Economic Crisis

  1. February 9, 2012 01:53 AM

    Audit Notes: Off the Hamster Wheel, The Dumb Money, iPad Newspapers

    By Ryan Chittum

    I like this Nieman Journalism Lab piece on how Salon hopped off the hamster wheel and saw site traffic increase dramatically.

    Salon's traffic jumped 40 percent even though it posted a third less than it had a year earlier. Adrienne LaFrance talks to Salon editor Kerry Lauerman:

    “I remember we had aggregated a Charlie Sheen story, and I...

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  2. February 8, 2012 10:16 AM

    Mostly Skimpy Coverage of JPMorgan’s Overdraft Settlement

    By Ryan Chittum

    Press favorite Jamie Dimon's JPMorgan Chase is paying $110 million to settle a class-action suit against it for gouging its customers on overdraft transactions. The bank, like many others, artificially re-ordered transactions to clear from highest to lowest in order to trigger more overdrafts.

    Obviously, $110 million is a lot of money in almost contexts—even for investors...

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  3. February 8, 2012 01:49 AM

    Audit Notes: Payment Protection, Greek Austerity, Inflation Bugaboo

    By Ryan Chittum

    American Banker's Victoria Finkle and Jeff Horwitz report on the credit card industry's payment-protection racket and note that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is scrutinizing at least one major player, Discover cards, something that could spell trouble for the industry.

    Customers get just 21 cents in benefits for every dollar they pay into these protections plans. The Banker...

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  4. February 7, 2012 02:02 AM

    NYT: Criminal Charges in the Foreclosure Scandal

    By Ryan Chittum

    Gretchen Morgenson of The New York Times reports this morning on new criminal charges against robosigning company DocX and its founder—what could be a big development in the foreclosure scandal.

    It's not Obama's Justice Department bringing the charges. Missouri Attorney General, Chris Koster will after a grand jury issued indicted the company and Lorraine O. Brown on 136 counts—many...

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  5. February 7, 2012 12:38 AM

    Audit Notes: Regressive Taxes, Another Task Force, Keller on Copyright

    By Ryan Chittum

    Kevin Drum looks at how regressive taxes are at the state and local level, an issue that doesn't get nearly enough attention.

    While the federal system is progressive overall, even after taking into account payroll taxes, the well-off pay far less of their income in state and local taxes than the poor do.

    I live in Seattle, a very...

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  6. February 6, 2012 07:41 PM

    Bad Math From the WSJ Opinion Pages

    By Ryan Chittum

    Brad DeLong catches The Wall Street Journal editorial page in some hilariously bad math.

    Here's Stephen Moore:

    Federal workers on balance still receive much better benefits and pay packages than comparable private sector workers, the Congressional Budget Office reports. The report says that on average the compensation paid to federal workers is nearly 50% higher than in the...

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  7. February 3, 2012 06:44 PM

    Audit Notes: Minimum Wage and the Recession, Facebook’s Numbers, Most Powerless

    By Ryan Chittum

    The Wall Street Journal runs an editorial today criticizing Mitt Romney for his support for increasing the minimum wage and indexing it to inflation.

    Few policies are as destructive as the minimum wage at keeping the young and least skilled out of the job market. By setting an arbitrary wage floor, politicians make it impossible for businesses to hire...

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  8. February 3, 2012 12:29 AM

    Audit Notes: CDO Charges, Facebook’s Board, Deficits

    By Ryan Chittum

    Sure enough, the Justice Department charged former Credit Suisse CDO executive Kareem Serageldin with fraud for allegedly artificially inflating CDO values. Two of his underlings pleaded guilty and say Serageldin orchestrated the scheme.

    The NYT:

    The government’s case against the former Credit Suisse traders depicts a brazen scheme to artificially increase the price of bonds on their books...

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  9. February 1, 2012 01:30 AM

    Audit Notes: Finally, Fraud Charges; Gee Whiz Wired; Freddie

    By Ryan Chittum

    The Wall Street Journal reports, and as far as I can tell, scoops that the Justice Department is preparing to file criminal charges against mortgage-bond traders at Credit Suisse for fraud. The WSJ says two traders will plead guilty, which would be the first such convictions of the crisis.

    That's a big deal, even if I suppose we shouldn't...

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  10. January 31, 2012 07:14 PM

    Bloomberg’s Big Miss in Silicon Valley Hiring Story

    An analysis forgets mergers and acquisitions

    By Ryan Chittum

    Bloomberg News reports on the hiring spree in Silicon Valley, possible evidence of "Web Bubble 2.0."

    But it makes some big mistakes that undermine its the story's credibility thesis.*

    Bloomberg says that about half of $100 million market-cap companies increased their workforces by more than 50 percent over a two-year span:

    Among U.S. technology companies with a market value...

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  11. January 30, 2012 07:56 PM

    Audit Notes: Data Pool 3, The UK Prints, Copyright

    By Ryan Chittum

    Scotland Yard arrested four top current and former Sun journalists and a cop. The Guardian's Nick Davies gives us the context and says it's a major development:

    And technicians have retrieved an enormous reservoir of material from News International's central computer servers, including one particularly vast collection that may yet prove to be the stick that breaks the media...

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  12. January 30, 2012 04:34 PM

    ProPublica and NPR on Freddie Mac’s Conflicts

    By Ryan Chittum

    Why haven't Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae been much more aggressive about refinancing the mortgages they hold?

    That's a $50 billion question. ProPublica and NPR have a $3.4 billion possible answer.

    Jesse Eisinger and Chris Arnold report that Freddie Mac has placed a huge bet that homeowners in its loans won't be able to refinance their mortgages. Around...

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  13. January 27, 2012 06:14 PM

    Audit Notes: Fukayama on the Crisis, WSJ on Exec Pay, Nonprofit News

    By Ryan Chittum

    The Browser has a great interview with Francis Fukayama on his five favorite financial-crisis books.

    Here he is on whether companies like Goldman Sachs were really capable of committing systematic fraud:

    It depends what you mean by systematic. Lloyd Blankfein doesn’t get up in the morning and say, “OK. How are we going to defraud people today?” but I...

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  14. January 27, 2012 01:13 PM

    Charlie Rose’s Weak Q&A With the SEC’s Khuzami

    By Ryan Chittum

    Audit contributing editor Felix Salmon, writing this morning about Channel 4 reporter Krishnan Guru-Murthy's tough questioning of Larry Summers, asked, "Has Summers ever been asked questions like this, on camera, by an American reporter?

    It seems unlikely. Our interviewers tend to be less Guru-Murthy than Charlie Rose.

    Rose has a new interview in Bloomberg BusinessWeek with the...

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