Wednesday, September 18, 2013

Pop, fizz, ...

Moral: Wherein we see more spiking of the bowl as Ben must want to go out with a bang.

Realistically, are some goats being led to slaughter?


Snaps from Market Watch

Savers? Still being slapped silly.

Remarks:

07/22/2015 -- Some of these are, now, poster boys.

12/19/2013 -- Ben did his parting shot (whimper that it was); they're going to taper slowly, less than a 1/8th on the bond buy, starting next month. And, he's going to torture savers for another year or so. We'll have to see how the pieces fall. The markets got heavily seeded today in hopes of luring in the idiots and moms/pops (who cannot afford the pending losses). So, it's pop, fizz, ..., again. Too, we'll see more goo-goo talk to the immature markets and the addicted investors thereof. One of many technical issues that we'll have to get into: Nanex's view.

09/29/2013 -- Appealing to sociology?

09/28/2013 -- Obviously, the glee abated as several days of negative gains ensued. And, some Fed people got to doing their soothing talk (oh, 2014, before tapering, slowly, and no interest for the savers for years - they say). Stopping to get more information before going further. For instance, we have all sorts of viewpoints to consider, such as Matt Levine (talking about Schneiderman), Kid Dynamite (July 9th rant and discussion - shows how far behind I am), and more.

09/19/2013 -- All's not lost. Some accountants see a change that is problematic. But, first, savers are more than just risk averse; they put their actions where their mouth is by being prudent. Now, that was once considered a virtue; in fact, one could argue that it was expected for fiscal responsibility. However, some claim that accounting has removed prudence in lieu of theoretical nonsense leading to annual reports that are incomprehensible. Actually, the computer can make things such, too, so the whole bit that underpins our world seems to have been given a shaky basis (on purpose, to allow rooking the people? - or, through stupidity?). Of course, the side that argues that prudence is quaint (well, it seems to be for quants) is vocal, too. But, we have China asking prudence of Ben and the Fed?

09/19/2013 -- The real irony of Ben is that he's holding down interest rates, for what? He came in under a Republican regime, supposedly the lovers of "free" economics. "Free" as in more natural and market, rather than the heavy hand of government. It didn't take him long to set an unnatural rate. Think of it, Ben. What he has set up is a perpetually subsidized system. Which is good for the borrowers. But, what do they learn when they get further into debt with easy money? And, who would lend money at such low rates (without the subsidy making up some difference)? ..., Ben would rather have us play the ca-pital-sino than to have a reasonable interest rate. I'm not asking for much, but he didn't have to go below 1%. Sheesh. There is no rationale that he can offer that would make sense. Ben has to realize that the gaming of the market moves money from the savers, and the luckless, and into the pockets of those who run the system and are lucky. What the heck kind of economy is that? Look at your heritage, Ben, is you want to see how to frame the proper view. ... Ah, markets, that magical thing of the invisible hand (Ben really knows deeply either how close to crap that is or, if he dug deep enough, he would see the Hand of God - wait, he cannot go there due to the growth of secularization thanks to all sorts of factors -- but, if he did see Yahweh's influence, he would have to know that slapping saves silly so that the spoiled can have it their way is not the proper way). Another aspect of importance is the insistence that they're data driven as if their model provides sufficient ability to do such. Sheesh, Ben. Your data didn't do any good before the fact. That is, you were mouthing that things were okay right before they fell apart. So, we're to expect that you are more wise now. The issue is that Ben, and his crew, need to use their brains and knowledge. Data driven is not a silver bullet. In fact, in a lot of cases such methods result in down-right inhumane results. We'll have to explain that further. But, it'll be too late to help Ben (I wonder what he thinks of intuition - which is what we're paying him to use, given his roles as oracle, et al - don't blame the stupid computer and its data model, Ben).

09/18/2013 -- Pop, fizz, ... Ben had to show largess because of idiots who ran the economy to the ground (rogues all around). Ben is going. What do we have to look forward to? Businessweek has a review issue (of the past five years). Several articles are especially interesting. Too, phrasing shines: spin dross into gold (in relation to mortgage bonds). Perhaps, we'll get back to some of the more pertinent ones, at some point. If we do, it would be to bring forward what has been said here, from the beginning. To wit? Tranche and trash (WSJ has a good take on that). Securitization? This article brings on weeping (one example of the misuse of mathematics and computing that has been harped about). Adoption, and improved understanding, of lazy evaluation let loose the powers that resulted in the wild web and its little children, namely social media and more. To grasp the problem, we have to go back to computing that is in some type of responsible area. Avionics comes to mind. If what is couched as software in looser domains (financial engineering? -- looser?, yes bailouts are the norm despite all of the protestations of the ruling elite; or the whole cadre of the poorer folk can just suck it up when there are problems in order to relieve the fat cats' loss) were to used in flight controls, would we not have planes falling out of the sky? We'll get back to the simple issues that seem to not be seen by the elites chasing after the bucks that Ben has been throwing out of his helicopter.

Modified: 07/22/2015

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