Ok here is one that may not make sense to some

[nadinbrzezinski]

I have been following things like LIBOR rates for oh since this mess started... they have gone down

Also the housing market is STARTING to stabilize

We also know the DOW may have hit button

Folks we MIGHT be seeing the light at the end of the tunnel

Oh and yes, things on the street

Target was very crowded last week

And I am waiting for hubby to finally see more traffic at the USPS

Remember, some of this is psychological, and we have actually seen a jump in people thinking that the economy is turning.

So I'd say yes, we are starting to see it... but will not feel it until the end of the year... in any way, shape or form... which means... the fall off the cliff has only slowed down

:-)

Feel free to take apart

[MercutioATC]

1. It's a bear market bounce...nothing more.

...and we haven't seen the bottom yet.

Commercial real estate and credit card bubbles are just starting to burst.

Unemployment is still increasing.

There's still no real plan to start digging out other than "throw money at it".

As soon as credit loosens, inflation is going to accelerate dramatically.


The big bounce in the market was due to Geithner's plan. Banks realize that they'll be able to dump bad assets onto the taxpayers. Bad for the taxpayers, but great for business. We're headed south again.

[imdjh]

3. So as someone who was kicking myself for not buying 10,000 shares of Citi at a buck....

.... because it would have been really sweet to make 20k on a lark, would I be a fool for going for it if it gets back down to dirt cheap? Or do you think that will be the last gasp?

[nadinbrzezinski]

7. The plan they have used follows very early Depression era

which also saw a bad bank and buying toxic assets

So who knows?

[girl gone mad]

20. You said the exact same thing about TARP..

over and over and over, and you were wrong then, too.

I just don't think your economic understanding is very deep.

[imdjh]

2. I hate to be the bearer of counter news

Three boat dealers have gone out of business here in the last two months, one a couple of days ago. The last one had been in business for 30 years.

K-mart is closing their location nearest me, they closed the one that was even closer 4 years ago.

Three months ago, Albertsons closed 17 stores in this market.

Citing the economy, Tampa's oldest automobile dealership, Ferman, has halted new car sales and repairs at its Plant City location but will continue to sell used vehicles there.

A motel on 34th Street has a sign that says "We accept rent vouchers". I don't know what a rent voucher is, but it can't be a good sign.

[nadinbrzezinski]

5. Oh perfectly all right, those street signs are important

you are also in one of the markets that has been worst affected

So am I, in California, so Target surprised me

But at the macro level... aka the numbers game at the overall economy we may be seeing a slowdown

Not that this stops the bad news at all

[imdjh]

11. What I don't get is why people aren't trying harder

Some are, of course, but so many places aren't really trying and others seem to be completely out of touch. So many of the small businesses around here seem to think that they are only supposed to work 8 hours a day five days a week. What model are they following? The Chinese and the Vietnamese and Pakis, and Indians don't do that- some of them work 7 days and all most of them work 12 hour days. It's hard to have sympathy for an American small business that closes up for good when he closed every day at 5 PM, 3 PM on Saturday, and all day Sunday and Monday.

Some people seem to be raising their prices because business is falling off. Insanity? Restaurants and grocery stores raising prices= guess what? Twenty pounds of rice and bushel of tomatoes and I'm good for a month or more. Almost every bit of cash I spend is discretionary. I really don't have to buy half the stuff that I do, so I am shocked when the price of something doubles before my eyes. I'm even going to quit smoking because I simply will not pay the new tax. It's abusive.

[Hello_Kitty]

23. Yeah, let's all work 7 days a week and 12 hours a day.

Because people in (third world shithole) countries do that. Oh yeah, the problem isn't that the we got fucked by the wealthy global elite, it's that we're not trying hard enough. :eyes: I mean really, if we don't try harder now, what are they going to be able to steal from us the next time?

[tama]

24. Yeah and look at all those kids

that could be sold to best bidder - be it swet shop, sex slavery or soylent green...

[Hello_Kitty]

29. Yeah, god, why aren't we making more use of the lazy little loafers?

Man, those nimble little fingers that 8 year olds have are really good for wiring circuit boards and assembling components, knowwhatimean?

[Taverner]

4. If we're lucky, it will stabilize at this

Again, the word here is "lucky"

If we can stabilize the economy for a while, we can work on the next boom

[CoffeeCat]

6. I used to feel like I had a pretty good grasp...

...on our economic situation.

Before the economy went to hell, I was terrified because I knew the bubbles would be
bursting. I knew we had propped up our economy with phantom money--credit card
spending, home-equity lines of credit and other borrowing. I knew that many had
financed homes that they could not afford, and that many of those ARMS would reset
to payments that would be out of reach for many.

I knew we had propped up our economy on hot air---and high unemployment, rising
business failures and decreased spending would result.

Ok, all of that has happened.

Now, the media is screwing with us--trying to make us think that there are positive
signals everywhere. The financial media can't stop telling us to jump in--because
we're at the bottom.

To top it off, I don't know what effect Obama and his team will have on the economy.
My sense is that it's still a house of cards--and that throwing money at it--is like
trying to fix a dilapidated house by planting a few rose bushes out front.

I just don't know what is happening any more, or what the future holds. Everything
feels like a big question mark.

It's possible that others are feeling the question mark too. So, they chose to
believe that things might be getting better. But..on what is that based? Psychology?
What CNBC tells us we should feel?

It's going to take a while for all of this to sort out, I imagine.

[nadinbrzezinski]

8. It is going to take a while indeed

but why I have been trying to look at the numbers those people in the news are looking at

Why I mentioned the Interbank Lending Rate... the LIBOR

As to the media, they are doing their best actually to tell us not to tell us how things are actually going

They are actually trying to talk it down... like they did in 1933

[CoffeeCat]

9. I just mentioned in a post...

...that the past three weeks have been PATHETIC when it comes to the media
trying to happy talk us into believing that "all is well" or that "things
are improving."

It's so frickin obvious that they're doing a number on us. The housing
start number fudging is just one example.

Interesting that you're paying attention to the LIBOR and that it's decreasing. Do you
think this is due to the toxic assets? Supposedly, this is why the banks need
their trillions--to unfreeze credit by purchasing these toxic assets.

I don't see how it works...

[nadinbrzezinski]

13. The LIBOR is the rate banks pay to each other

so if they go down, that unsticks the lending

As to the housing starts... it was actually surprising

And it is not fudging... but very surprising and perhaps a good sign.

But they have been doing all they can to tell us that things are not that good, and that is my point

[CoffeeCat]

30. But the positive housing start statistics..

...have been shown to be completely bogus.

There's no good news there.

[nilram]

21. I don't think the media is necessarily screwing with us

I just don't think they know any better themselves. If housing starts are "unexpectedly" up, well, that's something, isn't it? (Ok, I realize I have a limited view of the media -- for me, the media means NPR, NYT, Salon, and random wire reports.)

But as for what the future holds -- I'm really concerned that the "toxic assets" we know about are only the tip of the iceberg. Even if they're half of the iceberg, then we're still in for a rough ride. And all the cutting back that businesses and individuals are doing (as well they should) is just going to snowball...

Maybe we've got a positive month of something or another, but lemme see what happens next month...

[flyarm]

10. heck in Tampa area the malls are so empty they are now closing at 830 pm..

I have never seen so many restaurants and store fronts empty and papered up..inside the glass.

there is no turn around here..it gets worse by the day!
even grocery stores are closing and my BOA bank is shutting down April 17th!
Forget target here...the three i have been to in the past couple weeks are empty!

Oh and did I mention.. this is our high tourist season!

A little convienice store near me, the owner said he has people coming in trying to barter for wine!! And this is on the Beach..high rent district!..

This is the lowest rate of tourists I have ever seen here..ever!!

[imdjh]

12. It's a shame too, because things were looking up. Especially over there behind the Ocean Market

[nadinbrzezinski]

14. Some local economies are really badly affected

Florida is one of them

So is California, why I was surprised Target was quite full

[imdjh]

15. The only noticeable thing (other than business closings) I have seen was last summer

When gas hit $4/gal it was like this huge psychological wall was hit. I mean these streets were dead. OK, so summer is off season, but even Walmart was dead on Friday night, and Walmart is a social experience for some folks on Friday (or Saturday, I can't recall). I could turn left on Gulf Blvd without even looking. I had the beach to myself. One boat pulled into the Marina on the Thursday that week, and he only bought $400 worth of gas (I'm joking about 'only', but he was the only boat I saw pull in).

[flyarm]

16. i sit on the beach where I am at..height of season and it is me and the seagulls!

and the sandpipers!!

the pool is usually crowded this time of year..this year..pick your seat..no problemo..
i sat on my porch at 10 pm ..usually lights in adjacent building are all lit up this time of year..tonight 3 condo lights lit..3...in a building with 160+ condo's.

So many for sale..I quit counting.

And as bad as it is here..i was just on east coast near Daytona..my girlfriend and i counted in less than 1/2 mile 214 for sale signs ..on ocean front properties! Ocean front !!..most had "reduced" on signs..many forclosure signs.
Bad here...very bad.

[imdjh]

17. We're actually seeing some Spring Break stuff and the snowbirds did come, if not in force

Restaurant was crowded the other night, Wednesday, but probably one seating. Lots of people on the beach at Pass-a-grill , drunk homeowners on Sunset Beach complaining about tourists, but you get that at any beach town. Saturday was a busy day at the beach too, but not a lot of cash walking around.

[nadinbrzezinski]

18. I hate to say it, just like the summer of 1927

Florida was affected before 1929

Some of this is history repeating itself

And I hope it does not fully does that... and Florida starts to turn with the rest of the country, not after the rest of the country

[imdjh]

22. That's frightening, just the sound of it, and I wasn't even born yet.

[girl gone mad]

19. Housing is stabilizing?

Since when is a 41% decline, with the worst Feb. on record "stabilizing"?

I think we will be looking at a double dip recession.

[Hawkowl]

25. Not based on Psychology this time

This time the Recession has a very small psychological element. I mean that by and large the main reason for the recession is a failed structural component, i.e; no credit available. There is no credit being made available because the banks are insolvent, broke, have no money to lend. And because the banks are the same as the brokerage houses which are the same as the savings and loan and the same as the investment banks which are one and the same with hedge funds-- there is NO MONEY anywhere in the private sector to lend.

So this crap that the MSM is trying to spin to get us to spend is not going to work and just set us up for falling to the very last bottom of the stock market (which is not the economy) and I believe a national unemployment rate of about 15%. It doesn't matter how optimistic a consumer or business is if they can't get a tiny bit of financing to buy anything.

The Geithner plan to solving this credit crisis is a very, very risky plan which has, in my opinion, less than a 30% chance of being a final solution. There were better plans out there, but they just smacked to much of "nationalization" and the richest bagholders who run this country would have none of it.

Remember that all economic trends have blips up or down in the opposite directions. False starts if you will. It would be absolutely unprecedented to have achieved the beginning of the turnaround so quickly after the second greatest economic collapse in 100 years. Not impossible just unforecast, unexpected, and unprecedented.

[nadinbrzezinski]

26. Remember the great depression had several plans

and one that went all the way to the USSC

Geitner's plan is part of a continuum, but we may be seeing something positive, as some is based on what was done back then and lessons learned

[Hawkowl]

27. Oh certainly

Adaptive rational expectations and all that. In the continuum of policy prescriptions it is a small positive step. My problem is that the proposed solutions are not optimal because they are constrained by the stranglehold the Wall Street oligarchy has on our government. I mean that it would be cheaper and a quicker road to restored faith in our financial system and economic recovery if these giant bank behemoths would be forced into receivership, (aka nationalization), swapping debt for equity with the high level perpetrators being prosecuted for fraud ala Madoff.

[nadinbrzezinski]

28. It took the feds how long to move that way in the 1930s?

I think, not that I could prove it, that they are moving that way... just like they did in the 1930s

Just that they cannot use the N word for political reasons

The special guv'ment agency that will do the same for Insurance companies as the FDIC does for banks is exactly that...

:-)

Perhaps having the long view of much readying on the depression kind of gives me an inside look into what they are doing

And some of this is so damn similar and familiar it is not even funny