On Sun, 27 Jan 2008 19:01:22 -0500, Ed Huntress wrote:

"F. George McDuffee" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 27 Jan 2008 11:19:45 -0500, "Ed Huntress"
wrote:
snip
So, the answer is clear: It's time to learn to dance or shuffle.
Practice those pirouettes, and always deal from the top of the deck,
ya'll.
snip
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The black box economy
By Stephen Mihm
January 27, 2008

Behind the recent bad news lurks a much deeper concern: The world
economy is now being driven by a vast, secretive web of investments
that might be out of anyone's control.

Yeah. Remember our discussion about deregulated financial markets and
Ronnie Reagan? It's "collateral, collateral, who's got the collateral?"
all over the world.

I think it was five or six years ago I said here that the derivatives in
hedge funds are going to bite us in the ass some day, because nobody
knew how they linked together, after they've been bundled and re-bundled
a half-dozen times. I pointed out that we'd never find out how they're
linked until they started to tank and everybody made margin calls and
tried to collect on everyone else.

Too bad I didn't sell short on them as an investment.
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Looks like the derivatives/dominos are starting to topple.

This is a positive feed-back loop and looks like it may have *VERY* high
gain.

(For those not familiar with the bond market, MBIA is a major bond
"insurance" company that guarantees the payment of interest and principal
of (generally municipal) bonds. This [has] greatly reduced the risk
premium / interest rate on these bonds. If MBIA and the other bond
"insurers" get into serious trouble, the ratings of the bonds they
guaranteed will drop and so will the value of these bonds, resulting in
further write-downs, losses, and credit contraction.)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080131/ap_on_bi_ge/
earns_mbia;_ylt=AsN9YW0PpPIGg0E2MzS605SyBhIF
68.180.150.139
====================
MBIA loses $2.3 billion on write-downs

By STEPHEN BERNARD, AP Business Writer 1 hour, 48 minutes ago

NEW YORK - MBIA Inc. reported write-downs of $3.5 billion on souring
credit markets Thursday, exacerbating concerns that rising costs could
squeeze local governments as well as slow any recovery for big banks.
snip
Continued weakness in the bond insurance market may put struggling banks
in a precarious position. Banks, which have reduced portfolio values by
more $140 billion during the second half of 2007 in a deteriorating
mortgage market, might be forced to take further write-downs tied to
bonds insured by companies like MBIA.
snip
The insurer lost $2.3 billion in the fourth quarter, or $18.61 per share,
compared with earnings of $181 million, or $1.32 per share, during the
same period the previous year.
snip
MBIA raised more than $1.5 billion in recent months to try and maintain
its critical "AAA" rating. The company raised $1 billion through the
offering of surplus notes and another $500 million through a direct
investment by private equity firm Warburg Pincus, which closed Wednesday.
snip
Oppenheimer & Co. analyst Meredith Whitney said banks' could take up to
$70 billion in additional write-downs because of the faltering bond
insurers.
snip
The bond insurance market is in the midst of a major upheaval after
ratings agencies began reviewing their operations during the fourth
quarter.
snip
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