Hmmmm....

Of course, institutional investors overseas are ecstatic, just so long as they're hedging the performance of equities in the stock market versus things like, oh, bad debt. Might turn out to be a safe gamble, but they deal in numbers that make my portfolio look like a pittance.

I shudder to think what would happen to the economic house of cards if the "full faith & credit" of the US Treasury was no longer enough to vouchsafe a loan from the Chinese, e.g.

In truly off-topic news: I note that Countrywide has escalated their "cash-out refi" campaign - trade your already low fixed rate mortgage for a slightly lower rate on a 5/1 ARM. Sorry fellers - you're going to have to do a lot better than a 0.72% savings on a 30-year fixed. I smell something. Desperation, perhaps?

I've gotten no less than 4 mailings from them in the last two weeks.

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Georgia's in Florida, dumbass!

The-I-went-to-UT-and-took-Econ-Answer: "But as long as you buy American..."

I was expecting more like the 21st-century-Big-Box-retail-standards model:

"BUY MORE STOCK! What you lose in margin dollars you'll make up for in volume!"

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Georgia's in Florida, dumbass!

Looks like the answer is "today."

And yet the DJIA is still not keeping pace with inflation.

P.S. I wasn't off-topic.

While the Dow Jones Industrial average has continued to rally relentlessly closing within just a few points if it’s all time high at 12,786, the dollar has plunged in the currency markets, with the pound now trading at 26 year highs above the 2.000 level while the EURUSD is within striking distance of taking out its all time high of 1.3666 set in 2004.

Overall, the dollar index has broken critical support at 82.00 and may be well on its way to plumb a ten year low of 80.53.

[snip]

...some of the factors that are proving to be favorable to the stock market are becoming a serious handicap for the US dollar. With the currency market strictly focused on yield and more specifically on the potential for expanding yield, there is little surprise that the greenback has suffered. Even if US growth continues to be positive its relative growth versus the major trading partners has slowed significantly ... US GDP has lagged the GDP growth rates of EU, UK and even Japan since the middle of last year.

Put this another way: What good does $1 of marginal return on investment do when the nominal value of that dollar is moving steadily southward?

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Georgia's in Florida, dumbass!

Wednesday, April 25th, 2007 at 3:23PM

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Defense contractors General Dynamics and Ratheon report "earnings that beat Wall Street's expectations".

ConocoPhillips squeaks by, "first-quarter profit rose 7.7 percent as income from asset sales helped offset lower commodity prices and higher operating costs."

Boeing earnings up 27% on "robust orders for commercial airplanes and strong defense business".

Pepsi and Anheuser-Busch also doing well. We do love our sugar and beer!

I knew it was some downy floating critter...

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Georgia's in Florida, dumbass!

Maybe I should start investing in the Australian dollar before the situation really goes "down unda."

(Consulting XE.com...)

OK, this is crap. When I went on my honeymoon in Cairns in 2003, my dollar bought almost AU$1.50. One AU$ is now $0.83, and while I am referencing this, we're well down the path to parity with Canada ($0.89).

Time to invest in goosebacks, I suppose.

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Georgia's in Florida, dumbass!

Let's hope the weather stays mild so the housing market doesn't crash.

Wednesday, April 25th, 2007 at 10:02AM

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