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The credit-crunch, Countrwide, Sowood Capital, etc. - they all come down to families like the Montes. As go the Montes, so goes the economy. Let's keep our fingers crossed.

The headlines are screaming today about the credit market catastrophe and its effects on the Street. Ah, sorry but I;m not seeing those effects, are you?

The collapse of Sowood Capital is a good example of the perils of leverage.

Angelo Mozilo strikes me as a pretty honest and very smart guy and I wouldn't dream of comparing him to Ken Lay or Bernie Ebbers, but Countrywide could easily go into an Enron-like death spiral if their access to credit dries up.

The second quarter data is out from the National Association of Realtors and prices are holding pretty steady.

As VMWare is soaring, EMC has been trending down despite the fact that EMC owns 90% of the company

I didn't write this, but it came across my desk today and I think that it is great explanation for the current market crisis so I've posted it here.

Rates are holding relatively constant.

The Uptick rule was a 73 year old SEC rule that made it more difficult to short stock. The SEC eliminated the Uptick Rule on July 6 and the Wall Street Journal reported today that it may be on contributor to the market's recent volatility.

Enhanced Money Markets can get you rates above a traditional money market fund but they can also get you into trouble, as Europe is finding out.

Data that I follow seems to show fewer homes on the market, not more as would be expected. What's the explanation?

Friday was a scary day, especially in Europe. Near panic reigned throughout Europe, less so in the United States. The European Central Bank (ECB)hasn't pumped as much liquidity into the system since the day after September 11, 2001. The Fed, in contrast, added almost twice as much as normally, but contrary to the ECB held its powder dry. In the past, the Fed always acted more swiftly and decisively than the ECB. This change in behavior raises flags and suggests that things in Europe are worse that we suspected.

The news is out in the nerd-isphere that Facebook was hacked. The majority of the world could care less.

Nicolas Sarkozy was elected President of France in May and, in an extraordinary break from tradition, is spending his first vacation in office not in the Cote D’Azur, but in New Hampshire. Here is what he is likely to find.

I just received a flyer in the mail advertising ING's Electric Orange account. In speaking with many people, I often hear that the inconvenience of waiting to access the money is one concern since it usually takes 2-3 days to remove funds from an online bank. ING now provides its customers with the ability to withdraw the money via the ATM ($1,000 daily limit) or via a debit card (as much money as in the account).