This is a cute series (at least for those on the sidelines of it, actually maybe nobody IS on the sidelines. Then it's not so cute )
Planet Money's Toxic Asset : NPR http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=124491608 We spend two days with Solberg looking for the right toxic asset. One, full of what appear to be California McMansions, seems promising. Solberg prints out a 604-page prospectus that reads like a historical record of the entire financial crisis. It's all in there — vaporized companies, people struggling to pay their mortgages, and some horribly complicated logic describing which bond holders get paid, in which order, under which conditions. But that bond falls through, too.
Finally, we find a beautiful, totally toxic asset at what Solberg thinks is a good price: $36,000. Back in the bubble, somebody paid $2.7 million for this thing. We buy a piece from Solberg for $1,000. It's going to be our encyclopedia of the financial crisis.
What Our Toxic Asset Looks Like
Our toxic asset has 2,000 mortgages, many of them in hard-hit states like California, Arizona and Florida. A lot of the people in our bond are really struggling. Almost half are behind on their mortgage payments, and 15 percent of the homes are already in foreclosure.
At some point those homes will be taken over and sold for a loss. Every time that happens, the bond shrinks. Eventually, our part of the bond will disappear entirely.
Until then, we get a little money every month from people paying off their mortgages. We just got a check for $141. If it goes to Thanksgiving, we could double our money.
By the way, we bought the asset with our own money. Any proceeds will go to charity. If we lose money, we take the loss. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=124578382 Planet Money is committed to following the financial crisis to the bitter end. And what better way to do that than to own a piece of it. We bought one of those things that no one wanted, one of those things that almost brought down the global economy: our very own toxic asset. This one has more than 2,000 mortgages in it. We paid $1,000, with our own money, for our piece. It used to be worth more like $75,000. Click on the timeline and roll over the states to watch a disaster in progress.
SIDE NOTE: I thought Palen was a Republican?????
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=125263305 "Some of you are registered Republicans. Some of you are ... what we used to call Reagan Democrats," Palin said. "And some of you are like so many of my friends and my family, including my own husband, just independent, not registered in any party.
Last edited by jeffkrol; 03-28-2010 at 09:38 AM.
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