Main News

 

Fed plan reins in dicey mortgage policies
USA Today - USA
By Sue Kirchhoff and Noelle Knox, USA TODAY WASHINGTON — The Federal Reserve, criticized for standing aside as risky subprime mortgage lending soared then ...

 

Fed plan reins in dicey mortgage policies
USA Today - USA
By Sue Kirchhoff and Noelle Knox, USA TODAY WASHINGTON — The Federal Reserve, criticized for standing aside as risky subprime mortgage lending soared then ...

 

ECB: Hedge Funds Probably Not Responsible For August Mayhem <http://seekingalpha.com/article/57772-ecb-hedge-funds-probably-not-responsible-for-august-mayhem?source=i_email>

 

by Kirby Cundiff

 

NEW YORK (HedgeWorld.com)—Roughly 20% of hedge funds, or approximately 2,000 funds, will disappear within five years, Putnam Lovell predicted in a research report released last week. ......

 

Hunter Called Amaranth Gas Trades ‘A Bit of an Experiment, Mainly'

WASHINGTON (HedgeWorld.com)—Amaranth Advisors, the hedge fund that collapsed in 2006 amid $6 billion in losses from energy trading, its former head trader Brian Hunter and Mr. ......

by Barry Ritholtz

 

 

A landslide in South Korea
Does a new era beckon for the Korean peninsula?
Full article

 

The dollar and the world economy
Why the dollar should stabilise next year
Full article

 

Fed Tackles Subprime. Finally.
New mortgage rules are proposed. Read More

 

Short-sellers' make Mega-Moolah from Chaos
The Telegraph - Wednesday December 19, 08:11 GMT

 

SAC Trader Strikes Out on His Own
Deal Book - Wednesday December 19, 07:47 GMT

 

CHINA:  The new Web site for China's National Bureau of Corruption Prevention crashed Dec. 18 as people logged on en masse to complain about corruption among officials, Shanghai Daily reported. The large number of visitors rendered the site inaccessible the afternoon of Dec. 18, Beijing Youth Daily reported. By 4 p.m. local time today, people had posted 22 pages of messages on the site's guestbook. Many wanted to report specific cases of official corruption, but the site's webmaster immediately directed them to other sites, such as that of the Ministry of Supervision.

 

GLOBAL – Confidence in investments took a battering this month as institutional investors preferred to hold rather than sell investments, reflecting a pessimistic outlook on the health of the global economy and market fundamentals.

 

Banks Study Bailing Out Struggling Bond Insurer
New York Times - United States
In a conference call last month, executives at ACA insisted that losses on insured CDO's would be insignificant, noting that only $33 million of the bonds ...
See all stories on this topic

 

Layoffs Watch '08 Update: Citi CDO In '07
DealBreaker.Com - New York,NY,USA
Specifically today, and apparently "almost everyone" in New York, which we're told means more than forty. At this time I would like to offer our condolences ...

 

Goldman Clients Pull $3 Billion From Hedge Funds (Update2)
Bloomberg - USA
18 (Bloomberg) -- Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said clients pulled about $3 billion from quantitative hedge funds including Global Alpha in the fiscal fourth ...
See all stories on this topic

 

BEAR MANAGER MAY HAVE HEDGED HIMSELF
 By RODDY BOYD
A former Bear Stearns hedge fund manager who is being scrutinized for having pulled out up to $2 million from a troubled hedge fund, might have done so while at the same time telling investors in the fund to hold tight.  According to a senior Bear...
http://www.nypost.com/seven/12192007/business/bear_manager_may_have_hedged_himself_857954.htm

 

Yahoo/FT.com
Several hedge funds run by London's Cambridge Place Investment Management had another terrible month in November, dropping as much as 13 per cent as they were hammered by the ongoing subprime crisis. The flagship structured credit funds from Cambridge Place are already closed to redemptions after investors agreed to a one-year block on withdrawals in an effort to recover value in their US mortgage investments. The latest falls are a further blow to a company trying to maintain investor confidence as it prepares to launch a new fund next year.

 

Pension Fund Shortages Create Hard Choices
By MARY WILLIAMS WALSH New York Times

 

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Yield Curve Corner

 

Closing the mortgage barn door
Salon - USA
But even by that standard, Ben Bernanke's official statement today accompanying the Fed's announcement of proposed new guidelines for mortgage lenders is ...

 

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Natural Disaster Corner

 

Climate Prediction  http://www.nws.noaa.gov/predictions.php

World Meterological Organization http://severe.worldweather.org/

Tornadoes: http://www.disastercenter.com/tornado.htm

Great Sat Pictures of events: http://www.osei.noaa.gov/Events/Current/STMusnortheast353_MO.jpg

 

18th-century climate change

 

First human bird flu cases in Pakistan
12/18/07 04:41 PM, EST
Eight cases of bird flu among people have been confirmed in Pakistan, the first such cases in the country, the World Health Organization said Tuesday.
FULL STORY <http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapcf/12/18/pakistan.bird.flu/index.html> 

 

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Iranian Situation and Other Man Made Disasters

 

Iran: Six executed while another gets last minute reprieve
Adnkronos Wed, 19 Dec 2007 8:40 AM PST
Iran: Six executed while another gets last minute reprieve Tehran, 19 Dec. (AKI) - Six people were executed at Evin prison in Iran on Wednesday, while another female prisoner was spared the death penalty at the last minute.Despite a move by the United Nations' general assembly to approve a moratorium on the death penalty, Iran shows no sign of ending executions. Among those put to ...

 

IRAN:  Former Iranian nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani said Tehran is resolved to continue uranium enrichment, and nuclear fuel is a "strategic product for Iran," Fars news agency reported. Larijani made the statements at a meeting on nuclear energy at Islamic Azad University in Sari, the capital of Iran's northern Mazandaran province.

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Opalesque’s Corner

 

- Opalesque Exclusive: Opportunistic equity L/S hedge fund, winner of the 2007 Australian Hedge Fund Awards, goes for a float at long last
- New Launches: SAC Capital star trader leaves firm, expected to start on his own, Bear Stearns to launch 130/30 US Core Equity Fund
- Institutions: Ohio Schools puts $400m into hedge funds, Pennsylvania`s retirement board votes to include alternative investments
- HedgeOp announces 2008 excellence in compliance seminar series
- Indices: All regional Eurekahedge hedge fund indices down in November
- Assets: Goldman clients pull $3bln from hedge funds, GSAM expects more client redemptions in Q1 despite revenue rise
- London`s Cambridge Place funds suffer up to 13% further losses
- Sub-prime king Paulson records revenues of GBP3.97m from London subsidiary
- Short-sellers make huge profits from chaos
- People: Opalesque Exclusive: Svetlana Le Gall will not be joining Diamond Age Russia fund, Merrill`s Thain asks O`Neal-fired Kronthal back as CDO fixer, Quant team quits State Street for Lazard
- Portrait: Dallas HF manager J. Kyle Bass shorted subprime to `God, I hope you are wrong` Wall Street
- Bear Stearns:  Fund manager Cioffi departs amid probes, did he pull his own money from his dying funds?, In acknowledgment of Bear`s most difficult period, Cayne and other senior execs expected to forgo bonuses
- Investor Confidence Index falls from 75.8 to 65.9 in December
- Fitch reviews ratings method after AAA SIVs default,  Fitch may set limits for debt product ratings, Fitch says bank sponsors` actions to support affiliated SIVs bear fruits
- Background: Basel II: Welcome to 2008 - will banks` Internal Ratings-Based (IRB) approaches now use same models which were unable to estimate subprime fair value?,  Remember? Before subprime it was currency carry trades that frightened investors. This month, fundamental factors behind carry trades count again
- Spanish academic confirms Taleb`s `Black Swans` in paper, What missing best and worst ten days will do to your portfolio
- Administrators: GlobeOp says assets under administration up 11% to $94bln, completes SAS 70 Type II examination
- Regulators: Britain, Germany and France to draw up new proposals on self-regulation of hedge funds by spring, California extends public comment period re. registration rules
- Legal: SEC charges Mayer Brown`s partner Joseph P. Collins with aiding and abetting Refco disclosure fraud, Morgan Stanley to pay $17m in SEC market timing settlement,  Staten Island man gets 7 years for his America`s Hedge Fund, L.P.  pump-and-dump scheme, SEC sues hedge fund manager Don Warner (Magnolia Capital) for fraud, Nebraska Federal Court orders several parties to pay restitution to farmers injured by commodity trading program, Hedge fund wizards: illustration of a hedge fund scam
- Commodities / Energy: Investing in the global market is becoming an increasingly important theme in the commodities game, Calvert sees strong year for alternative energy opportunities in Europe
- Outlook 2008: Distressed debt hedge funds to shine in 2008,  Economists see 40% chance of U.S. recession, Morley sees dollar rebound by Q2,  Calvert sees strong year for alternative energy opportunities in Europe, Asia deal-makers enjoy record year, but worries lurk, Strongest corporate earnings growth to be in Asia: survey
- Murky view of Dubai debt: Assets backing loans remain behind cloud as oil supply declines
- News Briefs: Banks, BlackRock to create SuperSIV fund, Congress to push ahead AMT tax fix, Municipal bonds heading for worst year since 1999, Equity trading system Bats will reduce fees, Schwab cashes in on ETrade turmoil, Northern Rock rescue may cost UK taxpayers, Bermuda office builders meet hedge-fund and insurance companies` growing demands,
- ...And finally: Jingle-bang! Drug traffickers shoot at Santa`s helicopter over Rio slum
- Logon: http://www.opalesque.com/main.php?act=archive

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Misc. Items of Interest

 

 

In Defense of Illustration and Computer Art | by Alex Ostroy
Artist Alex Ostroy, who created the December 2007 cover
of Steve Jobs for
Fast Company, traces how art forms have transitioned
over time, with
painting losing ground to photography and now
photography arguably set to
lose some of its ground to computer renderings.
http://trax.fastcompany.com/k/w/mailman/fasttake/20071219/artdefense

 

Is Collapse of Home Prices About To Hit the Bottom?
BY Staff Reporter of the Sun
An end to the fall in housing prices came into sight yesterday, and with it, relief for those caught in the subprime mortgage mess, as the number of new single-family homes beginning construction slowed to the lowest number in more than 16 years....

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Funnies, Facts, Quotes, etc….

 

discursive dis-KUR-siv, adjective:

1. Passing from one topic to another; ranging over a wide field; digressive; rambling.
2. Utilizing, marked by, or based on analytical reasoning -- contrasted with intuitive.

 

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Conference, Courses, Books, Papers

 

Great Research Sites:

 

Merrill Lynch research Link to full report including important disclosures see example

 

John Mauldin’s Weekly Analysis

 

James Altucher’s Website:

 

Other useful sites:

 

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Index Corner

 

The CSFB/Tremont Hedge Fund Index www.hedgeindex.com.

The Cogent Dynamic Averages http://www.cogenthedge.com/home/inv_strategy.asphttp://www.cogenthedge.com/home/inv_strategy.asp

The Dow Jones Indices: http://www.djhedgefundindexes.com/index.cfm?event=viewPremiumContent (free registration)

HFRX Indices https://www.hedgefundresearch.com/hfrx_reg/index.php?fuse=login&1170880431

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Regulatory Info

 

 

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Disclaimer

 

The information contained in this document does not constitute an offer or solicitation to sell any security or other type of vehicles to or by anyone in any jurisdictions, nor should it be regarded as a contractual document. Under no circumstances should the information provided on this document be considered as financial advice, or as a sufficient basis on which to make investment decisions. The information contained herein has been gathered by Investor DNA, LLC from sources deemed reliable as of the date of publication, but no warranty of accuracy or completeness is given. Investor DNA, LLC is not responsible for and provides no guarantee with respect to any of the information provided herein or through the use of any hypertext link. Past results are no indication of future performance. All information in this newsletter is for educational and informational purposes and does not constitute investment, legal, tax or accounting advice. All materials are the property of the respective publishers, as referenced by header and appropriate hypertext links.