Smoke, Mirrors and Reality…

Opinions and stories on events as they happen in the News!

Archive for October 2nd, 2008

Bill O’Reilly is mad at Barney Frank

Oct 2

Posted by Ben in Current events, Economy | No Comments

Updated: separately, on The O’Reilly Factor, Bill interviewed Barney Frank, and confronted him about his role in bringing about the financial crisis and making comments that caused investors to lose millions of dollars. The confrontation escalated, of course. Bill ended up calling Barney Frank a coward for not accepting responsibility for his actions, as others like Chris Dodd have conceded.

Homeowners and the financial meltdown

Oct 2

Posted by Ben in Economy | No Comments

This PhysOrg.com article titled Study: Mortgage Losses On Owner-Occupied Homes Lower Than Assumed gives some interesting insights into how much home mortgages are contributing to the financial meltdown.

Here are some highlights:

  • losses on first mortgages for owner-occupied homes may range as high as $180 billion
  • the biggest losses in the mortgage crisis are not for owner-occupied homes, but for commercial real estate loans, and loans for houses bought as investments or built on speculation
  • The Americans who have fared the worst in relative terms economically are the wealthy. Findings showed that respondents who were in the top 5 percent in net worth saw an 8.6 percent decline in net worth over the past two years.