The Worst Is Ahead (Roubini)

This guy is the best economist i have ever seen, he has predicted 15 of the last 3 recessions.

+1 for print version.

Print version == less size per paragraph in bytes and visual overhead. This is especially good for mobile browsing, and I can't think of one instance where I would have missed something in the "web" version.

You know what all these articles remind me of? They remind me of how they used to hype the technology boom of the 2000s. You would see the same articles by the same people talking of how the situation would continue forever, and how great everything was and so on.

Right now, they are doing the exact same thing, but in reverse. I'll go with my instincts on this one instead of acting based of articles - when prices change in my supermarket, when clients stop calling, when my friends start getting laid off - then I will worry.

Worrying because of newspaper articles is like digging a bunker for the Y2K crisis.

History promises inflation, not deflation. The great depression was deflationary, but the great depression did not feature helicopter Ben at the helm. I suspect Paulson's recent decision to not purchase troubled assets has a simple genesis. Bernanke is doing it instead,

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aatl...

Henry Paulson said in September they would comply with congressional demands for transparency in a $700 billion bailout of the banking system. Two months later, as the Fed lends far more than that in separate rescue programs that didn't require approval by Congress, Americans have no idea where their money is going or what securities the banks are pledging in return.

Well, I doubt Ben would buy quality securities since quality securities are usually sold on the open market.

It seems like there are only two kinds of economists, "stopped clocks" and "wind socks".

The stopped clocks are ecstatic that their doomful (or glorious) predictions are finally right -- never mind the fact that they've been wrong nine years out of ten.

The wind socks just take whatever's happening now, good or bad, and say it'll keep on happening forever.

No wonder they call economics "the dismal science".

Roubini says L-shaped, Japan-style recession is unlikely. I'm breaking out the champagne.

my comfort comes in the fact that probably 80% of the predictions made about this recession has been off, from " fanny and freddy are fine" to numerous other statements

indeed, look at the great depression, look at japan in the 90s. in each of these secular bear markets, markets rebounded for gains as high as 100% from the previous low...yet still the ultimate direction of the market was downward. DJIA will rebound at some point to around 12k, then back down to 5k. it will be most amusing watching the last hopeful traders plow back into the market only to fall into an obvious bear trap.

ultimately we will get hyperinflation as the govt prints literally trillions to monetize the various debts of the govt. the strong dollar now is just a head fake as the yen carry trade and other various forex arbitrages unwind.

all real estate will lose 50%. everything. that is what happened in japan in the 90s...even desirable tokyo condos lost 50%. 50% will be the minimum downside for real estate.

actually its worth noting that when japan went down the toilet in the 90s, they were the world's biggest saver and lender. we are the world's biggest borrower. so don't expect anything as gentle as japan's ten-year recession.

expect an end to all of this around 2020, and this will only end when people see taking on debt, any debt, as about as attractive as sharing needles with a junkie. when this is over its impossible to say what the economy will look like, but you can be sure people will be dealing in tangibles...cash or barter.

the best thing you can do now is -preserve capital-. you are going to need it to survive. forget the charlatans telling you to "double down" because they have some anecdotes of companies exploding out of temporary down times....none of your luminaries have lived through anything like this, and indeed many of the superstars of the roaring twenties were literally gutted by the market turmoil of the 30s...they just refused to believe the downside would last very long, they thought it was all just a buying opportunity...little did they know how far things would fall.