I hope not.
So how about for 2009 we give up on the monthly sales numbers and builder-confidence surveys and home-price indexes. We already know 2009 isn’t going to be any better than 2008 in the housing market. Let’s just wait until next January to confirm that and avoid all the angst in between.Steve Kerch, assistant managing editor, MarketWatch
Similar rant against financial idiotism in Kevin Depew’s 5 things column on Minyanville today.
Just thought I’d call a spade a spade. At the moment the best way of measuring whether or not commentators believe we’re in the midst of a depression seems to be how often they fail to refer to it as a recession.
Anyway on the subject of blogging on the markets in general, it’s not often I allow myself the opportunity to comment on the daily financial noise, so when I do it’s with the intention of pointing out that the general short term outlook of those who should know better is more or less completely at odds with long term, set-in-stone realities. And it seems even those who do know better are unable to see any other way out of it:
The rise in debt eventually will lead to slower economic growth and diminished standards of living in the U.S
Allan Sinai, chief economist Decision Economics
Nevertheless he supports the Obama stimulus plan. I have a ‘meh’ attitude to all the political hubris surrounding the market today, but I can’t understand all his talk of building for the future when his policies will result in a poorer US tomorrow.
Another noteworthy individual coming from the ‘knows better but doesn’t appear to think there’s anything else for it’ stable is George Soros. He has been expounding exactly what circumstances the US finds itself in, but his solution seems to be to throw more public debt at it. Puzzling.
To put this into perspective, take a look at the ‘Some Inconvenient Truths’ paper causing a stir amongst the more savvy market commentaries. A depression of between 3 – 7 years. Note the FT writer covering the story was equally unable to decide on the state of the economy – the two tags she decided on to accompany the story? Depression and recession.
And now the ineptitude of our economic ‘masters’ has lead to violence on the streets of Paris. Not an uncommon thing in Paris but you can’t help wonder if it’s a sign of things to come?
As the cluster of disparate economies known as the eurozone struggles to cope with the oncoming depression, is it prudent to watch out for the health of the emerging banking sector of Eastern Europe as the next source of financial panic in the global meltdown? Austrian banks say EU bailouts are needed to prevent these organisations (their debtors at the end of the day) from collapsing – from this we may deduce their own balance sheets would not withstand such an event either.
The emerging Eastern states received the bulk of EU investment and optimism as the collection of states struggled to move sluggish economies even in the good times – will they prove their downfall in the bad times? And can anyone realistically expect to see a unified EU action on the crisis?
the HTML 5 spec is being developed with the intention of updating the language to better reflect what it is used for in today’s web. Namely web applications. It notes the rise of third party addons such as Flash and marks itself out as an open alternative.
Real 2-Way Communication between Browser and Web Server – no more ajax hacks?
Cross Document Messaging – a way to allow interdomain communication without resorting to json and without the issue of xss?
Real Drag n Drop – no more ugly multiple browser workarounds or bloated client side apis?
Embedding Video, etc Directly in a Document – no more cpu-hogging, memory leaking flash-based video sites?
Firefox 3.1 beta 2 has support for several elements of the spec, including the video element and Canvas (Scripting access to images). IE8 beta 2 is working on bits and pieces too (Cross Document Messaging) the production release of which is thought to be pencilled in for the first half 2009.Both IE & FF are also having a stab at cross site XmlHttpRequests, which while I think is not specifically referring to the above HTML5 spec, should still provide the necessary power.
Sometimes a breath of fresh air comes from a source so unexpected it really does astound. Yet it is a depressing wonder why something so simple and honest cannot emanate from the West?
But there it is. An Afghan blog (sadly not updated since ’07) concentrating on issues of Herat and it’s hinterland – publishes reports submitted from various news agencies around the country. What I am so impressed by is the simple addition of a ‘description of source’ footnote to the bottom of any external piece. Contrast that with Western media treatment of current hot potato the Gaza Strip, where any random eye-witness appears to be taken at face value and any opinion an authoritive one.
[Description of Source: Peshawar Afghan Islamic Press in Pashto -- Peshawar-based agency, staffed by Afghans. The agency used to have good contacts with Taliban leadership; however, since the fall of the Taliban regime, it now describes itself as independent and self-financing. OSC IAP20071006950019 Peshawar Afghan Islamic Press in Pashto 1916 GMT 06 Oct 07]
By my reckoning the BBC would do well to provide such explanatory warning notes with a good proportion of it’s foreign correspondents! Tribal Afghanistan is a complex society whose divisions at first seem obvious but as more is learned what was black & white becomes ever greyer, something we have a taste for in NI too. At least some of their press seem to know how to see the wood from the trees.
Tagline from 1984 Amsoft epic, Sultan’s Maze.
The first trading day of 2009, the year after the crash. Or was it? 1929′s fall of didn’t mark the bottom; those who bought then would be in the red for the next three years. 1907 on the other hand was the bottom. And stocks ran out 47% winners the next year.
I consulted Wikipedia (I know, I know) to decide which market our current predicament shares its traits with. The inability of many commentators to shed much light on such comparisons – in light of strikingly similar numbers – only gives me greater confidence that there is something in it. The sure sign of analyst capitulation being silence?
Continue reading ‘Which Way Now?’
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