(Bloomberg.com) President Barack Obama proposed almost $1 trillion in higher taxes over the next decade on the highest-earning Americans, Wall Street financiers, U.S.-based multinational corporations and oil companies to pay for permanent tax breaks for lower earners.
Obama’s 2010 budget proposal, released today, would reinstate the top two Clinton-era tax rates of 36 percent and 39.6 percent, up from the 33 percent and 35 percent the richest Americans now pay. That would affect about 2.6 million taxpayers. The budget also would raise taxes on capital gains and dividends to 20 percent for top earners, up from the 15 percent set by former President George W. Bush in 2003.
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Thursday, February 26, 2009
Mean Street: Mr. Obama, Please Return to Planet Earth
(WSJ--Deal Journal Blog) Has the President lost his mind? Listening to last night’s speech, it sure seemed that way.
It’s taken him five months and three tries to simply come up with a Commerce Secretary.
But somehow over the next couple of years, he will reinvent how we do almost everything. How we bank and borrow. How we educate our children. How we cure cancer. How we use energy.
Even how we build cars.
Forget the ideological objections to Mr. Obama’s ambitions. How about the practical difficulties? How will Mr. Obama ever get all those things done?
The answer is he won’t and shouldn’t even try. If Obama really wants a second term, he should devote his entire first term to making the economy strong again. And that’s it.
Read the entire article
It’s taken him five months and three tries to simply come up with a Commerce Secretary.
But somehow over the next couple of years, he will reinvent how we do almost everything. How we bank and borrow. How we educate our children. How we cure cancer. How we use energy.
Even how we build cars.
Forget the ideological objections to Mr. Obama’s ambitions. How about the practical difficulties? How will Mr. Obama ever get all those things done?
The answer is he won’t and shouldn’t even try. If Obama really wants a second term, he should devote his entire first term to making the economy strong again. And that’s it.
Read the entire article
How Much Is The Bailout Going To Cost You?
(right.org) Right.org shows how much the bailout is going to cost each family... the bailout calculator also shows how much your taxes are going to rise.
Go to right.org
Go to right.org
Sunday, February 22, 2009
The Unbalanced Dow Jones Industrials
(Wall St Journal--MarketBeat Blog) As the Dow Jones Industrial Average hits lows not seen since the dot-com bust, Wall Street is getting antsy about its inclusion of low-priced stocks that some traders and analysts believe should be yanked from the 30-stock average.
Their gripes are based in simple arithmetic, since the average is weighted according to the nominal price quotes of its 30 components, hand-picked by top editors at Dow Jones & Co., which also publishes the Wall Street Journal.
With five stocks in the Dow trading under $10 – Bank of America, Citigroup, Alcoa, General Motors, and, as of today, General Electric – the average’s detractors say it’s become a skewed indicator of the market. They want the runts replaced for essentially the same reason the editors would never add in an extremely high-priced stock like Berkshire Hathaway, now trading above $76,000 a share, or Google, at $340
.
Read the entire article
Their gripes are based in simple arithmetic, since the average is weighted according to the nominal price quotes of its 30 components, hand-picked by top editors at Dow Jones & Co., which also publishes the Wall Street Journal.
With five stocks in the Dow trading under $10 – Bank of America, Citigroup, Alcoa, General Motors, and, as of today, General Electric – the average’s detractors say it’s become a skewed indicator of the market. They want the runts replaced for essentially the same reason the editors would never add in an extremely high-priced stock like Berkshire Hathaway, now trading above $76,000 a share, or Google, at $340
.
Read the entire article
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Jim Cramer Warns Investors: Don't Follow Warren Buffett This Time
Attn all investors: It's different this time, don't follow Buffett. At least that's what Jim Cramer says.
CNBC Mad Money host Jim Cramer doesn't like what he sees in Warren Buffett's latest stock moves for Berkshire Hathaway, and doesn't think ordinary investors should follow the Omaha billionaire's lead this time around.
Buffett's holding company released its fourth quarter portfolio snapshot earlier tonight. It revealed a big reduction in Berkshire's holdings of Johnson & Johnson [JNJ 55.98 -1.12 (-1.96%) ].
Read the entire article
CNBC Mad Money host Jim Cramer doesn't like what he sees in Warren Buffett's latest stock moves for Berkshire Hathaway, and doesn't think ordinary investors should follow the Omaha billionaire's lead this time around.
Buffett's holding company released its fourth quarter portfolio snapshot earlier tonight. It revealed a big reduction in Berkshire's holdings of Johnson & Johnson [JNJ 55.98 -1.12 (-1.96%) ].
Read the entire article
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Greenspan Says U.S. May Not Be Doing Enough to Promote Recovery
Now Alan Greenspan chimes in on how to fix the problems in the banking system. Thanks Alan!
(Bloomberg.com) Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said the U.S. may be doing too little to repair its financial system and promote an economic recovery.
President Barack Obama today signed into law a $787 billion economic stimulus package of tax cuts and increased spending. He has also pledged to use the bulk of the roughly $315 billion left in the bank bailout fund approved by Congress last October to revive the battered financial industry.
Read the entire article
(Bloomberg.com) Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said the U.S. may be doing too little to repair its financial system and promote an economic recovery.
President Barack Obama today signed into law a $787 billion economic stimulus package of tax cuts and increased spending. He has also pledged to use the bulk of the roughly $315 billion left in the bank bailout fund approved by Congress last October to revive the battered financial industry.
Read the entire article
Friday, February 13, 2009
Stimulus Package Explained (Q&A)
(ritholtz.com) Sometime this year, taxpayers will receive an Economic Stimulus Payment. This is a very exciting new program that I will explain using the Q and A format:
Q. What is an Economic Stimulus Payment?
A. It is money that the federal government will send to taxpayers.
Q. Where will the government get this money?
A. From taxpayers.
Read the entire story
Q. What is an Economic Stimulus Payment?
A. It is money that the federal government will send to taxpayers.
Q. Where will the government get this money?
A. From taxpayers.
Read the entire story
25 People to Blame for the Financial Crisis
(www.time.com/ritholtz.com) There is a strange and strangely interesting list of people to blame for the Financial crisis from Time magazine. It is quirky and odd and in more than a few places, misguided and ignorant.
Despite its deep flaws (and revealing ignorance), it is still kinda interesitng.
I normally don’t link to this sort of click bait — you must click thru each individual adding 25 phoney page views in an obnoxious attempt to improve traffic readings — but there is this interesting variation: Readers get to vote on each culprit. Surprisingly, they move Clinton, Bush and Greenspan way down the list.
A few strange issues with the list: Why is Bernie Madoff here? He is a common thief (perhaps uncommon thief given the amounts he claimed to have stolen) but he had nothing whatsoever to do with the Financial crisis afflicting the global economy. What journalist would add him to the list of causes of the crisis? (Strike that moron from your reading list).
Read the entire story
Despite its deep flaws (and revealing ignorance), it is still kinda interesitng.
I normally don’t link to this sort of click bait — you must click thru each individual adding 25 phoney page views in an obnoxious attempt to improve traffic readings — but there is this interesting variation: Readers get to vote on each culprit. Surprisingly, they move Clinton, Bush and Greenspan way down the list.
A few strange issues with the list: Why is Bernie Madoff here? He is a common thief (perhaps uncommon thief given the amounts he claimed to have stolen) but he had nothing whatsoever to do with the Financial crisis afflicting the global economy. What journalist would add him to the list of causes of the crisis? (Strike that moron from your reading list).
Read the entire story
Madoff Lawyer Sorkin's Mom Was A Madoff Winner!
(Clusterstock.com) Ira Sorkin's mom rode Bernie Madoff's Ponzi scheme up from 2001 until her death in 2007, when she cashed out, Bloomberg says. And the account, opened by Sorkin's father, may have been compounding fictitiously for years before that.
This makes Sorkin's mother--and, through inheritance, Sorkin's two sons--"Madoff winners": A few of the lucky thousands who reaped huge "investment gains" that were actually just other people's money.
Read the entire article
This makes Sorkin's mother--and, through inheritance, Sorkin's two sons--"Madoff winners": A few of the lucky thousands who reaped huge "investment gains" that were actually just other people's money.
Read the entire article
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Charles Munger: How We Can Restore Confidence
(washingtonpost.com) Our situation is dire. Moderate booms and busts are inevitable in free-market capitalism. But a boom-bust cycle as gross as the one that caused our present misery is dangerous, and recurrences should be prevented. The country is understandably depressed -- mired in issues involving fiscal stimulus, which is needed, and improvements in bank strength. A key question: Should we opt for even more pain now to gain a better future? For instance, should we create new controls to stamp out much sin and folly and thus dampen future booms? The answer is yes.
Sensible reform cannot avoid causing significant pain, which is worth enduring to gain extra safety and more exemplary conduct. And only when there is strong public revulsion, such as exists today, can legislators minimize the influence of powerful special interests enough to bring about needed revisions in law.
Read the entire article
Sensible reform cannot avoid causing significant pain, which is worth enduring to gain extra safety and more exemplary conduct. And only when there is strong public revulsion, such as exists today, can legislators minimize the influence of powerful special interests enough to bring about needed revisions in law.
Read the entire article
For Bank of America and Merrill, Love Was Blind
(nytimes.com) IN mid-September, as Wall Street unwound and venerable financial institutions were brought to their knees, the mood inside the Manhattan law offices of Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz was decidedly celebratory.
After a weekend of whirlwind deal-making and emergency meetings at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, John A. Thain and his team at Merrill Lynch had sold their troubled brokerage firm to the Bank of America Corporation, dodging the financial sinkhole that was swallowing Lehman Brothers.
Read the entire story
After a weekend of whirlwind deal-making and emergency meetings at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, John A. Thain and his team at Merrill Lynch had sold their troubled brokerage firm to the Bank of America Corporation, dodging the financial sinkhole that was swallowing Lehman Brothers.
Read the entire story
Monday, February 9, 2009
Time For CNBC To Drop The Cramer Charade
(Clusterstock.com) Barrons' shredded Jim Cramer again over the weekend, putting forth the latest analysis showing that Cramer's picks underperform the market.* What was startling about the Barrons' article, though, was not this news, but CNBC's response:
"You wrote a premeditated hatchet job to curry favor with your new bosses at News Corp.," said CNBC's [spokesman Brian] Steel on Friday. "[Cramer] doesn't consider you a journalist."
Read the entire article
"You wrote a premeditated hatchet job to curry favor with your new bosses at News Corp.," said CNBC's [spokesman Brian] Steel on Friday. "[Cramer] doesn't consider you a journalist."
Read the entire article
Saturday, February 7, 2009
A 10-Year Stretch That’s Worse Than It Looks
(nytimes.com) IN the last 82 years — the history of the Standard & Poor’s 500 — the stock market has been through one Great Depression and numerous recessions. It has experienced bubbles and busts, bull markets and bear markets.
The Current Market Is the Worst Yet But it has never seen a 10-year stretch as bad as the one that ended last month.
Over the 10 years through January, an investor holding the stocks in the S.& P.’s 500-stock index, and reinvesting the dividends, would have lost about 5.1 percent a year after adjusting for inflation, as is shown in the accompanying chart.
Read the entire article
The Current Market Is the Worst Yet But it has never seen a 10-year stretch as bad as the one that ended last month.
Over the 10 years through January, an investor holding the stocks in the S.& P.’s 500-stock index, and reinvesting the dividends, would have lost about 5.1 percent a year after adjusting for inflation, as is shown in the accompanying chart.
Read the entire article
Buy Cisco, Intel, U.S. Technology Shares, Faber Says
(Bloomberg) Feb. 6 (Bloomberg) -- Investors should buy U.S. technology stocks after prices fell near the lows reached after the dot-com crash in 2000, investor Marc Faber said.
Cisco Systems Inc., Intel Corp., Microsoft Corp. and Oracle Corp. shares will outperform U.S. Treasuries over the next five to 10 years, Faber, managing director of Hong Kong-based investment firm Marc Faber Ltd. and publisher of the Gloom, Boom & Doom Report, said in a Bloomberg Radio interview today.
“You could make a case that in the U.S. some equities have come down a lot and are inexpensive,” Faber said. “In Nasdaq stocks, in high-tech companies, we have a base-building period.”
Read the entire article
Cisco Systems Inc., Intel Corp., Microsoft Corp. and Oracle Corp. shares will outperform U.S. Treasuries over the next five to 10 years, Faber, managing director of Hong Kong-based investment firm Marc Faber Ltd. and publisher of the Gloom, Boom & Doom Report, said in a Bloomberg Radio interview today.
“You could make a case that in the U.S. some equities have come down a lot and are inexpensive,” Faber said. “In Nasdaq stocks, in high-tech companies, we have a base-building period.”
Read the entire article
Friday, February 6, 2009
Buffett’s Buy Metric
(Ritholtz.com) .....Fortune first ran a version of this chart in late 2001 (see “Warren Buffett on the stock market”). Stocks had by that time retreated sharply from the manic levels of the Internet bubble. But they were still very high, with stock values at 133% of GNP. That level certainly did not suggest to Buffett that it was time to buy stocks.
But he visualized a moment when purchases might make sense, saying, “If the percentage relationship falls to the 70% to 80% area, buying stocks is likely to work very well for you.”......
Read the entire story
But he visualized a moment when purchases might make sense, saying, “If the percentage relationship falls to the 70% to 80% area, buying stocks is likely to work very well for you.”......
Read the entire story
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Obama to Limit Executive Pay at Companies Getting Aid
Obama hitting them where it hurts!
(Bloomberg.com) President Barack Obama will announce today that he’s imposing a cap of $500,000 on the compensation of top executives at companies that receive significant federal assistance in the future, responding to a public outcry over Wall Street excess.
Any additional compensation will be in restricted stock that won’t vest until taxpayers have been paid back, according to an administration official, who requested anonymity. The rules will force greater transparency on the use of corporate jets, office renovations and holiday parties as well as golden parachutes offered to executives when they leave companies.
Read the entire article
(Bloomberg.com) President Barack Obama will announce today that he’s imposing a cap of $500,000 on the compensation of top executives at companies that receive significant federal assistance in the future, responding to a public outcry over Wall Street excess.
Any additional compensation will be in restricted stock that won’t vest until taxpayers have been paid back, according to an administration official, who requested anonymity. The rules will force greater transparency on the use of corporate jets, office renovations and holiday parties as well as golden parachutes offered to executives when they leave companies.
Read the entire article
Wells Fargo Cancels Mortgage Meeting in Las Vegas Amid Crisis
(Bloomberg) Wells Fargo & Co., one of the nine banks to receive funds in the first round of the Treasury’s bailout, canceled a four-day corporate event in Las Vegas as financial firms cut perks amid criticism from lawmakers.
“We had scaled back the mortgage event, but in light of the current environment, we have now decided to cancel,” the San Francisco-based company said today in a statement. The lender said it had already abandoned plans for other functions.
Read the entire article
“We had scaled back the mortgage event, but in light of the current environment, we have now decided to cancel,” the San Francisco-based company said today in a statement. The lender said it had already abandoned plans for other functions.
Read the entire article
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Quote of the Day: Blaming Short Sellers
(ritholtz.com) There is a fascinating article about John Paulson in this month’s Portfolio.
What is so intriguiging is not the billions Paulson made on the collapse, but this exchange between short fund manager Jim Chanos and Bear Stearns CEO Jimmy Cayne.
Chanos, for one, is tired of the blame-the-shorts litany, and he recalls a conversation with Bear Stearns’ Schwartz to make his point.
The day before the Fed’s rescue of Bear Stearns, Chanos says he was walking to the Post House restaurant in New York City, when, at 6:15 p.m., his cell phone rang. He saw the Bear Stearns exchange come up on his caller I.D. and took the call.
Read the entire article
What is so intriguiging is not the billions Paulson made on the collapse, but this exchange between short fund manager Jim Chanos and Bear Stearns CEO Jimmy Cayne.
Chanos, for one, is tired of the blame-the-shorts litany, and he recalls a conversation with Bear Stearns’ Schwartz to make his point.
The day before the Fed’s rescue of Bear Stearns, Chanos says he was walking to the Post House restaurant in New York City, when, at 6:15 p.m., his cell phone rang. He saw the Bear Stearns exchange come up on his caller I.D. and took the call.
Read the entire article
Buffett buys HOG debt!
(Bloomberg.com) Billionaire investor Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. agreed to buy $300 million of debt from Harley-Davidson Inc., the biggest U.S. motorcycle maker, adding to holdings of corporate debt as yields rise.
Berkshire will get 15 percent interest on the senior unsecured notes, Milwaukee-based Harley said today in a statement. Davis Selected Advisers LP, the largest holder of the company’s stock, also committed to buy $300 million of debt. Harley, which is raising cash to lend to customers, rose the most in more than two decades in New York trading.
Read the entire article
Berkshire will get 15 percent interest on the senior unsecured notes, Milwaukee-based Harley said today in a statement. Davis Selected Advisers LP, the largest holder of the company’s stock, also committed to buy $300 million of debt. Harley, which is raising cash to lend to customers, rose the most in more than two decades in New York trading.
Read the entire article
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