Now, let us see the facts today: $ 512 Billions – Already written off by banks and brokers $ 59 Billions – Given to Bear Stearns and JP Morgan combine $ 200 Billions – given recently to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac $ 85 Billions – given to AIG as capital $ 2,400 Billions – Needed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mae $ 1,300 Billions – Needed by AIG for future provisions $ 700 Billions – Requested by Paulson – Bernanke for immediate need for Buying Bad debts $ 400 Billions – Requested by Paulson... Read Full Story

ECONOMY The Labor Department reported that jobless claims jumped by 32,000 to a seasonally adjusted 493,000 last weekThe Commerce Department said that new orders to factories for big-ticket manufactured goods fell by 4.5 percent last monthThe average price of a new home fell in August by 11.8 percent to $263,900, the biggest one-month drop on record. The median home price was down 5.5 percent to $221,900.Bookings for transportation equipment dropped 8.9 percent, today's report showed. Orders... Read Full Story

Morgan Stanley, Goldman Search for Deposits Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley: Playing It Safer Blame Fannie Mae and Congress For the Credit Mess Fannie Mae to sell $2 billion bills Wednesday WaMu Deal Could Take Time Holiday sales set for worst gain in 6 years Gold Futures Extend Gains on Demand for Haven; Silver Advances Microsoft to buy back $40 billion of stock Fertilizer outlook still strong Apple will sell 5 million iPhones in Q4 First Google Android phone to cost $199 Read Full Story

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley have transformed themselves into bank holding companies. The change in status allows the last two major independent investment banks on Wall Street to take advantage of different accounting rules, gives them more access to federal funds and buys them time to stabilize their funding base by acquiring deposits. The move was aimed to improve market confidence. The move provides Goldman with time to continue the process of de-risking itself to a level... Read Full Story

Major U.S. stock indexes turned higher in afternoon trading Thursday afternoon, in an excessively volatile session focused on Lehman Brothers (LEH) fight for survival, and trader attacks on Merrill Lynch (MER) and Washington Mutual (WM). Indexes turned higher amid market buzz that troubled investment bank Lehman, which is fighting for survival, is looking for a someone to help it bolster its tattered balance sheet. The shares came under selling attack Thursday amid continued doubts about the... Read Full Story

Yesterday i bought Google at 414$ for a quick upward bounce. I was hoping to sell it around 440$ level with time frame of 3-4 days. However Google made a 20$ jump today closing at 633.75$. I decided to take profits. Nothing wrong in bagging 4% profit in 1 day. I sold off before my price target of 440$ because it was hard for me to gauge price movement we had today. Is this a trend reversal or a dead cat bounce ?? Not sure. It looks like a solid move upward with good volume and maybe i sold... Read Full Story

Yesterday I loaded up KGC and RIO. Special thanks to dumb-ass Cramer for his predictions. KGC up 5.8% for the day. Surprizingly gold is down to 759$ level. RIO up 5.3% for the day. Lets see if it was a dead-cat bounce or time for some reversal. Both were over-sold and due for the bounce and that is exactly what happened. I sold both of them today for a sweet 1-day profit. Can't complain. Today i bought the internet-giant Google at the close ($414.40). 5 day chart shows 11% drop. Time for... Read Full Story

Lehman Brothers tried to bolster investor confidence by releasing quarterly results and announcing measures to keep the firm afloat. A day after trouble for investment bank Lehman Brothers (LEH) started a broad stock sell-off, major stock indexes opened higher Wednesday when Lehman made a series of surprise announcements designed to bolster investor confidence. On Tuesday, an investment deal with a South Korean bank appeared to fall apart, causing the investment bank's shares to plunge 45... Read Full Story

Cramer predicted a worst-case scenario for these names: They could lose all the gains they’ve seen since April 2005. That means Vale [RIO 20.96] drops 68%; U.S. Steel [X 93.69] 50%; fertilizer stocks like Potash [POT 140.26], Mosaic [MOS 77.01] and Agrium [AGU 66.65] could fall 80% to 90%. But this is only if you believe that the rise of these stocks was due solely to the increased value of commodities and not any growth by the companies themselves, he said. So what’s it going to take to... Read Full Story

I sold my KGC shares at the open since I didnt get the jump I was looking for. Also I didnt want to hold anything over this weekend. KGC opened at $14.25 and I sold my 1000@ KGC at $14.29 bagging 400$ profit in 1 day. Turned out to be a pretty good trade since KGC dropped all the way to $13.54 an hour later. I was tempted to buy it back, but I got conservative here and wanted lower 13s to get it back again. Turns out it didnt go that lower and infact jumped right back up, eventually closing... Read Full Story