Pimco, a Newport Beach-based investor in bonds, is one of four companies that will help the Federal Reserve buy up to $500 billion in securities backed by mortgages in an effort to ease the credit crunch. The others are BlackRock Inc., Goldman Sachs Asset Management, and Wellington Management Company.
The four companies will buy and hold [...]
GMAC, the owner of Ditech.com in Costa Mesa and a lender to buyers of General Motors’ cars, is getting $5 billion from the U.S. government, the Treasury Department said today.
The Associated Press reports the move will help GMAC avoid bankruptcy but also limit General Motors control over the company. GM previously sold a 51% stake [...]
(Update: Earlier call by Dean Baker.)
The other day I stumbled across an opinion piece that asks this question: In a world where — taking just one example — The Women, Infants and Children nutrition program costs about $750 a head, does it make sense to spend taxpayer funds to help people avoid foreclosure, if they [...]
From the NY Times: A Renter’s Market for Manhattan Offices
Even to industry veterans who have lived through other downturns, the precipitous decline in the Manhattan office market, especially in Midtown, has been startling.
“We have fallen further faster than any time in the last 20 years,” said Mitchell S. Steir, chief executive of Studley, a national [...]
A few more vacation days … I’ll be back soon.
Hopefully next week I’ll be moving to the new JS-Kit commenting system. This should help with improving the quality of the comments. For those interested, check on Mish’s site.
Intermittent posting continues …
Best to all
From the NY Times: Breaking Up Is Harder to Do After Housing Fall
With nearly one in six homes worth less than the mortgage owed on it, according to Moody’s Economy.com, divorce lawyers and financial advisers around the country say the logistics of divorce have been turned around. “We used to fight about who gets to [...]
From the WSJ: Case-Shiller Index Shows Sharpest Home-Price Declines in Sun Belt
Home prices continued to drop as the economic downturn deepened further in October, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller home-price indexes, a closely watched gauge of U.S. home prices, with home prices in the Sun Belt continuing to be hit hardest.
“The bear market continues; home prices [...]
From the WSJ: U.S. Deepens Involvement With GMAC Move
The U.S. government Monday deepened its involvement in the U.S. automotive industry by committing $6 billion to stabilize GMACLLC, a financing company vital to the future of struggling carmaker General MotorsCorp.
In a sign that the government’s role in the industry could become open ended, Treasury said late [...]
Some more discussion in the comments … I’ll post tonight. Posting will be intermittent for the next few days.
I’m hiking at the Canyon de Chelly in Arizona today. I’ll post later today …
