While I have been taking a break from posting, the world has been ending. There is nothing really new in that so I don’t know if I should make a point of recapping what these pages have missed. But just in case you are interested….

Macro Man says “Bloody Hell…..”

That is generally how a lot of people reacted to this week. It was the TIC data for august that had Macro Man all excited but most of the excitement has been centering on the structured investment vehicles of this world (other wise known as SIV’s). All anyone really knows for sure is that something is really wrong with the SIV’s of the world.

We know this because the Treasury department and Citigroup (the largest bank in US) have been banging heads together to try to create one big bail out fund. Seeing as how Citigrou’s own personal pet SIV demons have it on the hook for about 100 billion, the suspicion is that this is a plot to bail out Citigroup. But seeing as how even SIV’s that are not associated with Citigroup are starting to go bankrupt, I think that it is safe to say that this problem is broader then just Citigroup.

In other news, oil has almost managed to break $90 a barrel.

Some of our products are made exclusively for certain high-profile customers. In these kinds of arrangements, the customers are expected to forecast ahead of time what quantity of product they will need. The forecast does not have to be precise down the the last unit, but it does have to be in the right range Click Here to continue reading.

Great innovators are the ones who do what everyone said can’t be done. Columbus. Orville and Wilbur. Einstein. Edison.
Great idiots are the ones who attempt to do what everyone said can’t be done. Since they are so much more common, their names are less famous, though a good historian could name a few (shame on Click Here to continue reading.

I was working on some new Acer PC’s at work, when I noticed something that struck me as rather suspicious. The default profile is named “Acer User” as you might suspect, but in the Windows Directory structure, it is named “Lenovo User”. As you might already know, Acer and Lenovo are fierce competitors in the Click Here to continue reading.

I have been told that I am a fool for not investing in stocks while I am still young. They say “stocks always deliver positive real returns over any 20 year period.” They say” This hold true even if you buy right before the stock market crashes.”

I wish I could force those people to read this rant.

This is what the speculators are like. Even the best of them tend to build fortunes that don’t last.

The US mint still puts out gold coins that are legal tender. They are mostly sold to collectors but they are still legal tender. Got that?

In fact, if you try to pass of a forged coin as legal tender the full weight of the law can come down on you regardless of whether the gold content is the same as this case proves.

So what happens if you try to pay your employees with legal tender gold coins and report their income based on the face value of the coins (i.e. the amount that the coin is legal tender for)? The full weight of the government comes down on you for tax evasion because the coins are worth more then the amount they are legal tender for. Thankfully, we still have jury system in this country so the company in question did not get convicted.

Still, I think that it is disturbing that they only got off because of a hung jury. In my opinion, it should have been a straight acquittal. How can you make something legal tender and then demand that they value it according to some other standard for tax purposes?

Granted, the construction company that was doing this was trying to help its workers avoid taxes on their wages. But lots of companies use more dubious methods then this to avoid paying taxes and get away with because it is legal. The way that most companies account for stock options would be just one example. Why pick on the blue collar companies?

If you don’t want them reporting their wages according to the face value, don’t make it legal tender. How hard of a fix is that?

Acme, the international company, has been making changes, divesting from some product lines and investing in others. The changes have been occuring all year, but they are now looming over our site, my Acme. It is verly likely that things will be running differently by the end of the year. Will it be by our Click Here to continue reading.

This from Market Watch….

Outstanding U.S. consumer debt rose at an annual rate of 5.9% in August, pushed higher mostly by a hefty gain in credit-card debt, the Federal Reserve reported Friday.

The overall increase of $12.2 billion was the highest since May, the Fed reported. It pushed total outstanding consumer credit to $2.47 trillion in August, up from $2.46 trillion in July.

Outstanding consumer credit rose by an upwardly revised 4.7% in July. It was originally estimated to rise by 3.7%.

August’s data captures the impact of turmoil in financial markets that month, noted Ryan Sweet of Moody’s Economy.com. “They provide further evidence that consumers did not pack it in following the events,” he wrote in an email.

Revolving debt such as credit cards was the biggest driver behind the overall rise in August, the data show. That debt climbed by 8.1% in August, or by $6.1 billion.

This is from the Wall Street Journal…..

Despite potential tax and investment consequences, more individuals have been borrowing from their 401(k) plans or taking hardship withdrawals in recent months, some retirement-plan providers say.

Not all plans have seen jumps, and more-comprehensive statistics won’t be available until next year. But a number of plan providers that follow month-to-month patterns, including T. Rowe Price Group Inc., Hewitt Associates and Hartford Financial Services Group Inc., have seen a small but noticeable uptick.

Many in the field expect more 401(k) borrowing in 2008 as consumers struggle with tighter credit and potentially higher mortgage payments.