Ailing Banks May Require More Aid to Keep Solvent

Via: NY Times


Two smart and meticulous financial analysts - Reggie Middleton and Mish - argue that Wells Fargo is insolvent. In yesterday's update to his June 11, 2008 analysis, Reggie shows that the lion's share of Wells Fargo's assets are in mortgages in the California, Florida and Arizona markets, which are all tanking. Mish, who has also been covering Wells for a long time, wrote on February 2nd that Wells is drowning in loan defaults, and has hidden staggering amounts of toxic losses off of its balance sheets, just like Citigroup: [Despite its claim that it is saving mortgages by reworking their terms,] 30% of Wells Fargo's reworked mortgage loans are 90 days past due or longer, one year after loan modification.

Banks in Florida, Maryland and Utah are being closed, this trend continues...

By Ari Levy

Jan. 31 (Bloomberg) -- Banks in Florida, Maryland and Utah were closed yesterday as regulators wrapped up the busiest month for failures since the housing slump began in 2006. Ocala National Bank in Florida and Suburban Federal Savings Bank of Crofton, Maryland, were shut by federal regulators, according to statements sent by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. MagnetBank of Salt Lake City was seized by the Utah Department of Financial Institutions. The banks had total assets of $876.4 million and deposits of $790 million. Six banks have failed this month as tumbling home prices and a 16-year high in unemployment boost foreclosures. The FDIC classified 171 banks as “problem” in the third quarter, a 46 percent jump from the previous period amid the worst housing crisis since the Great Depression.

Entire Bloomberg Article, CLICK HERE

Adolf Merkle: Many prominent billionaires/millionaires are committing suicide?

The 74-year-old Billionaire died when he lunged in front of a train.


Not too long ago I wrote an article entitled The Rich are feeling the pinch and only one month later my predictions became even more revealing. This story of German Billionaire Adolf Merckle has been in the news for a few days now. But I wanted to take time to elaborate on this trend of Rich people falling on hard times, and just how much more of this we can expect to see.

His Empire was falling apart...



Mr. Merckle - whose estimated $9.2-billion fortune ranked him 94th on Forbes' list of the world's richest people, and ranked as Germany's fifth-richest person. In today's economy he became just like everyone else, desperately seeking emergency financing from a group of more than 30 banks led by Commerzbank AG, Deutsche Bank AG, Royal Bank of Scotland and the Landesbank Baden-Wuerttemberg.

This man's empire spanned the cement, machinery and drug industries. What kills me...is that he owed about 5 billion in debts, and just like in my previous article I had mentioned that for some wealthy people, dropping from billionaire to multi-millionaire is just too much to bear despite the intrinsic monetary values that these companies still have.



The Merckle family - stakes in Heidelberg Cement, Germany's biggest cement maker, Phoenix Pharmahandel, a drug wholesaler, and Ratiopharm GmbH, a generic drug maker, these were powerful conglomerates with assets well beyond projected worth. I've spoken with a few of my friends in the mental-health profession and they've all told me that Merckle is one of many in a lengthening list of high-profile investors around the world to take their own lives. Merckle's livelihood was certainly not threatened by his risky investments, but he was threatened by shame, a loss of face in society and a loss of honour.

Now it's left to the trickle down effect that will be felt as a result of his death, and his shares and companies being sold to creditors will plummet his entire life's work, already his building-materials supplier, based in Heidelberg, slid as much as 13%. Mr Merckle started his climb in 1967 at a time when his company had only 80 employees and 4 million deutsche marks (US$2.5-million) in sales, too bad he couldn't remember those times...and use it as his motivation again.

A lesson for all aspiring entrepreneurs...

New York investor Bernard Madoff is making alot of people...well, Mad!!!

Bernard Madoff, who was arrested in December and charged with securities fraud, oversaw a fund that managed capital for investors of varying income, hedge funds, banks and institutions including foundations, pension funds and charities. He fooled them for more then a decade...







Kevin Bacon


Hollywood actor Kevin Bacon and his actress wife Kyra Sedgwick are the latest people to have lost money on investments connected to accused swindler Bernard Madoff, according to media reports and according to Bacon's representative, Allen Eichorn.

Madoff is accused of running a purported $50 billion dollar global scheme in which earlier investors were paid off with investments from newer clients. Scores of wealthy people, universities and charities all over the world are claiming to be victims of massive fraud, though the exact amount of money lost is not yet known, this is being considered one of the largest frauds in Wall Street history.

Precious Metals is the ONLY real currency, what did you think paper money was backed by?

A picture of 'Mansa Musa' holding a Gold Nugget, this was when trade roots extended all throughout Africa; and you couldn't survive unless you could barter something, and if you had a skill that was IN DEMAND then you'd get payment in gold.



I’ll only venture to guess that we could see a monster financial crash, sometime in 2009. To some extent, all currencies are now free-falling together, some at slightly faster rates than others, but the situation of the U.S. dollar is so grotesquely dire, and it's structural imbalances so monumental, that it is hard to imagine that U.S currency will not win the international race to the bottom. Gold resumed its movement upward against the dollar a week before Christmas, and that may be an early sign. Even Microsoft is said to have laid off 17% of its workforce, this was reported as recently as January 2 2009 - www.mediapost.com

Greater minds then I, who were themselves conservative estimate analysts of the financial problem are now full-out saying with me that we are in a depression, not a recession, but yes...a depression.

The reason why you can't fathom that we are in a depression is because you probably can't imagine the depression in any other way but in black and white just like this picture below, so for you the depression isn't real to you yet, but you will see it sooner then you think...



Sprott Asset Management is a very reputable financial source of information, I encourage you all to read this article because I was shocked to see such straight talk from a financial investment leader being very candid about what we all gotta hear more of Click here

All great republics throughout history cherished sound money. This meant that the monetary unit was a commodity of honest weight and purity. When money was sound, civilizations were found to be more prosperous and freedom thrived. The less free a society becomes, the greater the likelihood its money is being debased and the economic well-being of its citizens diminished.

-- An example below...

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - The U.S. dollar's value is dropping so fast against the euro that small currency outlets in Amsterdam are turning away tourists seeking to sell their dollars for local money while on vacation in the Netherlands.

"Our dollar is worth maybe zero over here," said Mary Kelly, an American tourist from Indianapolis, Indiana, in front of the Anne Frank house. "It's hard to find a place to exchange. We have to go downtown, to the central station or post office."

That's because the smaller currency exchanges -- despite buy/sell spreads that make it easier for them to make money by exchanging small amounts of currency -- don't want to be caught holding dollars that could be worth less by the time they can sell them.

The dollar hovered near record lows on Monday, with one euro worth around $1.58 versus $1.47 a month ago.

Hope you guys see what I see coming...

Six banks with $540 billion in bailout money still flying 27 corporate jets

Pig-Headed Corporate Policies


Old habits still die slowly, and take a long time to change. Of the money already spent from the corporate bailout, an estimated $540 billion went to six financial institutions, and the money is being used in part, to operate 27 corporate jets. I may be the only one who feels this way, but I don't think the survival of the global economy depends on using taxpayer money to pay for financial executives to fly on their own corporate jets.

Here are the six financial institutions and the amount of taxpayer money they received and the number of corporate jets they're still flying:



- American International Group Inc (NYSE: AIG). $150 billion, seven corporate jets

- Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C). $330 billion, four jets. (The $340 billion includes Citi's initial $25 billion in TARP money plus its more recent $305 billion in loan guarantees.)

- Wells Fargo & Co. (NYSE: WFC). $25 billion, one jet

- Bank of America (NYSE: BAC). $25 billion, nine jets -- its CEO Ken Lewis used $127,643 worth of its corporate jets

- JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM) . $25 billion, four jets -- its CEO Jamie Dimon's personal use of its corporate aircraft totaled $211,182 in 2007 Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS). $10 billion, two jets -- its CEO John Mack's personal use of its

- Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS). $10 billion, two jets -- its CEO John Mack's personal use of its corporate aircraft totaled $358,882 in 2007



Factor in the amount that will be paid in bonuses to executives, even though the bonuses for 2008 will be down by 50%, that amounts to about $16.6 billion worth of taxpayer money going to the very people who already got a boost from the U.S government. I've heard people trying to defend the indefensible by arguing that their executive play toys are flying offices. If trimming down their operations is part of the conditions of the bailout, then they can start by flying first class on a commercial flight or sit in their offices and use online video-conferencing instead of flying - and that's free advice...lol

Take a page from out of Diddy's book...