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Meet the KFC "double down." Although no mention of it is made on KFC.com and we have never seen an ad for it ourselves, we are being lead to believe that it is real by Foodgeekery.com. They have crappy cell phone camera footage of a commercial (from Omaha, apparently) for the mysterious beast, as well as photographic evidence of it in the wild.
Continue..."Aug. 27 (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve argued yesterday that identifying the financial institutions that benefited from its emergency loans would harm the companies and render the central bank’s planned appeal of a court ruling moot.
The Fed’s board of governors asked Manhattan Chief U.S. District Judge Loretta Preska to delay enforcement of her Aug. 24 decision that the identities of borrowers in 11 lending programs must be made public by Aug. 31. The central bank wants Preska to stay her order until the U.S. Court of Appeals in New York can hear the case.
“The immediate release of these documents will destroy the board’s claims of exemption and right of appellate review,” the motion said. “The institutions whose names and information would be disclosed will also suffer irreparable harm.”"
"Aug. 27 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. added 111 lenders to its list of “problem banks,” a jump that suggests rising bank failures may force the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. to deplete a reserve fund that shrank 40 percent this year.
A total of 416 banks with combined assets of $299.8 billion failed the FDIC’s grading system for asset quality, liquidity and earnings in the second quarter, the most since June 1994, the Washington-based FDIC said in a report today. Regulators didn’t identify companies deemed “problem” lenders."
"The decrease in real GDP in the second quarter primarily reflected negative contributions from
private inventory investment, nonresidential fixed investment, personal consumption expenditures
(PCE), residential fixed investment, and exports that were partly offset by positive contributions from
federal government spending and state and local government spending. Imports, which are a subtraction
in the calculation of GDP, decreased....
Real personal consumption expenditures decreased 1.0 percent in the second quarter, in contrast
to an increase of 0.6 percent in the first. Real nonresidential fixed investment decreased 10.9 percent,
compared with a decrease of 39.2 percent. Nonresidential structures decreased 15.1 percent, compared
with a decrease of 43.6 percent. Equipment and software decreased 8.4 percent, compared with a
decrease of 36.4 percent. Real residential fixed investment decreased 22.8 percent, compared with a
decrease of 38.2 percent.
Real exports of goods and services decreased 5.0 percent in the second quarter, compared with a
decrease of 29.9 percent in the first. Real imports of goods and services decreased 15.1 percent,
compared with a decrease of 36.4 percent.
Real federal government consumption expenditures and gross investment increased 11.0 percent
in the second quarter, in contrast to a decrease of 4.3 percent in the first. National defense increased
13.3 percent, in contrast to a decrease of 5.1 percent. Nondefense increased 6.2 percent, in contrast to a
decrease of 2.5 percent. Real state and local government consumption expenditures and gross
investment increased 3.6 percent, in contrast to a decrease of 1.5 percent.
The change in real private inventories subtracted 1.39 percentage points from the second-quarter
change in real GDP, after subtracting 2.36 percentage points from the first-quarter change. Private
businesses decreased inventories $159.2 billion in the second quarter, following decreases of $113.9
billion in the first and $37.4 billion in the fourth..."
Aug. 25 (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve must make records about emergency lending to financial institutions public within five days because it failed to convince a judge the documents should be exempt from the Freedom of Information Act.
Manhattan Chief U.S. District Judge Loretta Preska rejected the central bank’s argument that the records aren’t covered by the law because their disclosure would harm borrowers’ competitive positions. The collateral lists “are central to understanding and assessing the government’s response to the most cataclysmic financial crisis in America since the Great Depression,” according to the lawsuit that led to yesterday’s ruling.
The Fed has refused to name the borrowers, the amounts of loans or the assets put up as collateral under 11 programs, saying that doing so might set off a run by depositors and unsettle shareholders. Bloomberg LP, the New York-based company majority-owned by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, sued Nov. 7 on behalf of its Bloomberg News unit.
The big banks want the smaller ones to clear currency trades (net out daily gain/loss) through a firm owned by them. Cost, among other reasons, make the small banks resistant. If the big banks really feel there is a settlement risk than they shouldn't trade outside the centralized clearing system; if that creates a two-tier pricing structure, all the better, as now firms have increased options and some type of market pricing mechanism(the difference between the rates) for currency settlement risk.
From the Financial Times:
"Banks that do not settle currency trades through a central system could be shut out of dealing at the best prices, according to one of the biggest foreign exchange banks.
Zar Amrolia, global head of FX at Deutsche Bank, one of the three biggest foreign exchange banks, said a two-tier system could become a reality as banks reassess their risks in the wake of the credit crunch."
"At the end of the day, we believe we will be able to pay back the government and we hope we will be able to do something for our shareholders as well," Benmosche said in an interview with Bloomberg while on holiday in Croatia."
"The number of companies defaulting on their debts has risen to record levels this year, according to Standard & Poor’s, while investment returns for risky corporate debt have skyrocketed since January.
S&P said 201 borrowers with $453.1bn in debt have defaulted this year, exceeding the 126 defaults for all of 2008, which comprised debt worth $433bn..."
Of course they won't listen; the State and Financial/Economic Elite are not interested in you or me.
Dear David (if I may),
You and your party may be the only hope we have for a resilient society insulated from negative Black Swans and in which everyone has the opportunity to benefit from positive Black Swans. For I despair of the Obama administration's ability to fix this financial crisis and prevent future ones. I am appalled by the dangers it has been creating and its takeover by the same economic establishment responsible for this crisis.
Sector | Total |
---|---|
Finance, Insurance & Real Estate | $3,696,067,299 |
Health | $3,551,488,019 |
Misc Business | $3,401,586,627 |
Communications/Electronics | $3,066,673,860 |
Energy & Natural Resources | $2,573,064,176 |
Transportation | $1,954,022,232 |
Other | $1,909,421,073 |
Ideological/Single-Issue | $1,264,198,306 |
Agribusiness | $1,150,780,371 |
Defense | $1,046,916,782 |
Construction | $401,304,776 |
Labor | $370,674,456 |
Lawyers & Lobbyists | $303,203,122 |
|
University of California | $1,591,395 |
Goldman Sachs | $994,795 |
Harvard University | $854,747 |
Microsoft Corp | $833,617 |
Google Inc | $803,436 |
Citigroup Inc | $701,290 |
JPMorgan Chase & Co | $695,132 |
Time Warner | $590,084 |
Sidley Austin LLP | $588,598 |
Stanford University | $586,557 |
National Amusements Inc | $551,683 |
UBS AG | $543,219 |
Wilmerhale Llp | $542,618 |
Skadden, Arps et al | $530,839 |
IBM Corp | $528,822 |
Columbia University | $528,302 |
Morgan Stanley | $514,881 |
General Electric | $499,130 |