A few years ago Texas was talking about leaving the US. Maybe we should
have let them. They wanted their own power grid to stay away from the
Federal regulations.

Now I don't really understand all the ins and outs of this, but seems
they can not keep the lights on with out a big money problem with a week
of ice.

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

I don't know who will be left holding the bag for this situation.


Bloomberg) -- The largest power generation and transmission cooperative
in Texas filed for bankruptcy in the wake of power outages that caused
an energy crisis during the winter freeze last month.

Brazos Electric Power Cooperative filed for Chapter 11 in Texas after
racking up an estimated $2.1 billion in charges over seven days of the
freeze. Last year, it cost cooperative members $774 million for power
for all of 2020.

On Monday, March 1, 2021 at 4:08:04 PM UTC-5, Ralph Mowery wrote:
A few years ago Texas was talking about leaving the US. Maybe we should
have let them. They wanted their own power grid to stay away from the
Federal regulations.

Now I don't really understand all the ins and outs of this, but seems
they can not keep the lights on with out a big money problem with a week
of ice.

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton

In article ,
says...

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton



Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws. Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.

On 3/1/2021 4:52 PM, Ralph Mowery wrote:
In article ,
says...

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton



Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws. Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.

I read that under certain circumstances there is a legitimate huge price
jump that comes into play, the idea is to get people to cut use. I've
not follow it closely though so don't know the details.

Why have electricity prices increased in Texas?
As the storm caused temperatures across the state to plummet early last
week, the utility commission ordered ERCOT to allow prices to increase
to reflect the lack of supply. As a result, electricity prices
skyrocketed. ... Texas utility regulators allowed that price to rise to
$9 per kilowatt-hour.

On Monday, March 1, 2021 at 5:11:50 PM UTC-5, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
On 3/1/2021 4:52 PM, Ralph Mowery wrote:
In article ,
says...

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton



Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws. Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.

I read that under certain circumstances there is a legitimate huge price
jump that comes into play, the idea is to get people to cut use. I've
not follow it closely though so don't know the details.

Why have electricity prices increased in Texas?
As the storm caused temperatures across the state to plummet early last
week, the utility commission ordered ERCOT to allow prices to increase
to reflect the lack of supply. As a result, electricity prices
skyrocketed. ... Texas utility regulators allowed that price to rise to
$9 per kilowatt-hour.

The obvious question is who got all that money and how much profit did they
make? If it's 2x, 3x the usual price, I can see that as the consequence to get
more power, but 100x? The power sure didn't cost the provider anything like
that to generate it. It's funny, there are laws and regulators that jump on some
poor SOB selling a generator for double the price or gasoline for double, but this
apparently they had nothing to prevent. Guess the windmills did it.

On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 16:52:51 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton



Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws. Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.

Bear in mind this was only one company offering a very speculative
pricing scheme tied to the wholesale price of power with no caps on
the top or bottom number. Nobody complained when they were getting
electricity for half price or less.
There were plenty of normal options for these people.
If you really want to play this game, give them an account number with
limited funds in it and fight with them before you pay, not after the
fact. The guy who gave them access to his life savings was a moron.

On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 16:07:58 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:



A few years ago Texas was talking about leaving the US. Maybe we should
have let them. They wanted their own power grid to stay away from the
Federal regulations.

Now I don't really understand all the ins and outs of this, but seems
they can not keep the lights on with out a big money problem with a week
of ice.

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

I don't know who will be left holding the bag for this situation.


Bloomberg) -- The largest power generation and transmission cooperative
in Texas filed for bankruptcy in the wake of power outages that caused
an energy crisis during the winter freeze last month.

Brazos Electric Power Cooperative filed for Chapter 11 in Texas after
racking up an estimated $2.1 billion in charges over seven days of the
freeze. Last year, it cost cooperative members $774 million for power
for all of 2020.
An emplyee in a 2019 review stated
"Will pay better than any other job in the area. If you can get a job
here the likely hood that you will be laid off is very low. You will
get many hours, especially during outages."


Another:
"The Jack county plant is not the best place to work. There are so
many people quitting due to poor management and employee will be
forced to work you will have no personal life and management does not
care at all. As long as current management is there People should be
very cautious when applying and ask questions About why so many
employees have left the jack county plant in the past 2 years."

and another:
"Jack County plant is struggling to keep people they are leaving
faster than they can hire them. There has been tons of turnover over
the last few years. People are tired and wore out. Management doesn't
seem to worry very much about losing experience or multiple people at
a time. They just work the employees that are left pretty much every
day. The pay is OK and benefits aren't too bad either. But if you have
a family think twice before accepting a job here. You will not get
time with your family and it will eventually harm your relationships.
Stay single and make lots of money."


and:
" This place has gone down hill in the last 2 years. We use to have
people that were very experienced, but management has managed to drive
them away. Everyone tells you go talk to management if you have a
problem like you should. But when you do you are painted as a trouble
maker. There is no reward for doing anything out there. There is no
consideration of what you have going on in your life. Like many people
have said on here if have a family stay away. At least till Waco can
wake up and see that management and a certain person in waco is the
cause of all this drama."

No wonder they went bust - - - -

In article ,
says...

Bear in mind this was only one company offering a very speculative
pricing scheme tied to the wholesale price of power with no caps on
the top or bottom number. Nobody complained when they were getting
electricity for half price or less.
There were plenty of normal options for these people.
If you really want to play this game, give them an account number with
limited funds in it and fight with them before you pay, not after the
fact. The guy who gave them access to his life savings was a moron.




I lerned a long time ago not to play the game of ups and downs of things
you almost have to buy or get on credit. Things usually only go up.
That came from the variatable rate morgages of around 1980. It was high
at around 8% for a standard fixed 30 year morgage when I bought a house.
Some people I worked with had rates near that but variatable. Those
rates went way up during that period of time.

Lerning that lesson I don't play the game. I do play the stock maket
with some money, but stay away from the 'long and short' of it. Some of
those just learned a big lesson with Gamestop.

Ralph Mowery writes:
In article ,
says...

Bear in mind this was only one company offering a very speculative
pricing scheme tied to the wholesale price of power with no caps on
the top or bottom number. Nobody complained when they were getting
electricity for half price or less.
There were plenty of normal options for these people.
If you really want to play this game, give them an account number with
limited funds in it and fight with them before you pay, not after the
fact. The guy who gave them access to his life savings was a moron.




I lerned a long time ago not to play the game of ups and downs of things
you almost have to buy or get on credit. Things usually only go up.
That came from the variatable rate morgages of around 1980. It was high
at around 8% for a standard fixed 30 year morgage when I bought a house.
Some people I worked with had rates near that but variatable. Those
rates went way up during that period of time.

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.

On 3/1/2021 5:49 PM, trader_4 wrote:

Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws. Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.

I read that under certain circumstances there is a legitimate huge price
jump that comes into play, the idea is to get people to cut use. I've
not follow it closely though so don't know the details.

Why have electricity prices increased in Texas?
As the storm caused temperatures across the state to plummet early last
week, the utility commission ordered ERCOT to allow prices to increase
to reflect the lack of supply. As a result, electricity prices
skyrocketed. ... Texas utility regulators allowed that price to rise to
$9 per kilowatt-hour.

The obvious question is who got all that money and how much profit did they
make? If it's 2x, 3x the usual price, I can see that as the consequence to get
more power, but 100x? The power sure didn't cost the provider anything like
that to generate it. It's funny, there are laws and regulators that jump on some
poor SOB selling a generator for double the price or gasoline for double, but this
apparently they had nothing to prevent. Guess the windmills did it.


A bunch went to gas suppliers. I read that wells that were not
profitable were suddenly being put on line to grab some money.

In article ,
says...

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.



When the rates drop one can usually negociate for the lower rates even
on fixed rates, or go to another bank (lender).

On 3/1/2021 6:40 PM, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 16:52:51 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton



Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws. Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.

Bear in mind this was only one company offering a very speculative
pricing scheme tied to the wholesale price of power with no caps on
the top or bottom number. Nobody complained when they were getting
electricity for half price or less.
There were plenty of normal options for these people.
If you really want to play this game, give them an account number with
limited funds in it and fight with them before you pay, not after the
fact. The guy who gave them access to his life savings was a moron.


While I'd normally agree with you, this is beyond all ethical and moral
business practice. If a normal bill is say $100 and it jumped to
$1000 it would be bad, but to jump to $10,000?

If I bought Game Stop or Bitcoin and it went to $0. I'd agree but this
is far beyond what anyone could ever guess. It is not like buying a
risky stock or a poker game.

On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 16:52:51 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton



Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws. Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.
Anywhere but the "wild west" of unregulated republican Utopia of
Texas

On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:12:22 -0500, Ed Pawlowski wrote:

On 3/1/2021 6:40 PM, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 16:52:51 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton



Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws. Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.

Bear in mind this was only one company offering a very speculative
pricing scheme tied to the wholesale price of power with no caps on
the top or bottom number. Nobody complained when they were getting
electricity for half price or less.
There were plenty of normal options for these people.
If you really want to play this game, give them an account number with
limited funds in it and fight with them before you pay, not after the
fact. The guy who gave them access to his life savings was a moron.


While I'd normally agree with you, this is beyond all ethical and moral
business practice. If a normal bill is say $100 and it jumped to
$1000 it would be bad, but to jump to $10,000?

If I bought Game Stop or Bitcoin and it went to $0. I'd agree but this
is far beyond what anyone could ever guess. It is not like buying a
risky stock or a poker game.

Why not? If you had a short position on a stock that skyrocketed you
would need to make good on those shares at the market price. You could
be on the hook for thousands in a wink of an eye.

On 03/01/2021 02:52 PM, Ralph Mowery wrote:
In article ,
says...

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton



Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws. Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.


It the state agency that set the spot price at $9000 MW-hour.

On 3/1/2021 8:12 PM, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
On 3/1/2021 6:40 PM, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 16:52:51 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price
of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton



Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws.Â* Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.

Bear in mind this was only one company offering a very speculative
pricing scheme tied to the wholesale price of power with no caps on
the top or bottom number. Nobody complained when they were getting
electricity for half price or less.
There were plenty of normal options for these people.
If you really want to play this game, give them an account number with
limited funds in it and fight with them before you pay, not after the
fact. The guy who gave them access to his life savings was a moron.


While I'd normally agree with you, this is beyond all ethical and moral
business practice.Â*Â*Â* If a normal bill is say $100 and it jumped to
$1000 it would be bad, but to jump to $10,000?

If I bought Game Stop or Bitcoin and it went to $0. I'd agree but this
is far beyond what anyone could ever guess.Â* It is not like buying a
risky stock or a poker game.

If that is the agreement you have with your provider to normally get
lower rates, you'd better have a really good generator that
automatically takes over when the spot market goes above some fixed level.

On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:07:18 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.



When the rates drop one can usually negociate for the lower rates even
on fixed rates, or go to another bank (lender).


You'd need to buy your way out of the mortgage - the penalty
is usually the interest they are losing plus a fee for the
trouble.
John T.

On Tue, 02 Mar 2021 00:50:55 -0500, wrote:

On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:07:18 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.



When the rates drop one can usually negociate for the lower rates even
on fixed rates, or go to another bank (lender).


You'd need to buy your way out of the mortgage - the penalty
is usually the interest they are losing plus a fee for the
trouble.
John T.
There is the VERY RARE occaision where you can have the new financier
pay the penalty to get your business and you can end up coming out
ahead. It usually involves debt consolodation where you refinance for
a higher amount and you are moving from floating rate to conventional
fixed rate so all 3 parties are in on the same gamble.
Otherwize there has to be a significant rate difference

On Monday, March 1, 2021 at 11:43:44 PM UTC-5, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:12:22 -0500, Ed Pawlowski wrote:

On 3/1/2021 6:40 PM, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 16:52:51 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton



Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws. Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.

Bear in mind this was only one company offering a very speculative
pricing scheme tied to the wholesale price of power with no caps on
the top or bottom number. Nobody complained when they were getting
electricity for half price or less.
There were plenty of normal options for these people.
If you really want to play this game, give them an account number with
limited funds in it and fight with them before you pay, not after the
fact. The guy who gave them access to his life savings was a moron.


While I'd normally agree with you, this is beyond all ethical and moral
business practice. If a normal bill is say $100 and it jumped to
$1000 it would be bad, but to jump to $10,000?

If I bought Game Stop or Bitcoin and it went to $0. I'd agree but this
is far beyond what anyone could ever guess. It is not like buying a
risky stock or a poker game.
Why not? If you had a short position on a stock that skyrocketed you
would need to make good on those shares at the market price. You could
be on the hook for thousands in a wink of an eye.

First you brought up commodities and I asked you to show us any example
where any commodity ever did anything like what we saw in TX, ie to go
up by a factor of 100x in a few days. Failing that, now you want to move to stocks.
So show us an example of that then. Where a stock skyrocketed
by anything like 100x in a few days. Nothing like it. And if it did start
to happen, you would know or should know it was happening and you could
get out when it was up 20%, 50%, 100%. Gamestop is the most extreme
example of anything like that I've ever seen and that's exactly what happened
there. It went up a factor of 20x, over many days. Furthermore, you couldn't
maintain the short position, without having sufficient capital to continue to
cover it. Unless you had the margin account capital to back it up, you'd have
to cover it or the brokerage would close the position without your.
It's nothing at all like a consumer in TX being unaware of what
the electricity price they were being charged today is and it going up 100x
in just a few days. Factor in that life experience for consumers, many of
which are elderly and/or not too smart is that utility bills can vary, but not
by 100x in just a few days. But I'm sure most of them know the futures
markets or shorting stocks can have a lot of risk and you need to be very
careful. This is like walking into a coffee shop, asking for a large coffee,
drinking it and then when you go to pay the bill, they say your owe $175
instead of $1.75. I suppose that would be OK too, it's the customer's
fault for not checking the price first? There is your correct analogy.

On Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 12:44:39 AM UTC-5, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:07:18 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.



When the rates drop one can usually negociate for the lower rates even
on fixed rates, or go to another bank (lender).
You'd need to buy your way out of the mortgage - the penalty
is usually the interest they are losing plus a fee for the
trouble.
John T.

Is that how it works in Canada? Not here in the US. I've never seen a mortgage
with a pre-payment penalty at all and I would bet that it's probably illegal in many
states. I've refinanced many times with no penalty. The only costs are whatever
it takes to get the new mortgage, eg application fee, appraisal fee, misc fee, etc.

On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 21:26:30 -0800, Bob F wrote:

On 3/1/2021 8:12 PM, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
On 3/1/2021 6:40 PM, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 16:52:51 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price
of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton



Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws.Â* Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.

Bear in mind this was only one company offering a very speculative
pricing scheme tied to the wholesale price of power with no caps on
the top or bottom number. Nobody complained when they were getting
electricity for half price or less.
There were plenty of normal options for these people.
If you really want to play this game, give them an account number with
limited funds in it and fight with them before you pay, not after the
fact. The guy who gave them access to his life savings was a moron.


While I'd normally agree with you, this is beyond all ethical and moral
business practice.Â*Â*Â* If a normal bill is say $100 and it jumped to
$1000 it would be bad, but to jump to $10,000?

If I bought Game Stop or Bitcoin and it went to $0. I'd agree but this
is far beyond what anyone could ever guess.Â* It is not like buying a
risky stock or a poker game.

If that is the agreement you have with your provider to normally get
lower rates, you'd better have a really good generator that
automatically takes over when the spot market goes above some fixed level.

We agree again Bob. The apocalypse must be near

On Tue, 2 Mar 2021 06:24:23 -0800 (PST), trader_4
wrote:

On Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 12:44:39 AM UTC-5, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:07:18 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.



When the rates drop one can usually negociate for the lower rates even
on fixed rates, or go to another bank (lender).
You'd need to buy your way out of the mortgage - the penalty
is usually the interest they are losing plus a fee for the
trouble.
John T.

Is that how it works in Canada? Not here in the US. I've never seen a mortgage
with a pre-payment penalty at all and I would bet that it's probably illegal in many
states. I've refinanced many times with no penalty. The only costs are whatever
it takes to get the new mortgage, eg application fee, appraisal fee, misc fee, etc.


We would call that an " Open " mortgage - it helped me pay off my
first house 1981-87 by putting $ 50 - 150 against the principle on
payday, whenever I could. Standard mortgages would allow a paydown
once-per-year on the anniversary - and it was often limited to a
given % of principle. 10 - 20 % iirc ?
"Open Mortgages" were available but not common then - the rates were
higher. The stiff penalties were introduced during that crazy era of
interest rates in the early 1980's
I was at 18.5 % for a while in 1982
The olde standard, to get out of a mortgage was a 3-month
interest penalty - in the early 80's new mortgages quickly became
ALL the remaining interest !
That same terrible era also saw the advent of short term mortgages ;
eg. 3 month ; variable rate mortgages ; weekly payments ; etc
John T.

On Tue, 02 Mar 2021 00:50:55 -0500, wrote:

On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:07:18 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.



When the rates drop one can usually negociate for the lower rates even
on fixed rates, or go to another bank (lender).


You'd need to buy your way out of the mortgage - the penalty
is usually the interest they are losing plus a fee for the
trouble.
John T.
I have refinanced a few times before. It really just depends on
whether you have an early payment penalty written into your mortgage.
Some do, some don't. You need to read before you sign or maybe spend a
couple hundred and have your lawyer read it. Personally I would never
sign a mortgage that I couldn't pay off early if I came into some
extra money. You also want to be sure additional payments come off the
principal and not just credited as future payments made early. The
faster you can knock down that principal the cheaper your property
ends up being. Even cutting a hundred bucks a month off the principal
really makes a big difference on the back end. You get that lawyer
money back many times over.
OTOH if you are just a person who makes the scheduled payments and
makes no effort to get out from under the debt, it really doesn't
matter.

On 3/2/2021 12:50 AM, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:07:18 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.



When the rates drop one can usually negociate for the lower rates even
on fixed rates, or go to another bank (lender).


You'd need to buy your way out of the mortgage - the penalty
is usually the interest they are losing plus a fee for the
trouble.
John T.


Maybe. I refinanced a couple of times years ago. The original mortgage
had no penalty after 1 year. There were some closing costs but the
payback was very quick on that too.

That was 1981 when I relocated and was fortunate to get a low 15%
compared to others paying 18%.

On 3/2/2021 9:24 AM, trader_4 wrote:
On Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 12:44:39 AM UTC-5, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:07:18 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.



When the rates drop one can usually negociate for the lower rates even
on fixed rates, or go to another bank (lender).
You'd need to buy your way out of the mortgage - the penalty
is usually the interest they are losing plus a fee for the
trouble.
John T.

Is that how it works in Canada? Not here in the US. I've never seen a mortgage
with a pre-payment penalty at all and I would bet that it's probably illegal in many
states. I've refinanced many times with no penalty. The only costs are whatever
it takes to get the new mortgage, eg application fee, appraisal fee, misc fee, etc.


I know of one but it is a commercial mortgage in the $1 million range.

On Tue, 2 Mar 2021 06:20:25 -0800 (PST), trader_4
wrote:

On Monday, March 1, 2021 at 11:43:44 PM UTC-5, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:12:22 -0500, Ed Pawlowski wrote:

On 3/1/2021 6:40 PM, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 16:52:51 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton



Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws. Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.

Bear in mind this was only one company offering a very speculative
pricing scheme tied to the wholesale price of power with no caps on
the top or bottom number. Nobody complained when they were getting
electricity for half price or less.
There were plenty of normal options for these people.
If you really want to play this game, give them an account number with
limited funds in it and fight with them before you pay, not after the
fact. The guy who gave them access to his life savings was a moron.


While I'd normally agree with you, this is beyond all ethical and moral
business practice. If a normal bill is say $100 and it jumped to
$1000 it would be bad, but to jump to $10,000?

If I bought Game Stop or Bitcoin and it went to $0. I'd agree but this
is far beyond what anyone could ever guess. It is not like buying a
risky stock or a poker game.
Why not? If you had a short position on a stock that skyrocketed you
would need to make good on those shares at the market price. You could
be on the hook for thousands in a wink of an eye.

First you brought up commodities and I asked you to show us any example
where any commodity ever did anything like what we saw in TX, ie to go
up by a factor of 100x in a few days. Failing that, now you want to move to stocks.
So show us an example of that then. Where a stock skyrocketed
by anything like 100x in a few days. Nothing like it. And if it did start
to happen, you would know or should know it was happening and you could
get out when it was up 20%, 50%, 100%. Gamestop is the most extreme
example of anything like that I've ever seen and that's exactly what happened
there. It went up a factor of 20x, over many days. Furthermore, you couldn't
maintain the short position, without having sufficient capital to continue to
cover it. Unless you had the margin account capital to back it up, you'd have
to cover it or the brokerage would close the position without your.
It's nothing at all like a consumer in TX being unaware of what
the electricity price they were being charged today is and it going up 100x
in just a few days. Factor in that life experience for consumers, many of
which are elderly and/or not too smart is that utility bills can vary, but not
by 100x in just a few days. But I'm sure most of them know the futures
markets or shorting stocks can have a lot of risk and you need to be very
careful. This is like walking into a coffee shop, asking for a large coffee,
drinking it and then when you go to pay the bill, they say your owe $175
instead of $1.75. I suppose that would be OK too, it's the customer's
fault for not checking the price first? There is your correct analogy.

I told you I don't play commodities but I imagine people who do can
tell you some stories. As for the options market, just look at those
people who were stuck in a short squeeze on GameStop and they bought
on a margin. The thought is you can lever thousands into tens or even
hundreds of thousands but you also assume the same kind of risk.

In real life I don't need a better example of stupid financial
decisions than Griddy. It happened.
Bob had the right answer.
If you are going to play this game, you better be watching the market
24/7 instead of just being happy your lights are on without asking how
much that costs. These people could have cut their losses by flipping
the main breaker right away. That $10 grand or whatever would have
bought a real nice whole house generator and had plenty left over.

On Tue, 2 Mar 2021 06:24:23 -0800 (PST), trader_4
wrote:

On Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 12:44:39 AM UTC-5, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:07:18 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.



When the rates drop one can usually negociate for the lower rates even
on fixed rates, or go to another bank (lender).
You'd need to buy your way out of the mortgage - the penalty
is usually the interest they are losing plus a fee for the
trouble.
John T.

Is that how it works in Canada? Not here in the US. I've never seen a mortgage
with a pre-payment penalty at all and I would bet that it's probably illegal in many
states. I've refinanced many times with no penalty. The only costs are whatever
it takes to get the new mortgage, eg application fee, appraisal fee, misc fee, etc.

They do it, particularly when rates are really high. I had to shop to
get one that didn't have the early payment penalty in the 70s. They
also did not want to let you pay down the principal early. I was
fortunate to know a person in the Riggs Mortgage Department (my MIL at
the time) who looked over my contracts before I signed and marked them
up as to how I wanted them to read before I would sign. We found
someone who wanted the business enough to go in their drawer and get
the contract I wanted. They usually have them, it is just not their
first offer. I suspect a contract with a fixed payment schedule is
easier to sell.
That was my condo. I refinanced twice and paid down the principal
every time I had a few extra bucks. An original 30 year note was paid
off in less than 10. The last 15 year mortgage I had was actually a
smaller payment than the original 30 year. I was doubling up on them
most months. That went real fast.

trader_4 writes:
On Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 12:44:39 AM UTC-5, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:07:18 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.



When the rates drop one can usually negociate for the lower rates even
on fixed rates, or go to another bank (lender).
You'd need to buy your way out of the mortgage - the penalty
is usually the interest they are losing plus a fee for the
trouble.
John T.

Is that how it works in Canada? Not here in the US. I've never seen a mortgage
with a pre-payment penalty at all and I would bet that it's probably illegal in many
states. I've refinanced many times with no penalty. The only costs are whatever
it takes to get the new mortgage, eg application fee, appraisal fee, misc fee, etc.

The biggest cost is that you're resetting your amortization clock. So you
often end up paying more in interest over the life of the loan, even tho the rate is lower.

Far better to just double your principle on each (or even every other) house payment.

You'll save much more over the long run.

writes:


I told you I don't play commodities but I imagine people who do can
tell you some stories. As for the options market, just look at those
people who were stuck in a short squeeze on GameStop and they bought
on a margin.

The "shorts" who were "squeezed" were mainly institutional
investors and hedge funds, and yes, many recorded losses - albeit affordable
for them; it was simply a hedge that didn't pay off, part of
daily business in a hedge fund.

The amateurs who got hurt were, as noted, buying on margin;
the same behavior that cause the big crash in 1929.

On Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 9:47:12 AM UTC-5, wrote:
On Tue, 2 Mar 2021 06:24:23 -0800 (PST), trader_4
wrote:

On Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 12:44:39 AM UTC-5, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:07:18 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.



When the rates drop one can usually negociate for the lower rates even
on fixed rates, or go to another bank (lender).
You'd need to buy your way out of the mortgage - the penalty
is usually the interest they are losing plus a fee for the
trouble.
John T.

Is that how it works in Canada? Not here in the US. I've never seen a mortgage
with a pre-payment penalty at all and I would bet that it's probably illegal in many
states. I've refinanced many times with no penalty. The only costs are whatever
it takes to get the new mortgage, eg application fee, appraisal fee, misc fee, etc.
We would call that an " Open " mortgage - it helped me pay off my
first house 1981-87 by putting $ 50 - 150 against the principle on
payday, whenever I could. Standard mortgages would allow a paydown
once-per-year on the anniversary - and it was often limited to a
given % of principle. 10 - 20 % iirc ?
"Open Mortgages" were available but not common then - the rates were
higher. The stiff penalties were introduced during that crazy era of
interest rates in the early 1980's
I was at 18.5 % for a while in 1982
The olde standard, to get out of a mortgage was a 3-month
interest penalty - in the early 80's new mortgages quickly became
ALL the remaining interest !
That same terrible era also saw the advent of short term mortgages ;
eg. 3 month ; variable rate mortgages ; weekly payments ; etc
John T.

So doing the math, if it's a three month penalty and you had a 6% mortgage,
getting out would cost you 1.5%. If the new loan is 1% lower, your recover
that in 1.5 years. But you'd also have the other associated new loan costs
to recover. Bottom line you can still pay off early in Canada to move to a
lower rate, but the interest rate differential has to be wider to make it
practical. Also timing becomes more important. When you can pay off
with no penalty, it makes it easier to shop around for a new loan with low
upfront costs that if you have that penalty to contend with. Sometimes
here it could makes sense to refinance for 0.5%, typically at 1% it's a no
brainer. What happens if you sell the property, same pre-payment penalty?
This is interesting because the US is thought of as more of the free
capitalism country, Canada more socialistic, buy we have no penalty,
you do.

On Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 11:51:08 AM UTC-5, Scott Lurndal wrote:
writes:


I told you I don't play commodities but I imagine people who do can
tell you some stories. As for the options market, just look at those
people who were stuck in a short squeeze on GameStop and they bought
on a margin.
The "shorts" who were "squeezed" were mainly institutional
investors and hedge funds, and yes, many recorded losses - albeit affordable
for them; it was simply a hedge that didn't pay off, part of
daily business in a hedge fund.

The amateurs who got hurt were, as noted, buying on margin;
the same behavior that cause the big crash in 1929.

Mostly agree, but the amateurs that got hurt were not necessarily limited
to margin buyers. There are likely dummies that bought it at $400,
expecting it to go to $1000. Dummies that bought it at $400 and are
still holding it waiting for it to go back so they can break even, etc.
This is really bad. It's the first time the internet has been used to flagrantly
organize a campaign to manipulate a stock price. And if it expands to more
stocks, it's the path to using the internet to destabilize stock prices.

On Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 10:13:03 AM UTC-5, wrote:
On Tue, 2 Mar 2021 06:20:25 -0800 (PST), trader_4
wrote:

On Monday, March 1, 2021 at 11:43:44 PM UTC-5, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:12:22 -0500, Ed Pawlowski wrote:

On 3/1/2021 6:40 PM, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 16:52:51 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

How can there be an electric charge of one weeks of power that exceeds
abot 3 times what it should be for a year ?

Deregulation.

Simply put, as the supply of electricity approached zero, the price of electricity
approached infinity.

Cindy Hamilton



Looks like that should somehow come under the price gouging laws. Where
if due to some disaster prices can not rise much above the normal price
range.

Bear in mind this was only one company offering a very speculative
pricing scheme tied to the wholesale price of power with no caps on
the top or bottom number. Nobody complained when they were getting
electricity for half price or less.
There were plenty of normal options for these people.
If you really want to play this game, give them an account number with
limited funds in it and fight with them before you pay, not after the
fact. The guy who gave them access to his life savings was a moron.


While I'd normally agree with you, this is beyond all ethical and moral
business practice. If a normal bill is say $100 and it jumped to
$1000 it would be bad, but to jump to $10,000?

If I bought Game Stop or Bitcoin and it went to $0. I'd agree but this
is far beyond what anyone could ever guess. It is not like buying a
risky stock or a poker game.
Why not? If you had a short position on a stock that skyrocketed you
would need to make good on those shares at the market price. You could
be on the hook for thousands in a wink of an eye.

First you brought up commodities and I asked you to show us any example
where any commodity ever did anything like what we saw in TX, ie to go
up by a factor of 100x in a few days. Failing that, now you want to move to stocks.
So show us an example of that then. Where a stock skyrocketed
by anything like 100x in a few days. Nothing like it. And if it did start
to happen, you would know or should know it was happening and you could
get out when it was up 20%, 50%, 100%. Gamestop is the most extreme
example of anything like that I've ever seen and that's exactly what happened
there. It went up a factor of 20x, over many days. Furthermore, you couldn't
maintain the short position, without having sufficient capital to continue to
cover it. Unless you had the margin account capital to back it up, you'd have
to cover it or the brokerage would close the position without your.
It's nothing at all like a consumer in TX being unaware of what
the electricity price they were being charged today is and it going up 100x
in just a few days. Factor in that life experience for consumers, many of
which are elderly and/or not too smart is that utility bills can vary, but not
by 100x in just a few days. But I'm sure most of them know the futures
markets or shorting stocks can have a lot of risk and you need to be very
careful. This is like walking into a coffee shop, asking for a large coffee,
drinking it and then when you go to pay the bill, they say your owe $175
instead of $1.75. I suppose that would be OK too, it's the customer's
fault for not checking the price first? There is your correct analogy.

I told you I don't play commodities but I imagine people who do can
tell you some stories.

In other words you have no example of any commodity that went up 100X in
just a few days. That's understandable, because it doesn't exist.


As for the options market, just look at those
people who were stuck in a short squeeze on GameStop and they bought
on a margin. The thought is you can lever thousands into tens or even
hundreds of thousands but you also assume the same kind of risk.

Like Scott said, those "people" were mostly hedge funds. If not and they
are individual investors, then to be shorting stocks it's reasonable to expect
that you have some smarts and that you are at risk. And again, even then
Gamestop didn't got up 100X, it went up about 20X and that took many
days, almost everyone that was short was monitoring their position and
had many days to get out. Not so with those TX utility bills.


In real life I don't need a better example of stupid financial
decisions than Griddy. It happened.
Bob had the right answer.
If you are going to play this game, you better be watching the market
24/7 instead of just being happy your lights are on without asking how
much that costs. These people could have cut their losses by flipping
the main breaker right away. That $10 grand or whatever would have
bought a real nice whole house generator and had plenty left over.


Sure, I expected that would be your answer. Expecting regulators to prevent
this kind of absurd ripoff is too much to ask for. And that is exactly what it was.
Or are you going to try to tell us that some power suppliers had legitimate
costs that suddenly went up 100X in a day? But at least it's consistent with
your '**** the Kurds". This time it's **** all the consumers in TX, it's their
fault and this kind of abuse of capitalism is OK. Are you living in 1900?
Even the barrons of the day back then probably didn't pull this crap.

In article , says...

If that is the agreement you have with your provider to normally get
lower rates, you'd better have a really good generator that
automatically takes over when the spot market goes above some fixed level.



How does a home owner in TX know when the price goes up or down ?

The large company I worked for would get a telephone call years ago
telling them that at a certain time the natural gas was going to another
rate and to get on the fuel oil.

Does TX do this for each house, or does the rate just go up and the home
owner had no idea before the payment statement is sent in the mail ?

Playing the power pricing game is much differnet than the stock market
game. Most have to have the electricity no matter the cost, but you set
your own limit as to how much you want to risk in the stock market, or
not even play it at all.

In article ,
says...

Is that how it works in Canada? Not here in the US. I've never seen a mortgage
with a pre-payment penalty at all and I would bet that it's probably illegal in many
states. I've refinanced many times with no penalty. The only costs are whatever
it takes to get the new mortgage, eg application fee, appraisal fee, misc fee, etc.




Often times even the new fees will be waved if asked. I wanted a home
equaety loan from the place I had a morgage on the house. To start with
the bank wanted a fee. I told them as I already had the house financed
with them and had not missed a payment in over 15 years I could not see
any of those fees, and if so I would check with another bank. They
waved the fees.

"trader_4" wrote in message
...
On Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 12:44:39 AM UTC-5,
wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:07:18 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.



When the rates drop one can usually negociate for the lower rates even
on fixed rates, or go to another bank (lender).

You'd need to buy your way out of the mortgage
- the penalty is usually the interest they are losing
plus a fee for the trouble.

Is that how it works in Canada?

And in Australia too.

Not here in the US. I've never seen a mortgage
with a pre-payment penalty at all

Thats not the same thing, most obviously when you sell the house.

and I would bet that it's probably illegal in many states.

I've refinanced many times with no penalty. The only costs are whatever
it
takes to get the new mortgage, eg application fee, appraisal fee, misc
fee, etc.

On Tue, 2 Mar 2021 12:48:23 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article , says...

If that is the agreement you have with your provider to normally get
lower rates, you'd better have a really good generator that
automatically takes over when the spot market goes above some fixed level.



How does a home owner in TX know when the price goes up or down ?

They know when they get their bill. There is no other form of official
notification. A select few might see/hear something on the news and take
action to limit their usage, but most would be oblivious until the bill
arrives.


The large company I worked for would get a telephone call years ago
telling them that at a certain time the natural gas was going to another
rate and to get on the fuel oil.

Does TX do this for each house, or does the rate just go up and the home
owner had no idea before the payment statement is sent in the mail ?

Playing the power pricing game is much differnet than the stock market
game. Most have to have the electricity no matter the cost, but you set
your own limit as to how much you want to risk in the stock market, or
not even play it at all.

In article ,
lid says...

In article , says...

If that is the agreement you have with your provider to normally get
lower rates, you'd better have a really good generator that
automatically takes over when the spot market goes above some fixed level.



How does a home owner in TX know when the price goes up or down ?

They know when they get their bill. There is no other form of official
notification. A select few might see/hear something on the news and take
action to limit their usage, but most would be oblivious until the bill
arrives


So there is no way to know when to limit your power usage or when to
switch to your own generator. Sure am glad I do not live in an area
where you only get to know the price of the almost necessary items way
after you use them.

The only other place I can think of like that would be the doctor or
hospital but most of the time insurance will cover you after reach a
certain ammount out of pocket.

On Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 10:08:28 AM UTC-5, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
On 3/2/2021 9:24 AM, trader_4 wrote:
On Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 12:44:39 AM UTC-5, wrote:
On Mon, 1 Mar 2021 23:07:18 -0500, Ralph Mowery
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On the other hand, those who got variable rates in 1992 when they
were starting at 9.25%, made out quite well as they quickly dropped
to 7 and later 5%.



When the rates drop one can usually negociate for the lower rates even
on fixed rates, or go to another bank (lender).
You'd need to buy your way out of the mortgage - the penalty
is usually the interest they are losing plus a fee for the
trouble.
John T.

Is that how it works in Canada? Not here in the US. I've never seen a mortgage
with a pre-payment penalty at all and I would bet that it's probably illegal in many
states. I've refinanced many times with no penalty. The only costs are whatever
it takes to get the new mortgage, eg application fee, appraisal fee, misc fee, etc.

I know of one but it is a commercial mortgage in the $1 million range.

I just checked. Since the 80s prepayment penalties have been in illegal in NJ,
on fixed rate mortgages, but they are OK on ARM mortgages.

On Wed, 3 Mar 2021 05:13:04 +1100, cantankerous trolling geezer Rodent
Speed, the auto-contradicting senile sociopath, blabbered, again:

FLUSH the trolling senile asshole's latest troll**** unread

--
"Who or What is Rod Speed?

Rod Speed is an entirely modern phenomenon. Essentially, Rod Speed
is an insecure and worthless individual who has discovered he can
enhance his own self-esteem in his own eyes by playing "the big, hard
man" on the InterNet."
https://www.pcreview.co.uk/threads/r...d-faq.2973853/

On Tue, 2 Mar 2021 09:08:26 -0800 (PST), trader_4
wrote:

On Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 11:51:08 AM UTC-5, Scott Lurndal wrote:
writes:


I told you I don't play commodities but I imagine people who do can
tell you some stories. As for the options market, just look at those
people who were stuck in a short squeeze on GameStop and they bought
on a margin.
The "shorts" who were "squeezed" were mainly institutional
investors and hedge funds, and yes, many recorded losses - albeit affordable
for them; it was simply a hedge that didn't pay off, part of
daily business in a hedge fund.

The amateurs who got hurt were, as noted, buying on margin;
the same behavior that cause the big crash in 1929.

Mostly agree, but the amateurs that got hurt were not necessarily limited
to margin buyers. There are likely dummies that bought it at $400,
expecting it to go to $1000. Dummies that bought it at $400 and are
still holding it waiting for it to go back so they can break even, etc.
This is really bad. It's the first time the internet has been used to flagrantly
organize a campaign to manipulate a stock price. And if it expands to more
stocks, it's the path to using the internet to destabilize stock prices.



I doubt it is the first time, just the worst time. People have been
pumping and dumping stocks as long as there were financial yacking
groups.
I always considered guys like Creamer were a pump and dumper guys.
Back when I was dabbling in day trading I used to put in a buy order
for a stock as soon as Jim started talking about it and put in a sell
order right away at 10% up or more. I usually sold it a few days
later.
Seldom did the price get much better and it usually went back to
where it was or worse. I did get tricked with SHLD because I got too
greedy on my sell order. Then it ended up being a wash for some of my
other short term trades when it crashed. I am a tad more conservative
now and not much short term. The tax laws make it unattractive.