Friday, Sep 21, 2007

Bernanke tells Congress subprime will get much worse

ABC News: Bernanke warns of worse to come in subprime fallout

Financial markets might be breathing easier, but US Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke is warning there is worse to come, with subprime defaults expected to surge in the coming months.

Posted by mybrainhurts @ 10:06 AM (630 views) Add Comment

8 Comments

1. Orwell said...

As we know,

Its only just warming up this. And we are 5 times more overindebted than the US? Is that what people are saying?

Friday, September 21, 2007 10:13AM Report Comment
 

2. sovietuk said...

Batten down the hatches - if you have any.

Friday, September 21, 2007 10:52AM Report Comment
 

3. Urine Trouble said...

sovietuk (2)

If you have no hatches - get some credit while there is still some and get hatches!!

Friday, September 21, 2007 11:24AM Report Comment
 

4. mybrainhurts said...

no, get battens. hatches are the weak point; battens are what protect them

Friday, September 21, 2007 12:54PM Report Comment
 

5. dohousescrashinthewoods said...

Wichever you buy, don't buy them on a teaser rate.

Friday, September 21, 2007 02:06PM Report Comment
 

6. dohousescrashinthewoods said...

I did a back-of-an-envelope calculation, based on yesterday's MarketOracle post:

Taking the market capitalization of all US stocks:
1994: $5.3 trillion
2006: $35 trillion

If you work out the compound growth it is 17%. If you assume growth of 4% per year for a stable economy, they would be at $8.5 trillion. The FTSE averages, what, 9% per year? even at that rate, they should only have reached $14.9 trillion.

That suggests the market is 235% what it should be. The DJIA started the year arount 12,500 suggesting it really should have been 5,300 (excluding inflation).
Does that mean assets values are approinately double what they would be in a "non-credit-infested" world?
Does that mean we can expect assets to halve in value if credit disappears?
And, if large amounts of resources are diverted to servicing debt, does that mean valuations could go below half?

Does that mean I can get that 300K townhouse for under 150K if I can still get a mortgage in a few years' time? ;)

Friday, September 21, 2007 02:29PM Report Comment
 

7. alan said...

Credit Suisse did some really useful analysis which was posted here yesterday. Ben couldn't do much else other than own up!

Friday, September 21, 2007 03:29PM Report Comment
 

8. harold said...

dohousescrashinthewoods, yes.

Friday, September 21, 2007 05:22PM Report Comment
 

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