We work with words every day, so this story about the FDIC’s move to interject itself into the Great Banking Bailout caught my attention.
Apparently, billions won’t buy you a “must,” a “will” or a “do this or else” from the FDIC. But billions will buy you a “should.”
The Kansas Sampler Foundation has created a slew of “8 Wonders of Kansas” lists, but the one naming nominees to the 8 Wonders of Kansas Commerce list is a bit of a puzzle.
On the list are a bait shop in Baxter Springs, a meat market in Lucas, a really big steam shovel (Big Brutus) that hasn’t worked in 30 or 40 years. And a giant feed lot in Garden City? I guess that’s a wonder, but it ain’t wonderful smelling.
I know the foundation is rural-oriented, I know they’re trying to spread the awards around, and I know it does list the aircraft industry, but come on. A bait shop.
How about: Koch Industries and its scary black headquarters; the Coleman Co. which goes back to 1903; or Old Town.
We’ve had some good discussions on this blog about the cause of last summer’s oil price run-up.
Proponents of the supply and demand canard aren’t going to be pleased by Sunday’s 60 Minutes report tracing the run-up to investment speculators, and specifically Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs.
If you missed the report, the link provides a detailed – and impressively sourced, for those prone to criticize CBS’ reporting – summary of the investigation’s findings.
Once the number one electronics chain in the country, a shrunken Circuit City is facing a Friday deadline to find a buyer or sell off the merchandise and go out of business. Even a buyer may just dismantle the chain.
The west Wichita store survived the 155-store bloodletting in November and remains open.
Stay tuned.
Senior bank executives think that primary causes of the credit crisis are tied to lenders not sticking to the fundamentals, a push to make more Americans home owners and a wild and unregulated mortgage industry.
That’s according to results of a new survey of bank chief executives and senior officers by accounting and consulting firm Grant Thornton and Bank Director magazine.
The survey was based on 339 responses to a survey mailed out to 3,000 bank executives in the U.S.
Fifty-four percent of bankers selected lax underwriting standards as the top cause for the credit crisis. Political emphasis on increasing home ownership and lack of oversight of the mortgage industry rounded out the top three reasons for the credit crisis.
This survey is undoubtedly one of many in the coming months that will attempt to assign blame for the crisis to one particular industry or group.
Whether that’s true remains to be seen.
It will likely be years before the true causes of the crisis will be established.