[TigerLikesRooster]

Ping!

[BurbankKarl]

What is the old saying? You won’t see who is naked until the tide goes out? Well, I say its heading toward old tide soon.

[2ndDivisionVet]

If I knew the Fed would give me $250 million to buy Bear, I’d have applied for the deal!

[Proud_USA_Republican]

Anyone in need of some office space in mid-town Manhattan? 1,200,000 sq feet of it just came on the market.

[glorgau]

Bear shareholders will essentially be wiped out in this close-out sale,

Yeah, but the executive suite doesn't have to give back the billions in "performance bonuses" that they pocketed. They would have had to if bankruptcy were declared.

[Racer1]

Its still too early to say what Cayne and the other insiders lost yet. I’ll bet there was some payment of some kind in the agreement. Even if they lost everything Cayne and company had been milking the company for years. Cayne if I remember correctly sold some stock last year while it was up.

[Jimmy Valentine]

Give it a year or two and JP Morgan Chase will realize a huge gain on the orderly liquidation of thos mortgage backed securities. The average life of a residential mortgage is still under ten years with home sales and refinances paying out most of this paper.

[2ndDivisionVet]

Inflation Blues sung by B.B. King

Hey Mr. President
All your congressmen, too
You got me frustrated
And I don’t know what to do
I’m trying to make a living
I can’t save a cent
It takes all of my money
Just to eat and pay my rent
I got the blues
Got those inflation blues

You know, I’m not one
Of those high brows
I’m average Joe to you
I came up eating cornbread
Candied yams and chicken stew
Now you take that paper dollar
It’s only that in name
The way that buck has shrunk
It’s a lowdown dirty shame
That’s why I got the blues
Got those inflation blues

Mr. President
Please cut the price of sugar
I wanna make my coffee sweet
I wanna smear some butter on my bread
And I just got to have my meat
When you start rationing
You really played the game
And things are going up
And up and up and up
And my check remains the same
That’s why I got the blues
Got those inflation blues

[palmer]

Meantime, he gets the Fed to backstop Bear's riskiest paper. We don't know the quality of that paper -- and we hope the Fed has done its due diligence -- but taxpayers are now on the hook for future losses.

Straw man. Incredibly, or maybe not incredibly, they use this token amount as an excuse to lower rates more. They will be the last people on the planet to admit that lower rates are the problem, not the solution. If the Fed has to pour in 100 billion or a trillion to keep the financial system from unraveling, then they should do so. But they must stop lowering rates, that will only result in risky securities, speculation and bigger problems later.

Mises was right, either we pay for this mess now with taxpayer cash and recession, or we destroy the currency. There are no other choices.

[mewzilla]

Bear naked spenders....

BEAR STEARNS & CO INC POLITICAL CAMPAIGN COMMITTEE FKA BEAR STEARNS PCC

[Gritty]

Let's hope the biggest losers are Bear Stearns shareholders, not American taxpayers.

My bet is it will be the taxpayers. I hope I'm wrong but I doubt it.

[DungeonMaster]

It seems like it was greedy banks making bad loans that caused the great depression.

[avg_freeper]

And if I had a million dollars - if I had a million dollars
Well, I'd buy you an exotic pet - yep, like a llama or an emu

[Toddsterpatriot]

This new risk-taking is an extraordinary expansion of the Fed's traditional crisis role, and not one to be taken lightly. In talking to central bank veterans yesterday, we were told the Fed has never taken a material loss. Even as a lender of last resort, the central bank has always made sure it had appropriate collateral.

Hmmmmm......