, why did the financial press media division of the "financial services" INDUSTRY "call" the alternative to this lazy-man approach to fixing the problem, "NATIONALIZATION (which means communism to most hot-heads)"?. When in fact, it should have been called "RESTRUCTURING (which means capitalism to most hot-heads)"! This kind of BS game with words is what affects public opinion, which in turn, affects the "political possabilities"!... No. The financial people deserve to burn at the stake, if this doesn't work.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/24/2009 01:45 PM Report

Last Friday I posted the following at the EliteTrader forum:

March 20, 2009

SouthAmerica: As the US economy descends into a new great depression – the stage has been set:

Fed Funds @ Zero %

Regarding the latest Fed moves:

As the US economy continues to be in complete free fall the Feds reaction = Fed hit the “PANIC” button.

For the people who want to study a country under an economic depression and at the same time under hyperinflation check the history of Germany around 1922, and also of Zimbabwe in the last few years.

******

But yesterday Tim Geithner increased the US government feast even further and people such as Bill Gross - an agent of a foreign company and the German government – are going to have a feast to the tune of billions and billions of US dollars at the expense of the US taxpayer.

******

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=154992

February 26, 2009

SouthAmerica: Today when I was visiting our local library I noticed an article published in the latest issue of Fortune Magazine – “Pimco’s Power Play.”

It was an informative article I was not aware that Pimco was a subsidiary of a major German financial conglomerate Allianz.

As the article said: basically Bill Gross is an agent of a foreign company and the Germans have the US government and corporate America by the balls. The exact quote from that article: “But Pimco is much more than just a big bond house. For one thing, it has become the U.S. government's partner in reviving the credit markets. It runs the Federal Reserve's $251 billion commercial paper program, which keeps short-term loans flowing to corporate America. It is also one of four asset managers picked to run the government's $500 billion program to purchase mortgage-backed securities.”

The article also said: “With many traditional bond market players - like investment banks, insurers, and pension funds - on the sidelines, Pimco is serving as a buyer of last resort for hedge funds and others seeking to sell bonds to raise cash.” - Pimco also has the American Hedge Funds by the balls.

…“Pimco also will be among the few institutional investors able to soak up the coming onslaught of Treasuries, as well as mortgage paper backed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and municipal bonds.”

…“In short, thanks to the missteps of its rivals as well as its own success, Pimco has become essential to the functioning of the credit markets - and the revival of the economy…. Gross is well aware of his firm's special status. "Our role now is to make money for Pimco, but it is also much greater," Gross tells Fortune. "We efficiently allocate capital around the U.S. and the world. We are in the business of capitalism."

The article said: "Gross, a famously good gambler…” - Anyway, there were many good gamblers around who eventually run out of luck or lost their “Midas Touch” such as Warren Buffet. If you stay long enough on the table in the long run you most likely will lose your shirt.

Americans are not that smart and the US financial markets have trillions of dollars in losses to back that up – and even with the obvious they take forever to connect the dots.

You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to figure out that Allianz being a major German conglomerate they must own the stock in many important German companies directly and indirectly. And you can bet that when their American subsidiary – Allianz – is in the process of “running the Federal Reserve's $251 billion commercial paper program, which keeps short-term loans flowing to corporate America” they also are keeping in mind which companies are competing head-on with German companies. (That is a nice way to eliminate the competition, and the competition is not even aware of what is going on.)

As you can see by the content of this article China is not the only country that has the US on its knees – the Germans are shafting the Americans and they are not even aware of what is going on.

********

Pimco is a subsidiary of a major German financial conglomerate Allianz.

In North America several companies with specialized expertise operate under the roof of the Allianz Group. Property & Casualty Insurance is provided by Fireman's Fund, Life Insurance and Healthcare Risk Management by Allianz Life, and Asset Management by Allianz Global Investors' network of companies, such as PIMCO, Nicholas-Applegate Capital Management and Oppenheimer Capital.

http://www.allianz.com/en/about_all.../usa/page1.html

********

Pimco's Power Play

By Katie Benner, writer

Fortune Magazine

March 2, 2009

.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/24/2009 01:45 PM Report

Last Friday I posted the following at the EliteTrader forum:

March 20, 2009

SouthAmerica: As the US economy descends into a new great depression – the stage has been set:

Fed Funds @ Zero %

Regarding the latest Fed moves:

As the US economy continues to be in complete free fall the Feds reaction = Fed hit the “PANIC” button.

For the people who want to study a country under an economic depression and at the same time under hyperinflation check the history of Germany around 1922, and also of Zimbabwe in the last few years.

******

But yesterday Tim Geithner increased the US government feast even further and people such as Bill Gross - an agent of a foreign company and the German government – are going to have a feast to the tune of billions and billions of US dollars at the expense of the US taxpayer.

******

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=154992

February 26, 2009

SouthAmerica: Today when I was visiting our local library I noticed an article published in the latest issue of Fortune Magazine – “Pimco’s Power Play.”

It was an informative article I was not aware that Pimco was a subsidiary of a major German financial conglomerate Allianz.

As the article said: basically Bill Gross is an agent of a foreign company and the Germans have the US government and corporate America by the balls. The exact quote from that article: “But Pimco is much more than just a big bond house. For one thing, it has become the U.S. government's partner in reviving the credit markets. It runs the Federal Reserve's $251 billion commercial paper program, which keeps short-term loans flowing to corporate America. It is also one of four asset managers picked to run the government's $500 billion program to purchase mortgage-backed securities.”

The article also said: “With many traditional bond market players - like investment banks, insurers, and pension funds - on the sidelines, Pimco is serving as a buyer of last resort for hedge funds and others seeking to sell bonds to raise cash.” - Pimco also has the American Hedge Funds by the balls.

…“Pimco also will be among the few institutional investors able to soak up the coming onslaught of Treasuries, as well as mortgage paper backed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and municipal bonds.”

…“In short, thanks to the missteps of its rivals as well as its own success, Pimco has become essential to the functioning of the credit markets - and the revival of the economy…. Gross is well aware of his firm's special status. "Our role now is to make money for Pimco, but it is also much greater," Gross tells Fortune. "We efficiently allocate capital around the U.S. and the world. We are in the business of capitalism."

The article said: "Gross, a famously good gambler…” - Anyway, there were many good gamblers around who eventually run out of luck or lost their “Midas Touch” such as Warren Buffet. If you stay long enough on the table in the long run you most likely will lose your shirt.

Americans are not that smart and the US financial markets have trillions of dollars in losses to back that up – and even with the obvious they take forever to connect the dots.

You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to figure out that Allianz being a major German conglomerate they must own the stock in many important German companies directly and indirectly. And you can bet that when their American subsidiary – Allianz – is in the process of “running the Federal Reserve's $251 billion commercial paper program, which keeps short-term loans flowing to corporate America” they also are keeping in mind which companies are competing head-on with German companies. (That is a nice way to eliminate the competition, and the competition is not even aware of what is going on.)

As you can see by the content of this article China is not the only country that has the US on its knees – the Germans are shafting the Americans and they are not even aware of what is going on.

********

Pimco is a subsidiary of a major German financial conglomerate Allianz.

In North America several companies with specialized expertise operate under the roof of the Allianz Group. Property & Casualty Insurance is provided by Fireman's Fund, Life Insurance and Healthcare Risk Management by Allianz Life, and Asset Management by Allianz Global Investors' network of companies, such as PIMCO, Nicholas-Applegate Capital Management and Oppenheimer Capital.

http://www.allianz.com/en/about_all.../usa/page1.html

********

Pimco's Power Play

By Katie Benner, writer

Fortune Magazine

March 2, 2009

.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/24/2009 01:20 PM Report

Today I was watching Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke testifying before the House Financial Services Committee

and the smartest question during that event was asked by Maxine Waters Representative from California when she asked Tim Geithner about the connection on the decision to let Lehman Brothers go out business and what role Goldman Sachs played in destroying one of the major investment banks that was a major competitor of Goldman Sachs in Wall Street.

Here is what I posted on the EliteTrader Forum regarding Tim Gaithner.

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=156802&perpage=6&pagenumber=2

March 12, 2009

SouthAmerica: Reply to Wallace

I did miss the first 15 minutes of his interview and the rest of the show Tim Geithner answered Charlie Rose’s questions with his usual evasive style. If you heard Tim Geithner on other occasions then you know what I am talking about. I did not learn anything new from that particular interview.

I am not the right person for you to ask my opinion about Tim Geithner since I am not an impartial observer – I posted the following on this forum when Barack Obama announced the members of his economic team:

Barack Obama’s New Economic Team

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showt...threadid=146345

November 28, 2008

SouthAmerica: I would give Barack Obama’s economic team an A+ grade with just an exception.

You can’t go wrong when you have on your team people such as Paul Volcker.

I am sure that Larry Summers will be a very influential member of his economic team

His nominee for secretary of the Treasury is Tim Geithner, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York for the past five years.

Obama also announced the creation of a President's Economic Recovery Advisory Board - and Paul Volcker will lead this new board.

Basically I have a problem with only one member of his economic team: Tim Geithner.

During the confirmation hearings they should place this guy under a microscope and check out his performance as a president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York for the past five years. They should check a number of things very closely as follows:

1) As a regulator – his relationships with Citi group. (A bank under his supervision went from being the largest bank in the US 2 years ago – to become the latest joke of the US financial system.)

2) This guy played a major role in the demise of Lehman Brothers. He has a close relationship with the Goldman Sacks Mafia Network. The question is: Did Goldman Sacks influence the decision to let Lehman Brothers die such a sudden death? If that is the case such a miscalculation by Tim Geithner caused a global financial Tsunami and he should not be the next US Treasury Secretary.

3) By the way, Tim Geithner has had a very close relationship with the current Treasury Secretary Paulson during this entire financial crisis – and Henry Paulson’s performance, as Treasury Secretary is nothing to write home about it.

*****

In case Tim Geithner confirmation is rejected to be the next US Treasury Secretary then I would suggest that they consider replacing him with Stephen Roach.

*************

March 12, 2009

SouthAmerica: I still think that Barack Obama should replace ASAP: Tim Geithner with Stephen Roach.

Even though I am sure Stephen Roach would not agree with many of my positions such as the immediate complete US government nationalization of the major Zombie banks, and the nationalization of the major 3 auto companies – GM, Ford and Chrysler – consolidate and restructure the 3 automakers into a viable company and privatize the new company – and clean up the balance sheet of the major Zombie banks – restructure them into distinct viable businesses: banks, insurance companies, and other businesses, and privatize the newly health companies ASAP.

Anyway, in my opinion: Stephen Roach probably would be a better Treasury Secretary than Tim Geithner and I would act on that replacement ASAP.

.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/24/2009 12:50 PM Report

I was just thinking how I had very high hopes for the Obama economic team when they first announced it because it included Paul Volcker – one of the best economists of our time - when Paul Krugman mentioned Paul Volcker’s name.

Timothy Geithner interview at the Charlie Rose Show on March 10, 2009

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=156802&perpage=6&pagenumber=2

Going back to today’s show I agree 100 percent with Paul Krugman and Nouri Roubini that the US government should nationalize the Zombie banks ASAP.

It is crazy to clean up the banks and other financial institutions of the toxic assets and keep it under the management of the people who caused this massive mess.

The Wall Street money masters took the global financial system for a ride, after that they took the Foreign Sovereignty Funds to the cleaners, and now they figure out they need a new prey to keep the old game going and they have found it and they are in the process of breaking the bank and bankrupt the last source of new capital – the US taxpayer.

Today you can’t escape Bill Gross’s comments on CNBC or on Bloomberg radio or TV – he is busy setting up the US government regarding the toxic assets program and he will make a ton of money at the US taxpayer expense when his company earn massive profits to the tune of billions of US dollars since Allianz being a major German conglomerate – is in the process of “running the Federal Reserve's….

Pimco, Bill Gross and CNBC

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=154992

Most Americans don’t realized that the rest of the world is watching Wall Street milk the US government to the bone and they are using the US government balance sheet as a dump ground for toxic assets and losses to the tune of trillions of US dollars.

Today Erin Burnett interviewed Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner on her CNBC TV show and she mentioned that the US dollar is being compared with the currency of Venezuela.

Today the more relevant comparison for the future of the US dollar should be against the Zimbabwe dollar.

US dollar = Confetti

.