Daily Digest
Daily Digest 5/17 - The Moral Hazard Of 'Too Big To Fail', Judge Blocks Controversial NDAA, North Sea Gas Leak Stopped
by Daily Digest
Thursday, May 17, 2012, 10:40 AM
- Bill Black: On JP Morgan's "Hedge", Jamie Dimon's Integrity, and the Epic Conflicts of Interest in the Federal Reserve System
- Why Plunging Commodity Prices Are Ominous For Stock Market
- Hot Money Bets Backed By Taxpayers: The Extreme Moral Hazard of 'Too Big To Fail' - Credibilty Trap
- Breaking: Judge Blocks Controversial NDAA
- Greece Can No Longer Delay Eurozone Exit
- Total Finally Stop Gas Leak at North Sea Well
- Debris Possibly From Japanese Tsunami Floating Up Strait Of Juan De Fuca
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Economy
Bill Black: On JP Morgan's "Hedge", Jamie Dimon's Integrity, and the Epic Conflicts of Interest in the Federal Reserve System (Jaime)
If you have distressed European debt, you are supposed to have already reserved against the losses in it. So why hedge the position at all? Just sell it. Get rid of these incredibly risky assets before they can suffer any additional losses. If you already have losses, it is not necessary to recognize a loss, because you have already reserved for it. So, you should not have had to hedge, period.
Why Plunging Commodity Prices Are Ominous For Stock Market (David B.)
As a five-year chart of the CRB Index of Commodity Prices shows, declining commodity prices usually indicate demand for goods is dropping and the economy is in trouble, which in turn is a problem for the stock market.
Hot Money Bets Backed By Taxpayers: The Extreme Moral Hazard of 'Too Big To Fail' - Credibilty Trap (adam)
That is the problem one faces when the public is apathetic, and the political leadership is composed of cynically pragmatic dealmakers and shallow but ardent ideologues driven by narrow personal expediency, not firmly rooted in history, moral principles, and stewardship for the broader public trust.
Breaking: Judge Blocks Controversial NDAA (Thomas C.)
At a hearing in March, three of the plaintiffs testified that the possibility of government repression under the NDAA made them reconsider how they approached their journalism and activism.
Guardian journalist Naomi Wolf read testimony from Jonsditir, who prepared a statement saying that she would not visit the U.S. for fear of detention.
Greece Can No Longer Delay Eurozone Exit (jdargis)
In the recent elections, Tsipras' Syriza party advanced to become the second-largest political force in the country, and Tsipras is making sure his gray-faced opponents from the Greek political establishment know it. Surrounded by cameras and microphones, he stood in the Athens government district last Tuesday, put on his winner's smile and called upon the two traditional parties, the center-left Socialists (PASOK) and the conservative New Democracy, to send a letter "to the EU leadership" and cancel the bailout deal that Athens made with the EU and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Tsipras knows what many Greeks are thinking. At the end of last week, his poll numbers rose to a new record level of almost 28 percent.
Total Finally Stop Gas Leak at North Sea Well (James S.)
Yves-Louis Darricarrere, the president of exploration and production at Total, announced that, “today a major turning point has been achieved. Our absolute priority was to stop the gas leak safely and as quickly as possible. We shall now fully complete the on-going task and take into account the lessons learnt from this incident.”
Debris Possibly From Japanese Tsunami Floating Up Strait Of Juan De Fuca (VeganD)
The buoy found by the Taylor family is nearly identical to one discovered on a Neah Bay beach in October that was traced to an oyster farming area in the hardest-hit part of the Japanese coastline by the March 2011 subduction quake and giant tsunami, which together resulted in 15,854 deaths.
A growing pile of marked floats is stored at the Dungeness refuge, said Falzetti, who said he is starting to become concerned about sensitive island seabird habitats.
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