Mid-Year Housing Bubble Predictions
What’s your housing bubble prediction for the second half of 2022? Six months ago: ” 2022 will be the year the Fed’s Everything Bubble bursts.”
“A reader sent me some quotes he’s collected over the year: “Coming back down to earth” “Reverting to a normal market” “Reached a plateau” “Going from 100 mph to 80 mph” “Sanity is returning” “Instead of 30 offers, maybe 5 or 6” “It is still a seller’s market over a buyer’s market,’ Winder said, adding that it’s still hot – just not ‘habanero hot. We’re back down to chili sauce hot.” “But buyers are starting to say ‘Whoa, wait a minute, what are we doing here?”
From one year ago: “Over a decade’s worth of rate suppression from the Fed, without their ever having ended the policy after the 2007-2009 financial crisis, has left market fundamentals dessicated by the hunt for positive yields.”
“What’s left at this point is a Hobson’s choice between safe investments with a negative expected return, after factoring in current and expected future inflation, and risk assets that everyone agrees are in a bubble which may generate stellar returns for a bit longer until a point of future collapse, which nobody could foresee, takes them back down to earth.”
A reply: “Sometimes there is no safe investment or no hedge against loss by inflation. The political circumstances can be so high risk that anything could happen.”
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Check out this video from Texas:
New Braunfels Home Builders To Buyers: LET’S MAKE A DEAL!
Jul 1, 2022 New Braunfels Home Builders to Buyers: LET’S MAKE A DEAL!
If I told you that right now is a great time to purchase a brand new home in New Braunfels with rising interest rates, you’d probably think I’m off my rocker. But new home builders in the New Braunfels area are saying to buyers LET’S MAKE A DEAL! Today’s video is all about how the shifting housing market in New Braunfels is creating equity rich opportunities for buyers. Wait to you hear what builders are saying in this video!
5:25.
‘A reader sent me some quotes he’s collected over the year: “Coming back down to earth” “Reverting to a normal market” “Reached a plateau” “Going from 100 mph to 80 mph” “Sanity is returning” “Instead of 30 offers, maybe 5 or 6” “It is still a seller’s market over a buyer’s market,’ Winder said, adding that it’s still hot – just not ‘habanero hot. We’re back down to chili sauce hot.” “But buyers are starting to say ‘Whoa, wait a minute, what are we doing here?’
I’m glad I put this in the predictions. It’s from a reader who collected these quotes over recent times. Go to the link to see the entire list. This thing was wobbling before rates went up.
Wobbling? The wheels were falling off the housing shit cart back in the first half of the Trump admin. It’s was then the Fraudulent Pricing Ternion chose to double down on crime.
It’s remarkable that the bottom fell across the board within 3 months of free and open discussion of it.
‘The coronavirus pandemic may be ebbing, but the hospitality industry still ain’t doing so hot. In what has been an ongoing trend, another hotel — this time Chelsea’s Holiday Inn at 125 W. 26th St. — has sold, albeit at a steep discount.’
‘Two Kings Management paid owner Watermark Lodging Trust approximately $80.3 million for the budget-friendly lodgings — a far cry from the roughly $111 million Watermark paid for the address in 2013, Crain’s reported.’
‘Not only did Watermark get some $31 million less than it paid for the property nine years ago, but the Chicago-based real estate investment trust had put an additional $8 million of renovations and capital improvements into the full-service hotel. While at one point the 226-room inn’s value was within the ballpark of $121 million, the pandemic did quite a number on its appraising: According to an April analysis by the firm Trepp, the hotel is now worth 30 percent less than it was before COVID-19. ‘
‘A $72 million loan on the property has not helped Watermark resell the establishment, which it’s been trying to do since at least January’
https://nypost.com/2022/07/01/manhattan-holiday-inn-sells-at-a-massive-loss-in-covid-trend/
Go on a vacation to the big rotten apple? Crime is off the scale there, as it is in every Dem controlled city. Plus there is a recession and most people are wondering how will they buy gas and food after their credit cards max out, nevermind a vacation.
I worked for years in Manhattan. Commuted from the Island. I couldn’t wait for 5 o’clock…so I always took the 4:19.
‘Klarna Bank AB is in talks to raise new equity at a valuation as low as $6 billion, a fraction of the $45.6 billion it commanded last summer as it became Europe’s most valuable startup, according to people with knowledge of the matter.’
‘The buy-now, pay-later giant is in talks with investors about the new funding round, said some of the people, asking not to be identified discussing a private matter. The $6 billion figure is drastically lower than the $15 billion mark reported as being negotiated last month.’
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/klarna-discussing-valuation-cut-6-190146456.html
The MSM lies.
Claim:
“… world grain and fertilizer markets have been disrupted by the war in Ukraine – which normally exports roughly one-third of global wheat supply – a figure projected to be cut in half this year according to the USDA.”
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/it-very-serious-war-and-weather-threaten-send-food-prices-even-higher
Fact:
“Wheat Exports by Country
“Russia: US$7.9 billion (17.6% of total wheat exports)
“United States: $6.32 billion (14.1%)
“Canada: $6.3 billion (14%)
“France: $4.5 billion (10.1%)
“Ukraine: $3.6 billion (8%)”
http://www.worldstopexports.com/wheat-exports-country/
So is Tyler Durden an outright liar, or just less than accurate?
ZH is FOS most of the time.
Do you disagree with their ideas and material posted? or do you just think their facts are wrong?
It’s their facts that are wrong oftentimes, and they also have a wishful thinking spin on a lot of their stuff. Like Jerome Powell is going to pivot and ride to the rescue of Wall St., etc. It’s slanted towards the reckless gambler crowd, Bitcon, etc.
That site hit the toilet when Google threatened them with removing ads….or when the FBI took it over.
And I think to myself………. what a wonderful world.
Axtell, UT Housing Prices Crater 32% YOY As Utah Economy Hemorrhages And Sellers Beg And Plead For Offers
https://www.movoto.com/axtell-ut/market-trends/
As one real estate economist commented, “Housing prices are falling at a rapid rate across the US.”
Oh dear….
Hong Kong developer Billion fails to sell a single flat at The Horizon project in Tai Po
https://www.scmp.com/business/article/3183849/hong-kong-developer-billion-fails-sell-single-flat-horizon-project-tai-po
Hereditary debt serfdom: another “innovation” from the banksters and their political puppets. As the elites impose their Neo-feudal “Liberal World Order,” will the lords of the manor be claiming the “right of first night” with the more attractive brides of the peasantry?
Families could be offered mortgages of 50 YEARS that they can then pass to their children under plans being considered to help them buy bigger homes
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10974931/Families-offered-mortgages-50-YEARS-pass-children.html
Families could be offered mortgages of 50 years or more that can be passed between generations under plans being considered by Boris Johnson.
Lenders will be encouraged to let buyers borrow over terms lasting five decades or even longer so they can move into bigger homes.
“…will the lords of the manor be claiming the “right of first night” with the more attractive brides of the peasantry?”
The first slice is the freshest.
“Families could be offered mortgages of 50 years or more that can be passed between generations under plans being considered by Boris Johnson.”
…aka indentured servitude?
I suppose Boris doesn’t want to consider that homes are just too expensive relative to incomes?
will the lords of the manor be claiming the “right of first night” with the more attractive brides of the peasantry
“right of first night”? Chances are she already slept with the village’s more attractive young men.
lords of the manor be claiming the “right of first night”
You guys are awful.
I saw this schmaltzy medieval soap opera as a kid. They shouldn’t have let us in. Being a little girl, I was like “Whuuttt?”
THE WAR LORD Original Theatrical Trailer
https://youtu.be/K9jGTDFAneQ?t=73
Are the sheeple finally wising up? Unplugging from the MSM and its globalist propaganda & DNC talking points packaged as “news” is the beginning of wisdom.
CNN suffers biggest ratings dip in SEVEN YEARS: Viewers plummet 13% in June in largest freefall since 2015 despite new CEO Chris Licht vowing to turn the network away from ‘extremes’
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10973931/CNNs-ratings-continue-plummet-network-worst-month-July-2015.html
One way or another, the criminals who imposed vaccine mandates need to be held accountable for their actions.
Santa Clara University law student SUES college for ‘ruining his career’ by refusing to let him complete his studies there or give transcripts so he can transfer elsewhere because he won’t get COVID vaccine
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10975087/Santa-Clara-University-law-student-SUES-college-Covid-19-vaccine-mandate.html
A California law student is taking his school to court and accusing them of preventing him from continuing his education at another college over his refusal to get the Covid-19 vaccine.
Ryan Driggs, who is representing himself in the case, is attempting to transfer from Santa Clara University’s law school, where he is currently enrolled, reports the San Jose Mercury News.
A Boston College student had a stroke after his booster. Couldn’t possibly be related to novel experimental gene altering injections, the miracle “life-saving” shots can’t possibly do harm and ALL human must be injected 3 times! Interestingly, BC run by Jesuits refused all religious and medical exemptions. At least one professor was fired over the booster mandate.
https://brownstone.org/articles/the-purge-call-me-ishmael/
Interestingly, BC run by Jesuits refused all religious and medical exemptions.
That doesn’t surprise me in the least.
There’s a reason why Jesuits are often expelled from Catholic countries.
Jesuits
Luciferians masquerading as Christians.
A Boston College student had a stroke after his booster.
Every morning after I wake up I remember that I’m still a pure blood with no spike proteins flowing through my veins.
damn, it’s good to be a PureBlood.
Santa Clara University law student SUES college for ‘ruining his career’ by refusing to let him complete his studies there or give transcripts so he can transfer elsewhere because he won’t get COVID vaccine
In the Soviet Union all you had to do was parrot the party’s narrative and keep your head down. In Muh Democracy you also have to agree to be injected with an experimental gene therapy.
My guess is that he’ll be allowed to transfer his credits to another school. If he’s suing for anything else, he probably won’t get it.
Libtards reaping what they voted: Minneapolis edition
Rep. Ilhan Omar says Minneapolis is MORE violent than the Somali refugee camp she fled to as teen and claims she saw two shootings within months of arriving in US
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10974975/Ilhan-Omar-suggests-Minnesota-worse-Somali-refugee-camp.html
Import 3rd worlders, get the 3rd world.
Cowardly, craven ‘Murican sheeple who let vaccine mandates be imposed on their fellow citizens are now suffering the consequences of staffing shortages at airlines and supply chain disruptions.
Misery as more than 300 flights are canceled ahead of Fourth of July: Delta boss APOLOGIZES for ‘unacceptable’ airline chaos as firm ‘offers flyers $10,000 bumped from overbooked flights’ and airports face busiest weekend since the start of the pandemic
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10973189/Delta-CEO-apologizes-unacceptable-cancelations-amid-hectic-Fourth-July-travel.html
The gimme dats who voted for Brandon cuz free sh*t lacked the intelligence to understand that supporting the “liberal world order” meant billions of tax dollars would flow into the corrupt black hole of Ukraine, not into the ‘hood.
Biden adviser: ‘Liberal world order’ demands enduring high gas prices
https://nypost.com/2022/07/01/biden-adviser-liberal-world-order-demands-enduring-high-gas-prices/
I think this will have to do primarily with interest rates – and i think that the central banks will chicken out and live with inflation (in spite of their mandate). So except for the huge bubble cities (San Fran, Boise, Toronto etc) the housing market will only go down another 15-20% from end-Q2.
US The 10 yr treasury yield is 2.8% (after eventually getting to 3%). Bond market is signaling that the central banks will stop raising rates before it gets to ‘neutral’
Europe I think that they will not do enough to fight inflation because they are deathly scared of the yield of Italian, Greek etc bonds. So they will punt.
Economists said the speed of the acceleration of inflation in June may persuade ECB policy makers to move more aggressively from September. Mateusz Urban, an economist at Oxford Economics, said he expects the key rate to reach 1% by the end of this year, from minus 0.5% now.
“Higher headline inflation puts an increasing pressure on the ECB to act,” Mr. Urban said.
Rising borrowing costs will increase the risk of a slide into recession, with the eurozone economy already slowing as households see their spending power reduced by a combination of sharply higher energy prices and still-modest wage increases.
Re: central bank credibility (Stolen from twitter)
Amount of Bonds that the Fed said it would sell in June: $47.5B
Amount of Bonds Fed sold in June: $728M
I love how the WSJ, CNBC and wall street analysts take the Fed’s word as gospel – but they are almost always just jawboning.
holy crap that’s a pretty large difference. Goodness if the whole pile of cards collapses at 1% interest and with the Fed buying 25% of all bonds, methinks thou might have a bubble economy.
Oh well. As a weirdo “saver” I’m enjoying the little boost in my interest income.
Any predictions for the Boston area? I would think it is considered a bubble city but the mantra here is “Will never happen here, R.E. always goes up, Boston is immune”.
Half way through, funny and tragic, talks about last two years.
FULL COMEDY SPECIAL | Jim Breuer – ‘Somebody Had to Say It’
Premiered Jun 30, 2022
https://youtu.be/bItcoUb5xsw?t=60
Well, first fifteen minutes are good.
‘Concerns over a global recession are growing as the international copper price logged a steep fall of 12.8 percent in June. The price of copper on the London Metal Exchange (LME) ended at $8,240 per metric ton on the last day of June, down 12.8 percent from $9,450 earlier in the month. The price of the metal is at its lowest level since February 2021, renewing a 17-month low.’
‘The slump in the price of copper is taken more seriously than other metal prices’ plunges, because the metal’s fluctuating price tends to predict turning points in the global economy.’
‘Often called “Dr. Copper” by the market for its predictability in global economic forecasts, copper’s widespread usage in most sectors, ranging from construction to home appliances, has made its price a reliable leading indicator of the global economy. In general, the fall of the price of copper is regarded as indicating a slowdown in the global economy, while an increase in the price of the metal is seen as a sign of economic revival.’
‘Copper is not the only metal that’s been witnessing a price fall lately. The prices of other industrial metals, such as aluminum, zinc and tin, all fell in the past month amid the gloomy outlook over the global recession.’
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/biz/2022/07/175_332056.html
‘ A new report from TD says Canadian home sales could fall by nearly one-quarter on average this year and remain low into 2023. The report, prepared by TD Economics and published Wednesday, says the bank has “significantly” downgraded its home sales and price forecasts compared to March “as monetary policy has tightened more acutely than anticipated.”
‘TD Economics expects increased borrowing costs to “weigh heavily on housing activity,” with the peak-to-trough decline, or the highest and lowest points in the business cycle, between the first quarters of 2022 and 2023 reaching 33 per cent.’
‘A report published last month by Desjardins suggested housing prices in Canada could fall by 15 per cent to approximately $675,000 in December 2023, down from their peak of just over $790,000 on average in February 2022.’
‘Despite this, Desjardins says $675,000 is still nearly 30 per cent higher compared to December 2019, when the average home price in Canada was $530,000.’
https://www.ctvnews.ca/business/td-significantly-downgrades-home-sale-price-forecasts-1.5971695
Expect no end to rate hikes, economists warn
The Australian|4 hours ago
Homeowners should prepare for the full pain of a 50-basis-point hike in official interest rates on Tuesday, with analysts saying its all but certain banks will pass on the entire increase to borrowers.
Those all too common million dollar mortgages in Oz are suddenly looking terrifying to those who borrowed them. I took a looksie and the current variable rate is 3.6% on a fully adjustable (in Oz a “fixed rate” loan is fixed for 1 to 5 years, then readjusts, a 5 year loan 5.75%)
According to excel’s pmt function a $1,000,000 mortgage @ 3.6% is $4546 a month, P&I. At 5.75% it’s $5835. The record, which was lasy year, was 2.14%, with a P&I of $3766
‘The textbook definition of a housing bubble requires three things. First, you’d see exuberant demand—boosted by speculation—rush into the housing market. Second, spiked home prices would travel well above what incomes can support and reach overvaluation levels. Third, the housing bubble pops and home prices fall.’
‘Let’s be clear: While the U.S. housing market has met, on paper, two key elements for a housing bubble, it doesn’t guarantee we are in one. We’re still missing the final component: a housing bust.’
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/housing-bubble-requires-3-elements-202959123.html
“Over the past year, U.S. home prices have climbed 20.4% while private sector wages climbed 4.8%.”
The magic of the pandemic’s loose lending standards.
Sixty companies exit the billion dollar m-cap club
‘Up to 70% stock correction from the peak in October 2021 and a plummeting rupee have led to a double whammy’
‘It’s not just unlisted start-ups that have lost valuation power in recent times. The broader market correction and sharp fall in rupee against dollar since October 2021 peak have shaved off over $660 billion market value in listed stocks, with 60 companies such as Dilip Buildcon, Indiabulls Housing, HEG, Vaibhav Global, Manappuram, Nazara and RBL Bank losing the coveted billion-dollar market capitalisation (m-cap) status. Up to 70 per cent correction in individual stock prices and the rupee falling to 79 from 75 levels versus the greenback have led to a double whammy effect.’
https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/portfolio/sixty-companies-exit-the-billion-dollar-m-cap-club/article65593310.ece
A billion rupees, while nothing to sneeze at, is only 14M USD.
Brookfield, MA Housing Prices Crater 32% YOY As Massachusetts Economy Hemorrhages And Sellers Beg And Plead For Offers
https://www.movoto.com/bronx-ny/market-trends/
As one real estate economist commented, “Housing prices are falling at a rapid rate across the US.”
https://www.movoto.com/brookfield-ma/market-trends/
I predict that Hans will be very cold this winter, and he will smell very bad, because Zelensky needs $7 billion a month.
Germans Told to Prepare for Gas Shortages, Hot Water Rationing Possible:
“Fearing Russia might cut off natural gas supplies, the head of Germany’s regulatory agency for energy called on residents Saturday to save energy and to prepare for winter, when use increases.
Federal Network Agency President Klaus Mueller urged house and apartment owners to have their gas boilers and radiators checked and adjusted to maximize their efficiency.
“Maintenance can reduce gas consumption by 10 per cent to 15 per cent,” he told Funke Mediengruppe, a German newspaper and magazine publisher.
Mueller said residents and property owners need to use the 12 weeks before cold weather sets in to get ready. He said families should start talking now about “whether every room needs to be set at its usual temperature in the winter — or whether some rooms can be a little colder.”
https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2022/07/02/sanctions-war-germans-told-to-prepare-for-gas-shortages-hot-water-rationing-possible/
My prediction is, ARMs and 40/50 year mortgages will start dominating the new mortgages.
Nope. Worse yet the 30 year will be gone within 2 years.
Well its happening, just still not quick enough for my life. Seven years since I had to sell my house when my wife got critically sick…son is now almost out of elementary school. If it goes much longer he’ll be saying “nice house, dad” on his way out the door forever. 🙁
I intend to buy not at the bottom but at the first blip to the deceleration. There was one of those in Q1 2010, and although it did go lower it wasn’t by too much.
I’m with you although it’s doubtful my son will be fleeing the nest.
Predictions:
1. Fed stays on the interest rate escalator. They simply must. Countries (ruling classes to be more precise) can survive austerity/depressions, but massive inflation brings down governments. They will probably slow down the pace after summer but it will continue to rise. Also you can’t push on a string forever by pulling all this demand forward with 0% rates forever. Nobody invests in anything real.
a. This comes as a massive surprise to BSD’s on wall street and some hedgie somewhere gets caught on the wrong side of a trade and some pretty massive dislocation happens.
b. the Fed however lies about actually selling their useless MBS because nobody wants them and god forbid they actually get a fair value (cuz that too crashes everything) but they continue to run off 30year treasuries which of course brings up the long end.
c. fuel prices are not going down, even with massive demand destruction. Which of course continues to fuel inflation and the recession/depression (4 quarters, which we’ll be at by Dec). Nobody is investing in new O&G production and refining when it can all be removed at the stroke of a pen.
d. Lots of zombie/scam companies start to go under. This is a good thing but it’s going to be painful. Free money equals massive malinvestment. Expensive money removes those.
2. Mortgage rates (30 year fixed avg) hits 7% by Dec (maybe 7.5). It will be up and down and painful but it’s going to be continue rising.
3. Housing prices make a massive dump in late summer but then slow their pace of falling as people freak and realize they are underwater and don’t want to/can’t sell. Housing prices are always sticky and it’s going to take time to go down. Nobody wants to lose 10 to 500k if they can. Plus if you get massively underwater (like in 2008) you just stop paying and it takes months to years for the banks to get off their butt and actually throw you out.
4. Lots of useless realtors realize not only is their OF career over but so is their UHS career. This really won’t happen until 2023 and 24 and someone somewhere will finally realize that 5 to 6% is simply way too much to pay for as little as they provide.
A. The realtor association will still however throughout the year be sending our PR notices about how the real estate market is strong.
5. The big western cities that exploded (take your pick, most of them) get a rude start to their awakening. Those markets lock up the most as sellers will be slow to realize the buyers are on strike.
a. Florida (esp tampa area) is going to get hammered. New people yes, but way too many houses and costs too high. Highest avg. home insurance in the states. ($4500 i heard) That’s a big add to the monthly payment.
6. It will feel like late 2007. It’s crashing and slowing (it’s a gully) but it won’t literally come to a dead stop (unless yet another monthly black swan appears and locks up lending.)
7. Crypto goes to 10k, on it’s way to zero (but it won’t get there this year)
8 Stocks continue their slow grinding bear market with “buy the dip” still sending up lower highes as it grinds all the money out of all.
9. “Ukraine” continues to get smaller as more and more becomes “Russia”. (i.e. Russia continues to win)
10. Europe freezes and industrial production crashes as they will have no energy by their own choice. Hungary leaves the EU.
4. Lots of useless realtors realize not only is their OF career over but so is their UHS career. This really won’t happen until 2023 and 24 and someone somewhere will finally realize that 5 to 6% is simply way too much to pay for as little as they provide.
If they can’t close, it’s over. And at 6% interest it’s hard as rocks to close. Just wait until it’s 7% or 8%.
I think you missed my point on the 5 to 6%. I meant as regards their commission not being worth the service generally provided. I wasn’t referring to mortgage rates.
But in reference to mortgage rates if 6% for 30 years blows up your economy, your economy is completely broken.
Going forward, it will be much easier for the older subtle guys who stay in shape, pay their bills and own their residence to attract the younger top shelf ladies that make life worth living. You know the type, saunter about the kitchen in Birkenstock sandals, Sloggi panties and a cozy cotton camisole spending fifteen minutes making a fresh gourmet salad. The overdrawn donkeys haven’t a clue where I’m coming from.
I shiver at the thought. Those beauties will spend you into the poorhouse.
But what a way to go.
I read a comment in a thread about older guys from a mid-twenties returning college student who rented a room in a house walking distance to campus from a guy in his mid-forties who retired early. Said he was clean, a gentleman and genuinely concerned about her success in college. When she decided to start sleeping with him the rent stopped and he assumed all her tuition expenses. I distinctly remember,“Works for me,” she said.
Just as I thought, an economic boat anchor. I prefer a woman closer to my age who has more money than me.
“Just as I thought, an economic boat anchor.”
I got the impression that she would move on after college to develop her career. They both got what they were looking for, so it was an equitable arrangement. Nothing wrong with that, IMHO.
Nothing wrong with that, IMHO.
I agree with you, it’s just that I wouldn’t want to hitch my wagon to an asset svcking vehicle like that, no matter how prime.
I think if I wanted to do the young woman thing, I’d just go to far east Asia. There are incredibly gorgeous young women who would come far cheaper than their American counterparts due to the currency exchange rate. Could live like a king in spite of the “cost.”
“…I prefer a woman closer to my age who has more money than me….”
Ditto.
She makes dinner at her place, spend the night at her place and leave the next morning.. Don’t even have to do the dishes.
Sloggi panties
Never heard of ’em. Quite boring but would go with Birks.
“Quite boring but would go with Birks.”
European, the bird wears an above the hips athletic style.
‘In the early 2000s, Angola became Africa’s biggest destination for Chinese capital, receiving US$42.6 billion from Chinese lenders – more than a quarter of China’s total lending to African countries between 2000 and 2020.’
‘But the boom was short-lived. When global oil prices plummeted to below US$50 a barrel in mid-2014 from a high of US$115 per barrel, the Angolan economy suffered. It fell into recession in 2016 and contracted for five consecutive years. The Covid-19 pandemic exacerbated the problem, and the country only narrowly avoided a debt default recently.’
‘Joao Lourenco – also known as JLo – who replaced dos Santos as president in 2017, promised to reverse the nation’s dwindling fortunes, diversify the oil-dependent economy and reduce its excessive reliance on China, describing economic diversification as “a matter of life or death” for Angola’s long-term prospects.’
‘In 2019, he admitted the concept behind the oil-backed loans the country had signed with China was not working.’
“The thing is that such kinds of credit lines had a condition that the debt would be switched out with oil as a collateral,” he said. “But today we are discontinuing such a practice … advised by the IMF and the World Bank.”
https://sports.yahoo.com/end-angola-model-sees-number-093000727.html
Your Old Fridge Is Vladimir Putin’s Friend. Dump It!
Washington Post|9 hours ago
Incentives like negative electricity rates and subsidies for energy efficient appliances can help Europe store up gas for the winter.
‘Two other soldiers the AP interviewed — former office-workers in Kyiv with no prior battle experience — said they were sent to the front lines in the east as soon as they completed their initial training. They said they observed “terrible organization” and “illogical decision-making,” and many people in their battalion refused to fight.’
‘One of the soldiers said he smokes marijuana daily. “Otherwise, I would lose my mind, I would desert. It’s the only way I can cope” he said.’
‘A 28-year-old former teacher in Sloviansk who “never imagined” he would fight for his country described Ukraine’s battlefields as a completely different life, with a different value system and emotional highs as well as lows.’
https://infotel.ca/newsitem/eu-russia-ukraine-war/cp1325663046
‘The end of emergency rental assistance could spell trouble for some families. CERA requests peaked in June after the state announced the portal would be closing at the end of the month. Roughly 9,000 applications poured in weekly compared to the previous high of 5,000 in October 2021.’
“Who would have imagined that we would have spent a billion dollars and that’s still not enough,” said Lisa Chapman, director of public policy for the Michigan Coalition Against Homelessness.’
https://www.mlive.com/public-interest/2022/07/michigans-1-billion-pandemic-rent-fund-is-drying-up-whats-next.html
Guberment can never replace capitalism. They don’t have any money. They either get it from us or they borrow it.
Or simply print it.
Here’s you labor shortage, right here. Get a fawking job.
‘Several unicorns like Ola, Unacademy, Vedantu, Cars24 and Mobile Premier League (MPL) have laid off employees in the name of “restructuring and cost-cutting”. Companies like Blinkit, BYJU’s (White Hat Jr, Toppr), FarEye, Trell are among other startup ventures to have shown the door to many employees this year.’
‘According to the report, the Indian startup sector may witness more than 60,000 job losses to navigate through the “funding winter”. Citing industry experts, the report suggests that at least 50,000 startup employees are likely to be fired in 2022 in the name of “restructuring and cost cutting” while certain startups keep receiving millions in fundings.’
‘Global companies like Netflix, financial services company Robinhood and several crypto platforms – battered by the economic headwinds– have trimmed their workforce.’
‘Investors should brace for a historic drop in the stock market to start filtering through to startups over the next few quarters, said a partner of US-based venture capital firm Sapphire Ventures, reported Bloomberg.’
“We are going to be in for some hard times ahead — I don’t know if it’s going to be one quarter, two quarters, three quarters or more,” Cathy Gao said in an interview with Bloomberg Television. “My message to everyone is this is an opportunity to look inwards, get your house in shape and be ready for the future.”
“My stage is a little bit frozen right now because, on one hand, a lot of companies raised a lot of money in 2021 — they might have 30 months of runway,” Gao said. “On the other hand, investors don’t know where the valuation is going to settle quite just yet.”
https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/world/thousands-of-techies-lose-jobs-in-us-nearly-12-000-in-indian-startups/ar-AAZa7m4
“We are going to be in for some hard times ahead…”
The overdrawn donkeys are having too much fun with their aerial fireworks, kegs of beer and 4×4 trucks, so they’ll never see this warning.
Six indicted in cryptocurrency and NFT fraud schemes that netted more than $130 million
‘David Saffron, 49, used his cryptocurrency investment platform Circle Society to raise about $12 million from investors to a fraudulent crypto fund that purported to trade on the futures and commodity markets, prosecutors said.’
‘Saffron allegedly told investors he used a “trading bot” to generate returns up to 600%. He held investor meetings at homes in the Hollywood Hills and traveled with armed security guards to “create the false appearance of wealth and success,” prosecutors said.’
“In reality, Mr. Saffron was operating an illegal Ponzi scheme to defraud victim investors and used the funds for his own personal benefit,” said Ryan L. Korner, special agent in charge of the IRS’ Los Angeles criminal investigation field office. Saffron faces up to 115 years in prison if convicted.’
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-07-02/six-indicted-in-cryptocurrency-and-nft-fraud-schemes
rms
July 4, 2022 at 7:58 am
I read a comment in a thread about older guys from a mid-twenties returning college student who rented a room in a house walking distance to campus from a guy in his mid-forties who retired early. Said he was clean, a gentleman and genuinely concerned about her success in college. When she decided to start sleeping with him the rent stopped and he assumed all her tuition expenses. I distinctly remember,“Works for me,” she said.
Reminds me of a song by Miranda Lambert and the Pistol Annies called “Hell on Heels”. Lyrics are thus….
I’m hell on heels
Say what you will
I done made the devil a deal
He made me pretty
He made me smart
And I’m gonna break me a million hearts
I’m hell on heels
Baby, I’m coming for you
This diamond ring
On my hand’s
The only good thing
That came from that man
Got a G.T.O. from one named Joe
And a big piece of land down in Mexico
I’m hell on heels
Baby, I’m coming for you
I got a pink guitar
A Lincoln town car
From ol’ what’s his name
I meet at a bar
Got a high rise flat in Hollywood
From a married man wasn’t up to no good
I’m hell on heels
Baby, I’m coming for you
Then there’s Jim
I almost forgot I ran him off
But I took the yacht
Poor ol’ Billy
Bless his heart
I’m still using his credit card
I’m hell on heels
Sugar daddy, I’m coming for you
I’m hell on heels
Say what you will
I done made the devil a deal
He made me pretty
He made me smart
And I’m gonna break me a million hearts
I’m hell on heels
Baby, I’m coming for you
I’m hell on heels
Say what you will
I done made the devil a deal
He made me pretty
He made me smart
I’m gonna break me a million hearts
I’m hell on heels
Sugar daddy, I’m coming for you
Written by: Miranda Leigh Lambert, Ashley L. Monroe, Angaleena Loletta Presley
Album: Hell On Heels
Released: 2011
Lyrics provided by Musixmatch
Happy 4th.
Rj not from Chicago anymore
My prediction is soon to be heard statements such as:
“Honey my parents said we can move in there. The kids can share the basement”
“$75 on f^*king nails? No wonder we can’t pay the God damn mortgage!”
“Jackson & Donnelly, divorce lawyers, how can I direct your call?”
And let me add 10-12% unemployment by 2024. Just like the government wants.
It’s either higher unemployment or inflation with much higher interest rates. Which do you think the government would prefer?
The CR8R in crypto and stonks will go deeper than most anticipate, due to underwater leveraged gambles which will result in unrepayable margin debt. Lenders getting burned, coupled with higher interest rates, will dry up the low interest lending that supported mania valuations in risk assets.
And in a few months, it will become obvious that housing has joined other risk assets in the CR8R, leading to much consternation on Wall Street and the potential for a Lehman Brothers type event this fall when denial gives way to panic and a race to the exits from leveraged housing gambles.
Quantitative Tightening won’t help buoy risk asset prices.
The Financial Times
FT Alphaville Morgan Stanley
Are quantitative tightening fears overblown?
Morgan Stanley thinks so
George Steer
June 14 2022
Morgan Stanley analysts have a simple if somewhat disconcerting message for anyone wondering how markets might react to the largest contraction of central bank balance sheets in history: “Your guess is as good as ours.”
So-called quantitative tightening has only ever been tried once before, when the Federal Reserve, the Bank of England, the ECB and the Bank of Japan in 2018-19 collectively shrank their balance sheets by around $0.8tn. Janet Yellen quipped at the time that the process would be as uneventful as “watching paint dry”.
But that was then. With inflation running hot, Morgan Stanley expects G4 central banks will have to run-off a massive $4tn-worth of assets through to the end of next year.
The Fed’s run-off process starts in earnest this week, and Credit Suisse strategist Zoltan Pozsar has warned that things could get nasty:
“If the current episode of monetary tightening were a scene from a movie, we’d be looking at something similar to the scene from Apocalypse Now, where a group of helicopters is approaching a small village on the beach with Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries beaming from the speakers.”
…
The Financial Times
Property sector
Property set to cool as investors face ‘new paradigm’, Brookfield warns
Canadian private equity firm’s Europe boss says rising rates and economic gloom are rapidly slowing the sector
99 and 100 Bishopsgate buildings in London, UK
Brookfield has a $52bn property portfolio in the UK and Europe, including 99 and 100 Bishopsgate in London
George Hammond yesterday
Property dealmaking is set to plummet and values to fall as investors adapt to a “new paradigm” of rising rates and a global economy in turmoil, the head of European real estate for Brookfield has said.
Brad Hyler, who manages the Canadian private equity fund’s $52bn property portfolio in the UK and on the continent, said property investors had been caught cold by the rapid deterioration in the economic outlook.
“The pace of change and the shift in sentiment from reasonably positive to negative across the board has been a big adjustment,” he told the Financial Times.
That shift is chilling the property market. “Banks have gotten more selective, more risk-averse,” said Hyler, adding: “We’re expecting transaction volume to decelerate pretty significantly — it already has.”
Having entered the UK market with its purchase of a stake in Canary Wharf in 2003, Brookfield is now among a handful of North American private equity funds, alongside Blackstone, Apollo, Ares and KKR, that are increasingly dominating the trade of large European real estate portfolios.
The Canadian firm has been among the most active players in Europe in the past decade, building portfolios of laboratories and life science campuses, rental accommodation and student housing. In May it sold its UK Student Roost portfolio for more than £3bn.
The fund also owns holiday resorts business Center Parcs, which it may look to sell soon, according to Hyler.
He is confident there will be a market for “higher quality assets”, but warned that values in out-of-favour sectors such as older, poor quality offices could fall sharply, with interest rates and inflation adding to property owners’ costs at the same time as the gloomy economic outlook weighs on tenant demand for new space.
Stress is likely to emerge when landlords come to refinance mortgages, warned Hyler. With rates having risen fast since the start of the year and tenant demand for older office blocks waning, borrowing costs for some could exceed income from the building.
Shares in some of the UK’s largest listed office owners were decimated last week after analysts at Bank of America turned bearish on the sector, warning that office values were likely to fall 12 per cent by 2024 and rents to flatline.
“Office stock prices are not fully reflecting the end of the ultra-low bond party, the fall in asset prices and the lack of earnings growth ahead,” said analysts at the bank, adding that “the cost of borrowing is now solidly higher than investment yields — a situation not seen since 2007”.
…
Sounds like the tsunami tide of private equity money that flooded commercial and residential real estate over the past few years is headed back out to sea.
“the cost of borrowing is now solidly higher than investment yields — a situation not seen since 2007”
Ahem…
Great snippet!
When the dust settles on the cryptocollapse, the Blockchain technology will be revealed to be an overly hyped scam with zero fundamental value.
The Financial Times
The Big Read Bitcoin
Will the crypto crash derail the next web revolution?
Advocates argue that the blockchain technology that underpins digital assets will withstand the recent fall in values
Richard Waters and Hannah Murphy in San Francisco and Scott Chipolina in London 47 minutes ago
…
Stephane Kasriel, the head of commerce and financial technologies who oversees blockchain efforts at social media group Meta, is among those who argue that when the dust settles, crypto mania, like the dotcom bubble, will turn out to have been the manic precursor to a more stable and lasting tech revolution.
“A lot of these technologies go through the same hype cycle,” he says, with early euphoria and speculation followed by a bust. But, he adds, like the web at the start of the century, the underlying blockchain technology is something that “solves a real problem for people” and will be “useful for the world in general for a very long time”.
‘Risky, flawed and unproven’
That is not a universally held belief. Exactly what that “something” is — or what uses it could be put to that are not already possible with today’s technology — is not absolutely clear. So far, crypto tech has been used mainly for financial speculation, criminal activity, decentralised finance or DeFi (which exists outside regulation) and the creation and trading of unique digital tokens called NFTs, which have been through their own boom and bust.
“A lot of the language [about decentralisation] is an almost exact replica of what we talked about in the 1990s,” says Martha Bennett, who at the time was head of advanced technology at UK insurance group Prudential. But she points to a fundamental difference between the early days of the world wide web and Web3 now: “We already had lots of utility by 1995 — we had email, we had lots of information online. With Web3, we have none of that.”
Bennett, who now analyses new technologies at Forrester Research, says it is probably still too early to judge whether anything lasting or useful will survive. But a growing chorus of critics in the tech world argue that — unlike with the dotcoms — the tech underlying crypto has no redeeming features at all.
A group of 26 computer scientists and academics wrote to members of the US Congress in May to warn that the technology was “risky, flawed and unproven”. Bruce Schneier, a computer security expert and one of the authors, says that any application built to run on a blockchain would be more practical, cost-effective and secure if it was based on other technologies: “Whatever it is you’re doing, it’s better without blockchain,” he says.
The crypto boom drew its power from new technology, anti-establishment social forces and powerful financial incentives that combined in an era of loose money to produce an explosive mix. With that era apparently over, it is now entering a challenging new phase.
Summing up the case against crypto and Web3, Phil Libin, a computer scientist and former chief executive of Evernote, the note taking app, describes the forces that inflated the bubble as: “80 per cent greed, 20 per cent ideology and zero per cent technology”.
Would you care to invest your life savings in The Emperor’s New Blockchain?
dawg
I posted this on the wrong thread, so wanted to re-post, especially after reading on today’s thread that Bend, OR has a median of almost $800,000. Unreal.
My prediction has to do with which areas I believe are the most bubblicious and prone to the steepest overall price declines once this whole thing shakes out. Here are my top 10:
1st place – Bend, OR
2nd place – Boise, ID
3rd place – Reno, NV
4th place – Salt Lake City, UT (all of Utah, really)
5th place – Las Vegas, NV
6th place – Phoenix, AZ
7th place – Inland Empire, CA
8th place – Austin, TX (and beyond)
9th place – Seattle, WA
10th place – Portland, OR
I realize this is heavily slanted towards the west, but for good reason. First, it’s all I really know. Next, the bubble seems to be much worse out west than back east, for some unknown reason.