financial history

Last week, I followed up Yves Smith’s excellent post on “Why Big Capital Markets Players Are Unmanageable” with “More on why big capital markets players are unmanageable.” I would like to extend the discussion beyond the U.S. border into a…

The Absolute Return Letter, July 2009 “You can’t beat deflation in a credit-based system.”-Robert Prechter The great debate As investors we are faced with the consequences of our decisions every single day; however, as my old mentor…

Last night I wrote an article reminding you that downside risk remains in the global economy.  While I have been singing a more bullish tuneregarding the prospect of a technical recovery in 2009, I am concerned about a double dip as a…

As you all know, I think we are in a secular bear market rally/cyclical bull market right now. So, yes, this has been and may continue to be a powerful up-move in shares worldwide. However, I am certainly not convinced we are off to the…

Last night I received an advance copy of a new book by Wall Street Journal reporter Kate Kelly that gives us a peek inside the last seventy-two hours at Bear Stearns in March 2008.  If you are interested in finance, “Street Fighters” is…

The following is an excerpt from Murray Rothbard’s excellent book, “A History of Money and Banking in the United States.”  The passage outlines how the gold standard prevented governments from using inflation as a device to manipulate…

When the United States closed the gold window in 1971, the world entered a new era in which nearly all money was supported by nothing more than the full faith and credit of the governments issuing it. If one looks back to the history of…

This is another post I originally ran on Naked Capitalism last month. As you know, I have turned more positive about the potential for a cyclical economic recovery. However, I am unchanged regarding much of the sentiment expressed in this…

This is a post I originally posted over at Yves Smith's site, Naked Capitalism, in April 2008. My intent here is not to malign Obama, Roosevelt or Hoover or make facile comparison but to identify important differences between the economic…

Update 31 Mar 2009: I am re-posting this post about unemployment figures from November 2008 because I think it relevant. The next unemployment number is coming out on Friday and I expect a large number. If you read this analysis, you can…