• 2009’s Dumbest Business Moments
    Posted by on June 30th, 2009 at 10:21 am

    Fortune has a roundup of the Dumbest Business Moments of 2009.
    My favorite is when the SEC banned Bernie Madoff from the securities industry. Exactly two weeks ago, nine years after they were first warned of him.

  • Boring = Technical Analysis; Better = Technical Analysis Explained by Hot Aussie Chick
    Posted by on June 30th, 2009 at 10:16 am


    (HT: Timmay)

  • Cramer’s Greatest Hits
    Posted by on June 30th, 2009 at 10:12 am

    Joe Weisenthal notes that Jim Cramer said that today is the exact bottom of the housing market. He said that last September.
    Check out Joe’s collection of Cramer’s greatest hits.

  • Headline of the Day
    Posted by on June 30th, 2009 at 10:01 am

    First Place goes to CNN:

    Home prices drop, but at a slower rate

    My comment: I stopped reading after the comma.
    Second Place goes to the LA Times:

    Rising oil prices lift stocks higher

    My comment: ???????

  • British Economy has Worst Quarter in 50 years
    Posted by on June 30th, 2009 at 9:43 am

    Bloomberg reports:

    The U.K. economy shrank more than previously estimated in the first quarter in the biggest contraction since 1958 as the recession choked industries from construction to services.
    Gross domestic product fell 2.4 percent from the final three months of 2008, compared with the prior measurement of a 1.9 percent drop, the Office for National Statistics said today in London. The median prediction in a Bloomberg survey of 28 economists was for a 2.1 percent decline. Construction activity plunged almost three times as much as originally estimated.
    Bank of England Governor Mervyn King said last week that Britain’s recovery from recession may turn out to be “a long, hard slog.” While business surveys have indicated the economic slump is easing, unemployment may continue to increase and net mortgage lending is the weakest since records began in 1993.
    “In big picture terms, it doesn’t really change the outlook,” said Nick Kounis, an economist at Fortis Bank Nederland Holding NV in Amsterdam and a former U.K. Treasury official. “The recovery is unlikely to be very strong any time soon. There’s more bad news for consumers ahead.”

    The lousy economy is apparently affecting everyone: Queen to run out of funds by 2012.

  • BarryTV
    Posted by on June 29th, 2009 at 8:54 pm

    Here’s blogger and Carney-foil, Barry Ritholtz discussing Bailout Nation on C-Span’s BookTV.
    Here’s my review of Bailout Nation.

  • The Best of the Money Blogs
    Posted by on June 29th, 2009 at 4:35 pm

    I’m honored to have been nominated by Howard Lindzon and David Berman as one of the best money blogs at the Globe and Mail.
    You can vote here for Crossing Wall Street. Please vote early and often. You can see the gentleman at the Acorn office for additional assistance.

  • Stocks Chillax
    Posted by on June 29th, 2009 at 4:14 pm

    The stock market’s volatility continues to subside. The VIX closed at its lowest level in nine months. At one point in October, the VIX came within inches of 90. Now it’s close to dipping below 25.
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    Except at very low points (like below 13), a low VIX is neither good nor bad for stocks. It simply means that there will be less volatility.

  • Taleb Watch
    Posted by on June 29th, 2009 at 12:17 pm

    I think the world is beginning to catch on to the increasingly tedious Nassim Nicholas Taleb. A few weeks ago, Janet Tavakoli blew the whistle on the claim made in GQ that Taleb “made $20 billion for our clients, half a billion for the Black Swan fund.” Taleb says he was misquoted (Felix comes to his defense).
    On his website, Taleb writes:

    Note that NUMBERS are wrong. This is not a business/finance, but a philosophy article written by a literary person the novelist Will Self. So read the article for ideas. Someone used the errors as a platform for her (failed) smear campaign.

    Lame.
    Saying that it’s a philosophy article not a finance article is not an excuse. If the numbers are wrong, then GQ should put out a correction. If Self stands by the quote, then he should stand by it. I don’t buy the argument that Taleb exists in some higher plane where ideas trump facts.

  • Hey Bernie
    Posted by on June 29th, 2009 at 11:34 am

    See you in 2159!