Saw this courtesy of Calculated Risk…..

Joan Shaffer is turning in the keys of the north Phoenix Tatum Ranch home she bought with her daughter in late 2005. They put nothing down on the home, took out a loan that let them pay less than they owed each month and now their loan is $200,000 more than the house is worth.

“We paid $585,000. It was the peak of the market, but no one told us,” said Shaffer, a real-estate agent from Colorado. “We would probably have to spend the next 20 years trying to get right on the mortgage. That’s crazy.”

As Calculated Risk said “It’s amusing that she is a real estate agent.” He has such a gift for understatement.

On a more serious note, I saw a link to this discussion thread in the comments of CR post. The discussion is about the morality of just walking away from ones mortgage and it takes place on a forum for mortgage brokers. I recommend that everyone take the time to least skim the thread. The perspective of the people who where involved in making these loans is very interesting.

Monster Cables is one of those companies that relies on lawyers to make money because it is easier than relying on the quality of their goods and services. In other words, they like to sue other companies on dubious trademark grounds.

While we feel that the behavior of companies like Monster Cables is proof that are legal system needs reforming, we must admit that part of the problem is general cowardice on the part of victims. So often companies decided to settle over these dubious claims rather than fight because it cost less in the short term and is less “risky”. But of course, this only encourages the bullies continue with their misuse of the law.

Happily, Blue Jeans Cable is not one of those who are inclined to roll over. Here is Blue Jeans Cable’s response to Monster Cables. Make sure you read the last three paragraphs even the the rest of the rant is to much for you.

At a meeting on Friday afternoon, P.B. introduced to some of the supervisors a template for creating work instructions. I regret that I once again demonstrated my talent for being an obnoxious questioner. I questioned whether there was really the political will to accomplish the arduous work of creating and maintaining a comprehensive set of Click Here to continue reading.

From Naked Capitalism…..

The Wall Street Journal reports on another sign of how bad the credit crunch has gotten: banks fudging on what they are reporting as their short-term cost of interbank borrowing, out of fear of revealing how stressed they are. So the Libor becomes less useful as a guide. That in turn means that the so-called TED spread (the difference between three month Libora and ninety-day Treasuries), which is one of the preferred measures of stress in the interbank markets, is understated by as much as 30 basis points.

Next they will be telling us that the inflation figures are not accurate.

From the Consumerist…

New York’s argument, based on a reading of the 1992 Quill vs. North Dakota U.S. Supreme Court ruling, is that because Amazon makes sales through affiliates who live in the state, it can be considered to have a physical presence there—which means the new law wouldn’t apply to retailers who don’t use affiliate programs.

Oddly, until now New York residents have been asked to voluntarily provide their total sum of online purchases on their state tax forms in order to estimate a tax payment, but InternetNews wrly notes it “evidently has fallen short” of the expected revenue goals set by the state.

In other words, because some people sell stuff over Amazon even though they do not work for Amazon and Amazon does not own their stuff, New York State thinks that it has the right to tax them.

From Market Movers….

Wachovia’s real problem with Golden West, it turns out, is not the headline acquisition cost, so much as the inherited Golden West loan portfolio, which includes a staggering $121 billion – no, that’s not a misprint – in “pick-a-pay” mortgages.

These loans behave just like you think they do: borrowers get to decide how much money they’re going to pay back each month. Predictably enough, that isn’t working out too well.

On Monday, Wachovia conceded total losses from Pick-A-Pay loans could eventually amount to a staggering 7% to 8% of the loans’ combined value, a range of $8.5 billion to $9.7 billion.

Read on Naked Capitalism…..

Ah, what cheery news this morning. Oil at a new high, producer price increases running twice as high as expectations, real estate repossessions running double the rate of last year. Yet the Dow is up a tad on the report that New York manufacturing increased. Pray tell what is New York manufacturing, besides the garment business, artisanal cheese, Long Island wine, and tree farms? The last three items probably aren’t included in the factory index; nevertheless, a clearer image might staunch unwarranted enthusiasm.

Read on CNN…

Riots from Haiti to Bangladesh to Egypt over the soaring costs of basic foods have brought the issue to a boiling point and catapulted it to the forefront of the world’s attention, the head of an agency focused on global development said Monday.

“This is the world’s big story,” said Jeffrey Sachs, director of Columbia University’s Earth Institute.

“The finance ministers were in shock, almost in panic this weekend,” he said on CNN’s “American Morning,” in a reference to top economic officials who gathered in Washington. “There are riots all over the world in the poor countries … and, of course, our own poor are feeling it in the United States.”

Read in the Times….

CITIGROUP and Merrill Lynch will heap further pain on Wall Street this week as they reveal additional sub-prime write-downs totalling $15 billion (£7.6 billion) or more.

In another sign of the intense pressure on leading banks, Deutsche Bank is attempting to offload some of its €35 billion (£28 billion) of toxic debt to a consortium of private-equity firms.

Huge exposure to American mortgages is expected to result in Citi taking a $10 billion hit to its accounts, dragging the bank to a first-quarter loss of almost $3 billion. Some analysts believe Citi’s write-downs could stretch to as much as $12 billion.

Merrill will suffer $5 billion of write-downs, analysts say, which would push the bank $2.7 billion into the red.

Dryfly is a regular commentator on calculated risk and one of the better (best?) ones. He really should start his own blog. Here is what he had to to say about high levels of investment in China…..

I work for companies who have put plants in China – they have been racing to get the plants in & operational & then transfer over & convert money about as fast as they can. As much as the Chinese will allow. They did it to get in under the revaluation should it happen. Lotsa companies are doing that.

Currency controls in PRC make it difficult to move big sums fast so the way to get around it is buy or build a plant IN China. Then liquidate it when the revaluation occurs – you should come away with more dollars for doing little or nothing IF all goes as planned…

In response to further questions he elaborated a bit more by saying…..

He doesn’t know where the ‘hot money’ is – no one does or isn’t saying – my guess is companies like the one’s I sell for are moving way more in than they need to operate. WAY MORE. They want it in RMB IN CHINA BANKS before the revaluation. So some of this transfer is in bricks & mortar and illiquid and some is liquid ‘operating capital’.

A lot of smart folks are going to end up too smart by half before this is all over.

The “he” in the above comment is talking about Brad Setser who has been wondering about China’s accounts lately.

Dryfly mostly worries about these “smart” people getting margin calls. But I wonder if anyone will want to buy the factories from them when they want to cash in. To me, that is the biggest risk.

A week ago, or around then, P.B. messaged me that there was a person who needed light duty work, and he was going to utilize this person to help me catch up on claims. Technically, P.B. is not the person to do that; I report to K.K. But K.K. doesn’t care if someone else takes Click Here to continue reading.