Sunday, April 5, 2009

The Worst is Over!

16 comments:

J said...

What a relief! Now I just need to find a way to get rid of all my Gold. I doubt anyone will even be willing to buy it now...

Ok back to reality. Do people still follow his advice or was this interview on Comedy Central also?

Mark said...

Comedy Central indeed...

Martijn said...

This is a great proof of Taleb's theory that most of those analysts are in a random game.

According to Taleb, putting an infinite number of monkeys behind a typewriter guarantees one of them coming up with Shakespare's Hamlett. It would however be quite unwise signing that monkey on for a million dollar book contract.
The same holds for stock analysts. There are literally heaps of them, so it's guaranteed that some will come up with an accurate prediction of the stock market. As all the bad predictors tend to be filtered out (unless they are really funny their contract in not likely to be renewed), we only see the guys that did it "right" for a while, and so some people believe stock market analysts can be trusted upon. They do however hardly ever put their money where their mouth is, and they don't find too much negative consequence for being wrong. So all they try to do is just draw the most likely card.

In this video we see "good ol'Jim" drawing the "it's over card". Seems like a monkey-behind-the-typewriter random prediction.

I especially applaud Jim for turning the high complexity of the problem into a binary game: "back then it was pretty terrible, but right now it has to work out fine since we are doing the exact opposite of what was done in the 1930s". Humanity has finally conquered complex interrelations, dynamics, shades of grey etc. It's all binary now!

Martijn said...

Here's a link to an interview with William K. Black, senior regulator during the S&L crisis. What he says is that bankers were aware of the problems with all the derivatives and the shadow banking system, but that the everyone (government and bankers) is trying to cover that up.

Think about it: most of those high positioned bankers have good education and are likely to be rather intelligent people. Many blog amateurs (general comment, not directed at you FOFOA) tend to argue how "stupid all those bankers are for not seeing it", but in my opinion that's not the way it is. They probably knew there was a risk, but as everyone played along they chose to ingore the risks. The same happens with e.g. environmental pollution. People know it's wrong, but acting on that while your competitors do not will not improve your business.

Read the interview here: http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/04032009/transcript1.html

Martijn said...

The interview posted above truly makes a point. Most of the trouble we face today still resides in the banks and I believe there is more to come. The best solution to the problem is probably to nationalize and recapitalize the banks, even though that will not be cheap. The reason that doesn't happen is however that the bankers do not want that, and they have too much power. As always, the ones controlling the money are the ones with most power. William Black (in the above interview) accurately states:

"But the other element of your question is we don't want to change the bankers, because if we do, if we put honest people in, who didn't cause the problem, their first job would be to find the scope of the problem. And that would destroy the cover up."

Says it all, doesn't it?

Martijn said...

And finally two vids seeing the current crisis to Argentinean eyes. Very clear explanation arguing that "there is no global financial crisis. What we are seeing is the irreversible meltdown of the global financial system."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlDNMB6wYmI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78ddURofMWs&feature=related

Martijn said...

And here we see that the financial crisis has been predicted more that two centuries ago!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AH8ccoEFdek

FOFOA said...

Hello Martijn,

I did see that William Black interview yesterday. It is very good and highly recommended. Mark and I chatted about it briefly in yesterdays comments.

Thanks for the other links, I will check them out.

FOFOA

PS. Don't worry, I don't take your comments personally, at least not until you have repeated them 3 or 4 times. ;)

And J, I'll still buy your gold, FWIW, esp. at today's bargain price.

Anonymous said...

Silly question (or not).. if the unthinkable happened, all PMs that were not lead shielded would absorb deadly amounts of radiation and basically become transmitters, no? Is fallout the ultimate enemy of gold?
Creepily uncanny word verification: decon

MogwaiHunter said...

Cramer is an unstable, lying, sociopathic, psychopathic, criminal.

Other than that, it is great that he is on TV all the time spewing nonsense. Booyah!

LOL!

Martijn said...

@FOFOA

Max Keiser has impoved his site and his daily newslinks.
http://maxkeiser.com/

Today he posted this link: "A small but growing number of cash-strapped communities are printing their own money." I have read some similar posts about other countries. All on a very small scale, but still..
http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/2009-04-05-scrip_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip

Mark said...

That was me who asked the radiation question, I just don't use my name on certain PCs. I just read Alas Babylon by Pat Frank (c 1959) and he described the death of some folks who had looted an intact jewelry store in a fallout zone. Migrants being searched for metal so as not to spread radiation, etc. I was just curious, as I said, thinking the unthinkable.

FOFOA said...

Mark,

I don't know the answer to your question about PMs becoming radioactive.

Perhaps you should avoid buying any more PMs because this seems to be a real concern. You should instead buy one of these and some of this. ;)

Sincerely,
FOFOA

FOFOA said...

You should also get this to check your stash for past exposure. Some of it might have been reclaimed from Nagasaki and recast into coins.

Then you can wrap your PM's in this.

The leftovers can be used to protect yourself and your loved ones.

Mark said...

Wow - that lead foil looks almost as comfortable as aluminum!
Thanks :P

Martijn said...

Just wear a tin hat and they will never get you! All else is nonsense, from now on I am buying tin hats only.

Post a Comment

Comments are set on moderate, so they may or may not get through.