| Submit your comments on this article | |
| Home Front Economy | |
| Timeline of the financial crunch | |
| 2008-10-04 | |
Here are some key dates: January 11 - Bank of America pays $4 billion for Countrywide Financial after the mortgage lender goes bust when risky loans to shaky borrowers fail. | |
| Posted by:lotp |
| #3 The key event for me was the first week of August 2007, when 2 Bear Stearns hedge funds declared bankruptcy, costing investors $1.6 billion. The two funds were highly leveraged in mortgage-backed securities, and were two of the most prominent funds affected by the sub-prime mortgage meltdown. Over the next week stock markets continued their decline in reaction to these further developments: * The Bear Stearns CFO said this was the worst credit market he had seen in 22 years. * Standard & Poor's cut Bear Stearns credit rating to negative, stating that its mismanagement of hedge funds left it liable to investor lawsuits. * The Co-President, Warren Stearns, resigned. The news articles about this event informed me about the gross excesses of the housing bubble and the extreme vulnerability of the economy to overleveraged institutions like Bear Stearns. That was when I decided to sell out everything I had in stocks & go into CD's, Treasury paper & banks. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2008-10-04 16:15 |
| #2 The Dems were responsible for the Community Reinvestment Act back in Jimmy Carter's day, in 1995, Janet Reno ruled it would be discriminating if loans weren't given to illegal immigrants. Republican free traders like importing cheap immigrant labor and outsourcing to cut costs, leading to open border policies and deregulation and elimination of any ethical oversight. Money launderers/speculators have driven up the cost of housing with lots of excess money from the drug trade and all of us were very comfortable with the "prosperity" this revenue brought to Main St. When the US got serious about immigration and law enforcement, plus the successful tracking of FARC/terror financing, the fancy bookkeeping became apparent. Refinancing legitimate mortgages for primary residences would help the taxpayers, but bailouts for speculators is ridiculous. We can't legislate morality, but the greedy swindlers should suffer the consequences of their own doing. Unfortunately, we all have to collectively suffer and can only delay is a little by this bail-out. Pelosi looked so pleased with herself signing the bill and presenting it as though she had saved us all from ruin. Taking credit without taking the blame pegs the failing & contradictory policies of the last few decades and it will be a long time undoing this mess. Finding necessary funds for Defense and Homeland Security will take a miracle and the bad guys know it. I am thinking of investing in the Lakota Industries Palin bow to hunt turkeys.... |
| Posted by: Danielle 2008-10-04 13:28 |
| #1 Cavuto was just (dunno why..) interviewing Jesse Jackson about the meltdown and mortgage crisis. He kept asking if "personal responsibility" could be part of the blame game, and Jesse acted like he didn't understand what those words meant - LOLZ |
| Posted by: Frank G 2008-10-04 10:17 |