My morning routine is to help get the kids to the school bus (down about 1/4 mile of dirt road - today was good, 24 degrees; Friday will be bad, -2). During the 15 minutes between getting back from the high schooler's walk down and before the middle school bus and then for about 15 minutes after getting back from the second walk I flip between The Weather Channel (the #1 indicator for energy futures' prices) and CNBC.
So far I have resisted throwing anything through the TV while watching CNBC. It keeps getting harder. Today was a low point.
Just before the opening bell, they had a talking head Chief Investment Officer from a fund manager on to get his take on the economy. Major news flash - "There is no and will be no recession". WTH? More below
Once again the disingenuous double speak of the money manager. His reasoning was, try to follow (I am paraphrasing his points):
The Federal Reserve will cut rates and housing prices will stop dropping. Exports will stay strong.
Excuse me, housing prices will rise because we inflate the hell out of the dollar? Citi group wrote down over $17 BILLION in the subprime market today and noted they have another $34 Billion in additional exposure. Plus they reported that consumer loans are showing increasing default rates. Oh yeah, they are also cutting 4,400 jobs - and those aren't the hotel cleaning jobs the Bush economy is creating. Giving banks more money will create more income for people to pay loans after they lose a $150,000 (or more) job)?
Second:
GM earns more money in Asia than in the US.
The talking head is right. In Q3 of 2006, GM lost $367 million in the US (a $1.3 BILLION year over year improvement); lost $16 million in Europe and made $83 million in Asia. But we don't export cars from the US to China. So this great increase in GM profits is not employing US workers.
And this guy doesn't get why I am 85% in cash right now (and a chunk of that in non-US currencies). Because this administration and its business henchlings are seeing if they can replicate the Brazilian wealth distribution and lock it in before losing political power.
Retail sales - Down
Housing prices - Down
Dollar value - Down
Us Dollar taking the pejorative designation as the northern peso from the Canadian dollar. And this guy wants you to believe the US economy is not and will not go in recession?
AAAAARRRRRGGGGHHH!!!