July 15, 2008
Explicitly Guaranteeing a Dollar Decline
Fannie Plan a `Disaster’ to Rogers; Goldman Says Sell
“‘I don’t know where these guys get the audacity to take our money, taxpayer money, and buy stock in Fannie Mae,’ Rogers, 65, said in an interview from Singapore. ‘So we’re going to bail out everybody else in the world. And it ruins the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet and it makes the dollar more vulnerable and it increases inflation.’”
The airheads interviewing Rogers (”don’t you like anything here, Jimmy? can’t you be bullish about one thing, Jimmy?”) only ask the kind of questions someone who isn’t paying attention would ask. Bloomberg should be better than that. If I wanted mindless cheerleading or puerile positivity, I’d turn on CNBC or open the Wall Street Journal (editorial page).
Here’s a weekly view of the US Dollar Index. It’s a dead cinch to fall to a new low. (Yes, famous last words, but c’mon, this is too easy.)
July 15th, 2008 at 11:10 am
Lehman and Friends
July 15th, 2008 at 11:56 am
Tom D: The end of Wall Street as we know it? Multiple massive bank failures? (Indy alone took 10% of FDIC reserves, yes?) The last blow to America as financial capitol of the world? Sounds like we have to be close to a bottom? (He says naively.)
July 15th, 2008 at 8:38 pm
As bad as things look GS is still hanging onto its weekly uptrend. It’s not the end of Wall Street until GS cracks. =)
July 15th, 2008 at 9:22 pm
Brian: I show the weekly trend in GS reversed long ago, though it’s true that the monthly is hanging in there (so far).
July 16th, 2008 at 12:08 am
85 Broad Mafia lieutenants taking over the Street, Thain, now Bob Steel of Wachovia.
July 16th, 2008 at 5:10 am
GS topped on the weekly P&F back in October 2007 and has completed the formation of a gargantuan H&S topping structure and has now sliced below trendline support on both the daily and weekly P&F charts and thus has technically “cracked”… weekly P&F target “count” = 120… look at current homebuilder charts if you want an idea of what the future holds for the financials…
just as a rising water level will lift all ships, a receding water level will likewise lower all ships, with the “strongest” ship being the last to join in — Brian has it exactly wrong, GS will just be the last ship to go down [lagging indicator]… think of a roller coaster in the process of going over the top of the highest peak — those in front car are most certainly heading almost vertically down but those in the rear car will still be going up…
July 16th, 2008 at 9:04 am
i couldn’t fall asleep in the middle of the night, and flipped around. cnbc global had an interview with rogers, and it was really funny to listen to him rip the cnbc people. some guy from australia, and some woman from europe.
things like “have you looked at their balance sheets - how are they not insolvent?”, “if they really have 5 trillion in capital, the stock will go up to 60 tomorrow” and “well, what plan do YOU have to fix this?”
really funny stuff.
July 16th, 2008 at 10:51 am
Little ole Jimmy Rogers from pre Obama ‘bama is getting pretty tiresome in his old age. OK, some of his investors got their money back from the Revco debacle, and he got out of NYC. He wasn’t the only or necessarily the smartest person to suggest buying commodities in the very late ’90’s. He was just the loudest and most obnoxious.
I hope he enjoys living sultry Singapore and spending his summers in the steamy Malaysian highlands. He burned many bridges here in the US and won’t be missed. Just another blowhard OF like his former partner, Soros.
July 16th, 2008 at 11:07 am
@bob: If I were technically capable, I’d make a sound bite of Jimmy saying “Betty, look at your Bloomberg” … I can do a good imitation of it in my southern twang but I’d love to sample the original.
@Tom D: Yes, Singapore is awful in summer (and most of the year for that matter), but I bet he has air conditioning. :-) I agree he can grate a little and is probably a little full of his (little) self, but the man is a lonely voice among the doubetalkers of Wall Street (and the MS financial M), and he did absolutely nail the timing of the commodities bull. Plus anyone who rides a motorcycle around the world with a blonde half his age has my undying respect.
July 16th, 2008 at 11:41 am
Well I nailed it too, but my mouth and motocycle are smaller than Jimmie’s….;))) My babe is far better than his, however.
Incidentally I have trimmed my commodity exposure to the smallest percent of total asset allocation since 1999. I could be wrong, but if so it’s easy to get it back in these days. Bear in mind that I never sell my physical gold or reduce my life and medical insurance.
http://twocents.blogs.com/weblog/
July 16th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
anyone who puts their money where their mouth is, particularly large bets, almost always gets a pass. how many times have you seen an analcyst on CNBS pounding the table long & they the pop-up shows he has NO position.
July 16th, 2008 at 3:47 pm
QQQ: Yes, this is why I’ve joined Covestor, because I’m in desperate need of a pass. :-)
July 16th, 2008 at 10:31 pm
bob is referring to this one:
Don’t Bail Out Fannie, Freddie: Jim Rogers
The Treasury and the Federal Reserve should not bail out Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as this would increase the US public debt, investor Jim Rogers, CEO of Rogers Holdings, said Tuesday.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=793635578&play=1
There is another one on Bloomberg:
Rogers Calls Fannie, Freddie Rescue Plan a `Disaster’: Video
July 14 (Bloomberg) — Jim Rogers, chairman of Rogers Holdings, talks with Bloomberg’s Carol Massar and Ellen Braitman from Singapore about the U.S. government’s efforts to bolster Fannie Mae and Freddie Mae, the outlook for financial stocks, the dollar and commodities, and his investment strategy. (Source: Bloomberg)
00:00 Fannie, Freddie plan: “unmitigated disaster”
01:52 Fannie, Freddie are “basically insolvent.”
02:27 U.S. Treasuries; short position on financials
04:10 Fannie, Freddie “should’ve gone bankrupt.”
05:31 Reasons for dollar rally; dollar strategy
06:10 Outlook for interest rates, inflation
06:50 U.S. recession “going to be one of the worst”
07:30 Government “bailing out everybody in sight”
09:38 Strategy: airline stocks, agriculture
10:06 Commodities bull market has “long way to go”
11:46 “Contemplating” base metals
12:35 China stocks; Taiwan as “best opportunity”
13:57 Possible government action on commodities
Running time 15:35
Last Updated: July 14, 2008 09:12 EDT
http://www.bloomberg.com/avp/avp.htm?clipSRC=mms://media2.bloomberg.com/cache/vIQvD7yNni2I.asf
Transcript:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=apEivHJhf1vE
July 16th, 2008 at 11:09 pm
Maybe my models are more forgiving, but unless GS fails to stay above 130 - 140, it’s still in decent shape in my book. Down, but definitely not out.
And with the VIX finally spiking today, it may even be a good long trade in the next few weeks.
July 17th, 2008 at 1:46 am
A guy down the hall is doing research on research using citation index from google.scholar.
he says in most fields there was a shift somewhere after 2001 with young researchers flooding to EU (he cites post 9-11 visas troubles/sharp jump in pan-EU research grants and general perception of the US among aspirant researchers and the fall of the greenback as culprits).
you see the same pattern in most fields (specially core-science ones, here i took my fields) :
http://www.scimagojr.com/compare.php?c1=Western+Europe&c2=US&c3=&c4=&area=2600&category=2613&in=it