The Gross US National Debt

My Take On Things

Things and events the way I see them.

Monday, February 19, 2007

WALL STREET - 20 Years Later And It Still Rings True












Well, I appreciate the opportunity you're giving me Mr. Cromwell as the single largest shareholder in Teldar Paper, to speak.
Well, ladies and gentlemen we're not here to indulge in fantasy but in political and economic reality. America, America has become a second-rate power. Its trade deficit and its fiscal deficit are at nightmare proportions. Now, in the days of the free market when our country was a top industrial power, there was accountability to the stockholder. The Carnegies, the Mellons, the men that built this great industrial empire, made sure of it because it was their money at stake. Today, management has no stake in the company! All together, these men sitting up here own less than three percent of the company. And where does Mr. Cromwell put his million-dollar salary? Not in Teldar stock; he owns less than one percent. You own the company. That's right, you, the stockholder. And you are all being royally screwed over by these, these bureaucrats, with their luncheons, their hunting and fishing trips, their corporate jets and golden parachutes. Teldar Paper, Mr. Cromwell, Teldar Paper has 33 different vice presidents each earning over 200 thousand dollars a year. Now, I have spent the last two months analyzing what all these guys do, and I still can't figure it out. One thing I do know is that our paper company lost 110 million dollars last year, and I'll bet that half of that was spent in all the paperwork going back and forth between all these vice presidents. The new law of evolution in corporate America seems to be survival of the unfittest. Well, in my book you either do it right or you get eliminated. In the last seven deals that I've been involved with, there were 2.5 million stockholders who have made a pretax profit of 12 billion dollars. Thank you. I am not a destroyer of companies. I am a liberator of them! The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge has marked the upward surge of mankind. And greed, you mark my words, will not only save Teldar Paper, but that other malfunctioning corporation called the USA. Thank you very much.


The above speech is courtesy of 20th Century Fox from the movie Wall Street 1987


Yup, 20 years on and the red highlights above are still true, and getting worse by the day. Lets check back in another Twenty and see if it's still the same. I say it will be, only way worse.

Friday, February 16, 2007

Ben Bernanke "PINKY TUSCADERO"


Yesterday (02/15/07), one Ben “Pinky Tuscadero” Bernanke really screwed a few people in the markets. This can readily be seen on any Forex Chart at around 10:25 – 10:45am.

After the TICS report came out at NEGATIVE 11 Billion (which means nobody invested in the US debt, but rather, divested it.) we were all long Euro and well on our way to a one cent move.

Enter Pinky at his 10am testimony before the House Panel on Monetary Policy.

Finally at 10:45am we got his official statement which was one sentence that went like this. “Bernanke says economy may be stronger than Fed thinks”. Instantly on the charts you can see a 30 pip move towards the long USD side.

What really irks me and some of my colleagues is this. After a week of absolutely bad US economic news with no light at the end of the tunnel for the foreseeable future, Ben starts riffing wildly with the cavalier attitude of Pinky Tuscadero from Happy Days (hence the new nickname) on how in spite of all the bad news out there, the US is really in great shape.

Well Ben, Shut the F**K up. With statements like yours and the reactions they get, I and others are thinking you might just be covering your friends positions in the market as well as your own, which I’m sure is illegal for you.

How you can say what you said when the numbers this past week say exactly the opposite in such a large way is just beyond any rational comprehension.

Smarten up will ya.

Monday, February 12, 2007

Dixie Chicks Take Home 5 Grammys


My congratulations to the Dixie Chicks on winning 5 Grammys at last nights awards.
Well done ladies.

Wednesday, February 07, 2007

Canadian Weather (Toronto north to Barrie)

Photo courtesy of P. Catchpole, Keswick, Ontario

Above is a shot of Keswick, Ontario earlier today.
30 minutes south of there in Richmond Hill it is partly cloudy and not a lick of snow is falling.

Simply amazing.