Barry L. Ritholtz Fusion IQ 535 Fifth Avenue, Suite 612 New York, NY 10017 212-661-2022 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Bailout Nation is here!
Amid the gloom of bankruptcy and a miserable market for new vehicles, G.M.’s new Chevrolet Camaro muscle car is winning over consumers looking for a little excitement in a bland landscape of look-alike sedans and watered-down sport utilities. G.M. sold 9,300 Camaros during the month of June — more than either its entire Buick or Cadillac divisions could muster on their own. And with G.M. expected to emerge Friday from bankruptcy as a newly constituted company, it is hardly surprising that the Camaro will play a starring role in the company’s coming-out party and news conference at G.M.’s Detroit headquarters
The Chevrolet Camaro, a working-class hero of the 1967-2002 model years, has been reintroduced for 2010. At left, the Camaro SS model.
The Camaro's arrival completes a baby boomer trinity of so-called pony cars, following the return of the retro-styled Ford Mustang and Dodge Challenger.
For those who want to save money and fuel, or just be seen in the Camaro's hunky embrace, the V-6 will do the trick. But muscle car mavens will want the 6.2-liter V-8, with 426 horsepower when paired with a 6-speed manual transmission, or 400 horsepower for the version mated to a 6-speed automatic. If saving gas is a priority, note that the car will also run the V-8 on 4 cylinders.
The new Camaro has sharp style outside, but the interior is less enticing.
The SS starts at $30,995, while the base model begins at $23,995. RELATED
With more displacement, the V-8 engine in the SS offers nearly 150 extra pound-feet of torque (for a total of 400), as compared to the base-model V-6 engine
The coupe is built on a modern sport sedan platform, a modified offshoot of the Holden Commodore that General Motors builds in Australia.
- Mortgage Default & Foreclosure Crisis - Brutal Past Two-Months
- Will loss reserves decrease again in Q2?
- Long-term default trends broken
- Prime, Jumbo Prime, and Option ARMs leading the way
- FL and NV - 1 in 5 homeowners in default or foreclosure
- 637k NEW mortgage delinquencies in May
- Q1 new loan production down slightly from Q1 2008
Our mission is to provide our clients a significant edge. This is done by turning the daily, market-moving real estate and mortgage news flow and events into old news by the time it makes headlines. - Mark Hanson
With earnings on tap, one of the major pro-financials arguments I have been hearing lately is the continued reduction of loss reserves. I just assumed that everyone was in the ‘reserve building’ camp this quarter. The fact is, defaults are rising across the board. With respect to residential real estate, defaults and foreclosures were up over 20% in Q1 relative to Q1 our data show.
A couple of weeks ago Lender Processing Services put out its monthly mortgage performance observation report that I skimmed through. The charts and results looked a lot like our data, so I filed it away in the mental hard drive and moved on. But upon closer examination over the past few days, the report was very enlightening. They also show that conditions continue to worsen, but only in the past couple of months long standing seasonality trends were broken and mortgage performance turned markedly worse.
The report is 3mb so instead of attaching, below are the charts that are the most important. If you want the full report, please shoot me a note and I will send.Mark
Defaults, Foreclosures and Seasonality Trends Broken
May month-over-month default increase over 300% abovethe average for past four years.
Foreclosure inventories across Pay Option, Subprime and Alt-A continue to surge -- up 88.3% y-o-y. This shows how lagging foreclosures actually are. The foreclosure resales for sale today are from 30-day loan defaults that first happened from 1 to 1.5 years ago -- the heart of the Subprime Implosion.This highlights how much housing supply is in the foreclosure pipeline at any given time.
As explained in the previous chart, the massive default surge in higher grade paper over the past 6 months shown below will not produce foreclosure-related housing supply for months down the road…even longer with mortgage modifications in full force that extent out the default and foreclosure crisis.This will keep supply/demand fundamentals strained indefinitely, especially with lending outside of $417k still extremely tight relative to 2002-2007.
ONE in FIVE properties in FL and NV are in some stage of foreclosure. Now that is what you call supply.
This number even shocked me -- this equates to 1.3% of ALL mortgage loans in the country becoming delinquent in May alone.This is out of control. We track from Notice-of-Default, which is at 90-days typically. At 90-days most borrowers don’t cure. But as values come down, jobs continue to be lost and financing remains tight, more and more 30-day delinquencies are making all the way to foreclosure. Therefore, this 637k number is now very important and comes into play.
What happened in April and May? A complete break of trend can be seen here. This is significant.
The same significant trend break can be seen here.
The perfect mortgage credit crisis -- the perfect borrowers, many that don’t need the help and that will not spend their $100 month refi savings, are the only ones able to borrow.
The epidemic mortgage mod re-default rate averaging 60%-70% will keep foreclosure related housing supply on the market for years.
This is another great example of why mortgage mods are ineffective -- they are addressing the problem far too late in the process. As a mortgage mod bear, this data is a positive to me.But if they wanted to make mods more effective, they would hit the borrower with force at the 30-day late mark.
With the federal government refusing to lend its assistance, the State of California is in dire financial straits. Here are some of the budget cuts being considered to save the state:
$1.2 million: Canceling a planned monument to Adrienne Barbeau
$109 million: Eliminating program that gives $100 pocket cash to hopeful starlets as they get off the bus in Hollywood
$100,000: Reduce annual salary of people holding up letters for Hollywood sign all day
$170 million: Closing all schools east of Bakersfield
$24 million: Promotional fund for spreading bullshit claim that California makes great cheese
$11 million: Ceasing production of Tell Me About The Rabbits, George: The 3-D IMAX Experience for the Steinbeck Center in Salinas
$9 million: Funds used to keep vandals out of Peter Falk's yard
Chicago's Sears Tower has opened a glassed-in viewing platform that is not for the faint of heart.
By Karen Hawkins, AP
Visitors to the Sears Tower's new glass balconies all seem to agree: The first step is the hardest.
"It's like walking on ice," said Margaret Kemp, of Bishop, California, who said her heart was still pounding even after stepping away from the balcony. "That first step you take – 'am I going down?'"
Kemp was among the visitors who got a sneak preview of the balconies Wednesday. "The Ledge," as the balconies have been nicknamed, open to the public Thursday.
The balconies are suspended 1,353 feet (412 meters) in the air and jut out 4 feet (1.22 meters) from the building's 103rd floor Skydeck. They're actually more like boxes than balconies, with transparent walls, floor and ceiling.
Visitors are treated to unobstructed views of Chicago from the building's west side and a heart-stopping vista of the street and Chicago River below – for those brave enough to look straight down.
John Huston, one of the property owners of the Sears Tower, even admitted to getting "a little queasy" the first time he ventured out. But 30 or 40 trips later, he's got the hang of it.
"The Sears Tower has always been about superlatives – tallest, largest, most iconic," he said. "Today is also about superlatives. Today, we present you with 'the Ledge,' the world's most awesome view, the world's most precipitous view, the view with the most wow in the world."
The balconies can hold five tons, and the glass is 1.5 inches (3.8 centimeters) thick, officials said.
Sears Tower officials have said the inspiration for the balconies came from the hundreds of forehead prints visitors left behind on Skydeck windows every week. Now, staff will have a new glass surface to clean: floors.
The balconies are just one of the big changes coming to the Sears Tower. The building's name will change to Willis Tower later this summer.
Barry L. Ritholtz Fusion IQ 535 Fifth Avenue, Suite 612 New York, NY 10017 212-661-2022 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Bailout Nation is here!
Earlier this week, NASA released an amazing photograph of an eruption of Sarychev Peak Volcano, taken by astronauts aboard the orbiting International Space Station (ISS). Seeing that great photo prompted me to dig into the archives and see what other imagery I could find from recent NASA archives. Collected here are a handful of photographs of Sarychev Peak Volcano, and more, taken by astronauts aboard the ISS over the past few months. (35 photos total)
High above Russia's Kuril Islands, astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) look down on erupting Sarychev Peak Volcano (plume in center, left) on Matua Island and its brownish ash mixing with cloud cover downwind on June 12, 2009. Part of the ISS, a Soyuz module, is visible in the foreground. (NASA/JSC) [Google map]
A closer look at Sarychev Peak Volcano reveals more detail, the circular hole in the clouds around the island, the smooth condensation cloud wrapping much of the ash plume. (NASA/JSC) # [Google map]
Closer still to Sarychev Peak Volcano, pyroclastic flows can be seen tumbling down its slope (lighter clouds, bottom). Also visible is a closer view of the condensation cloud or "pileus", formed by the rapidly rising plume. (NASA/JSC) # [Google map]
A view looking straight down at the top of the eruption plume of Sarychev Peak Volcano on June 12, 2009. Local winds were very light that day, and the eruption plume's upward motion was hardly disturbed at all. (NASA/JSC) # [Google map]
One day after its eruption pictured above, ash from Russia's Sarychev Peak Volcano mixes and ripples out into the surrounding clouds. (NASA/JSC) # [Google map]
Ahile above the Pacific Ocean on may 11, 2009, ISS astronauts shot this photo of a waning gibbous moon, slightly distorted, seen through the Earth's atmosphere. (NASA/JSC) #
A strange circular area of thinned ice in the southern end of Lake Baikal in southern Siberia. While the origin of the circles is still unknown, the peculiar pattern suggests convection (upwelling) in the lake's water column. (NASA/JSC) # [Google map]
High above the Indian Ocean, astronauts captured these four images (animated here) of the Aurora Australis and surrounding airglow in the Earth's atmosphere
A round watermelon can take up a lot of room in a refrigeratorAnd the usually round fruit often sits awkwardly on refrigerator shelves.
Smart Japanese Farmers have forced their watermelons to grow into a square shape by inserting the melons into square, tempered glass cases while the fruit is still growing on the vine.
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