The U.S. Department of Labor reported a fall from a revised 575,000 jobless claims don to a still very elevated 554,000 this past week. On the whole these numbers demonstrate that many jobs are being lost and that the December unemployment number will be very large when released early next month.
Archive for December, 2008
U.S. initial jobless claims fall 21,000 to 554,000
Dec
Canada: how much of a slowdown should we expect?
Dec
I am going to post a BBC article here that gives an anecdote about western Canada and how the boom in oil and commodities is causing economic problems there. Make of it what you will, but my bottom line is that Canada is neither immune from global pressures or from the commodities savaging. This type of thing will com to an end.
Rio Tinto: all kinds of trouble
Dec
Just months ago, Rio Tinto was a behemoth swaggering from the huge run up in commodity prices. This is a company that had revenue of nearly $30 billion and net income of nearly $8 billion in 2007. It was worth over $160 billion by May as the commodities boom took shape.
They were everywhere: building projects in Saudi Arabia, resisting a takeover by BHP Billiton and operating across the globe. Most of that is history now, except for the debt.
Links: 2008-12-17
Dec
After yesterdays melt-up on the Fed’s decision to go ZIRP and introduce quantitative and qualitative easing, things are a bit calmer today. Here’s what I have.
Enjoy.
Ed
U.S. Dollar: Cliff Diving Again
Dec
Is this an unorderly decline for the dollar?
These last two days have been bad for the dollar. We are seeing heavy losses against the Swiss Franc, the Euro, the Australian Dollar, and The Japanese Yen.
Jamie Dimon on the economy
Dec
It’s interesting to hear a chief executive of a major Wall Street firm speak openly and on the record about the economy. So, it’s refreshing to watch this video and see Jamie Dimon’s take on a number of economic issues ncluding house prices and infrastructure spending.
A few days ago, I showed you a video from a long session he did with Erin Burnett of CNBC. This is another segment of that session. On the whole, he sounds very reasonable. Take a look.
Jamie Dimon on the Economy
Quote of the day: “The cash has to go somewhere”
Dec
With Treasury securities at all time lows you get the feeling fundamentals is not the only thing driving the rally in U.S. government bonds. After all, the Fed has been lowering interest rates and showering the financial sector with money. So, I wanted to highlight a comment that I find fitting.
Morgan Stanley’s writedowns bring us to a cool $1 trillion
Dec
Morgan Stanley released a dismal earnings report one day after Goldman’s. Obviously this is shaping up to a be a very bad quarter for financial institutions. Morgan’s $2.2 billion loss was certainly less than Goldman’s but very large nevertheless. And it brought us to $1 trillion in losses by global financial institutions since the credit crisis began way back in February 2007 with HSBC’s subprime writedowns.
Inflation explained
Dec
This video from the 1930s is a timeless piece of work, giving an explanation of what inflation and deflation are and how they work. (hat tip Tim Iacono)
Picture of the day: Planet ZIRP
Dec
hat tip jka on economics UK
Subscribe
Search
Random Quote
- “Stock prices have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau.”
-- Irving Fisher, 1929
Polls
- Sorry, there are no polls available at the moment.
Recent Posts
- Links: 2010-03-20 – Bank Failure edition (plus repo man for the rich)
- The week in review at Credit Writedowns: 2010-03-20
- Links: 2010-03-19 – Irish bank head arrest, hyperinflation, Arizona budget
- Currency battle begins
- A New World Order
- A quick video primer on Repo 105
- Fed Does Not Hike Discount but Greek Concerns Continue To Bolster US Dollar
- Jim Rogers: expect a double dip by 2012
- Roach: I think we should take the baseball bat out on Paul Krugman
- Chinese protectionist flashback
Tweet Blender
- edwardnh: The Case for Regulating Financial Derivatives - Barrons.com: http://bit.ly/aIkSZz $$
7 hours agoedwardnh: Watch What They Do With Their Cash - Interview with Bill Priest - Barrons.com: http://bit.ly/98O2Mu $$
8 hours agoedwardnh: RT @AlephBlog: WSJ: The Case for Saturday School - http://bit.ly/dqFk5R - Children benefit from more and shorter feedback cycles
8 hours agoedwardnh: Economist's View: "The Misinformed Tea Party Movement": http://bit.ly/d6Y6IY $$
9 hours ago
Blog Rating
Average blog rating:
9.3
427 votes cast for 211 posts
Tip Jar
Research
Casey Research: Sooner or Later, You’ll Invest Abroad
Casey Research: Will Obama Destroy Any Hope of U.S. Energy Independence?
Casey Research: An Insider’s View of the Real Estate Train Wreck
Casey Research: Vintage Wine Turns Sour for Financiers
Casey Research: What’s a Company's Gold Worth?
Casey Research: The Other Oil Play You Simply Can't Ignore
INO: A Quick Peek at Crude Oil
INO: Make Some Sense of Today's Gold Market
Popular Posts
- Strategic default: In come the waves again
- The politicization of economic problems
- Roach: I think we should take the baseball bat out on Paul Krugman
- Germany backtracking on IMF involvement in Greece
- Chart of the Day: Financial, Household and Government Debt-to-GDP ratios
- The Economy's Vicious Cycle for Michigan Banks and Business
- Is China in a bubble blow-off top like Japan post-Plaza accord?
- Serious Problems Emerge For The F-UK-DE Group of Countries
- This is the problem with China’s currency peg
- Japan - Defying Gravity?
Most Viewed
- Credit Crisis Timeline
- Switzerland threatened with bankruptcy
- Letterman’s Top 10 George Bush moments
- Is the State of California bankrupt?
- The Dummy’s Guide to the US Banking Crisis
- Marc Faber: I advise every American to hold his gold outside of the United States
- Top ten predictions for the 2009 global economy
- Byron Wien: Ten Surprises for 2009
- Chart of the day: Dow 1928-1932
- The recession is over but the depression has just begun
- The Swedish banking crisis response – a model for the future?
- Quantitative easing: printing money like mad to ward off deflation
- About
- The top 25 European banks by assets
- Lehman Brothers: a primer on Credit Default Swaps
- Marc Faber: China’s numbers are fake
- California will go bankrupt
- Chart of the day: Total US Debt
- Currency crisis is gathering storm
- The TED Spread
Highest Rating
Is the recession dating committee preparing for a double dip? (4 votes)
New York Times caught copying financial blogs (4 votes)
The mindset will not change; a depressionary relapse may be coming (13 votes)
The recession is over but the depression has just begun (5 votes)
The Fake Recovery (5 votes)
Readers of this blog expect the recession to last redux (5 votes)
Randall Wray: Fire Geithner Now! (4 votes)
The Age of the Fiat Currency: A 38-year experiment in inflation (4 votes)
On the sovereign debt crisis and the debt servicing cost mentality (3 votes)
Bill Black and The Federal Reserve’s War Against Effective Regulation (3 votes)




