Steadfast Finances

 Economy,Real Estate         1 comment

An under-reported study conducted by the St. Louis Fed reveals a very different narrative with regards to the causes of the recent housing crisis. Researchers studied national foreclosure demographics to determine if predatory lending played a crucial role in the recent housing collapse. Economists were able to hone in on two demographics that made up [...]

 Investing 101,Politics         No comments

Someone in mainstream media, and it’s not all that surprising it’s 60 Minutes, finally got around to covering one of Congress’ most astonishing ethical, moral, and soon to be illegal, violations of holding public office… politicians trading on insider information.  Brief clip: Insider trading on the stock market: if you are a member of Congress, [...]

 Infographics & Chartology,Politics         4 comments

If you’re a member of Gen X and Gen Y, this is probably the scariest chart you will see in 2011, and possibly, right up to the time you’re old and gray. As you can clearly see, the crony capitalism, fake prosperity, recycled Keynesianism memes et al., have been a great benefit to the U.S. economy… right [...]

 Investing 101         No comments

Predictably, a vast majority of people thought the markets would soar after a verbal agreement had been reached on the debt ceiling fiasco. Err, wrong. The bigger problems, at least in my opinion, is a potential breakdown of a 2 and 1/2 year support trendline in the S&P 500 index and a potential close under [...]

 Infographics & Chartology,Politics         11 comments

US Government Spending: Why the Republican Argument of “Obama is a Keynesian” Doesn’t Hold Water. ~ ~ ~ Being an idealist, I’m easily repulsed from any person/organization that I lose respect for. Case in point, the reason why I said goodbye to the Grand Old Party was because they’ve completely gone off the deep end [...]

 Infographics & Chartology,Investing 101         No comments

Image Source: Chart of the Day If you’re an avid follower of the financial markets, no doubt you’ve heard a money manager make the claim that “this market is cheap” as a reason to get you, or keep you, invested in the stock market after it’s doubled from March 2009 to present. Truth is, that [...]

 Infographics & Chartology,Real Estate         No comments

  More troubling data on real estate and foreclosures as a whole from the NYT: In New York State, it would take lenders 62 years at their current pace, the longest time frame in the nation, to repossess the 213,000 houses now in severe default or foreclosure, according to calculations by LPS Applied Analytics, a [...]

 Infographics & Chartology,Investing 101         4 comments

Two years after making the observation that terrible earnings news was the time to buy (see first chart), it looks as if the billions of taxpayer dollars (via future earnings) have gotten corporate earnings back to credit bubble highs (see second chart). From May 18, 2009: An Index Fund Investor’s Dream: S&P 500 Earnings Nearing [...]

 Infographics & Chartology,Real Estate         7 comments

As if we had any real doubt that U.S. real estate was FUBAR, but the March Case Shiller Index numbers did us a favor and confirmed what the smart money already knew. Too bad the Case Shiller model doesn’t take condos, bank owned real estate, short term prices, etc. Wouldn’t want to show chartology for [...]

 Infographics & Chartology,Real Estate         3 comments

Legendary chartporn of this quality would almost make me ill had I not been so prepared for the smell of Castor Oil. From the article: This chart is really astounding. It shows the average number of days that homeowners with defaulted loans (NOD) have not made a mortgage payment. For New York, one of the [...]

 Infographics & Chartology,Real Estate         No comments

Image via Chart of the Day A 20 second scan of the headlines for the real estate tab on this blog will show you I’ve been bearish on U.S. real estate since this blog began several years ago, but I’m thinking it might be time to go from ultra bearish to neutral on select markets based [...]

 Politics         4 comments

If you want a simple explanation of the root cause of America’s political and economic woes, this chart represents it. As Teddy Roosevelt so famously said: There can be no effective control of corporations while their political activity remains. To put an end to it will be neither a short nor an easy task, but [...]