small business

Below is the latest from John Mauldin via his weekly newsletter. John expects a double dip recession as I do. Here he talks about what I call structurally high private sector unemployment i.e. unemployment in the private sector that cannot…

I am not sure I buy Meredith Whitney's assertion that the government is “out of bullets” in its quest to prop up the economy. It’s a matter of political will more than anything else. Nevertheless, I do agree with her basic premise in the…

You kind of knew this was going to happen.  Given the fact that AmTrust Financial, the holding company filed bankruptcy (see my story here) after a bit of asset stripping, the FDIC was forced to come in and seize the banking subsidiary…

Recently, I have been writing a lot about regional banks and the capital problems they have been having. This is having a direct impact on lending capacity available to small and medium sized businesses (SMEs) and households. As a result, a…

AmTrust Financial, a privately held regional bank holding company based in Cleveland, has just filed for bankruptcy. With well over $10 billion in assets, AmTrust Bank is fairly large. The circumstances surrounding its failure are unusual…

This story is on the front page of Business Week: Detroit Mayor Dave Bing is struggling to save his city from fiscal calamity. Unemployment is at a record 28% and rising, while home prices have plunged 39% since 2007. The 66-year-old…

Initial jobless claims for the past week were 505,000, tied with last week for the lowest since January. This brings the 4-week average down to 514,000, the lowest since November of last year and the 11th consecutive week of declines. …

Josh Reviews Everything: And then he took his pants off. Again. frontline: a class divided: watch the program | PBS In Case Someone Says You Couldnt See This Coming - Yves Smith U.S. conservatives: Obama bowed too deeply to…

Below is a CNBC video with Meredith Whitney in which she joins Nouriel Roubini on the doom and gloom parade.  Over the summer, both Whitney and Roubini were fairly optimistic. In June I said: Think of the consensus forecast as an…

Today, I want to run a few thoughts by you courtesy of John Mauldin.  In his recent weekly newsletter, he makes a number of points I have made here over the past few weeks and comes to a similar conclusion about the weakness of…