„Dann säuft der Karren erneut ab“

Die Finanz- und Wirtschaftskrise sei noch lange nicht ausgestanden, schon steckten wir in der nächsten Blase, fürchtet der deutsche Wertpapierhändler Dirk Müller. Der hat wohl das Föhrenbergkreis-Zukunftslabor besucht.

Aus dem gestrigen Standard.

Buddy, Can You Spare $5 Trillion?

Aus John Mauldin’s Newsletter.

I have been writing for months that I don’t think the US can find $2 trillion dollars this year and then come back to the well for another $1.5 trillion next year without serious disruption in the markets. Where do you find that much money when all the rest of the world also wants to borrow massive amounts? How much are we talking about? The friendly folks at Hayman actually spent the time to add it all up. This is not a comforting graph.

The graph shows the US will need to issue $3 trillion in debt. „Wait,“ I asked, „I thought it was only 1.85″ The answer is that the number has grown to almost $2 trillion (as I wrote it would). Then you need to add in off-budget items like TARP, state and municipal debt, etc. Pretty soon it adds up to another trillion. All told, Hayman estimates that the world will need to find $5.3 trillion in NEW government financing. Never mind the needs of corporations or individuals or commercial mortgages, etc.

The Land of the Setting Sun

Aus John Mauldin’s Newsletter über Japan.

Over the years, I have written about Japan often. Its economy is very important to the world, and its banks have funded and loaned a great deal to companies outside of Japan. Global growth would have been a lot slower without the Japanese. Up until recently, their population has saved a great deal of its disposable income, and those savings have allowed the Japanese government to run massive deficits.

And we are talking truly massive. Over the last ten years, the government has seen the level of debt-to-GDP rise from 99% to over 170%, not including local governments.

This Is Outrageous

Aus John Mauldin’s Newsletter

I want to direct the attention of those in the US finance industry to a white paper written by Themis Trading, called „Toxic Equity Trading Order Flow on Wall Street.“ Basically, they outline why volume and volatility have jumped so much since 2007; and it’s not due to the credit crisis. They estimate that 70% of the volume in today’s markets is from high-frequency program trading. They outline how large brokers and funds can buy and sell a stock for the same price and still make 0.5 cents. Do that a million times a day and the money adds up. Or maybe do it 8 billion times. It requires powerful computers, complicity of the exchanges (because the exchanges get paid a lot), and highly proximate computer connections. Literally, the need for speed is so important that to play this game you have to have your servers physically at the exchange. Across the river in New Jersey is too slow. Forget Texas or California. This is a game played out in microseconds.

Mathematics Versus Economic Logic

Aus von Mises Daily

The problems of prices and costs have been treated also with mathematical methods. There have even been economists who held that the only appropriate method of dealing with economic problems is the mathematical method and who derided the logical economists as „literary“ economists.