Credit Writedowns (www.creditwritedowns.com) is a news and opinion site dedicated to bringing a well-informed view of finance, economics, markets, and foreign policy into the mainstream consciousness.

The site has quickly become one of the highest-ranked economics and finance sites on the Internet (now in the top 20 by traffic and ranked one of the best finance blogs on the Internet by finance resource Business Pundit). Posts by its authors have been featured in the mainstream media in the Guardian Newspaper, Reuters and the Chicago Sun Times as well as on big-name finance sites like the Financial Times, Seeking Alpha, the Prudent Bear and RGE Monitor. Edward Harrison also contributes guest posts at Naked Capitalism and has been interviewed numerous times on topics related to finance on American, Canadian and British television and radio.

The site is best known for its Credit Crisis Timeline, the most comprehensive data set of links to credit crisis-related events, and for the Dummy’s Guide to the U.S. Banking Crisis.  Part news source and part opinion, this site is great for both newbies and experts.  Consider Credit Writedowns an early warning signal for what to expect in the global economy.  Contact us here.

Topics we write on?  Here they are in no particular order

• The global economy
• The credit crisis and government bailouts
• Finance
• Stocks and bonds
• Housing bubble
• Gold, oil and commodities
• Economics
• Economic history
• Government statistics
• Money markets
• Employment
• Politics

Below are a few of the articles you might find on our site:

Credit Crisis

• Why is this blog named Credit Writedowns?
• Lehman’s bankruptcy: putting the cart before the horse
• Lehman Brothers: a primer on Credit Default Swaps
• The U.S. financial system is effectively insolvent
• De-leveraging
• De-leveraging redux

Finance

• Large US bank failure coming
• Lehman fallout: HBOS and RBS are getting slaughtered
• AIG: looking to raise $20 billion
• WaMu on the brink of disaster: has agreement with regulators
• CDS Market: Did Fannie and Freddie Default ?
• Question: How is Fannie Mae a AAA company?

Housing

• Prime Foreclosures greater than subprime
• Prime looks terrible
• JPMorgan Chase: Large exposure to real economy downturn
• What is a credit writedown?
• The $103,000 shack: a perfect explanation of why housing is a mess

Bailouts

• The $700 billion Paulson Plan is dead on arrival
• The nationalization of America’s mortgage problem
• Bank bankruptcy or bailout?
• Sweden: competitive auto bailouts begin with Saab and Volvo
• Volkswagen: if the American carmakers can get bailout funds, so can we
• Is the State of California bankrupt?

Global Economy

• US Recession Signals
• Ten predictions for 2008
• Top ten predictions for the 2009 global economy
• Byron Wien: Ten Surprises for 2009
• Nouriel Roubini: Will massive stimulus ward off stag-deflation?
• China is set up for a big fall

Economic History

• Chart of the day: Dow 1928-1932
• Credit deflation and the Japanese problem
• The Swedish banking crisis response – a model for the future?
• The Japanese Problem is now ours
• A populist interpretation of the latest Boom-Bust cycle

Economics

• Quantitative easing: printing money like mad to ward off deflation
• What is Inflation?
• A brief philosophical argument about the role of government, stimulus and recession
• Another Perfect Recession Indicator
• What does Mises say about trying to stimulate the economy out of recession
• Confessions of an Austrian economist

Markets

• Treasury yields go below zero
• Spain can’t sell its bonds
• Treasurys are in a bubble
• Relative value in financial services
• Glencore: credit default swaps suggest something amiss

Currencies

• Currency crisis is gathering storm
• Why I am bearish on the U.S. Dollar
• The carry trade unwinds and it’s not pretty

Commodities

• Marc Faber: I advise every American to hold his gold outside of the United States
• Oil to sink to $100
• Refiners as a canary in the coalmine

Politics

• Senator Bunning blasts Bernanke at Senate hearing
• Palin: a tidbit I received from a friend by a Wasilla resident

To get the most out of the site, please do sign up for the Email and RSS feeds. We have a page “Subscribing,” which highlights the best way to get the most out of a subscription to Credit Writedowns or any other Internet news source. Please feel free to send us feedback at feedback at creditwritedowns dot com. We always look to respond to questions in a timely fashion.

Also see writer profiles at Blogger for:

• Edward Harrison
• Marshall Auerback

Main Writer: Edward

I am a former European credit markets and M&A guy who started out as a diplomat. — so I have some pretty diverse interests.

The official line is that I am a banking and finance specialist at the economic consultancy Global Macro Advisors focusing on global economics and corporate strategy. Previously, I held positions at Deutsche Bank, Bain Consulting, the Corporate Executive Board and Yahoo. I have a BA in Economics from Dartmouth College and an MBA in Finance from Columbia University. So, I consider myself to basically be an economist cum geopolitical strategist.

From an ideological perspective, I would call myself a libertarian realist. I am a firm believer in the primacy of markets over a statist approach. However, I am no ideologue who believes that markets can solve all problems. Often government intervention and oversight is not just wanted but warranted.

Having lived in a lot of different places, I tend to take a global approach to economics and politics. I started my online career largely because I was concerned that our economic and political masters are ill-equipped to deal with the volatility of the new globalized world.

I started my career as a diplomat in the foreign service and speak German, Dutch, Swedish, Spanish and French as well as English and can read a number of other European languages. So, you will probably see a few translated texts from time to time to give a different perspective.

You can get a feel for my writing by looking at the popular posts section now in the footer. I enjoy a good debate on these issues and I hope you enjoy my site. Feel free to email me at edh at creditwritedowns dot com.

Cheers.

Edward

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