The number of emergency distributions hit record highs both of the last two years, according to Vanguard, which administers 401(k)-type accounts for nearly five million people and published the data ahead of an annual report scheduled for June, reports the WSJ.
Scott Rechler, chief executive officer of New York landlord RXR described the market in five stages of grief Elisabeth Kübler-Ross outlined in her 1969 book On Death and Dying: Denial, Bargaining, Depression, Anger, Acceptance,
“In 2024, we’re at that fifth stage of grief,” Rechler said. “People are now in acceptance.”
Nobody has bought Musk’s Boring line of bull except the Las Vegas Convention and Visitor Authority (LVCVA) which forked over $52.5 million in 2019 and $4 million per year for two tunnels less than a mile long under the convention center. Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman was the lone vote against the project. She told Bloomberg, “Everybody turned them down,” she now recalls thinking. “What are we, dumb here?”
Real estate mogul Barry Sternlicht told Bloomberg “there’s a giant skeleton in the closet of the regional banks,” referring to commercial real estate loans. He made the point that “every piece of real estate is worth less when interest rates go up 500 basis points.”
With 400 square feet, no garage, and driveways just wide enough for one vehicle or two motorcycles — builders can offer prices under $300,000 in markets like San Antonio and Redmond, Oregon. The days of the $100,000 to $300,000 starter home are long gone in many markets. “This is the front end of what we are going to see,” said Ken Perlman, a managing principal at John Burns Research and Consulting.
This pronouncement happened during a speed round of questions in Detroit while chatting with Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer. “I would choose John Maynard Keynes,” said Yellen. Keynes “changed the way all of us understand business cycles, public policy and financial markets.”
But loan sales are unlikely with properties now valued 50%-75% below their valuations at the time loans were made. No one will buy loans at par where the underlying collateral has fallen by 25%-50%. Selling loans at a loss will generate capital-eroding losses these banks can’t afford. For the same reason, borrowers seeking an extension for their undercollateralized loan will be asked to pay down the principal balance with cash they likely don’t have.
Offshore bookies like BetOnline.ag and Bet U.S. have dozens of ways to bet Ms. Swift. BetOnline.ag is offering 89 proposition bets, a reference to her album “1989.” The primary color for her top being red is a -250 favorite. The color of her lipstick being red is a prohibitive favorite at -1500.
Bad acting may not just happen in the betting universe. Fox announcer Joe Buck, who is not doing the Super Bowl play-by-play said on “The Opening Drive,” co-hosted by Randy Karraker and Brooke Grimsley on 101 ESPN in St. Louis that he would not be coming to town. “There’s gonna be a big something that happens. I don’t know what it is. I have no idea. That is going to be a mess, in my mind.”
Speaking of business, Ms. Swift will do hers–performing a concert in Tokyo on the 10th– and then fly to Las Vegas for the Super Bowl on the 11th. The game is projected to break all TV viewership records and with the increased female interest in seeing a gushing, cheering Swift and at least one tight end, the roster of advertisers will be a little different. Beauty brands Dove, e.l.f. eyes lips face, and NYX Professional Makeup have purchased what every year is the most expensive ad time in the world.
The late Peter Gent wrote of a pay-per-view Super Bowl in his deeply cynical novel The Franchise published in 1983.
Finesilver writes, “Our current system cheats kids, rips off taxpayers, and sucks the energy and creativity out of teachers.” At the same time, “where I and my colleagues work are places where lawlessness prevails.”
With $131 billion outstanding in loans to banks and credit unions collateralized by U.S. Treasury and agency debt at par value one would assume the program like most other central bank and government programs would be extended, indefinitely.
Whitney’s claim is the housing market is in trouble because 74% of homes are owned by people over 50 and they won’t have anyone to sell to because family formation is dropping because young men are on their phones betting parlays on sporting events instead of..well..forming families, or practicing said formation.
But, a guy who is by now an old Vegas wiseman, Donny Osmond, probably has it right about the Grand Prix, "The traffic has been horrendous...But the locals, eventually, are going to embrace this thing completely."
“It’s always gonna be this” way, said Zaheer Ebtikar, founder of crypto fund Split Capital. “People can’t help it. [Crypto] is literally the most FOMO [fear of missing out] industry ever.” Ever? Ebtikar wasn’t around for tulipmania.
A few minutes later Simon Rabinovitch with The Economist, threw this curveball at Powell. “Quick follow up to the question about banking stresses. You talked about how the banking system is resilient. Of course, part of the resilience of the past year stems from the Bank Term Funding Program that you launched in March.
Maybe all one needs to know is FTX and related firm Alameda Research, valued at $32 billion, did their financials on QuickBooks. The company had no risk officer, no chief financial officer, or head of human resources.
For more than a decade interest rates were falling and zombie companies roamed the economy with the benefit of low interest payments. Free money from the government during COVID also provided a shot in the arm for the financially infirm.
Carson Block is the founder of Muddy Waters LLC. His firm is shorting solar firm Sunrun, Inc. (for the second time) as a part of a short theme he calls the “ESG hustle.” When he released his first report on Sunrun, in July 2022, he included in the title that ESG stands for “Everybody Screws the Government.”
