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The global dominant narrative about China is wrong, claims Gordon Chang. Don't expect it to be the 'pocketbook of last resort' that will rescue world markets from their current malaise. And don't expect its remarkable economic growth to continue. In fact, expect a "hard landing" for China - and soon. Forbes.com columnist and international lawyer Gordon Chang has spent much of his time since the early 1980s working and living in China. His primary knowledge of the country and his relationships there give him a superior understanding to how its economy is actually faring than many analysts based in the...

The still-neutral Club for Growth weighs in on Herman Cain's polling surge, in a statement suggesting that Cain has a chance of winning over the powerful advocacy group: “Herman Cain is surging in the polls because his clear message of limited government and economic freedom is resonating,” said Club for Growth President Chris Chocola. “Cain has articulated a strong vision for putting America back on the path to prosperity. A clear message promoting economic growth, like the one Herman Cain is presenting, is essential to defeating Obama. Republican primary voters ought to give Herman Cain a close look. We are.”...

Texas congressman assesses damage in wake of market plunge Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas Acting as a "central economic planner," the Federal Reserve is moving the U.S. economy from one market bubble to another, and the next one will be a disaster, Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, told Michael Savage on the "Savage Nation" national radio show. After the collapse of the tech, housing and financial bubbles, Paul said, the "dollar bubble" will be next. "That's going to be the big one," the Texas congressman said on the heels of yesterday's worldwide market plummet, which saw the Dow lose more than 500...

Like most Freepers, I like to get my news and information online. Also, I am (as I suspect many Freepers are) a confirmed coffeeholic. There are few things more pleasurable than sitting down with a tall coffee -- extra cream, and Splenda or Stevia, please, I'm doing the Atkins diet -- and surfing through the web for the latest news and commentary. Free Republic is only one of my favorite sites. Within the last couple of weeks, I have noticed a great deal of time and attention being given to the ongoing debt limit negotiations in DC. Apparently the problem...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – A pair of NASA probes wandering in deep space discovered that the outer edge of the solar system contains curious magnetic bubbles and is not smooth as previously thought, astronomers said Thursday. The NASA Voyager twin spacecraft, which launched in 1977, are currently exploring the furthest outlays of the heliosphere, where solar wind is slowed and warped by pressure from other forces in the galaxy, the US space agency said. "Because the sun spins, its magnetic field becomes twisted and wrinkled, a bit like a ballerina's skirt," said astronomer Merav Opher of Boston University. "Far, far away...

The 2008 financial crash originated with a housing bubble. Not long ago, the cheap-money policies of the Federal Reserve, the infusion of trillions of dollars in new foreign investment, and the misguided policies of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae all conspired to extend to millions of Americans lots of easy credit for houses whose inflated prices they could hardly afford. Owning a house was seen as a “right” rather than the just rewards of household sacrifice, delayed gratification, and budgetary discipline. Builders, lenders, realtors, and bureaucrats all got in on the easy-money Ponzi scheme — until a few noticed that...

One week after moving into our new home, my wife became concerned with a new revelation. She had been out on our deck, enjoying a sunny spring day, when a pipe sticking three feet out of the ground began to spew bubbles. My reply? “Oh, it’s no big deal.”Ever notice, when folks have a problem on their hands, they often do not realize it? Or they minimize the problem, so they do not have to address it?Amo 4:10 I have sent among you the pestilence after the manner of Egypt: your young men have I slain with the sword, and...

We have been alerting you to the breakdown in the US long bond over the last several weeks and have noted that its collapse in price has serious implications for all of us. Judging solely by the price action in both the Ten year and the long bond, the Fed’s QE program, which was designed to hold down long term interest rates and thus spur lending particularly in an attempt to generate activity in the real estate sector, has proven to be an abject failure. Rates have gone up, not down. Combine that with a surfeit of houses due to...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Two huge, unexplained gamma ray emitting bubbles have been discovered at the center of the Milky Way galaxy, US astronomers said Tuesday. Masked by a fog of gamma rays that appears throughout the sky, the bubbles form a feature spanning 50,000 light-years and could be the remnant of a supersized black hole eruption or the outflows from a burst of star formation, the astronomers said. The structure spans more than half of the visible sky, from the constellation Virgo to the constellation Grus, and it may be millions of years old, the astronomers said in a paper...

...Unfortunately, America is being brainwashed by the mainstream media into believing there is a gold bubble. The truth is... the public in 2010 has purchased $2.7 billion worth of gold and $155 billion worth of bonds. Which one do you think is a bubble?

RICHMOND, Va., May 6 (Reuters) -- Richmond Federal Reserve Bank President Jeffrey Lacker said on Thursday he was not presently seeing any signs of bubbles in financial markets, but would be vigilant about not waiting too long to tighten monetary policy. "Right now, I don't see bubbles forming," Lacker said. "Having said that, count on it that I'll be vigilant about avoiding the error of waiting too long." He added that policymakers cannot stamp out all asset bubbles, but can use regulation to curb excessive risk-taking.

Why The Housing Bust Aftermath Means A V-Shaped Recovery Is Impossible This Year Dean Baker Feb. 3, 2010, 9:40 AM From Caixin: The U.S. economy will continue to be weighed down in 2010 by the after-effects of the bubble collapse in residential and non-residential real estate. This collapse, not the financial crisis that was sparked by the collapse, is the cause of the recession and the main factor suppressing growth. The fallout from the collapse of these bubbles virtually guarantees that 2010 will be a year of slow, and possibly negative, growth with 2011 offering little better prospects. The impact...

Another Warning Sign: China-Based, Singapore-Listed Firms Rapidly Collapsing Amidst Debt And Fraud Joe Weisenthal Jan. 24, 2010, 7:47 PM Here's a fascinating, just-out artcile in Hong Kong's South China Morning Post (sub req'd) about the collapse of Singapore-listed, mainland China-based firms that have collapsed amidst an inability to repay debt and fraud. Since late 2007, a spate of so-called S-chips - mainland companies listed on the Singapore exchange - have borrowed money then failed to repay the debts, with some becoming mired in fraud scandals. Of the 11 S-chips that issued convertible bonds between 2005 and 2008, six have declared...

China And The U.S.: Dysfunctional Real Estate Bubble Twins Charles Hugh Smith Jan. 22, 2010, 5:38 PM China and the U.S. share two central traits: a financial-command-economy and an addiction to cheap, easy money to prop up bubbles that serve the status quo. Despite the many obvious differences between the Chinese and American systems of governance and "capitalism," there are two key similarities. We might phrase this thusly: China's leadership has empowered specific strains of capitalism to serve the party's socialist goals, while the American leadership has socialized the mortgage/housing/banking sectors to serve its predatory-capitalist Masters (the financial-rentier Power Elite)....

... and what's worse, makes clear they won't stop - and why. Indeed, what James Bullard has done with this speech is both destroy the claims of Bernanke that low interest rates didn't cause the bubble (remember, Mr. Bullard is a Fed President) but at the same time he pulls down the curtain on exactly why The Fed ignores bubbles! Specifically, Bullard said: He noted that monetary policy necessarily affects asset prices and interest rates. “Historically this did not appear to create prolonged run-ups in asset prices, but changes in the recovery of employment in the past two recessions led...

Markets Bubble warning Markets are too dependent on unsustainable government stimulus. Something’s got to give THE effect of free money is remarkable. A year ago investors were panicking and there was talk of another Depression. Now the MSCI world index of global share prices is more than 70% higher than its low in March 2009. That’s largely thanks to interest rates of 1% or less in America, Japan, Britain and the euro zone, which have persuaded investors to take their money out of cash and to buy risky assets. For all the panic last year, asset values never quite reached...

NEW YORK (AP) -- A string of exploding investment bubbles that started with the dot-coms and ended with mortgages and oil dominated the years from 2000 to 2009. And it looks like the next decade will be no different. It doesn't seem to matter to many hedge fund traders and other professional investors that the Standard & Poor's 500 index has turned in its first losing performance over the course of a decade, having fallen 23 percent from 1,469.25 at the start of 2000 to its current 1,126.20. Or that they or other investors helped create and then destroy the...

China Acts To Calm Its Overheated Real Estate Sector - And Misdiagnoses the Problem by: Patrick Chovanec December 20, 2009 China’s leaders are becoming increasingly alarmed that a bubble may be forming in the country’s booming real estate sector. That’s why, late last week, they announced the reimposition of a nationwide property sales tax in an effort to rein in speculative buying. But while their intentions are sound, the new tax takes China in entirely the wrong direction, and is more likely to make the problem worse rather than better. To understand why, it’s important to realize what the new...

In 2010, as protectionism and the economic and social depression will gain momentum, a large number of States will be compelled to choose between three brutal options: inflation, high taxation or defaulting on their debt.

Germany’s new finance minister has echoed Chinese warnings about the growing threat of fresh global asset price bubbles, fuelled by low US interest rates and a weak dollar. Wolfgang Schäuble’s comments highlight official concern in Europe that the risk of further financial market turbulence has been exacerbated by the exceptional steps taken by central banks and governments to combat the crisis.

From The Wall Street Examiner comes this: Another anomaly of note is the fact that 10 year Fannie paper is now yielding less than 10 year Treasuries. This is another sign of mass psychosis. Unfortunately, the source of the infection has been Bernanke’s insane policy of piling up risky MBS paper on the Fed’s balance sheet. Wave after weekly wave of Fed buying has created one of the most ridiculous market distortions in history. Unfortunately, the problem it was designed to solve, the housing market collapse, isn’t responding. This is more than ridiculous. It is in fact outrageous. The GSEs...

10 Ways A China Blow-Up Will Slam America Vincent FernandoNov. 3, 2009, 8:50 AM Beware a surprise economic crash in China. The country is expanding like crazy, and while this may look great in the short term, there are many signs that the country's economic path is unsustainable. The government itself realizes the problem, but must balance the country's bubble concerns with the zealous economic expectations of its population, and most importantly, the massive need for job creation. It's also a huge country and the government has far less control over the economy than it would like to admit. Should...

As I have repeatedly noted, China has been blowing a bubble with easy credit. MarketWatch's Craig Stephen warns investors to be wary of a potential correction, at least in some sectors: Policy tightening could soon become the dominant market theme, meaning it's time for a rethink. After recent rate hikes in Australia and Norway, tightening is back on the agenda in many countries, including China. And with the U.S. just clocking up 3.5% annualized GDP growth for the third quarter, dollar bears will have something to think about. Nomura says its time to get a little more defensive in the...

One of the goals of proposed regulatory changes of the financial industry is — as President Obama has argued — to create "a 21st century regulatory framework to ensure that a crisis like this can never happen again": Yet can a government — whether run by Republicans or Democrats — really anticipate future bubbles or meltdowns? And if it could, would the government have the political will (or political power) to prevent future meltdowns? The last time that we had a recession as deep as the current one was in 1980-82 when a Federal Reserve induced credit crunch caused short...

With housing prices down 30+% on average over the last few years, is Uncle Sam blowing fresh air into the housing balloon and actually creating another housing bubble? I believe that’s exactly what is happening. If you are scratching your head and think I am off base with my assertion, please navigate this path along our economic landscape with me. What drove the housing bubble? Cheap rates and undisciplined lending from the private sector. What added to the bubble? The internal ‘hedge fund’ portfolios of Freddie Mac (NYSE:FRE) and Fannie Mae (NYSE:FNM). What is perpetuating the housing bubble if not...

MACKENZIE RIVER DELTA, Northwest Territories – Only a squawk from a sandhill crane broke the Arctic silence — and a low gurgle of bubbles, a watery whisper of trouble repeated in countless spots around the polar world. "On a calm day, you can see 20 or more `seeps' out across this lake," said Canadian researcher Rob Bowen, sidling his small rubber boat up beside one of them. A tossed match would have set it ablaze. "It's essentially pure methane." Pure methane, gas bubbling up from underwater vents, escaping into northern skies, adds to the global-warming gases accumulating in the atmosphere....

The death hadn't even been confirmed, the body not yet cold, before the comparisons were being made. The passing of Michael Jackson reignited the occasional debate about the King of Pop and Elvis Presley, "The King" of rock 'n' roll. In the hours after Jackson's passing, Canadian songbird Celine Dion claimed it felt "like when (President John) Kennedy died, when Elvis Presley died. We are not only talking about a talented person dying, it's an amazing loss." The articles analyzing the similarities between Jackson and Presley have been ubiquitous and inevitable. Even Billboard magazine editorial director Bill Werde declared, "The...

London, July 2 : Late King of Pop Michael Jackson's old friend Bubbles the chimp will not be attending his funeral. The ape will be kept 3,000 miles away when Jackson is laid to rest in California, and it will spend the day listening to "calming flute music" at the animal sanctuary in Wauchula, Florida, where it presently lives. "It is sad for Bubbles but it is better that he stays here," the Sun quoted a spokesman for the Centre For Great Apes as saying. He revealed that staff at the centre have "not said anything" to Bubbles about Jackson's...

JACKO'S chimpanzee pal Bubbles is missing his old friend - and could be the subject of a Hollywood movie and book, his owner claims. The 26-year-old is living at a sanctuary where he was taken in 2003 after becoming too aggressive. He is now healthier in mind and body and new owner Bob Dunn claims a mega-bucks deal is "on the table". Bob said: "There's a lot of interest. Bubbles has led an interesting life. There's lots to say." Jacko rescued Bubbles - his "child" - from a Texas cancer research centre in 1985. They were often seen together in...

So as it goes with major deaths tragic events. where were you and what were you doing when the king of pop Died today

Breaking AP Wires: Michael Jackson suffers major heart attack in Los Angeles...listed in critical condition...

At the very opening of the book, Bagehot illustrates with exquisite simplicity how, at least in a boom economy, traders on margin can "harass and press upon, if they do not eradicate, the old capitalist." The old capitalist in question is the poor sap who believes all this stuff about neither-a-borrower-nor-a-lender-be and is foolish enough to be using his own cash: "If a merchant have £50,000 all his own, to gain 10 per cent on it he must make £5,000 a year, and must charge for his goods accordingly; but if another has only £10,000, and borrows £40,000 by discounts...

A financial bubble. I will use the familiar term “bubble” as a shorthand, but note that it confuses cause with effect. A better, if ungainly, descriptor would be “asset-price hyperinflation”—the huge spike in asset prices that results from a perverse self-reinforcing belief system, a fog that clouds the judgment of all but the most aware participants in the market. Asset hyperinflation starts at a certain stage of market development under just the right conditions. The bubble is the result of that financial madness, seen only when the fog rolls away. is a market aberration manufactured by government, finance, and industry,...

Housing prices across Southern California plunged a record 27% in May, signaling that more trouble lies ahead for builders and lenders exposed to the region. Sales volume in the market fell 15% from a year ago, marking the slowest May in more than 20 years, according to DataQuick Information Systems. The median price fell to $370,000 from $505,000 in the counties of Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Diego and Ventura.Sales of foreclosed homes repossessed by lenders continue to dominate many of the inland markets, such as Riverside County, where foreclosure sales totaled 57% of all home sales volume,...

Alan Greenspan may be correct that a glut of global saving pumped up the housing bubble by keeping long-term interest rates low. If so, then watch out, because the situation has gotten worse: Foreign stockpiles of U.S. dollars are fatter and interest rates lower than at housing's zenith in 2005. Global central-bank reserves surged to a record $6.4 trillion in the fourth quarter of 2007, according to the International Monetary Fund, up from about $4 trillion in 2005. Those reserves are pouring into U.S. Treasury bonds for safekeeping. Foreigners held $2.32 trillion in Treasurys in the fourth quarter, compared with...

I ran out of dishwasher powder recently and thought I could substitute liquid Dawn instead. Well, now I've got massive bubbles and suds seeping out from underneath the dishwasher. I googled my idiocy and found the solution: run a COLD cycle with no soap. The problem is that this dishwasher can't run a cold water cycle. Any ideas how to solve this problem? Every time I start the dishwasher the suds return more vicious than before. And this all happened about a week ago. I've been washing all dishes by hand since then. Rip the dishwasher out and throw...

My blogs attract some very interesting readers due to their lack of real estate cheerleading. It has always been my intent to be direct, straightforward, present the facts, and let my readers make up their own minds about current Boise real estate market conditions and activity. I was recently asked by a major lender investigating loan fraud in the Boise real estate market to help analyze the number of vacant home listings in our market. This was the second time I have been contacted by a lender who subscribes to my blog who was looking into suspicious loans in the...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - For a man who insists he is not running for president, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg is the subject of much recent speculation. Newsweek's latest issue carries a cover story on the businessman-turned-mayor in which a top aide, Kevin Sheekey, refers to an independent Bloomberg presidential run: "If it happens, it's a billion-dollar campaign." The fact that Bloomberg is quoted in the same piece saying "I am not running for president" seemed to do little to calm the waters. Another news report analyzed his shifting answers -- moving from "I'm not running" to "I'm not a...

LONDON – The fate of the world economy hinges on what happens to house prices in America and that may not be a good thing, former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan said on Monday. Speaking at the Reuters headquarters in London, the former Fed chair delivered a gloomy prognosis on the state of the global economy – U.S. house prices are likely to fall further and they could drag the rest of the world with them. * * * “The critical variable in this judgement is the price of homes in the United States,” said Greenspan, who ran the U.S....

Fifty-three condominiums -- most of them in the 3900 block of Ohio Street in North Park-- will be on the block. The units are not foreclosures; they are brand-new units. They are being offered by REDC. The units were built by developer D.R. Horton. According to the company's Web site, the condos are anywhere from one-bedroom, one-bath, 694-square-foot units to two-bedroom, two-bath, 1,148-square-foot units. The homes have previously been valued at $309,990 will have starting bids of $149,000. Bidding for units previously valued at $546,900 will start at $249,000.

Back in the 17th century in the Netherlands, there was a mass rage for, of all things, tulip bulbs. Prices got bid way up, and speculators jumped in to bid them up higher still. By the peak of the tulip fever, a single bulb was going for the equivalent of thousands of dollars. But eventually the market fizzled and prices plunged. If I had been one of the people who invested in flowers during the frenzy, I would have felt bad to lose my money. But I like to imagine I would also have taken great comfort in seeing the...

Metro housing slide keeps repo man busy 'Snowball effect' from mortgage woes, easy credit keeps lot overflowing By TAMMY JOYNER The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Published on: 09/03/07 Swing by Richard Grosvenor's business for a closeup of how quickly the nation's housing market is unraveling. In the last six months, Grosvenor and his repo drivers have hauled in hundreds of vehicles in the course of normal business. Richard Grosvenor stands amongst repossessed vehicles, including a Corvette taken from a plumber (left), on his 3-acre lot at Speedy Recovery in Lithonia on August 29, 2007. With credit and mortgage problems rising, Grosvenor has...

NEW YORK - Bad credit has supplanted terrorism as the gravest immediate risk threatening the economy, a key national research group reported Monday. Borrowers' withering ability to pay their bills and the subsequent fallout in the credit markets this summer topped the list of short-term risks on peoples' minds, according to a survey of 258 members conducted by the National Association of Business Economics. NABE, a Washington-based association, said 32 percent of its surveyed members cited loan defaults and excessive debt as their biggest near-term concern. Only 20 percent of members cited defense and terrorism as their biggest immediate worry,...

Often, a big financial house will create its own hedge funds, specifically for the purpose of digesting risky tranches of mortgage debt. The hedge fund raises some capital…and then typically borrows additional money in order to leverage its returns... Anyone who would lend money to something called the High-Grade Structured Credit Strategies Enhanced Leverage Fund deserves the indigestion he gets. No nation should know what goes into its laws, its sausages or its CDO's. Indeed, most of the time, the contents are of no interest to anyone. But once in a while, a little curiosity pays off. Here, we poke...

Beverly Sills, the Brooklyn-born opera diva who was a global icon of can-do American culture with her dazzling voice, bubbly personality and management moxie in the arts world, died Monday of cancer, her manager said. She was 78. It had been revealed just last month that Sills was gravely ill with inoperable lung cancer. Beyond the music world, Sills gained fans worldwide with a style that matched her childhood nickname, Bubbles. The relaxed, red-haired diva appeared frequently on TV talk shows, on "The Tonight Show," "The Muppet Show" and in televised performances with her friend Carol Burnett. Together, they did...

KABUL, Afghanistan, June 5 — The Afghan Defense Ministry said Tuesday that a boat full of fleeing Taliban fighters had been fired upon by NATO helicopters and sunk in the Helmand River, in southern Afghanistan. All on board, between 20 and 30 guerrillas, drowned, said Gen. Zaher Azimi, a ministry spokesman. It was the second sinking on the river reported in recent days. Another boat, carrying about 60 people, sank Saturday in the same area, although there were conflicting reports as to whether those aboard had been civilians or Taliban fighters. General Azimi said that in Tuesday’s episode, NATO helicopters...

MORTGAGE DELINQUENCIES RISING SHARPLY; EAST SIDE OF SAN JOSE IS A TROUBLE SPOT Sarah Portales wants to keep paying her mortgage on time, but she's got a problem. Her monthly payments are $3,500 and her income is slightly less than that. All the efforts this San Jose custodial supervisor has made to find a way to refinance her loan into something she can afford have so far led nowhere. Portales is the face of a problem that is troubling the real estate market in San Jose and across the country: As the residential market flattens and lending standards grow tougher,...

Buyers looking for quick turnover, fast profit losing gamble in Nevada LAS VEGAS — In the rampant real estate speculation of the Las Vegas valley three years ago, people lined up outside Pulte Homes sales offices overnight as if they were waiting for the release of the latest video game console or hot new movie. Having seen his house in an upscale part of suburban Henderson, Nev., jump $200,000 in value in 18 months, Sam Schwartz felt he couldn't miss any part of the boom. He spent the night in the parking lot with TV, snacks and drinks, along with...

A man arrested in December at the Kansas City airport with $70,000 in his bulging pockets while trying to board a Southwest Airlines flight claiming the money was actually Muslim prayer books, a San Francisco mortgage company executive who went on the run from the FBI in November, seven people arrested in September in Salt Lake City with ties to al-Qaeda, and a co-defendant in the Sami al-Arian/Palestinian Islamic Jihad trial all have one thing in common – the growing trend of terrorist associations with mortgage fraud rings in the US. Financial experts say that mortgage fraud has become the...

A white-collar crime wave is raking Chicago's poorest communities, robbing vulnerable families of their homes and draining billions of dollars from the U.S. economy. During the last five years, as home loans became easier than ever to get and identity theft blossomed, mortgage fraud surged. FBI officials say it now threatens to become a national financial epidemic. Gang members call it "the new street hustle." "If you are still making money selling drugs, you are an informant or about to be busted. Mortgage fraud is the thing to do now," said convicted identity thief Christopher Scott in a prison interview....