2008

You've probably heard the adage that the American consumer just won't quit. And this last month's retail sales numbers seems to follow that saying. However, if you look beneath the surface, American consumers are cutting back indeed.…

Top StoryWhy No Outrage? - James Grant, WSJ (A MUST read.)Jim Grant: "Why No Outrage?" - Naked Capitalism (Yves' take on the article, you've seen mine)Financial ServicesBanks responsible for the loss of trust - LA TimesA Call to Ease the…

UPDATE: 23 Mar 2009: I am re-publishing this and a February post (Where is the outrage?) because of the situation at AIG. In my view, the outrage that has finally boiled over in the AIG bonus scandal has long been simmering. In reading…

Starbucks has released the full list of the 600 stores it expects to close in the coming year. Long a Wall Street darling, Starbucks' retrenchment is very much representative of the magnitude of the slowdown we are now seeing. Apparently,…

Now that Friday has come to an end in the UK, we can give a post-mortem to the UK capital raising campaigns from Bradford & Bingley, HBOS and Barclays.Bradford & Bingley shareholders have approved the bank's £400m rights issue at…

In her column at Bloomberg News, Baum had this to say about the financial bailout solutions proposed by the U.S. government.How do we know the market failed if we don't allow it to work? Capitalism without failure is like religion without…

Financial collapse edges closer - Martin Hutchinson, Asia TimesMortgage squeeze tightens further - BBC NewsJim Bunning's Capitalism Pitch Is in Strike Zone: Caroline Baum - BloombergGoogle shares slump after ad warning - Irish…

With the earnings season only halfway done, it is clear who the big losers are: Merrill Lynch and Citigroup. They have reported over $15 billion in additional writedowns for the quarter. What is increasingly clear is that those who had…

Senator Jim Bunning's classic line, "when I picked up my newspaper yesterday, I thought I woke up in France," was delivered before the Senate Banking Committee as Ben Bernanke, the Fed Chair, gave testimony. He was rightfully upset that…

Just because the financials are in for a few further rounds of pain doesn't mean that quality financial institutions in the U.S. don't exist. There is a stark difference in the level of risk some institutions took during the heydays of the…