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An Irish Easter Blessing

Posted by Larry Doyle on April 23rd, 2011 7:03 AM |

There will be time to continue navigating the economic landscape but this weekend is a time for family, friends, and faith. In fact, wouldn’t it be great if we could always keep our proper focus and perspective when it comes to our family, our friends, and our faith? The world would be a better place if we could.

I hope for today and this weekend you have the opportunity to be with loved ones. In doing so, for those who share my faith let us reconfirm the greatest of all our beliefs,

For our sake he was crucified
under Pontius Pilate;
he suffered died and was buried.
On the third day he rose again,
in fulfillment of the Scriptures;
He ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again to judge
the living and the dead.

For those of other faiths, I wish for you real peace today and everyday.

For those who can not be with family, please let me share this beautiful Irish blessing with a melodious accompaniment so God will watch over you and all of us.

 

Read

 

May the road rise to meet you,

May the wind be ever at your back.

May the sunshine warm upon your face,

And the rains fall soft upon your fields.

And until we meet again.

May God hold you, May God hold you

Ever in the palm of his hand.

May the road rise to meet you,

May the wind be ever at your back.

May the sunshine warm upon your face,

And the rains fall soft upon your fields.

And until we meet again.

May God hold you, May God hold you

Ever in the palm of his hand.

Ever in the palm of his hand.

The palm of his hand.

 

After visiting with my fabulous Uncle Charles a few years back and prior to his passing in early 2010, I encouraged him to “keep the faith.” He responded, “no, Larry, no, do not merely keep the faith, spread the faith.”

Here’s to you, Charlie!!

Additionally, Charlie, if you get a chance please put in the good word for us!! A couple of the Doyle boys might need a little extra help getting through purgatory!!

Larry Doyle

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I have no affiliation or business interest with any entity referenced in this commentary. The opinions expressed are my own. I am a proponent of real transparency within our markets so that investor confidence and investor protection can be achieved.

 


Sense on Cents Central Station

Posted by Larry Doyle on April 22nd, 2011 8:14 AM |

A few years back when I had just launched Sense on Cents, I would host formal weekly exchanges with readers. This forum, entitled Sense on Cents Central Station, allowed readers an opportunity to ask questions, make comments, or shout from the mountaintop (how many currently feel like saying, “I’m pissed and I’m not going to take it anymore!!” More than a few I’ll bet.). Are there specific financial or economic topics you would like me to address now? Ask away.

Given all that is going on in our world and in each and every large city and small community within our own country, I firmly believe people want a voice and to know that somebody is listening. You have it right here. What is on your mind? Speak out. Inquire. Do not be bashful. Are there questions you have as you navigate your own personal economic landscape that I might be able to address? Collectively we can help each other.

As a disclaimer, I am not a financial planner.

Sticking with the theme of this thread, “All aboard….”


Auction Rate Comments Reflect Real Pain

Posted by Larry Doyle on April 21st, 2011 8:05 AM |

Today’s commentary is a little lengthy but is very personal. I hope you will take the few extra minutes to read it and share it with friends, family, and colleagues. Thanks. LD

Each and every day I think of what I can write that will truly help people further understand the dynamics at work in our global economy. In the course of my writing I am often drawn to specifically help those who have been defrauded or abused by the system that operates on Wall Street and in Washington.

I derive tremendous personal satisfaction in providing an outlet and a sympathetic ear to those who feel that few if any people are in their corner. No group of investors and individuals deserves greater sympathy and a stronger voice than our fellow American citizens so badly mistreated in the entanglement of auction-rate securities.

While many within our nation and the markets today may care to focus on recent earnings reports, a rebounding equity market, or the upcoming long weekend, let us remember that there are thousands in this country who still experience real pain from the ARS scandal. Is it easier to forget about them? If you care.

I choose to reach out to them again and spread their stories of real pain and anguish. Why? Read the rest »


Auto Scams Alive and Well

Posted by Larry Doyle on April 20th, 2011 6:47 AM |

In the market for a car? There are few jobs in our country today with a lesser reputation than that of a car salesman. While there are certainly plenty of very reputable individuals within the auto industry, why do car salespeople have such horrendous reputations? Here’s why.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Although this hidden camera expose was produced by Dateline NBC back in 2003, a recent report by the Center for Public Integrity indicates that little has changed in the scams and cons practiced within the auto industry. Read the rest »


Is It Getting Time to Buy a House?

Posted by Larry Doyle on April 19th, 2011 8:51 AM |

Given the recent experience in housing is real estate an asset that should be abandoned? Obviously not but that mentality has grown dramatically within many segments of our nation.

Can you blame people for never wanting to venture back into the real estate market? No. It is understandable but it is not the real estate’s fault. The fact is very regrettably far too many people did not fully understand and appreciate the dynamics at work in the real estate market nor did they appreciate the risks involved in the mortgage finance space. I empathise. That said, real estate ownership should not be abandoned. Read the rest »


S&P’s Lack of Confidence in Washington

Posted by Larry Doyle on April 18th, 2011 9:22 AM |

Standard & Poor’s decision this morning to place the credit rating of the United States on negative watch is long overdue. While the impact of S&P’s announcement is immediately reflected by a decline in the equity markets of approximately 1.5%-2.0%, the real target of this release is Washington D.C..

In layman’s terms the S&P release is voicing a lack of confidence in the credibility of both parties in Washington to deal with our financial house. We should not be surprised.

While politicians from both parties may talk a good game—especially recently—while they feed at the trough of the large monied interests emanating from Wall Street and other corporate entities, the American taxpayer has suffered from the incompetence and intransigence of Washington to deal with our LONGSTANDING fiscal issues and indebtedness. Playing shell games may fool some of the people all of the time but that gamesmanship is no way to manage a nation’s finances. Read the rest »


Merrill Lynch Lawyer Told Eliot Spitzer: “Be Careful, We Have Powerful Friends”

Posted by Larry Doyle on April 18th, 2011 8:29 AM |

Is the need to repair the health of our financial system SO GREAT, that we should be willing to allow the basic rights of individuals and the laws of our land to be trampled and violated in the process? In my opinion, this very question is central to the rage that burns in so many hearts across our great land.

Bailing out banks may be anathema to those who love and cherish capitalism BUT not pursuing justice and real accountability for the transgressions of those individuals and those institutions central to our crisis is sickening. I believe it is inherently un-American to allow these transgressions to pass without proper prosecution. Which transgressions? Read the rest »


Calling All Auction-Rate Securities Holders: “A Break for 8 Banks” or Did the Fed Violate Your Property Rights?

Posted by Larry Doyle on April 14th, 2011 5:48 PM |

New information would seem to implicate the Federal Reserve for violating the property rights of tens of thousands of investors holding auction-rate securities. Could this be true? Let’s navigate.

I have been writing about the nightmare known as auction-rate securities since mid-January 2009. I often pause to reflect on ARS holders whom I have ‘met’ here at Sense on Cents but whom I will never truly know. I think of how their lives have been forever changed and negatively impacted from having been entangled in this ARS web. The pain shared in so many stories is very real.

I have also often thought that somebody or some institution within our government sacrificed the welfare (cash, mental, physical, emotional) of so many tens of thousands of individual ARS holders in order to help our large financial institutions. I shared that opinion in the midst of an interview with PBS last week. (The PBS documentary addressing the ARS travesty should run this summer.)

Today we learn that the Federal Reserve intervened in the midst of an SEC investigation of the ARS scandal in mid-2008 and ‘slowed the horses.’ Read the rest »


“WAMU Loan Fraud Should Have Been Easily Detected”

Posted by Larry Doyle on April 14th, 2011 10:16 AM |

I have long believed and written extensively that I thought our nation experienced extensive fraud in the mortgage origination industry in the first decade of this century. That fraud was then conveyed throughout our markets and economy via the securitization process on Wall Street. Many people, divisions, departments and firms profited along the way while regulators were negligent, incompetent, or both.

While only a select few individuals in the mortgage origination industry have paid any type of price for engaging and promoting this fraud, our nation as a whole has paid a very heavy and steep price. I find this reality to be reprehensible and hold our nation’s banking regulators in contempt for allowing this gross injustice to transpire. Even to this day the banks and mortgage servicers involved in the initial fraud and having engaged in ongoing abusive business practices are poised to get a slap on the wrist and little more for their practices. Read the rest »


Words Matter but Numbers Matter Even More

Posted by Larry Doyle on April 13th, 2011 5:30 AM |

Do words matter?

Of course they do. If we can not trust what somebody says and means, how can we engage them in an honest, open, forthright manner? We can’t. On this note and with the prospects of aggressive debate on raising the federal debt ceiling on the near term horizon, let’s review what a United States senator had to say on this topic back in March 2006, Read the rest »


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Larry Doyle

Larry Doyle A Wall Street veteran's views and instincts on the markets, economy, and all things financial.







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