30 Oct 2008

Posted at 13:58h in The Friday Brief by
With each passing day more of the dark corners of uncertainty are illuminated. A few goblins lay in wait to surprise us in the coming weeks (like pension funds and corporate real estate), but most have reared their ugly heads by now. The world’s financial system is slowly and systematically being purged of its ills, though recovery will be a long and painful process.

24 Oct 2008

Posted at 16:35h in The Friday Brief by
Everyone is wondering if there is a bottom? Markets around the world tumbled yesterday on the same fears driving our markets down. How badly will a global recession hurt corporate profits? As investors sell on earnings fears, they exacerbate the fragile stability of the credit markets – a self-perpetuating spiral. Every drop in stock prices reduces further the assets of banks and corporations, suggesting that an increasing number of them will have trouble paying their debts.

17 Oct 2008

Posted at 16:40h in The Friday Brief by
The party’s over, the bills are due, and the place is a wreck. Years of excessive you-name-it have brought the global economy to the brink of ruin. Perhaps the “boom!” in the Baby Boom generation will define it. Everything about it has been noisy and big. Moms of this generation had the new how-to guide in Dr. Spock’s The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care, which was second only to the Bible in sales.

10 Oct 2008

Posted at 16:42h in The Friday Brief by
News continues worsen in financial markets throughout the world. No economy is free from the carnage with more than $25 trillion erased from global equities in 2008. The Dow Jones Industrials index is now down more than 43% from its record high a year ago. This week represents the worst for the S&P 500 since 1933.