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I know it's Colbert's shtick and I never really got into it, but still...

"I have friends who live and work in London. They said "don't worry,we're very sensible people."

What's sensible for people in London might not be sensible for people in Salford. Or Boston. Or Wolverhampton. London, or the South-East in general, is as representative of the UK as the East/West Coast is of the US.

The hinterland has been drained at the expense of the center, on both a global and a national scale. If you live and work in the City of London, things might look quite ok, and whatever issues there are only need some reforms to no longer be an issue. But if your factory, the factory that provided jobs for the people in your home town, closed down ten, twenty years ago and now the best you can get is zero-hour contracts, then no, things are not ok.

People up top keep telling you that the economy is growing, that everyone's gonna be better off, that it's ok for multinational corporations and rich individuals to optimise their taxes, while they cut your welfare. Banks get a bailout, you get to pay the bedroom tax.

So no, your sensible friends, if they exist, live in a different universe than many of their countrymen. That's the disconnect we've been talking about.

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"The British economy is tanking. The pound has plunged to its lowest level since 1985... The Dow lost 611 points."

Again, so what? If the economy is growing and it has no effect on you, why should you give a jar of cold piss about the value of the pound or the stock exchange? Arguably, a drop in the exchange rate of the pound makes it easier for you to export your goods and raises the prices for imports, thereby encouraging you to produce the shit yourself. The UK does have a sovereign currency, unlike the Spanish, the Greeks, the Portuguese or the Italians who have to suffer internal devaluations, because Wolfgang Schäuble says so.

"Equity losses over $2 trillion"

Why should that matter? QE has pushed up stock prices beyond any resonable level, so what meaning do these book values hold? Not to mention that a lot of people made a shitload of money by shorting these stocks, including George Soros against Deutsche.

"There'll be no more money"

QE never trickled down anyway, makes no difference. Corbyn's people call their version "QE for the People" and "Green QE" for a reason: the previous version was only meant to prop up banks and stock values.

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On a more general note, the hatred, the racism, the xenophobia... in most cases, it's a pressure valve. You leash out against someone else, you need someone to blame. The narrative is that we're living in a meritocracy, which makes it your fault that you didn't inherit an investment portfolio. So you start blaming yourself. You're a fuck-up. You worked hard and not only didn't climb the ladder, you actually went down. There's depression for ya. Guess what happens if someone, a person of perceived authority, then comes along and tells you it's not your fault, it's the fault of the immigrants. That narrative is very appealing if history is any indication. Even the supposedly most prosperous country in the EU, Germany, has the very same issue in the eastern parts, where there is no hope for a meaningful job.

People need work, meaningful work. Wanna guess how many of those "xenophobes" would be out in the street protesting against immigrants if they had a meaningful job with decent pay? Not to many would be my guess.

So the likes of Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson are providing the narrative. But the lack of social cohesion is a result of market fundamentalism, of Thatcherism, of Third Way social-democrats leaving the lower half of the income distribution to the wolves. You can't exclude large swaths of the population from the benefits of increased productivity, etc. Social dividend, they called it. It's what keeps the torches and pitchforks locked away in the barn.

You're right, a merger is not a takeover. The Deutsche stock exchange buying a controlling share in the NYSE is a takeover.

"Deutsche Boerse AG is in advanced talks to buy NYSE Euronext in an all-stock transaction that would create the world’s biggest exchange operator. (...) Deutsche Boerse will own about 59 percent to 60 percent of the joined entity." /source.

>> ^srd:

A merger is not a takeover.

Brits invade Canada. http://videosift.com/video/London-Stock-Exchange-To-Buy-Toronto

Cramer is just being vocal about a real, and pervasive problem in the current wall street investor mentality. He advocating the investor mentality of sucking money out of companies instead of the older, and some would say antiquated, notion of finding companies that are going to successful and invest in them.

Which sounds easier, to invest in winners and gain over time, or to invest a short into any company and instill a sense of panic in the company that causes a run on it to collect your short? The later is much easier, and done often even though it is illegal. The gains are multimillion as well, the risk can usually be obfuscated away with front companies that only exist in paper.

While Cramer here is doing wrong, he is only a small fish in the pool of wrong doers. The huge mutual funds do the same, and have been implicated in the death by stock manipulation of many companies. The SEC is mostly helpless in regulating such things. I think stock owners, buyers and sellers, should demand more transparency in all stock exchanges. It is beneficial to nearly all people to have complete transparency, and beneficial to a select few when the books are closed. Stockholders and companies really need to advocate a sort of "stock exchange bill of rights", because government oversight is a joke and problems like Cramer are all to common.

ETFs are flexible enough depending on the risk you want to take on. You could buy into a fund that literally holds the gold reserves for you remotely or you could buy into one that tracks the price through derivatives. Obviously the fund manager adds some kind of risk regardless of their discretion. I'm sure you probably know all this. Point is, I think it's hard to deny that buying into a fund rather than being an individual investor cuts down on transaction and obviously shipping cost. You say that you keep your holdings in a safe, and that adds an additional expense for the security you would otherwise not need.

As for liquidity, ETFs allow the liquidation of holdings on the appropriate stock exchange on the internet instantly. Comparatively for local storefronts, imagine if the price began dropping precipitously and on the assumption that they would be overpaying currently, those storefronts decided to temporarily stop buying. In that case you would have a far better chance finding a willing buyer in a deeper globalised stock exchange.

My point is, that kind of negative scenario is far more plausible than losing your holdings through stock market collapse.
>> ^dgandhi:

It's not just the doomsday scenario, it the mismanagement scenario. Any of the ETFs could be subject to abuse or mismanagement, whereas coins in my floorboard safe are much more in my control.
Since I got the whole minting cost of the coins I bought back, it's not as though it cost me any money to hold coins.
As to liquidity, How fast can you get cash in hand from liquidation of ETF shares? I can turn a 1oz coin to cash in 15min at any number of nearby storefront resellers.
>> ^RedSky:
Don't waste your money on a less liquid form of the same commodity investment based on the prediction of some highly unlikely doomsday scenario.

>> ^timtoner:

>> ^mgittle:
Problem is, who are you putting on trial? Obviously the entire company's worth of people isn't responsible for any deaths. Who had the malice, who was negligent?

Okay. I'm a person, and when my behavior indicates that I am a danger to myself and others, there are legal remedies that exist which can make sure the damage I do to society is minimized. I can be involuntarily committed, until such a time that I can prove that I am not a threat to myself or others, and that I can care for myself. So BP's a company that's shown a depraved indifference to human life and the welfare of others. It's a person. I say we file papers to have it committed.
See, this personhood has some cons, as well as the obvious pros. If you can't do this one thing, then you're not really a person.


I agree, but in court you need to prove a crime was committed. You need to show evidence, convince a jury, etc. But, you can't put a corporation in jail, and you're going to have a really hard time proving that the entire upper management was culpable in whatever event/crime/etc occurred. At best, you're going to find one or two people who you can stick it to in court. But, this means everyone else escapes with their giant salaries and bonuses. Maybe some stockholders lose some, but the actual people involved in the decision making and creation of the company's culture are not penalized.

Corporate structure is extremely good at insulating everyone involved, which means lowering everyone's risk of losing their investment. The basic idea is that this encourages lots of investment because people aren't as worried about losing their money. So, the stock exchange thrives when people aren't worried. This has created a ton of wealth for western nations in recent history.

I'm not disagreeing with you in principle...one of the arguments against corporations being treated as people is that their structure tends to cause that corporate "person" to act like a psychopath, literally, in psychological terms, not the generic kind. A corporate entity is not required to have empathy, and if you think about it, the vast majority of our laws are designed to punish/fine/etc people who have low empathy. I agree that if corporations are going to be treated as people under the law, then they need to be punished when they lack empathy. Currently, they are not, so people tend to have a problem with their actions since they are a group of people treated as an indivudual...and it just feels "wrong".

I see this show, and then look down and see those stock exchange ticker tabs; I am disheartened. Not only does government need to be limited but corporations need to be limited, yet again.

Citizens United, the Conservative lobby, has successfully convinced the SCOTUS to overturn the laws that limited their political contributions, or "1st ammendment rights".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United

>> ^notarobot:
Why is there so much uninvestigated crime? Because the people who are supposed to be keeping criminals off the streets and away from management positions at stock exchanges are busy cracking down on kids for NOT committing crimes.


Haven't you heard? They just busted a bunch of corrupt judges and cops for making a profit from busting and jailing minors.

Crime is an industry, and a profitable one at that. You don't like it, move to a free country. Oh wait...

Unchecked capitalism = fascism.

Why is there so much uninvestigated crime? Because the people who are supposed to be keeping criminals off the streets and away from management positions at stock exchanges are busy cracking down on kids for NOT committing crimes.

The place that girl shoots up is just outside the Oslo stock exchange...I guess you could call that irony.

>> ^BillOreilly:
>> ^Raverman:
The poor state of the American economy is a given.
- Massive banks failing,
- Huge numbers of homes foreclosing - NATIONWIDE.
- The Stock exchange in free fall.
- So many trillions of overseas debt with countries like China, they basically own America.
- Not to mention the massive new cost from Hurricane Ike and the raising price of oil again due to the closed pipelines.
BillOReilly - to distract the conversation with a completely irrelevant comment about Michigan being run by a democrat? To try to divert the topic as my state vs. your state?
Shame on you. Thats an insult to the people who are truely suffering across america.
Rebulicans go on and on about patriotism and loving their country...
But don't give a damn about their countrymen, just their own pockets and politics.

Massive banks failing are due to corporate greed. Foreclosing homes are due to morons living beyond their means with variable-rate loans, which are now catching up with them. Hurricane Ike is a natural disaster. None of these issues are the fault of "Republicans who don't care about their countrymen."
And liberals care more about their fellow man than conservatives, I'm sure.


BillO, you may be right about why those things are failing, but as a result of their failures and the impact that will have and more importantly, the cause of those failures, for McCain to suggest that the fundamentals are strong, really does suggest he's out of touch with reailty.

Analysts can be nobs for their fortune telling, but they and economists like to talk up the market to keep mum and dad thinking that investing in the stock market is a good thing. I don't think you'd find one of them suggesting that the fundamentals of the US economy are strong...

>> ^Raverman:
The poor state of the American economy is a given.
- Massive banks failing,
- Huge numbers of homes foreclosing - NATIONWIDE.
- The Stock exchange in free fall.
- So many trillions of overseas debt with countries like China, they basically own America.
- Not to mention the massive new cost from Hurricane Ike and the raising price of oil again due to the closed pipelines.
BillOReilly - to distract the conversation with a completely irrelevant comment about Michigan being run by a democrat? To try to divert the topic as my state vs. your state?
Shame on you. Thats an insult to the people who are truely suffering across america.
Rebulicans go on and on about patriotism and loving their country...
But don't give a damn about their countrymen, just their own pockets and politics.


Massive banks failing are due to corporate greed. Foreclosing homes are due to morons living beyond their means with variable-rate loans, which are now catching up with them. Hurricane Ike is a natural disaster. None of these issues are the fault of "Republicans who don't care about their countrymen."

And liberals care more about their fellow man than conservatives, I'm sure.

The poor state of the American economy is a given.
- Massive banks failing,
- Huge numbers of homes foreclosing - NATIONWIDE.
- The Stock exchange in free fall.
- So many trillions of overseas debt with countries like China, they basically own America.
- Not to mention the massive new cost from Hurricane Ike and the raising price of oil again due to the closed pipelines.

BillOReilly - to distract the conversation with a completely irrelevant comment about Michigan being run by a democrat? To try to divert the topic as my state vs. your state?

Shame on you. Thats an insult to the people who are truely suffering across america.
Rebulicans go on and on about patriotism and loving their country...
But don't give a damn about their countrymen, just their own pockets and politics.

actually, there was a guy that made like 200 straight successful transactions in the stock exchange. When the SEC arrested and questioned him, he said he was from the future and knew what was going to happen. There was quite a few articles on this guy over a few days about 8 or 9 months back. Then all of a sudden all news reports on him stopped. Like he vanished in thin air. I wish I could find the articles again because it was quite interesting.

*edit*
actually, found it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Carlssin