PDA

View Full Version : AIG: The Looting Continues ~ Karl Denninger


peaceandlove
07-19-2009, 02:23 AM
AIG: The Looting Continues

Friday, July 17. 2009
Posted by Karl Denninger

No wonder The Fed was threatening Congress when asked about audits - it might expose the underlying realities of something like this: AIG’s European Derivatives May Take Decades to Expire http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aXu5aUboayJY

European banks including Societe Generale SA and BNP Paribas SA hold almost $200 billion in guarantees sold by New York-based AIG allowing the lenders to reduce the capital required for loss reserves. The firms may keep the contracts to hedge against declining assets rather than canceling them as AIG said it expects the banks to do, according to David Havens, managing director at investment bank Hexagon Securities LLC.

$200 billion dollars for foreign banks that we, the taxpayer, have now backstopped through The Fed with zero oversight or approval by Congress?

These aren't even American businesses!

The average weighted length of the European swaps protecting residential loans is more than 25 years, while the span tied to corporate loans is about 6 years, AIG said in a regulatory filing. Contracts covering corporate loans in the Netherlands extend almost 45 years, and the swaps on mortgages in Denmark, France and Germany mature in more than 30 years.

So now we, the American Taxpayer, are backstopping mortgages in Netherlands, Denmark, France and Germany?

Remember this?

*URGENT* BAILOUT BILL SELLS US TO CHINA (UPDATED)

VIDEO (1:50): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ONUSxiGN4m4&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fmarket%2Dticker%2Edenninger%2Ene t%2Farchives%2F1230%2DAIG%2DThe%2DLooting%2DContin ues%2Ehtml&feature=player_embedded

Now you know why, and what The Fed and Treasury have done - in black and white.

You have been robbed America, and now they intend to steal $200 billion more - to bail out not Americans but foreigners.

Tell me again why we're doing this, and why people aren't in prison?

SOURCE: http://market-ticker.denninger.net/archives/1230-AIG-The-Looting-Continues.html

peaceandlove
07-19-2009, 02:28 AM
Well, I'll throw this one in too, since it's a Karl Denninger Commentary

What Are They Smoking?

Friday, July 17. 2009
Posted by Karl Denninger

This is not "good news": U.S. housing starts up 2nd straight month in June http://www.marketwatch.com/story/us-housing-starts-up-2nd-straight-month-in-june

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - New construction of U.S. houses expanded for the second straight month in June after hitting a record low in April, the Commerce Department estimated Friday. Starts rose 3.6% in June to a seasonally adjusted 582,000 annualized units stronger than the 531,000 pace expected by economists surveyed by MarketWatch. This is the highest level of starts since last November. Starts of new single-family homes rose by 14.4% to 470,000 in June, while starts of large apartment units fell 29.4% to 101,000. Building permits, a leading indicator of housing construction, rose 8.7% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 563,000. This is the highest level of permits since December.

How do you sell down the existing inventory, including the hidden inventory of foreclosures, when these fools are still building houses?

I get it - its summer, that's when you break ground on houses. This allows you to get the framing and exterior up before it gets cold and snows.

But we have millions of homes that have been foreclosed or will be foreclosed, and we have an insane amount of existing "listed" supply on the market. In the apartment/condo marketplace in some markets there is literally five or more years of supply! Go down to Miami and take a drive around at night - brand new buildings, open, occupied, with four or five lights on at night.

Really.

Building more into this sort of market environment is criminally insane. It is guaranteed to destroy the comparable values due to competition and will absolutely decimate lenders who are holding back foreclosures instead of putting them on the market.

The futures spiked a fair bit on this news release, but you have to wonder why anyone would consider this "bullish" news? Bullish for who? Foreclosure lawyers? Courthouse fees?

It is truly unbelievable that builders would be ramping construction into this market environment. I thought I had seen everything stupid under the sun, but this, among all else, takes the cake, even though these figures are coming off deeply depressed levels.

We need less construction, not more, until we clear the excess inventory - this sort of "build into a severe inventory overhang" is how you go bankrupt - with certainty.

What lending institutions are funding this sort of thing? Where are the bank regulators? The FDIC and OCC? The Fed?

SLEEPING (AGAIN), THAT'S WHERE!

I smell lots (hundreds) of bank failures about a year down the road out of this when that inventory is unable to be sold and the construction loans default.

I'm stunned - literally.

SOURCE: http://market-ticker.denninger.net/archives/1229-What-Are-They-Smoking.html