I told you so to the 20th power!!!

Okay, I am going to be super-smug on this one. I have been telling people that hedge-funds are a zero-sum game for quite a while now. To be honest, anyone stupid enough to punt thier money in a hedge fund deserve everything they get. Be suspcious of an invesment opportunity that returns greater than GDP growth.

What the flying f**k were universities and charities doing gambling on hedge funds? And why were so many local councils putting thier money in dodgy Icelandic schemes? What happened to prudent investing? What happened to stewardship?

Welcome to Japan!

Even now, as interest rates dissapear altogether and people fire up thier money printing machines, I am going to make a contrversial prediction - there is no way we can avoid deflation. I know I go on and on about this one, but so much money was created in the bubble that the fed cannot print money fast enough to reflate to the same extent. Get used to deflation.

My predictions for 2009? Same as usual
1. 2009 will be so bad that we will wish for 2008
2. Everyone will understand what deflation really means
3. We have nothing to fear but unemployment itself
4. 10 buck oil (btw, I was predicting this when oil was at 150)
5. UK house prices will take another hefty step on thier way to 50% from top to bottom. The half price sale is coming!

Hoorah for Barack! Hazah for his gran!

First off, I think it is great we have anyone outside the bush regime coming into power. Beyond that I don't hold much expectation of change, all these washington operators are cut from the same cloth. If Ohbama is really an outsider then he's very cunningly disguised as a regular insider. Not that I blame him, this is the price to pay in order to get into the position to change things. But I don't think he will change things much. I think it will be someone else we aren't even aware of at the moment who will be the agent of real political change in the next 5 years. Let's hope it's not a facist, although experience tells us it may very well be.

Anyway, as I said before, the campaign was significantly boosted by the illness of Barack's gran. This brought the white side of the family into the fore, which made him look like the all-american boy. The republicans got wise to this and managed to dig up dirt on his black grandmother, and then Barack was recast as some sort of illegal immigrant. His white gran, not to be outdone, brought out the trump card and moved on to a better place, leaving Barack whiter than before, and even more of a family man. Thankyou whitegran for your sacrifice. And blackgran, next time you want to sneak into the country, could you let any presidential candidates in your family know about it in advance? Thanks.

Lolcowz.......

Thankyou grandmother Obama!!!!

This is genius! Somehow Obama's grandmother got sick and he has to take time off from his campaign to visit his grandparents (see attached picture). And hey presto, Obama changes from a mixed race east coast radical to a white redneck all-american boy. This shows mastery of propoganda of the highest level!

Why is this good? Well firstly it means Obama has a greater chance of being elected by middle America voters now, and secondly it means that he is much better at propoganda than the current administration, which bodes well for the efficacy of the next white house.

The case for universal welfare.

Today we are having a "day of the dead" when all the undead companies walk the stock market with a spring in thier step after the Fed has force fed them fresh brains. This is the ideal time to step back from the panic of the moment and consider the longer term, and then panic even more about that.

People can argue all they like about "liquidity" and "confidence", until they show me evidence of solvency I simply won't even listen anymore. People, banks, corporations, even governments are insolvent and this will have very real consequences.

First, we will see deflation as people stop spending to rebuild thier balance sheets. Then we will see corporate defaults. After that, massive government spending in the private sector to try and stem balooning unemployment (can baloons be stemmed?).

In my opinion (notice I do not use the modifier "humble"), the government, the corporations, us as citizens, we are all behind the curve on this one. The dangers are not purely economic - the damage is done and we cannnot escape the consequences - the real dangers are political. The danger is of unemployment, unrest, a swing to the right, protectionism and even world war.

We need to stop fiddling with the economy like we can all get back to 2007 tommorrow, and we need to prepare for 1933. That means we need to build a proper welfare net for all citizens, and we need to make sure that people know about it; this will significantly reduce fear and cut out the hooverville danger. We also need to put together a public works program to employ people while the economy goes through full depression cycle. You can think of that as part of the welfare program.

Redistribution of wealth on this scale will not be pleasant, in many ways it is like putting the country back into 50's austerity, but it is needed because the alternative is simply horrible.

In A.D. 2008

Meltdown was begginning

Pandit: What happen?

CFO: Somebody set us up the CDO

Trader: We get signal

Pandit: What!

Trader: Bloomberg screen turn on

Pandit: It's you !!

Paulson: How are you gentlemen?

Paulson: All your banks are belong to us

Paulson: You are on your way to destruction

Pandit: What you say!!

Paulson: You have no chance make your time.

Paulson: Ha ha ha ha ....

CFO: Captain!!

Pandit: Take off balance sheet every MBS

Pandit: You know what you doing.

Pandit: Move MBS

Pandit: For great justice!