Lay off the layoffs, addendum

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Dec 10, 2008 in Blog | 2 comments I wanted to add an addendum to my post earlier this month about “laying off of the layoff” announcements. Include in that previous post the fact that businesses often want to layoff employees when their prospects are soaring, but cannot because the climate is not right. Economic downturns oftentimes provide the “cover” necessary for firing people because the public, and...
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Everybody else is doing it

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Dec 10, 2008 in Blog | 0 comments Happy Wednesday to all of you! Today I wanted to talk about a conversation that frequently occurs amongst corporate executives, as well as professional investors. I am going to call the conversation the, “Everyone Else is Doing It” conversation and it goes something like this… Executive 1: “We have made all of the loans to safe credit-risk individuals that we can. I...
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Downturns are a test of strength

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Dec 8, 2008 in Blog | 2 comments I hope that everyone had an excellent weekend. In today’s posting I wanted to reveal what I believe to be one of the secrets to making long-term as an investor. Namely, that investors make most of their money in an economic and financial market downturn, but that they just do not know it at the time. This secret is not my proprietary secret, but instead comes from the wisdom of Shelby...
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A quick missive

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Dec 6, 2008 in Blog | 0 comments Just a quick missive for your weekend from Muggy Miami. In yesterday’s posting I said it would be interesting to see what happened to the financial markets given the huge number of jobs lost in November (i.e. 553,000). As you may know the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed up 3.1%, while the S&P 500 was up 3.7%, and the NASDAQ Composite close up 4.4%. I consider this to be incredibly...
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Big unemployment figures

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Dec 5, 2008 in Blog | 0 comments So yesterday’s posting looks particularly timely after today’s big announcement of the number of jobs lost by the U.S. economy in the month of November. In case you have not heard, the estimated number of jobs lost was 533,000. Furthermore, the unemployment rate ticked up 0.2% last month. In case you did not read yesterday’s posting, these figures are pertinent and telling. It...
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Lay off the layoffs

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Dec 4, 2008 in Blog | 0 comments Good morning friends and readers! One of the tough things about tough times is seeing the endless parade of job layoff numbers. They create lots and lots of anxiety amongst people. I know because when I was growing up my mom experienced layoffs on multiple occasions. I also know people who have been personally laid off during our current recession. Layoffs are never pleasant. What I wanted to...
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The recession is officially on

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Dec 2, 2008 in Blog | 0 comments As you probably all know by now the U.S. “officially” entered a recession exactly one year ago in December 2007. The fun bunch of officials who have officially stated this are the National Bureau of Economic Research.   More specifically it was the organization’s super funky bunch, funily named the Business Cycle Dating Community. Another way of stating this is that the...
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