Infectious Greed

We have temporarily dodged a bullet. The upcoming IEA World Energy Report will say that global oil supplies are falling faster than expected, and massive investments are required just to (almost) stand still. The only thing making things marginally less calamitous? The current downturn-induced demand collapse has given us a little more time to prepare for the inevitable.

The Financial Times got a leaked copy of the report, which is due Nov. 12.

We are not running out of oil (yet). However it will be increasingly more difficult to get it out of the ground at an economical price.

Hmm, the dollar is falling again, OPEC is cutting back, now this. We may be at or near a bottom in oil prices.

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Yup. apparently even Big Oil wants Obama to win because then the US would presumably have friendlier relations with countries like Venezuela and Iran, and this would make it easier for the OilCos to make deals there with less worry about getting nationalized.

Bush / McCain. They’re bad for business.

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DiFi came through. This is a huge boost for No on Prop 8.

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Bloomberg chart

Volkswagen stock has been heavily shorted. This means traders borrowed shares, sold them, expecting to buy them back at a cheaper price and pocket the profit. It closed at about 200 on Friday.

Over the weekend, Porsche they would increase their share of Volkswagen stock to 75%. The stock exploded upwards, closing today at over 900. Reports said some hedge fund traders were in tears.

The math. You short 100 shares at 200 and pocket 20,000. The stock goes to 900. You are out 70,000 ((200*100) - (900*100)) and will have almost certainly gotten a margin call to either make up the difference in cash in the account by the end of day or margin clerks will buy back the stock at the market and you take the loss. That’s why (some) traders were in tears…

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Pat Oliphant. 10-27-08

Take special note of who the little guy is that’s asking”Who’s in the cart?”, and the response from the person in the crowd.

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The State of California now faces a $10bn budget shortfall for next year rather than the $3bn projected just a few weeks ago. Gov. Schwarzenegger has called an emergency session of the lame duck legislature on Nov. 5 because the revenue shortfall is so serious and happening so fast that it can’t wait until January. Yikes.

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… what Elder God did they offend, given that their current moment in the world spotlight is filled with negative news about their corrupt Senator and loose cannon Governor.

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Back in my younger daze, I smoked copious amounts of marijuana. It was always there, always available. I treated it like it was legal.

I wonder if corruption is the same way. You get so used to it that after a while it just seems normal and not illegal at all. Maybe that’s why politicians who get indicted on corruption charges get so indignant. After decades of doing it, maybe they see it as normal, and thus become outraged that someone could accuse them of being crooked.

Or maybe they’re just skilled liars.

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The title of this post sounds like it should come from a socialist site. But it doesn’t. It’s from Bloomberg, and comprehensively explains how the securitization of debt, and its accompanying greedfest, directly led to banks selling subprime mortgages - and we all know what happened after that.

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Mamas for Obama has twelve videos on YouTube. Check their website for full info. These ads are done by industry pros in their spare time.

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