Errr ummm Professional Wrestling is starting to look good by comparison - at least it makes no pretensions to be anything other than it is. What's left?
Mostly original content that examines financial surreality in equity markets in general, and the Japanese Stock Market in particular.
Monday, March 12, 2012
Another One Bites The Dust (Updated)
Things, people, ideas believed to have integrity now seemingly compromised...(the updated and expanded version)
The "risk-free" rate
LIBOR as a Benchmark
Public Sector Pensions
HFT as a Beneficial Provider of liquidity
Diversifying properties of Hedge Fund's
Einstein's Theory of Special Relativity
Celtic Rangers
Macroeconomic Forecasts
John Paulson
FRB Open Market Operations
Standardized Educational Testing
Swiss National Bank
A Relaxing Cruise
WTI as Oil Benchmark
Olympus Corp.
TEPCO
Payment Protection Insurance
DSK
HM Revenue & Customs
Sony Playstation Network
Google
Privacy
Social Mobility
Actuarial Return Assumptions for Pension Funds
Marmite
Ryan Giggs
Acupuncture
USA Govt AAA
France AAA
Voicemail
Boob Jobs
Snooker
David Einhorn
Nuclear Power
Deepwater Drilling
Tiger Woods
Professional Cricket
Sumo
Professional Cycling
High-Frequency Trading
Professional Baseball
FIFA
Professional Tennis
Municipal Bond Underwriting
The Catholic Church
Track & Field Athletics
NCAA Sports
US Congress
UK Parliament
Analyst Research
Credit Ratings
Banks
Newtonian Physics
The Stock Market
The Food Pyramid
Incentive Stock Options
Reinsurance Brokerage
Lou Dobbs
The Mortgage-Backed Securities Market
Hedge Funds
Social Security
Government Balance Sheets
Tooth Fairy
Errr ummm Professional Wrestling is starting to look good by comparison - at least it makes no pretensions to be anything other than it is. What's left?
Errr ummm Professional Wrestling is starting to look good by comparison - at least it makes no pretensions to be anything other than it is. What's left?
Spanish trade unions
ReplyDeleteCB - excuse my ignorance about organized labour in Spain, but should they be deposited in "what's left", or dumped into the "Integrity has-been" list?
ReplyDeleteHaving been a member in days gone by of the Casino Workers Union (ironic I know!) and a permitted scab under the terms of my B-i-L's Company's contract with the Teamsters, I can tell you that integrity went missing from these unions more than three decades ago.
Perhaps a little too specific, but ... Canadian banks?
ReplyDeleteMarmite? What's gone wrong with marmite?
ReplyDeleteWhat about "my word is my bond..?"...when did that disappear from market morality like the early mist around Mt. Fuji on a summer's morning ?
ReplyDeleteSee Marmite banned in Denmark
ReplyDeleteAs for Canadian Banks, I would agree, BUT, like Gollem's ring, [temporary] success in banking brings hubris. Word on the street is Canadian banks are on a hiring spree and expanding all over. Their last global expansion into London if I remember correctly coincided with their post 87' implosion due to the last great Canadian property crash. They had so much integrity they were selling office buildings at 30c on the dollar (50% of construction cost) that are undoubtedly worth 10x those puke-prices. And of course now, they will fund new construction at 10x those old prices. Is that your definition of integrity? Should Shilling be right, and deflationary forces win, I think even Canadian banks would be panhandling.
The latter
ReplyDeleteI was suggesting Canadian banks because of there *perceived* integrity.
ReplyDeleteI think you hit the nail on the head as to the reality!
The building manager at the biggest of the 80's Toronto lemons (O&Y, of course) told me - some time around 1990 - that his 78 storey ward was only 2/3 occupied. So overbuilt with office space was the city that virtually nothing has been added to the stock in the 25 years since the boom ended.
ReplyDeleteAll that shiny new stuff you see here is residential. A story in itself, I guess.
Who did so well off that crash that they figured that they had nothing to learn was Teachers. Got their comeuppance a couple of years ago.
how about?
ReplyDelete- value of a college education
- European unity
- solar's bright future
- government statistics
- long-term care insurance
- RSA security
- clinical trials
- daylight savings time
- safe as houses
- keep looking and you'll eventually land a job
Not bad anon though one might counter the value proposition of college edu has also been suspect outside a few disciplines; solar (from an investment pt) has been hyped and therefore spec, but some feed-in tariffs subsidies by fossil) like the Germans still makes longer-run sense; Govt stats lost much integrity during Nixon (I was going to include CBO); RSA and LTC Ins indeed, while "safe as houses" hits the target. I am more sanguine on employment, though if you qualified it with "...land a GOOD job with rising real earnings" that'd hit the target too.
ReplyDeleteHere's a funny one: Martin Armstrong is back in black. If his conference fees are any indication, he didn't really need to hoard all that gold after all.
ReplyDeletehow about...
ReplyDeleteevaluating value and integrity based on factual analysis and reason instead of mindlessly repeating the populist meme du jour, often the one being promoted by self interested parties who satisfy the dreaded intersection of irony and hypocrisy recently highlighted by, uh, you.
Get Shorty was brilliant, but Out of Sight is the sleeper of the bunch. Most romantically portrayed, skin-free love scene of all time, among other things. And as I think of it, a little more realistic about the complexities of value, integrity, and the human condition than your pop-target list.
...was that a compliment or a smackdown??!?
ReplyDelete