Dear rss free blog,
Eighty
is the new sixty! These days I am beginning to feel like a kid again.
Despite being a recipient of Social Security and Medicare, mainly to
finance this re-start-up, I am in my 60s. And these days, what with
Paul Volcker taking the lead on Administration bank regulation and
Felix Rohatyn taking the reins at Lazard
Freres (after
the untimely death of Bruce Wasserstein)
it is the 80-year-olds who are helping run things.
Here
is a suggestion for newly-reappointed Ben Bernanke at the Fed. Copy
the other guy with a no-moustache beard and a bald head, and top the
latter with a Persian lamb cap. If Karzai can negotiate with the
Taliban surely Bernanke can chat up the populist opposition.
More
on the possible intervention of the Fed in stock market trading by
venerable TX reader AK, who writes:
“With the US government
buying/selling notes, bonds, mortgage-related debt, land, property
rights, currencies, unique securities derived from federal
“reorganizations” etc., why should one conclude they do not
indirectly buy/sell the stock market? Is it wise to leave out a
critical capital market link?
“In fact, I would argue it
would be irresponsible under emergency economic conditions for the
feds to not indirectly (via selected investment banking surrogates
using index futures) support the stock market from time to time. We
know well a crashing stock picture has a very negative effect on main
street psychology. A strategic support operation would be easy for
the feds to finance and direct.
“Do you know the first
financial futures/derivative to trade on an organized exchange in the
U.S.? Are you aware that a federal agency participated in trading
that first derivative contract? How long do you think it took for the
agency involved to start trading? Hint: I have very personal, direct
knowledge of the situation since I was an exchange member in the
trading pit and (under then strict confidentiality instructions)
filled the first series of orders for the agency.”
Readers, including AK, are
welcome to fill in the gaps. I don’t go back that far.
My strictures against
proliferation of cookie-cutter Exchange Traded Funds (in my report
for sale on the wwww.global-investing.com site) has begun to impact
the fund business.
Today Wisdom
Tree,
a manager of ETFs aimed at owning the best dividend earners in
different sectors, announced that it would close ten of its “lightly
followed” exchange traded funds Mar. 24. Of the 10, 8 are aimd at
tracking dividend paying international stocks in industries like
consumer staples and consuemr discretionary, health, or
communication, and one is the Europe Total Dividend fund. A relative
newcomer in the fund business, it has $6.7 bn under management.
More for paid subscribers
follows about funds, including one in the Covestor account I manage, plus stocks from Britain, France, India, and Israel. I can only write to Covestor investors once a month until they improve the site. I am also agitating to have my portfolio there linked not to the S&P 500 which is not my index, but to a combo of the MSCI EAFE and a bond index. Wish me luck. Meanwhile, to learn what is up, you should try subscribing to the newsletter.
