"CNBC's Carl Quintanilla speaks to John Paulson, founder and president of Paulson & Co., about his firm's investments, and his level of concern about the Fed's monetary policy. 'Although the Fed has printed a lot of money, to date there is little inflation,' he says in discussing the gold market." Continue reading →
http://finance.moneyandmarkets.com/reports/GST/072213/g4/
"Looking for a quick $40,000? Consider joining the rapidly growing legion of New York-area home flippers. The average gross profit on a home owned for less than six months and sold in the first half of 2013 in the New York City, Long Island and Northern New Jersey area was $39,458, according to a report released July 19 by real estate analytics firm RealtyTrac. Based on gross profit percentage (10 percent), RealtyTrac found the local market to be the nation's 14th best for profitable home flipping. The practice is on the rise across the country." Continue reading →
"Don't ever think that a combination of central bank stop and go money printing combined with suffocating government regulations can't push us back into the Stone Age. Detroit today reminds me in many ways of the Bronx in the 1980s. The details of the government destruction causing interventions are a little bit different, but the results are the same." Continue reading →
"Conservatives will, of course, be proven correct that Detroit will be only the first major city to seek a bail-out, but their objections will be fruitless. In fact, it is not only possible, but likely, that, once the concept of 'No City Left Behind' transforms public perception of a Detroit from municipal redundancy to humanitarian necessity, the door may be further opened, not only to other major cities, but to entire states. As Rahm Emanuel famously stated, 'Never let a good crisis go to waste.' Detroit may be used by the Federal government to establish the necessity to nationalise any crisis." Continue reading →
"Fiscal conservatives have said for years that this was inevitable. We were dismissed as crackpots. The red ink could flow forever, we were told. 'No problem!' They say the same thing today about the federal government. The suckers line up for jobs with the federal government, with its fat pensions and unfunded liabilities. The result will be the same: default. Cities can do what individuals do: run up large bills, and then declare bankruptcy. The voters will shrug off 20,000 pensioners who lived in a fantasy world all their lives. They are no longer politically viable. They are merely a tiny voting bloc that has no money to give to campaigns." Continue reading →
"Not that far behind. In fact, the cost per resident to just payoff pension liabilities is greater in Chicago, Los Angeles and Baltimore than in Detroit." Continue reading →
"Not that far behind. In fact, the cost per resident to just payoff pension liabilities is greater in Chicago, Los Angeles and Baltimore than in Detroit." Continue reading →
"Paul Krugman and Dean Baker took the Washington Post editorial page to task yesterday for stating that unfunded state and local pension liabilities amounted to $3.8 trillion. They accuse the page of misquoting a study in which the total was cited as only $1 trillion. Currently, standard practice measures the funding status of public pensions in the US under the laughable assumption that every dollar in the pension funds will earn compound returns of 7.75% or 8% per year. That’s the basis for the $1 trillion in unfunded liabilities. If unfunded liabilities are $1.0 trillion under an 8% rate, then they are $3.4 trillion unfunded under a 4% rate." Continue reading →
"Paul Krugman and Dean Baker took the Washington Post editorial page to task yesterday for stating that unfunded state and local pension liabilities amounted to $3.8 trillion. They accuse the page of misquoting a study in which the total was cited as only $1 trillion. Currently, standard practice measures the funding status of public pensions in the US under the laughable assumption that every dollar in the pension funds will earn compound returns of 7.75% or 8% per year. That’s the basis for the $1 trillion in unfunded liabilities. If unfunded liabilities are $1.0 trillion under an 8% rate, then they are $3.4 trillion unfunded under a 4% rate." Continue reading →