September Will Be Interesting

Markets were pretty much down, up, down, up, down up, side-ways all day. Consumer sentiment, while very low, still better than expected. Housing prices up but that is due to the tax credit so the other direction is to be expected in upcoming reports. FOMC minutes, not so good. Overall, mixed news and nothing too significant. And August was not such a good month to speak of for the market. Will September be better?

I have read several pieces today saying October is known for the steeper drops but September overall is the bigger month for being down. We will see. I have for some time predicted a bad Fall for the U.S. and if you predict enough stuff you will eventually be right and then get to say afterwards how intelligent you are for your predictions, so if September sucks wind I will be shouting from the roof tops how intelligent I am. If not, expect silence. I have done it before and am not beyond doing it again. It is a secret of the blogger trade.

Not in the Mood(y)

Apparently SEC is not in the mood to sue Moody's over bogus ratings during the crisis. Now I am certain this has nothing to do with Buffet being a shareholder and there are certainly no politics behind this decision. It has to be totally above board.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-08-31/sec-says-it-declined-to-sue-moody-s-for-fraud-over-company-s-cdo-ratings.html

Good Luck With That

Bloomberry reports that Emirates is needing to raise $28 billion to build its aircraft fleet through 2017. They are seeking to compete with other airlines by adding 45,000 more seats. At a time when many airlines are idling airplanes to lessen seats and improve pricing this just seems to be a bit against the grain of what is going on elsewhere in the industry. Go figure and good luck with that.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-08-31/emirates-to-raise-28-billion-for-fleet-expansion-seeks-majority-in-debt.html

Not Eating Our Way Out of This One

In another sign that consumers are cutting back, restaurant spending has contracted for a fourth month in a row. Face it folks, despite consumers showing a slight uptick in spending in the latest figures they need to deleverage big time. Savings are up but need to go up more to be at historic norms and with incomes down and debt maintenance payments high any expectations of higher savings rates need to be tempered. This will take years to correct and the government just needs to stabilize as minimally as they can while it happens.

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/08/restaurant-index-shows-contraction-in.html

Just my take.

Disclosures: None