Update from Sicily

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Sep 28, 2010 in Blog | 0 comments Over the weekend my wife Dawn and I headed to Sicily for a vacation.  You might think that I have been preoccupied with food, wine and surf here in Taormina, and you’d be right!  However, I also have been tuning into the state of the Italian economy. Taormina is overrun with tourists from all over the world.  Folks from the U.S., U.K., Germany, Italy, France, and many other parts are here...
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Rest in pieces Blockbuster

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Sep 23, 2010 in Blog | 0 comments This morning sees news of video store rental chain Blockbuster’s bankruptcy declaration.  The closure of what was once one of the world’s most vibrant and exciting retailers makes for a good brief capitalist case study. I want to use the Blockbuster story to highlight something important: just how quickly information and capital move these days.  Less than a decade ago Blockbuster...
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The post unemployment recovery haze

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Sep 21, 2010 in Blog | 0 comments Yesterday the National Bureau of Economic Research’s “Business Cycle Dating Committee” declared that the recession that almost all of us have limped through officially ended in June of 2009.  The economic damage has been deep: 4.1% of the economy was destroyed; net worth was reduced by 21% and 7.3 million jobs were lost. The group is considered to be very conservative (and I...
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Pulling the curtain back on window dressing

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Sep 16, 2010 in Blog | 0 comments There has long been a distasteful practice on Wall Street known in the parlance as “window dressing.”  As a quarter nears its end, banks and other financial institutions (like mutual funds) will take advantage of the massive liquidity of most financial assets and sell those assets that would appear distasteful to investors and regulators and buy assets that would appear to be more...
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Excellent exports tally from the Germans

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Sep 16, 2010 in Blog | 0 comments Good morning! Yesterday, Germany’s Federal Statistical Office released the export tally for the country’s first 6 months.  The numbers are very positive.  Specifically exports were up 17.1% as compared with the first 6 months of 2009.  Additionally, the European Union Commission estimates that German gross domestic product growth will be 3.4% for 2010.  Recall that this number would...
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Buy baby, buy

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Sep 14, 2010 in Blog | 0 comments August retail sales were up in the United States by 0.4%.  This figure compares to a July retail sales figure of up 0.3%.  Excluding automobiles and parts, retail sales rose 0.6% last month.  If you were to exclude the same category, car-stuff, in July, retail sales were up a paltry 0.1%.  Consumers mostly purchased clothing, gasoline and groceries; in other words, essentials. Analysis: There...
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Safer bank standards

Posted by Jason Apollo Voss on Sep 13, 2010 in Best of the Blog, Blog | 11 comments Over the weekend it was announced that global banking regulators had finally agree to new capital standards for banks.  The standards were coordinated by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision.  In short, banks are going to be required to have more capital (read: equity) on hand relative to the amount of leverage (read: debt and other investments) on their balance sheets. These new...
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