Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Tuesday, December 23, 2008, 12:09 PM 8 Comments
It’s funny how the rapidly changing economic scene changes our view on even the most basic things. A few years ago, it would be hard to imagine anyone seeing Frank Capra’s “It’s a Wonderful Life“ as anything more than a feelgood holiday classic movie. It’s always been a favorite of mine to watch this time of year.
Here’s a recessionary take on current lending as it relates to Potter v. Bailey.
Here’s the thing about Pottersville that struck me when I was 15: It looks like much more fun than stultifying Bedford Falls — the women are hot, the music swings, and the fun times go on all night. If anything, Pottersville captures just the type of excitement George had long been seeking.
And what about that banking issue? When he returns to the “real†Bedford Falls, George is saved by his friends, who open their wallets to cover an $8,000 shortfall at his savings and loan brought about when the evil Mr. Potter snatched a deposit mislaid by George’s idiot uncle, Billy (Thomas Mitchell).
But isn’t George still liable for the missing funds, even if he has made restitution? I mean, if someone robs a bank, and then gives the money back, that person still robbed the bank, right?
I checked my theory with Frank J. Clark, the district attorney for Erie County upstate, where, as far as I can tell, the fictional Bedford Falls is set. He thought it over, and then agreed: George would still face prosecution and possible prison time.
“In terms of the theft, sure, you take the money and put it back, you still committed the larceny,” he said. “By giving the money back, you have mitigated in large measure what the sentence might be, but you are still technically guilty of the offense.”
We’re not saying that Bailey versus Potter is a perfect allegory for today’s credit crunch; Angelo Mozilo and his predatory buddies are no latter-day George Baileys, “starry-eyed dreamers” giving up their own riches to give the Ernie Bishops of the world a chance at the American Dream.
And the majority of the bad loans that have crippled our credit markets were not made to folks like Ernie Bishop, working tirelessly to put a roof over their families’ heads. A fair few of those loans enabled bad real estate investments by people who had no business buying or building homes as big as they did.
But consider this: Perhaps Mr. Potter wasn’t just a heartless Scrooge. Perhaps Mr. Potter, in the absence of sufficient regulatory oversight, was the one voice of sanity keeping the good people of Bedford Falls from over-leveraging themselves.
Salon: All hail Pottersville! This article is from 2001, also written during a recession.
But even a master sometimes flubs a brushstroke, and there is a glaring flaw in Capra’s great canvas.
I refer, of course, to Pottersville.
In Capra’s Tale of Two Cities, Pottersville is the Bad Place. It’s the demonic foil to Bedford Falls, the sweet, Norman Rockwell-like town in which George grows up. Named after the evil Mr. Potter, Pottersville is the setting for George’s brief, nightmarish trip through a world in which he never existed. In that alternative universe, Potter has triumphed, and we are intended to shudder in horror at the sinful city he has spawned — a kind of combo pack of Sodom, Gomorrah, Times Square in 1972, Tokyo’s hostess district, San Francisco’s Barbary Coast ca. 1884 and one of those demon-infested burgs dimly visible in the background of a Hieronymus Bosch painting.
There’s just one problem: Pottersville rocks!
Clearly, we see things the way we want to see them and right now, it’s probably not helping too much. Conservative lending practices continue to damage the very collateral they are intended to protect. Consumers won’t buy because they are worried about their jobs, which in turn causes more businesses to fail.
The solution?
Just watch the movie as intended and have a wonderful life holiday.
The program 60 minutes is on a roll after lying dormant for several years. I always view it as the bookmark to my weekend after watching my dose of NFL on sunday afternoon. It began with the Obama interview and keeps on rolling.
I am very late to post this, but the clip on the “Mortgage Meltdown” from a week ago Sunday is more of the same but, but like cod liver oil, it’s probably good to take.
Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Monday, December 22, 2008, 10:56 PM Comments Off
I am not one for mushy demographic survey stats, but this one intrigued me because it incorporates Census findings and overlaps with housing sales. “Who Moves? Who Stays Put? Where’s Home?”
As a nation, the United States is often
portrayed as restless and rootless. Census
data, though, indicate that Americans are
settling down. Only 13% of Americans
changed residences between 2006 and
2007, the smallest share since the
government began tracking this trend in
the late 1940s.
A new Pew Social & Demographic
Trends survey finds that most Americans
have moved to a new community at least
once in their lives, although a notable
number—nearly four-in-ten—have
never left the place in which they were
born.1 Asked why they live where they
do, movers most often cite the pull of
economic opportunity. Stayers most
often cite the tug of family and
connections.
On the surface, this seems to contradict the surge in sales activity in 2004, 2005 and 2006 during the housing boom. However, NAR indicated that roughly 36% of all sales in 2004 were investor or vacation home sales. I interpret this as a surge of secondary housing, not primary, which is one of the reasons the surplus housing stock is going to be difficult to absorb over the next several years. Although I can’t find an updated version of those numbers (likely because they would not be rosy enough), I suspect they are nearly a non-factor now.
Exercise: try counting the number of times you have moved in your entire life, including higher education if applicable. I moved roughly every 4 years before I left for college, then every year of college (2x) and every 2 years until I owned my first house. After that I averaged once every 6 years. 8 states. I am sick of moving.
The findings that interested me most:
Most adults (57%) have not lived outside their current home state in the U.S. At the opposite end of the
spectrum, 15% have lived in four or more states.
More than one-in-five U.S.-born adults (23%) say the place they consider home in their heart isn’t where
they’re living now. And among those who have lived in two or more communities, fully 38% say they aren’t
living in their “heart home†now.
The Midwest is the most rooted region: 46% of adult residents there say they have spent their entire life in
one community. The least rooted is the West, where only 30% of adult residents have stayed in their
hometown. Residents of the South (36%) and East (38%) fall in between.
College education is a key marker of the likelihood to move: Three-quarters of college graduates (77%)
have changed communities at least once, compared with just over half (56%) of those with a high school diploma
or less. College graduates also are more likely to have lived in multiple states.
Movers are more likely than stayers to say there is a good chance that they will move in the next five years.
Not surprisingly, only a third of those who rate their current communities highly predict they’ll move within
five years, compared with half of those who give their current communities a poor rating.
Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Thursday, December 18, 2008, 1:47 PM 1 Comment
Ok, it’s the SEC football conference logo, but a more effective regulator.
Regulatory authorities can’t catch everything, yet they can anticipate mamoth problems and sometimes adapt timely to changing complex financial instruments.
The SEC has become the poster child for all that is wrong with the federal regulatory oversight. The federal government needs to be re-build trust in a financial system.
Mary Schapiro, a veteran and diligent regulator if ever there was one, is Barack Obama’s choice to head the Securities and Exchange Commission. It is a choice that should please those who hope the S.E.C. can recover from what must be the worst year in its history.
“I’ve abandoned free-market principles to save the free-market system”
and of course:
“I feel a sense of obligation to my successor to make sure there is not a, you know, a huge economic crisis. Look, we’re in a crisis now. I mean, this is — we’re in a huge recession, but I don’t want to make it even worse.”
The SEC is an agency that missed the Madloff ponzi scheme involving fifty billion dollars or more by relying on data voluntarily provided by Madloff,who may have had some inside help. Who are we kidding?
Here’s betting the SEC’s Chris Cox can’t wait turn over the keys to his office once the new administration rides into town. The embattled regulator yesterday said he was “gravely concerned” after reports surfaced that an agency official that took part in auditing Bernard Madoff’s books in 1999 and 2004 later married his niece.
The nuances are way beyond my expertise, but the common sense, for the most part, isn’t. Expect a boatload of hedge funds to sink in 2009.
Hindsight tells us it’s a lot cheaper to have modest effective regulatory oversight than complex regulations that don’t separate church/cookie and state/cookie jar so to speak.
“We didn’t float any plan,” Paulson said. “I am always looking at new ideas and I have said from day one that the key thing to get us through this period is getting housing prices down.“
Mission accomplished: – housing prices are down. Perhaps that is why he is leaving in January.
Warning – excessive rhetorical questions ahead
So the US Government is working hard to push housing prices down?
…go against the “American Dream” agenda of the current and prior administrations?
Isn’t it kind of late for that?
And that type of policy will solve the credit crunch?
Ok, I’m back
The financial system enabled now-obviously illogically cheap credit which pushed housing prices higher with little regulatory oversight. We experienced a mortgage bubble – a housing boom was merely the byproduct.
To follow his logic, by going backwards using the recent history timeline, Paulson seem to view falling housing prices as a way to stabilize the financial system – take the pressure off, so to speak.
What he probably meant by his quote: I think he is simply a poor communicator and probably meant that housing price declines have a way to go and he doesn’t want to do anything to artificially “prop” them up.
I agree.
All fixes need to take the long view into consideration.
However, the economy can’t function without credit – it is not the exclusive purview of mortgages.
Apparently large numbers of consumers thought precisely that during the week after the disclosure that the Treasury Department was working on plans to slash loan rates for consumers who buy houses in the coming months.
But in the meantime, the news threw a wrench into the marketplace — making some shoppers reluctant to commit to purchase without guaranteed access to 4.5 percent mortgage money. In some cases, it stalled deals that were ready to go.
Good grief – January 20th can’t get here fast enough. I’ve had it.
Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Wednesday, December 17, 2008, 1:26 PM 1 Comment
It’s nice to see the Fed deal with the recession aggressively in their rate cut. Here’s agood summary from Bloomberg:
The Federal Reserve cut the main U.S. interest rate to as low as zero and said it will buy debt as the next step in combating the longest recession in a quarter-century and reviving credit.
The Fed “will employ all available tools to promote the resumption of sustainable economic growth and to preserve price stability,” the Federal Open Market Committee said today in a statement in Washington. “Weak economic conditions are likely to warrant exceptionally low levels of the federal funds rate for some time.”
We are now 0 to .25, the lowest federal funds rate ever and hopefully the beginning of noticeable stimulus to the economy. Of course, this fact is still to be determined by whether banks opt to start lending full scale soon rather than simply recapitalizing.
I am thinking we will see some thawing (on a small scale) in the first half of 2009, because lenders have to actually lend at some point (I know they are currently lending, but not enough to sustain their existence). If they don’t move forward, many will need to reinvent themselves (that is what the investment banks already did) fairly soon.
Ok, so I am feeling guilty about enjoying a 50%-75% average discount (without even trying) during my holiday shopping expedition this past weekend. Clearly retail stores do not have an extra 50%-75% margin to play with and I am not even asking for a discount. Retailers are pleading for us (consumers) to make an appearance. The stores were not crowded – amazing at this time of the year. I may even visit (shhhhh) the local mall, which I swore off (and at) while ago because I don’t expect it to be packed.
I would think that a number of big retailers already know it is over and we will learn their identities in early 2009 when the holiday receipts are totaled. Some are already dead but don’t know it yet. Is the consumer going to benefit from slash and burn retail pricing? In the short run, yes, of course. In the mid to long run, it sure feels like “no”. Ruinous competition for survival may lead to less selection and higher prices.
It seems that no matter what the bar is set at, consumers aren’t shopping in large numbers. The “black friday” uptick was due to the huge discounts offered from the start. Prices have to drop further to get more people out.
We all are observing the lack of activity in the housing sector right now (California is a notable exception with higher sales, thanks to properly priced foreclosures off 50% to 75%.)
It’s all about pricing.
Many housing markets are simply going to have to correct sharply before activity returns in a meaningful way.
By all accounts, sellers are about 9-12 months behind the market. Lenders are twice as disconnected. National retail banks are distracted with all the buyout activity of the past year and are not focused on consumer lending yet. It’s a lot to swallow: BofA -> Countrywide, JPM Chase -> WaMu, PNC -> National City, Wells Fargo ->Wachovia
Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Wednesday, December 17, 2008, 12:00 AM Comments Off
The US consumer doesn’t seem to want to fight like Oasis, although Oasis ends up making bettermore informed music…
Here’s a strange press release by Fitch, one of the big three rating agencies along with Moody’s and S&P.
Fitch Ratings has formalized the expanded housing-related metrics used in its public sector rating process and will continue to refine these data as market conditions warrant.
Ok, so we are getting insight from one of the big three , although Fitch is believed to be the most conservative of the three. The ratings agencies sharply downgraded billions of highly rated mortgage-backed bonds just after the credit crunch began in July 2007. I seem to recall that their models didn’t have the right data.
Fitch believes the housing downturn will be more prolonged and acute in regions that experienced the most dramatic home price appreciation and new residential development since 2000 and in regions with high exposure to sub-prime and option ARMs mortgages.
The three firms that dominate the $5 billion-a-year industry — Standard & Poor’s, Moody’s Investors Service and Fitch Ratings — have been widely criticized for failing to identify risks in subprime mortgage investments, whose collapse helped set off the global financial crisis.
The rating agencies had to downgrade thousands of securities backed by mortgages as home-loan delinquencies have soared and the value of those investments plummeted. The downgrades have contributed to hundreds of billions in losses and writedowns at major banks and investment firms.
The agencies are crucial financial gatekeepers, issuing ratings on the creditworthiness of public companies and securities. Their grades can be key factors in determining a company’s ability to raise or borrow money, and at what cost which securities will be purchased by banks, mutual funds, state pension funds or local governments.
These agencies need to do a lot of credibility-building going forward. I can’t help but wonder why these agencies aren’t receiving more scrutiny. How will investor confidence be restored when the ratings they relied on were inadequate?
Chauntay Barnes, 30, moved into a single-family home with her two kids in November 2007 on a quiet street in Hamden, Conn. She never missed a payment on her $800 rent — never had so much as a late fee — and yet in mid-September she opened her mail to find an eviction notice.
If you are going to solve the housing crisis, you can’t treat tenants who met the their obligations as a throwaway. Fannie Mae is going to work with some tenants to prevent eviction. Still, only a fraction of the evictions will be prevented.
In a move that provides relief to thousands of renters who face eviction but draws the federal government even deeper into the housing market, the loan giant Fannie Mae said Sunday that it would sign new leases with renters living in foreclosed properties owned by the company.
In recent months, skyrocketing foreclosure rates have exposed as many as 70,000 renters to evictions, even though many never missed rent payments, according to analysts who track housing data. In many cities and states, renters can be evicted after their home goes into foreclosure, regardless of how long their lease stretches into the future.
Yes, properties may be easier to market when vacant, but the reality is the property will likely see extended marketing times with the surplus inventory levels. Why not keep income coming in to the taxpayer while the market finds it groove?
“We’re not in the business of managing rental properties, and we’re not in the business of being a landlord,†said Thomas Kelly, a spokesman for JPMorgan Chase, which owns about two million loans. “Clearly the renter is caught in the middle in cases like this. When a property is in foreclosure, we follow the law.â€
When will the renter stop being treated like a second class citizen? Is the American dream of homeownership myopic?
Aside: The National Community Reinvestment Coalition, a consumer advocacy group has an amazing public relations sensibility. I would guess that coverage of this issue in the NYT and WSJ was a perfectly placed pitch. Kudos to them on this important issue.
Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Monday, December 15, 2008, 12:01 AM Comments Off
I have had the pleasure of providing a monthly chart for the Economic Spotlight section of Crain’s New York Business magazine since September 2003. Here is the latest, which appears in the current issue of Crain’s New York Business.
Had a fun interview with Tom and Sara this morning on the always MUST watch/listen Bloomberg Surveillance. We talked housing, rentals, vacancy and inventory. An added bonus was the addition of Adam Davidson – co-founder and co-host of Planet Money... Read More
