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Author Archives: Felix
When Co-CIOs Disagree
Mohamed El-Erian and Bill Gross will, as of January, both hold the title of chief investment officer at bond giant Pimco. Few firms have as much money as Pimco tied up in short-term debt instruments like the ones issued by … Continue reading
Posted in bonds and loans
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Looking for Carbon Budgets
Many companies and projects, like the documentary Jeff mentioned a couple of weeks ago, claim to be "carbon neutral" – which is a worthy thing to be. But obviously it’s a lot easier to say that you’re carbon-neutral than it … Continue reading
Posted in climate change
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The Risk Disclosure Problem
Taleb and Greenspan have gotten all the press, but my nomination for book of the year in the finance/economics space (with the important proviso that I haven’t got very far into it yet) is "Plight of the Fortune Tellers" by … Continue reading
Posted in banking, derivatives
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Abstract of the Day
From Case Western’s Erik Jensen: Abstract: Law professors dress scruffily, and we need to do something about that. The paper itself is surprisingly long, with far too many atrocious puns ("as you rip, so shall you sew"). But in case … Continue reading
Posted in law
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Paulson Gets it Right on Housing
Hank Paulson’s speech today about the housing market is spot-on, I think. Let me highlight a few passages, since most of you aren’t going to read all 4,300 words: Recent surveys have shown that as many as 50 percent of … Continue reading
Posted in housing
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China Datapoint of the Day
Eight of the 20 biggest public companies in the world, by market capitalization, are Chinese. The US has just seven of the top 20. To put it another way, China Mobile is worth more money than Microsoft, and China Life … Continue reading
MemeWatch: Superconduit as Treasury Bail-Out
Bloomberg’s Brendan Murray and Simon Kennedy have an article up today headlined "Paulson Credit Push Earns Jeers From Free-Marketers". It kicks off like this: U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson’s plan to shore up asset-backed commercial paper is drawing criticism from … Continue reading
Posted in banking, fiscal and monetary policy
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InTrade got the Economics Nobel Right
Barkley Rosser is unimpressed by the InTrade speculation about the winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics: The various betting markets on the Sveriges Riksbank Prize for Economics in Memory of Alfred Nobel, such as intrade.com, were just way off. … Continue reading
Posted in prediction markets
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2007’s Mortgages Even Uglier than 2006’s
If you thought Citigroup was an unwieldy beast which is hard to turn around, you should have a look at the subprime mortgage industry. It’s now been well over a year since people started to get shocked by subprime default … Continue reading
Posted in housing
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Liquidity and Information
The annoyingly anonymous WSJ economics blog (one assumes it’s Greg Ip, but can never be sure) talked to Richmond Fed president Jeffrey Lacker yesterday, and asked him about this year’s Nobel Prize in Economics. In response, he made an interesting … Continue reading
Posted in fiscal and monetary policy
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Blogonomics: The Long Tail
Jeff Bercovici asks: A question for you, Felix: Are you sure increasing the number of bloggers increases the value of the site? I think there’s a point of diminishing returns, and I suspect, with 1,800 bloggers, HuffPo has already passed … Continue reading
Posted in blogonomics, Media
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Speculating over Chuck Prince’s Ouster
Duff McDonald stilettoes Chuck Prince in this week’s New York, just in time for Citi’s dreadful earnings. McDonald says that Prince’s CEOship has been "a nightmare" since shortly after he got the top job, largely because he "regularly violated a … Continue reading
Posted in banking, defenestrations
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Blogonomics: Paying for Content
I do wish that Mark Gimein will start blogging: he’s a natural. He’s provocative, and interesting, and – at least until the final entry of his guest-blogging stint at Time – unafraid to write long. (This is your own place, … Continue reading
Posted in blogonomics, Media
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Dow Jones: The Murdoch Era Begins
Rupert Murdoch does not, yet, officially own Dow Jones. But he clearly controls it, all the same. Today, the day that Rupert’s new business channel launches in head-to-head competition with CNBC, Dow Jones’s websites have decided to pull all CNBC’s … Continue reading
Posted in Media, publishing
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For the Record
The wager entered into between me and Jesse Eisinger: that investment banks’ bonus pool this year – in aggregate – will be at least 90% of the size it was last year. If it is, I win a bottle of … Continue reading
Posted in banking
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Why Environmentalism is Here to Stay
Kevin Maney reckons that environmentalism is a short-lived fad, and that Americans will keep on upping their consumption of bottled water and other environmentally-unfriendly products. I’m more optimistic than he is, however. Kevin sees environmentally-friendly behavior as making a virtue … Continue reading
Posted in climate change
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Investment Banks: Not Dead Yet
Jesse Eisinger has the cover story of the November issue of Portfolio with an obituary for Wall Street. I wonder what Barry Ritholtz thinks about this: Barry is structurally bearish, and might be inclined to agree with Jesse’s thesis, but … Continue reading
Posted in banking
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Mechanism Design Theory for Dummies
This Nobel prize is exactly the sort of thing that journalists have nightmares about. They wake up early, and read a citation from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences giving the Economics prize to three economists they’ve never heard of, … Continue reading
Posted in economics
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How the Superconduit Just Might Work
Yves Smith is pessimistic about the prospects for this proposed superconduit. (The press is all over the story this morning: you can start with the NYT, FT, WSJ, and Bloomberg, although there’s much more where that came from; that said, … Continue reading
Posted in bonds and loans
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Ben Stein Watch: October 14, 2007
Ben Stein had an intimation of mortality about a week ago, and before he dies, he wants to share with us, his readers, his "best possible thoughts". And, amazingly, it turns out that Ben Stein’s best possible thoughts are, mostly, … Continue reading
Posted in ben stein watch
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Is it a Bird? Is it a Plane? No, it’s Superconduit!
There’s a certain amount of sense to this idea: as Citigroup and other banks find themselves at the mercy of their off-balance sheet structured investment vehicles, or SIVs, they should just create one enormous pool with $100 billion or so … Continue reading
Posted in banking, bonds and loans
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Adventures in Personal Finance, APR Edition
I just got my Mastercard statement from Citibank, and found this: Apparently the ANNUAL PERCENTAGE RATE on purchases is 36%, corresponding to a "Nominal APR" of 17.74%, while the two are the same on advances. (Click on the image for … Continue reading
Posted in personal finance
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International Capital Flows, Swiss Border Edition
Mark Gimein is puzzled by the lack of attention that the news media is paying to the story of a man who was stopped at a Swiss border crossing in possession of a $500 million check. I can think of … Continue reading
Posted in fraud
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US Inequality Hits New Record Highs
Greg Ip is all over the inequality beat today, with a whole series of datapoints from the IRS: New data from the Internal Revenue Service shows that in 2005, the richest 1% of tax filers earned 21.2% of all income, … Continue reading
Posted in fiscal and monetary policy, pay, Politics
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Madonna Math, Revisited
I still can’t quite believe the supine nature in which a throwaway clause in a rushed WSJ article – "people in the music industry estimate that at current recorded-music prices, the promoter would have to sell about 15 million copies … Continue reading
Posted in Media
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