Tag Archives: Morgan Stanley

The term “derivative” has become a dirty, if not evil word. So much of what ails our global financial system has been laid-at-the-feet of this misunderstood, mischaracterized term – derivatives. The purpose of this paper is to outline the origin, growth and ultimately the corruption of the derivatives market – and explain how something originally designed to provide economic utility has morphed into a tool of abusive, manipulative economic tyranny. Words: 3355

Wall Street has been transformed into a gigantic casino where people are betting on just about anything that you can imagine. This works fine as long as there are not any wild swings in the economy and risk is managed with strict discipline but, as we have seen, there have been times when derivatives have caused massive problems in recent years - the government bailout because of derivatives at AIG; the failure of MF Global because of bad derivatives trades; and the 6 billion dollar loss that JPMorgan Chase recently suffered because of derivatives - [but the next] derivatives panic that comes will destroy global financial markets, and the economic fallout from the financial crash that will happen as a result will be absolutely horrific. [Let me explain my contention.] Words: 1485

The cards may be stacked against equities in 2010. After one of the most spectacular rallies in the history of the equity markets from its March, 2009 low stocks are now arguably overbought, overvalued and on borrowed time Words: 773

Don’t invest in gold just because it’s popular. Don’t lose sight of longer-term historical investment results, especially during short-term periods of extreme volatility and trending markets. Short-term, return-chasing investing is precisely what is driving this modern-day gold rush and that is exactly why you should be looking elsewhere. Words: 860