2008

Recent news out of the UK has been very negative. There is so much data piling up suggesting that the UK is quickly moving toward a US-style housing collapse that I am going to use this blog entry to post recent news stories without…

As the epicenter of the credit crisis has clearly moved to Europe, British Banks are at the center of new developments. However, doubts still exist about how they are valuing their assets and accounting for loan losses. Yester day the…

The list below is the largest collection of links related to the present credit crisis on the web. I have been amending this list since May 2008. But, as the list is pretty large now, I have taken care to break it up into different…

The inflation genie may be out of the bottle for a while. The headlines are being made by food and energy prices spiking higher. The Fed and many economists ignore food and energy when looking to underlying inflationary trends, relying…

Oil hit $126 a barrel today on production fears. Refiners and firms that need oil to make money seem to be hoarding it as the price rises inexorably higher. According to Bloomberg, "U.S. crude supplies rose 5.65 million barrels to 325.6…

A Bloomberg article today highlight's the Commercial real estate sector (CRE) as the next leg down in the U.S. property bubble. The article states:With 312,000 private-sector jobs lost in the last four months, foreclosure rates more than…

That's the title of a UK Telegraph article on a report showing that UK repossession orders have increased to levels not seen since the housing bust of the early 1990s. According to this morning's BBC 5 Live program, "Wake Up To Money," the…

Updated throughout the dayMarketsTop UBS banker detained in US - The Guardian (05/07/2008)Bernanke Wants Fed to Pay Interest on Bank Reserves - Bloomberg (05/07/2008)USU.S. Economy: Worker Productivity Increases More Than Forecast -…

Despite stock markets being lower the last few days, there are some bright spots in he macro picture. On Feb 24th, I mentioned that risk in the markets was high as suggested by the Ted spread. (The TED spread measures the gap between the…

Spain is perhaps the next domino in the global credit bubble to fall. The UK economy is slowing as well, but the pace of slowing in Spain is truly remarkable.According to Spanish-language news reports I have seen today (see Round-up),…