Tag Archives: Wall Street

Larry Summers and Harvard

As I’ve repeatedly pointed out over the years, during the last decade or so Harvard University had basically become a gigantic hedge-fund, with some sort of little school or whatever attached to one side. For example, I think I once … Continue reading

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A Trillion Here and A Trillion There…

According to an estimate by Bloomberg News released this morning, the sum of the new commitments already made by the federal government in its financial bailout has already reached a total of 8.5 trillion dollars, including loans, investments, guarantees, and other liabilities. Frankly, this … Continue reading

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The Red-and-Black Fund

Since another multi-billion-dollar hedge fund announced on Friday that it had lost almost all its money and was liquidating, I suppose it’s a little too late for me to start my own Red-and-Black Fund, based on some shrewd investment principles I worked out … Continue reading

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One-Fifth?

This morning, Citicorp, previously America’s largest bank, wrote down the value of its security holdings by an additional $22B, following massive multi-billion-dollar write-downs in previous quarters. The total market value of Citicorp has now been cut in half. Merrill Lynch, … Continue reading

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Options and Threats

Last week, I distributed a column reviewing the financial and accounting tricks that have played such a major role in recently erasing some seven trillion dollars of value from our capital markets. This piece generated a great deal of response, … Continue reading

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Taking Stock

“Taking Stock” by Ron Unz The Los Angeles Times, Sunday, August 25th, 2002 PALO ALTO—Regulators looking at how stock options are accounted for have seen cause for concern. I see opportunity. It’s true that when actual expenses don’t appear on an … Continue reading

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Options and Perpetual Motion

Options and Perpetual Motion by Ron Unz Wall Street Journal (Letters), Thursday, August 15, 2002 In his Aug. 8 editorial page commentary, “The Real Value of Options,” Harvey Golub, the former CEO of American Express, argued that the issuance of stock options … Continue reading

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Wealth and Stupidity

Just over twenty years ago, at the dawn of the 1980s, a conservative theorist named George Gilder published a million-copy international best-seller entitled Wealth and Poverty, providing an intellectual case for the superiority of free markets and entrepreneurial capitalism over … Continue reading

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The Fall of Free Market Dogmatism

“The Fall of Free Market Dogmatism” by Ron Unz Unpublished, May 2001 Last week’s warm spring weather brought the return of rolling blackouts to California.  Since electricity demand is still expected to climb 50% over the next three months to its … Continue reading

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