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Markets tumble after Bear Stearns rescue fails to reassure »
Posted by: JamesMarcus 1 year, 9 months agoShare prices around the world fell sharply today as shock waves from the collapse of US investment bank Bear Stearns swept through financial markets.
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JamesMarcus
James Marcus is a writer, translator, critic, and editor. He is the author of Amazonia: Five Years at the Epicenter of the Dot-Com Juggernaut and ...
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Comments: 52
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nikkibabe
March 17, 2008, 8:51 a.m.Another 4 years of Bush with a McCain face mask will speed up the entry of USA to the third world.
India & China will benefit most while UAE(Dubai) will become the financial capital of the world. South Korea, China & Dubai will end up buying major US icons like Citicorp, Merril Lynch, JP Morgan and airlines like AA, United, Delta.
McCain will keep telling the "SURGE" is a success.
Neo conservatives then can put their tongue out in astonishment.
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TweekerchickQC
March 17, 2008, 10:51 a.m.Ughhh. Good god, $2 a share?!
Im going to have grey hair by the end of this.
Work in finance, they say. Job security, they say....
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ETproductions
March 17, 2008, 10:54 a.m.Here's an interesting question. When over a trillion dollars in total value evaporates from the economy, who owns the condenser that collects it?
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quackpot
March 17, 2008, 11:34 a.m.J.P. Morgan pikes up Bear Sterns for a song ($2/share) AND the Fed provides 30 billion in funding?
So, the average Joe tax-payer ponies up about $400/family of four so that the big boys at J.P. Morgan can make a killing off of this disaster?
Over the next year-and-a-half, J.P. Morgan expects to make a billion in after tax dollars off of this deal.
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TheRealizer
March 17, 2008, 11:59 a.m.Possibly the Morgan people made bigger contributions than the Bear Sterns folks!
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mackiemesserComment has been removed: Retracted by user
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cleare
March 17, 2008, 12:46 p.m.a sad statement on the fragility of the global economy which is based on perceived value, rather than on anything tangible.
i am often amazed and disgusted at the extremely poor level of competence in global corporate leadership. then those same failed leaders land safely thanks to platinum parachutes.
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simonsez
March 17, 2008, 1:36 p.m.Presidents get too much credit ... good and bad. Not Bushes fault.
What is hard to understand is why financial professionals were so willing to bet the farm to try to get double digit returns.
These are 50-60 year old professionals with 30 years experience in banking and investments choosing to make the kind of mistakes they made to achieve better numbers and a larger bonus. It borders on criminal in my mind.
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nostalgia
March 17, 2008, 1:43 p.m.This has been coming and will likely hit others as well
Bear Stearns Faces Collapse of
$6 Billion Sub-Prime Unit
June 14, 2007 (EIRNS)â;;Bear Stearns put up $4 billion in Mortgage Backed Securities (MBS) for sale in a desperate effort to shore up its losses in the sub-prime blow-out. Two of its hedge funds are in trouble, and if both are liquidated, as many on Wall Street expect, then a subsidiary of Bear Stearns, Everquest Financial, could go out of business as well, just as it was about to conduct an IPO.
http://www.larouchepub.com/pr/2007/070614bear_s...
"Plans announced Thursday by Rep Barney Frank, a Massachusetts Democrat, and Senator Christopher Dodd, a Connecticut Democrat, that would provide billions of dollars to states to buy homes in foreclosure and prod lenders into writing down the value of some mortgages"
http://www.berkshireeagle.com/editorials/ci_858...
Does that mean the US taxpayers will hold the mortgages on all of these homes?
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joeblowe
March 17, 2008, 2:24 p.m.Odd odor here - I heard somewhere that B/S was around $30 on the open market. But they sold out for $2.00? If true, something ain't right there. Again, if true, I'd expect to hear about a LOT of lawsuits. ... HaHaHa - I just googled for a price history chart, and there is ALREADY a web site set up to sue for lost value: www.bearstearnsinvestors.com
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shead
March 17, 2008, 4:59 p.m.This bums me out a little. I used to work for Bear Stearns in the early '90s, when Larry Kudlow was there. I always looked forward to his meetings.
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DrBenway
March 17, 2008, 5:22 p.m.George Bush was probably thinking... "There's something wrong with beer steins? I love beer steins!"
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walden3
March 17, 2008, 7:59 p.m.This really angers me. These scumbags run their business into the ground, take their million $ bonuses, sell lousy products to those too lazy to do their own research and then leave the taxpayers holding the bag.
Why no outcry about this socialist/communist behavior of the government propping up big business, big money banks?
No government bailout. Let the chips fall where they may. Allow economic Darwinism to rule.
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buckheadd
March 17, 2008, 8:21 p.m.The Bank of England moved to stabilise the markets this morning, offering £5bn of three-day funds in a move designed to bring overnight interest rates down. Banks scrambled for the cash, asking for nearly five times more than was on offer.
US president George Bush attempted to reassure the markets this afternoon, saying that the Fed had taken "strong and decisive" action.
"In the long run our economy's going to be fine. Right now we're dealing with a difficult situation."
BUCKHEADD FOR PRESIDENT! 2008! VOTE FOR ME AND YOU WILL EMBARK UPON AN UNFEIGNED JOURNEY HELPING PEOPLE HERE IN THE USA AND PEOPLE ALL AROUND THE WORLD!
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Gransater
March 17, 2008, 9:06 p.m.It would appear that when you replace rules, oversight and responsability with a free for all mentality with the aim of creating rapid fire commissions, this is what you end up with.
I find it difficult to classify whats going on as investments. Its more like a lottery of chance, where if you win you get to keep the spoils, and if you fail, your favorite uncle will come to the rescue. End result is that the little guy ends up paying for this mess twice. Once in lost principal and secondly when his taxes end up bailing out the big guy.
Of course, listening to some people, you are told that the economy is going ganbusters, and this is only a small bleep.
Isn't it time to bring back responsability to our economic system? It seems that it was working quite well, even when the rate of return on investment was 6%/year or less. The cost of living was stable, and most people who wanted work had employment.
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OnionHeadComment has been removed: Retracted by user
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HanymanComment has been removed: Retracted by user
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nostalgia
March 18, 2008, 7:16 a.m.Government has been pressuring banks for years to make more home loans available
Remeber all the complaints about "redlining" - it goes back to the late 1980's
Congress fixed 'redlining.' Result: Today's foreclosures
Redlining was the supposed practice of banks refusing to extend loans based on skin color and, in effect, drawing red lines on maps around minority neighborhoods. Though this particular series did go on to win a Pulitzer that year, some contended the idea was bunkum - that what banks were really doing was refusing to offer loans to bad risks, some of whom happened to be minorities.
Regulators and other federal officials joined with community groups to persuade banks to ease up on their standards. Congress itself weighed in with legislation pressuring lenders to provide home mortgages with far less hesitation than good business sense dictated.
An unintended consequence was today's ballooning number of foreclosures.
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