My favorite headline of the morning comes from CNBC. Depression Likely, but Buy Stocks: Strategist. Alrighty, then. Other things that caught my eye:
Home prices fall again (NY Times)
“Foreclosures have picked up, and that seems to be pushing prices down,” said David Blitzer, chairman of S.& P.’s index committee. “The recession is really biting.”
Show me the stimulus money (Marketwatch)
“Although politicians agreed that the intent of the stimulus program was to pump money into the economy as fast as possible, the way this package was constructed makes it virtually impossible to achieve this objective. This is because the stimulus package as conceived and passed tried to do too many things at the same time.”
Stocks the rally left behind (Bloomberg)
Yet among the laggards are several companies that I do believe can repay brave investors handsomely over the next one to three years. They include Sunoco, Chubb Corp. and Norfolk Southern Corp.
GM bankruptcy puts lawyers to work (NY Times)
How many lawyers will end up working on G.M.’s expected bankruptcy case still is not clear, but in legal circles, the joke is that there may not be enough experienced bankruptcy lawyers available to handle the filing.
My $500,000 check from Bernie Madoff (The Daily Beast)
Bernie Madoff stole $5 million from The Daily Beast’s Burt Ross, who just received a half-million-dollar check back from the bankruptcy. Never has a 90 percent loss felt so good.
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