Posted on December 18, 2009 by Doug Henwood
Happy Beethoven’s baptism day. Fed begins to withdraw some indulgence On Wednesday, the Federal Reserve held one of its regular policy-setting meetings, which happen every six weeks or so, and decided to do nothing, for now. That is, it left the interest rate under its direct control, the so-called federal funds rate, the interest rate that bank charge each other for overnight loans, unchanged at 0. Ok, it’s averaged 0.12% for the last few weeks, which is pretty close to 0. It also said in the statement accompanying the decision that it… Read More
Posted on December 18, 2009 by Doug Henwood
score one for the cows An interesting article in the New York Times earlier this week, reporting that Congress has done absolutely nothing to reform the credit-rating industry. You may recall that the credit rating industry helped give us the recent financial crisis, which, though ending, has left behind a toxic economic residue. The industry is paid by the issuers of securities to rate them. Investors then choose whether or not to buy these securities based on the ratings. You may wonder how objective these ratings are if they’re paid for by… Read More
Posted on December 4, 2009 by Doug Henwood
[Not retrieved from the future. Most of this was delivered on WBAI last night, but the bits about the employment report and liberal disillusionment were written for tomorrow morning’s KPFA version.] Things today… Two stories on the front of Thursday’s Financial Times tell you a lot about life in today’s USA. Above the fold—a phrase that probably doesn’t mean that much to anyone under the age of 35—the lead story tells us that the Bank of America is about to pay back the $45 billion the U.S. government lent to it when… Read More
Posted on December 18, 2009 by Doug Henwood
Radio commentary, December 17, 2009
Happy Beethoven’s baptism day. Fed begins to withdraw some indulgence On Wednesday, the Federal Reserve held one of its regular policy-setting meetings, which happen every six weeks or so, and decided to do nothing, for now. That is, it left the interest rate under its direct control, the so-called federal funds rate, the interest rate that bank charge each other for overnight loans, unchanged at 0. Ok, it’s averaged 0.12% for the last few weeks, which is pretty close to 0. It also said in the statement accompanying the decision that it… Read More
Posted on December 18, 2009 by Doug Henwood
Radio commentary, December 10, 2009
score one for the cows An interesting article in the New York Times earlier this week, reporting that Congress has done absolutely nothing to reform the credit-rating industry. You may recall that the credit rating industry helped give us the recent financial crisis, which, though ending, has left behind a toxic economic residue. The industry is paid by the issuers of securities to rate them. Investors then choose whether or not to buy these securities based on the ratings. You may wonder how objective these ratings are if they’re paid for by… Read More
Posted on December 4, 2009 by Doug Henwood
Radio commentary, December 5, 2009
[Not retrieved from the future. Most of this was delivered on WBAI last night, but the bits about the employment report and liberal disillusionment were written for tomorrow morning’s KPFA version.] Things today… Two stories on the front of Thursday’s Financial Times tell you a lot about life in today’s USA. Above the fold—a phrase that probably doesn’t mean that much to anyone under the age of 35—the lead story tells us that the Bank of America is about to pay back the $45 billion the U.S. government lent to it when… Read More
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