I thought your other comments were stupid, but this analogy takes the cake considering you actually traded on the CME.
Pabst wasnt'what goldman did akin to me setting fire to my home and then calling the insurance company to pony up on the full value when my home is now worth 50% less...
Exactly. Paulson would be a person of interest if there were any true justice and interest in real regulation in this country.
Pabst, I try to understand this insurance business of AIG. If AIG is paid fees and collateral by hedge funds (short sellers) to buy securities for them, but AIG takes the money of fees and collateral and make their own bets with that money, then where is the money to cover any AIG bad bets? If that is their business, they should have money to cover.
Uh, let's see. I've traded Treasury futures since 1982, been a member of the CBOT and CME and traded for a bank bigger than Goldman but I'm going to take cues from Michelle Malkin? Yea right. Goldman was smarter than AIG. Instead of reading insipid commentary read facts: "The critical moment came late last year -- coincidentally around the time of my NovaStar Financial (NYSE: NFI) short call -- when Goldman's CFO called a "mortgage risk" meeting which concluded that Goldman should reduce its MBS holdings and buy expensive insurance as protection against further losses." http://www.bloggingstocks.com/2007/11/19/how-goldmans-risk-managers-mined-mortgage-gold/ "At Goldman, the controllerâs office â the group responsible for valuing the firmâs huge positions â has 1,100 people, including 20 Ph.D.âs. If there is a dispute, the controller is always deemed right unless the trading desk can make a convincing case for an alternate valuation. The bank says risk managers swap jobs with traders and bankers over a career and can be paid the same multimillion-dollar salaries as investment bankers. âThe risk controllers are taken very seriously,â Mr. Moszkowski said. âThey have a level of authority and power that is, on balance, equivalent to the people running the cash registers. Itâs not as clear that that happens everywhere.â http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/19/business/19goldman.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&ref=business
I do pretty well compared to you two for a guy who is "ignorant", eh? Instead of being a one-liner piece of shit please tell me how an institution seeking to be made whole by AIG is any different than a institution who'd want to be made whole if the CME Clearing Corp went bk?
If I remember correctly, Pelosi (one of obama's closest allies) was the one who spearheaded the support for the future bankruptcy of our country.
It's more like buying a put on a stock well off it's high and you making a volatility or risk assessment more sophisticated and accurate than the trader who sells you the put.