Full Financial Meltdown for Thursday coming...

[DontTreadOnMe]

Goldman Sachs now looking for a partner...
WaMu selling itself via auction...
Morgan Stanley Gets Call from Wachovia...
Gold prices post biggest 1-day gain ever...


did I miss any?

[Ikonoklast]

1. I had a guy on the streetcorner stop and ask me

if I wanted a Hedge Fund. Said he could get me one, cheap.

Not a knockoff, either, a real-live Upper East Side Hedge Fund.



Wait until those unregulated monsters unwind and take their owners' billions with them.

The wailing will be Biblical.

[Blue Meany]

2. I can't keep track, but I sure am glad I bought gold when

Bush was elected. The profit off that and the oil stocks I bought at the same time have outstripped my losses on virtually everything else. I assumed that oil could only go up with to oil men in the WH and that they would screw up the economy (thus the gold). I had no idea it would get this bad this fast, though. I expected a a gradual slow motion economic crisis as peak oil kicked in.

[Stop Cornyn]

3. Maybe Porkbarrel Palin could put WaMu on e-bay and repeat her big success with the Alaska state jet?

[Renew Deal]

8. That would be a funny ebay auction.

WAMU Buy it now for -$80,000,000,000. :bounce:

[AlCzervik]

4. check out the loss leaders----

http://finance.yahoo.com/losers?e=aq

http://finance.yahoo.com/losers?e=nq

http://finance.yahoo.com/losers?e=o

http://finance.yahoo.com/losers?e=us

[old guy]

5. But.... but oil is under $100 per barrel,

the market will probably go up triple digits!

[msallied]

6. I bank through WaMu....

Should I be worried about my money in there? I don't have much, but I just wanna make sure... If this is taken over by another institution, I shouldn't be seeing an interruption in my ability to do business should I?

[Max_powers94]

10. I bank with WAMU too but I only have a balance of -120

[msallied]

11. heh... believe me, I know the feeling. Sigh...

[regnaD kciN]

15. No, there shouldn't be any interruption...

...although the terms may change ("Totally Free Checking"...? Fugetaboudit!). What I'm concerned about is that, in addition to my regular accounts, I also have my business accounts for my three LLCs with WaMu (actually, two for each -- one general-purpose and one for tax withholding). It was convenient to do so, because they allowed personal checking customers to open no-cost business accounts. Now, if some other bank buys it out, and requires monthly fees for each of those accounts, it would be a real inconvenience.

[Johonny]

28. I just pulled money out to make sure I'm below the limit

sounds like there is no need to be WORRIED, but there is a need to be worried.

[vinylsolution]

7. Yes, gold is up.....

... but also watch out for silver. It's going to go through the roof any time soon.

[elkston]

9. People, don't PANIC. It makes it worse. If you have long term investments, sit tight.

Things will settle down and come back up again. Its the panic selling that causes the market to go down.

[regnaD kciN]

16. True, but after today...

...I wouldn't be surprised at another steep drop tomorrow as well. Not much effect on long-term investments, but it won't be good for retired seniors living off investment income.

[depakid]

22. That's true if your companies have solid earnings and fundamentals

Once all this shakes out and we find out where the bodies are buried, there'll be a lot of bargains out there.

[DeschutesRiver]

26. If you choose to step out of the way of an oncoming train, it isn't panic

it is prudence.

Whether a person sits tight, or makes a few considered moves right now, depends on where you are at, age-wise, work-wise, investment-wise.

I sat tight right through the tech meltdown some years back. Just last year, we finally made back just what we had lost (during a wonderful bull market at that). Which given the returns of the last so many years, means that we are way down from where we would have been, had I recognized what was going on during the tech boom and how it would affect my portfolio once the music stopped (retirement $$). By the time the musical chair game was over, I was still standing without a chair.

Little bit on the news that dh heard: that whatever has been gained from the period 2002-2007 has now been wiped out by 50% already, with more loss in sight.

I am sitting tight right now, but that is only because I am 100% in treasuries, having choosen last summer not to undergo another tech style meltdown from inside the trenches. Yeah, it cost me then a loss to do so, but not anywhere near the degree it has cost others I know. I simply, at age 50, don't have the stomach for it. Being self employed, we don't get pensions (probably a god send in a way now). I will rejoin the market at a later date, when investing begins to make sense again. I am not freaking living on cat food when I turn 70.

I voted for a return OF my money, instead of a return ON my money. It is the only thing keeping me sane right now.

[DFW]

12. Gold went from $778 to $862 in ONE DAY

That's investor language for PANIC TIME!!!!!!!!!

[msallied]

19. I'm not a commodities investor, but...

I cleaned out my jewelry box a couple weeks ago and got like $1000 bucks for scrap gold. It was jaw-dropping. I thought I'd only get a few hundred bucks.

[Raine1967]

13. Citibank.

<...>
After Lehman filing for bankruptcy and another rival Merrill Lynch being bought over by Bank of America in a distress sale, Pandit wrote to the bank's employees that Citi was "well capitalised" and had "tremendous capacity" to meet commitments to its clients.

Falling prey to deepening credit crisis, 158-year-old investment banking major Lehman Brothers on Monday filed for bankruptcy protection from its lenders, to whom it owes over 600 billion dollars.

Naming Citigroup among its biggest unsecured creditors with close to 138 billion dollars in bonds, Lehman said in the filing that it had assets of 639 billion dollars and debt of 613 billion dollars as of May 31.
<...>

http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus/000200809162029.htm


I can't find this anywhere in American media.

Looks like citibank is in deeper doo than has been reported.

[anonymous171]

14. Thank god the republicans didn't succeed in their 60 year quest to eliminate the New Deal.

Otherwise we'd all be totally fucked.

[regnaD kciN]

17. ...instead of only majorly so.

:shrug:

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

18. Bush is still President?

[mamalone]

20. Can somebody explain what all this means to someone like me?

A single mom, living basically week to week, barely able to make my mortgage and with some debt. I don't have any investments or anything anywhere... I hate to sound self-absorbed, but I do wonder how and if these big bank troubles will impact on my little life, and how exactly?

Can anybody break it down for me a bit?

[Hestia]

25. I agree mamalone - even during the Great Depression, not every

job dried up.

I do remember reading stories though that employers wouldn't hire a married woman if her spouse had a job, so a lot of people had secret marriages or just lived as 'roommates'. Married women weren't allowed to be teachers either.

I don't see any other way to reset mortgages to realistic levels - how else to get people to stay and to buy? Prices are still overpriced, people have them listed at their mortgage balance (not all though if you research).

I just not feeling any empathy right now for people living in $2 million, 1100 sf apt in Manhattan losing their job right now. They were part of the problem with overpriced real estate. Call me cold and calloused, but there are a lot of people having a hard time affording a $400 flop house apt.

[progressivebydesign]

27. Should be a big effect on most of us...

But it makes for compelling news stories...

[Not a robought]

21. I never thought I'd see the day

that the US would socialize independent banks, investment houses and insurance companies. Unreal.

[Imagevision]

23. We will not see nor hear from Cheney again...

[DeschutesRiver]

24. Dow plunges and closes down nearly 450 points (after yesterday's 504 point plunge)

and AIG, part of the insurance industry, gets a loan for up to 85 billion from The Federal Reserve.

[msallied]

29. It is now officially lower than it was when Bush took office in 2001.