Loading ...Others here probably read the Yahoo GSS message board back when it was cheap and then took off. One of the frequent posters back then, foodogfighter, had a lot to say about detention camps and also body bags. He supposedly worked for a plastics manufacturer and posted that he saw a gazillion body bags being made for and shipped to the US government.
Read today about the cost of iron and other raw material costs rising for steel manfacturing. Japan steel costs to rise:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aKU_ammD8YSA&refer=home
I have a 30,000sf entertainment complex , two 18,500sf office buildings, and a 60,000sf warehouse in planning stages now with developers our company works with. Contract documents are in process now. Our red iron suppliers have not been alerted to any forthcoming price increases (structural steel is prices to contractors by the pound). We will be able to lock in prices within the next 6-8 weeks. However, I am concerned about any cost increases in the near future. Commercial markets do not adhere to the same set of banking consideratins as residential, of course, and the market in my area has yet to retract. Believe it or not, banks still must make loans even in the current environment.
I know from experience that the steel fabricators do not always get real time information and are fed what they want to hear. Does anyone on the Tent have any insight into structural steel costs in the coming year? Any nside knolege of raw materials or energy costs and the true effects on costs. Obviously, energy, transportation, & materials all should increase. My problenm is in attempting to make an educated guess as to how much.
I realize there is no magic oracle to consult, but with the connections of some on this site, I thought it might be worth an inquiry.
Funny you should ask about the value of your pennies and up pops this news story:
click here for the story
I hope you happen to have some of these gems in the jar!
at your local detention center. Fort Dix in new jersey is officially designated as one.( iragi detention a couple of years ago… or was it polish imigrants ?)
So I don’t normally go back and read all the posts from the weekend, but tonight I did and I must say there were many good pieces of information. Guess I will have to start making this an actuall habit.
Seems you guys and gals had some good jokes too. 
they are internment camps ie prisons where all resistance to future martial law once implemented will end up. the prison system is run by profit making public listed corporations. gata fill them beds to be paid you know. wj
youtube.com/watch?v=NBkrAESUbyI
Thank you, you are very kind, but I am sure I don’t deserve such high praise. Just post things that I find interesting and think someone else might also.
It seems anytime someone gains a loud enough voice telling the truth to the masses, he/she is bought off or murdered. David Walker was one of the few non-partisan people in government taking a stand against reckless spending. Now he is going to work for a new foundation created by the chairman Emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations…. I’m sure I’m being too skeptical. (;-) PM
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David Walker will leave his position as U.S. comptroller general and head of the Government Accountability Office (GAO) on March 12 to become president and chief executive officer of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation.
Peter G. Peterson, Chairman of the Peterson Foundation, is Senior Chairman and Co-Founder of Blackstone and a member of the board of directors of its general partner, Blackstone Group Management L.L.C. He is Chairman Emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations and Chairman of the Council on Foreign Relation’s International Advisory Board, founding Chairman of the Peterson Institute for International Economics (Washington, D.C.) and founding President of The Concord Coalition. Mr. Peterson was the Co-Chair of The Conference Board Commission on Public Trust and Private Enterprise (Co-Chaired by John Snow, formerly Secretary of the Treasury). He was also Chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York from 2000 to 2004.
Yes they can - GREED get in the eyes and Blinds all judgement. Deadeye
You do indeed seek out and display to the tent the best content of substance…providing food for thought….you, sir, are a master of the craft.
I have had a problem that the financial geniuses worldwide could be sucked into “investments” … which are now shown to be worthless… CB’s, hedge funds, private equity funds. My gut feel is that they are part and parcel of the setup…
No one could be that stupid without a plan B in progress.
So even minimal investigation verifies that they do exist, in quite some number. The government has its explanations (and Wanka has his )… I guess it’s up to the rest of us to decide for ourselves. Can’t say I like the look of it. Thanks to all who weighed in.
Your guideline should be that moose pellets have no PM resale value whatsoever unless the moose diet contains Equisetum that has taken up gold microparticles into the Equisetum tissue and, in turn, unless the Equisetum has grown with its roots in a substrate, like alluvial sites, that contains gold particles in the soil and gravel. So, by peddling moose pellets, you too could be one of the pump and dump proponents that were all too common on Gold Forum (less so on Goldtent) unless you can authenticate how much gold-bearing Equisetum was in the moose diet.
p.s. No <g> on this posting. Just want to set the facts straight. A good Sunday evening to you. (Well, I suppose I should add a LOL here). Equiz.
Feb. 18 (Bloomberg) — Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd. fell to a 2 1/2-year low in Sydney trading after Chief Executive Officer Michael Smith said the “bloodbath” in debt markets will erase profit growth this year.
Provisions including $200 million on derivatives linked to U.S. debt insurer ACA Capital Holdings Inc. will “offset” forecast profit growth of 11.5 percent in the year ending Sept. 30, the Melbourne-based bank said today.
The upheaval in global debt markets “is a financial services bloodbath,” said Smith, who joined ANZ from HSBC Holdings Plc last year, at a briefing. “Credit costs are going up, well above underlying earnings growth.”
The U.S. subprime mortgage crisis that’s spread through credit markets may lead to $400 billion of write-offs from financial institutions around the world, according to Group of Seven estimates. In Australia, profit margins have narrowed and banks are raising mortgage interest rates faster than changes in the central bank’s benchmark as funding costs rise.
ANZ slid 4.9 percent to A$22.73 at 12:27 p.m. in Sydney, its lowest since September 2005. The stock’s lost 17 percent this year.
“The market wasn’t pricing in the full potential of writedowns,” said Angus Gluskie, who helps manage the equivalent of $500 million, including ANZ shares, at White Funds Management in Sydney. “ANZ is being cautious given the times in which we are living, and doesn’t want to make the mistake of the U.S. investment banks which damaged their credibility by underestimating writedowns.”
Debt Ratings
The bank said a “substantial” portion of the $200 million provision may be written back in the future. ANZ spokesman Paul Edwards confirmed the insurer as New York-based ACA, which had its rating sliced 12 levels to CCC by Standard & Poor’s in December, casting doubt on more than $75 billion of debt the company guarantees, including $69 billion of securities such as collateralized debt obligations.
The bank was expected to post a full-year net profit of A$4.34 billion, 3.8 percent higher than last year, according to 15 analysts compiled by Bloomberg before today’s announcement.
ANZ will also make a A$51 million ($46 million) provision for the “failure of a resources client,” and a A$90 million charge resulting from a credit rating downgrade of a commercial property customer. It didn’t identify either company.
Commonwealth Bank of Australia, the nation’s biggest mortgage lender, last week posted the slowest profit growth in more than three years as provisions for bad debts jumped 71 percent and its bad-loan ratio increased.
Credit Costs
Growth in lending and deposits in the first four months of fiscal 2008 at ANZ “have been overshadowed by higher credit costs on commercial lending,” Smith said in today’s statement. “The turmoil in global financial markets has impacted a small number of customers and counterparties which is likely to result in higher credit costs.”
Australian banks have an estimated A$5.5 billion of investments linked to companies troubled by the global debt crisis, the Sydney Morning Herald reported on Feb. 15, citing brokerages including UBS AG.
ANZ this year joined rivals in raising interest rates on its variable home loans to recoup higher funding costs by more than changes in the central bank’s benchmark. It was the first time in a decade that banks lifted rates without any action from the Reserve bank of Australia.
In October ANZ reported full-year profit of A$4.18 billion, following an 8 percent increase in costs in the second-half and a 39 percent jump in provisions for bad debts.
U.S. bond insurers such as ACA may lose $34 billion on securities they guaranteed, Citigroup Global Markets said this month. They are likely to take losses of $32 billion on collateralized debt obligations backed partly by U.S. subprime mortgages, Citigroup said. They also may have an additional $2 billion in impairments on bonds backed by home equity lines of credit. CDOs repackage assets such as mortgage bonds and buyout loans into new securities with varying risk.
well, it’s 5:00 somewhere