The Market Ticker

Amusing day today....

Let's start with KB Homes. Awful.

"For the three months ended August 31, 2007, the Company reported a loss from continuing operations, net of an income tax benefit, of $478.6 million or $6.19 per diluted share due largely to pretax non-cash charges of $690.1 million related to inventory and joint venture impairments and the abandonment of land option contracts, and $107.9 million related to goodwill impairment."

Wow......

Oh, and the dollar. Ouch.



That's not good. In fact, its very bad. Nobody seems to think this is a big deal - wait until it shows up in everything you buy. We've been effectively cramming our inflation into China as our dollar has collapsed, while at the same time whining about how all our jobs are going over there. Now there's a bill in The US House that will slap a 20% tariff on everything coming from there unless they "float" their currency.

Oh boy, do these assclowns know what happens if they do drop their peg (and before people scream "there is no peg!" yes, I know its officially a "soft" basket mark, but the government has a strict trading band on the currency that prohibits it from floating - so quit trying to misdirect and misrepresent reality!)

Hint: Everything goes up immediately in price by 20, 30%.

To those who say "they can't screw us, they'll screw themselves" you better start paying attention to trends. What's the key that you're missing? China is now exporting as much to the EU as they are to us!

There is no way this ends well folks, and our government's unwillingness to defend its currency and the purchasing power of its citizens is going to result in very, very ugly effects on us - and soon.

August New Home Sales came in down 8.3%, more than expected, biggest drop in 37 years, and prices fell in the most in 4 decades! Wow - that sucks - severely! And guess what - its just starting!

"Sales of new one-family houses in August 2007 were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 795,000, according to estimates released jointly today by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. This is 8.3 percent (±12.4%)* below the revised July rate of 867,000 and is 21.2 percent (±9.0%) below the August 2006 estimate of 1,009,000."

Ouch.

The funny part of this was that Cramer was apparently on the Today show and basically said "don't buy a home today - you'll lose money. NAR, the key pumpers of all things real estate, went batshit and is basically "demanding a retraction." Cramer, on CNBC this morning, essentially told them to get fucked. Love it. Can we have another on-air meltdown? That'd be delicious.

Heh NAR, how about all those people who have gotten buttfucked in the last two years sue your fucking asses for defrauding them with knowingly false projections on the housing industry? We have the very builders of houses saying that the market sucks and is going to suck more, and you're pissed off that Cramer (who is a total tool) tells the truth?

And more on mortgage rates... which are going up, not down..... guess why? Falling dollar!

"The benchmark 30-year fixed-rate mortgage rose 17 basis points, to 6.49 percent, according to the Bankrate.com national survey of large lenders. A basis point is one-hundredth of 1 percentage point. The mortgages in this week's survey had an average total of 0.37 discount and origination points. One year ago, the mortgage index was 6.29 percent; four weeks ago, it was 6.43 percent."

Nice Ben. As I noted yesterday, there's nothing like saying you're going to help someone and then fucking them straight up the ass.

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