BenBernanke posts
FeedPosted Jun 10th 2010 2:00PM by Connie Madon (RSS feed)
Filed under: Market Matters, Money and Finance Today, Personal Finance, Headline News, Financial Crisis
Nassim Taleb, author of The Black Swan, predicts trouble ahead for world economies. The Black Swan is a metaphor for unexpected events because people view the world as something structured, ordinary and comprehensible.
Some of his statements are factual, and some are conjecture. Here is list of quotes from his interview on CNBC:
Continue reading Nassim Taleb, Author of Black Swan, Predicts Trouble Ahead for World Economies
Posted Dec 16th 2009 5:00PM by Douglas S. Roberts (RSS feed)
Filed under: Forecasts, Other Issues, Good news, Money and Finance Today, Economic Data, Headline News, Federal Reserve, Recession, Financial Crisis
The Federal Reserve Open Market Committee (FOMC) issued its statement indicating again that interest rates will remain low for an extended period of time. The decision was unanimous.
The Fed continues to avoid any potential language which could disrupt the financial markets. Chairman Bernanke, a student of the Great Depression, does not want to do anything to damage the current stabilization in the economy.
Continue reading The Fed decision: Ending extraordinary measures but no monetary tightening
Posted Oct 20th 2009 2:00PM by Mark Fightmaster (RSS feed)
Filed under: Law, Options, Financial Crisis

So, I was flipping through some articles in
Rolling Stone, when I found a very interesting economic story - yes, in
Rolling Stone. The article, "
Wall Street's Naked Swindle," takes a look at what happened in the options pits leading up to the death of Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers. According to the article, an unknown option buyer made "one of the craziest bets Wall Street has ever seen," by shorting Bear Stearns. The unknown trader felt that Bear Stearns would lose "more than half" of its value in nine days or less, a bet that one financial analyst likened to buying 1.7 million lottery tickets.
What is crazy is that this bet paid off, leading to only one conclusion: insider trading (cue dramatic music). When Bear Stearns dropped from roughly $63 to $2 per share on March 17th (just six days later), the person purchasing the options made roughly $270 million. Senator Chris Dodd from the Senate Banking Committee thought that something wasn't on the up and up with this trade, and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) promised it would look into the trade. Of course, nothing has happened since.
Continue reading Who profited from Bear Stearns' collapse? One insider did, and got away with it
Posted Jul 21st 2009 4:00PM by Jon Ogg (RSS feed)
Filed under: Coca-Cola (KO), International Business Machines (IBM), Caterpillar (CAT), duPont(E.I.)deNemours (DD), Merck and Co (MRK), United Technologies (UTX)

Today's news boiled down to two issues. First was that five DJIA components reporting earnings this morning, with
details on three components. The second issue was Ben Bernanke testifying that inflation was not a huge concern because the economy is likely to stay frail for some time. The markets were mixed to down most of the day until a late day rally saved shares.
Here were today's unofficial closing bell levels:
Dow 8,911.71 +63.56 (0.72%)
S&P 500 954.10 +2.97 (0.31%)
Nasdaq 1,914.13 +4.84 (0.25%)
Top 10 Analyst Upgrades/DowngradesContinue reading Closing Bell: DJIA earnings mix it up (CAT, KO, DD, IBM, MRK, UNH, UTX)
Posted Jun 11th 2009 9:45AM by Mark Fightmaster (RSS feed)
Filed under: Deals, Bank of America (BAC), Federal Reserve
Bank of America (NYSE:
BA) CEO Ken Lewis threatened to use a "material adverse change" (MAC) clause to kill the agreement to buy Merrill Lynch because he wanted to get a
lower price, according to the
Financial Times. New e-mails reveal how he was then pressured to proceed with the deal.
A House committee on oversight and government reform is investigating whether or not undue pressure was put on Lewis in order to complete the deal to purchase Merrill Lynch. Reportedly, the Federal Reserve would not comply with the committee's request for documentation and e-mails regarding the accusations, but the committee issued a subpoena to the central bank on Tuesday. Lewis is set to testify about the matter today at a congressional hearing.
Continue reading Bank of America says it was pressured into Merrill Lynch deal
Posted May 7th 2009 4:00PM by Jon Ogg (RSS feed)
Filed under: Cisco Systems (CSCO), Wal-Mart (WMT), Sirius Satellite Radio (SIRI), Symantec Corp (SYMC), Vonage Holdings (VG)

Fed Chairman Bernanke gave an
outline of regulation for banks and financial institutions today, and the weekly jobless claims gave some hope that tomorrow's unemployment
might come in under expectations. There is a "sell the news" mentality that is going around ahead of the stress test and there was some tech profit taking after John Chambers was less optimistic. It looks like at least some profit taking is actually possible to see again.
Here are today's unofficial closing bell levels:
Dow 8,376.64 -135.64 (-1.59%)
S&P 500 907.28 -12.25 (-1.33%)
Nasdaq 1,716.24 -42.86 (-2.44%)
Top Analyst UpgradesTop Analyst DowngradesContinue reading Closing Bell: Profit taking is actually possible (COF, CSCO, SIRI, SYMC, VG, WMT)
Posted Apr 23rd 2009 11:00AM by Elizabeth Harrow (RSS feed)
Filed under: Bank of America (BAC), DJIA, Federal Reserve, Financial Crisis
An outspoken group of Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) shareholders has been calling for CEO Kenneth Lewis's head lately, with investors none too pleased by the bank's near-disastrous acquisition of Merrill Lynch. However, testimony is hitting Wall Street today that indicates Lewis was simply following government orders by keeping hefty losses at Merrill under wraps.
Lewis testified under oath before New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo in February, asserting "it wasn't up to me" to disclose Merrill's fourth-quarter losses toward the end of 2008.
According to Lewis, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson pressured him to stay mum about Merrill Lynch's troublesome balance sheet. The regulators reportedly urged Lewis to proceed with the merger, warning that the deal's failure would "impose a big risk" to the nation's financial system.
Continue reading Was Bank of America's CEO intimidated by the feds?
Posted Apr 3rd 2009 10:00AM by Jim Cramer (RSS feed)
Filed under: Market Matters, Gilead Sciences (GILD), Cramer on BloggingStocks, Financial Crisis
TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says it'd be easy to follow the herd and doubt the staying power of this rally, but that's not his style.
People think I am nuts . . . even more than usual. All they can talk about at the cocktail parties and the lunches and on the Street is how bad things are. They want to hide in gold. They want to hide under the bed. They think that every move is false and every rally must be sold. The negativity is so thick that even my closest friends think that I am being wishful about the turn. Oh, and heaven forbid there would be one positive article in The Wall Street Journal about this market. Just one!
Continue reading Cramer on BloggingStocks: Sticking to my guns
Posted Mar 16th 2009 4:30PM by Michael Fowlkes (RSS feed)
Filed under: International Markets, Middle East, Economic Data, Oil, Federal Reserve, Recession, Financial Crisis

Earlier in the session we were looking at lower oil prices, but the mood has changed, and the precious crude is trading higher with the overall market today, picking up nearly 2.5% on the day.
Yesterday, despite rumors to the contrary, OPEC decided to
leave its oil output alone, and this had the initial reaction of sending prices lower in early morning trading. With oil prices falling sharply since last summer, many analysts had been expecting to see a production cut from the group, but instead OPEC announced that it would be leaving its output unchanged, and stated that previous cuts were starting to take effect.
Continue reading Oil rises despite OPEC decision
Posted Mar 11th 2009 11:30AM by Sheldon Liber (RSS feed)
Filed under: Major Movement, Forecasts, Citigroup Inc. (C), Politics, DJIA, Recession

If we learned anything from Tuesday's market, it's that it is
spring loaded, pun intended. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 379.44 or 5.8%, closing at 6,926.49. The NASDAQ and S&P were up even more. All this on skimpy news from
Citigroup Inc. (NYSE:
C) that it may have made a profit in the first two months of the year.
That was all it took to get the market to pop!
For it's part, Citigroup jumped even more, ending the day at $1.45, for a $0.40, or 38.10% gain. Sending a memo to employees is not a novel approach to getting some stock buzz when anything more could have ended up being a lawsuit for potentially misleading investors somewhere down the road.
Continue reading Is the stock market spring loaded? Could it move 3,000 points higher now?
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