Tuesday, September 30, 2008

1907 Redux

I'm not the only one who thinks the 2008 Credit Crisis is comparable to the Panic of 1907. Gordon Crovitz writes in the Journal:
A key holdup to getting past this crisis is the continuing unknown of the remaining value of mortgage-based securities. In Morgan's day, price discovery resulted when he went around the room seeking details of balance sheets... Getting our arms around the scope of the bad debt would define the capital needs for banks, and there would be prices set that potential private-sector buyers of the debt could consider.
Wall Street doesn't need extra cash - they need a proper valuation of their own assets.

3 comments:

cory said...

oh man, chops, are you saying no bail-out? i thought i was the only one!

Macro Guy said...

Today in a conversation about Congressional leaders who are pushing the bailout, I think I used the phrase, "bastard babyeating pigdogs with the dicks of castrated snails".

That about sums about my feelings about Paulson / Pelosi / Boehner / Bush right now.

Mike said...

That was in conversation with me!