Chicken Little, the sky is falling. Did you not notice the sky is falling? I mean, everyone knows the sky is falling. Do you not watch TV, read a newspaper, own a house, have a mortgage? Do you not know that the sky is falling is the flavor of the day? Do not worry. Next [...]
Entries from July 2008
July 28, 2008
Drill, drill, drill vs. Research, tax, research
Drill, drill, drill. Sounds so simple, right? If you drill, you end up with oil. And if you end up with more oil, you will drop the price, right? The reason to drill has to do more with what people think than reality. What I mean by that is the drilling will cause people to [...]
July 25, 2008
Just trade bad paper for good paper
Without ground rules to play with in the financial markets, people will make stupid bets for short-term profit that cost everyone 100 times over in the long term. The U.S. had–I stress had–the best mortgage system in the world: 30-year fixed paper at a decent rate, with 20% down. This was a bet that created [...]
July 24, 2008
Record access agreement reached in Australia
Herald Sun: Rio Tinto to buy ore and keep third parties off tracks Buy the Australian juniors that are on the rail lines. A solution has been reached on rail access. This is huge news for the small stranded resources. The question, of course, is, what is the rail head price? This just opens the [...]
July 24, 2008
Basic rule of law needed in Russia
An investment gets trapped in Kremlin’s vise Very scary article on Russia. As resource prices go up, expect more and more to be taken back by the locals. Russia is ahead of the curve, but just you all wait, others will catch up. At least this guy is out and is not spending his time [...]
July 23, 2008
More CSN (and the bidders are unknown)
Reuters India: Russians, Japanese vie for CSN unit Ok, well, not unknown, but we are not certain who they are. There are a couple separate lists provided by different people, so I tend to not trust them. The valuation numbers are more interesting. We are seeing a $10 billion price tag for the whole project [...]
July 21, 2008
Feeling the pain of inflation across the globe
At some point, inflation is going to hurt everyone, but it hurts people differently. This is because inflation is in essence measured alongside a basket of goods and services. From country to country, people spend different proportions of their income on raw materials, processed goods, and services. The question I want to look at is, [...]
July 16, 2008
Top ten stories for July 16, 2008
1. Bloomberg.com: Cleveland-Cliffs to buy Alpha Natural for $10 billion Introducing an all-in-one stop ‘n’ shop store for steelmakers. Iron ore producer Cleveland-Cliffs plans to buy coal mining firm Alpha Natural to create a merged Cliffs Natural Resources. 2. ABS-CBN: Nickel mine firm asks PSE to suspend Oriental Whistle-blowing, accusations against Oriental Peninsula Resource Group. [...]
