Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Nassim Taleb Tells the Truth!



I love Nassim because I believe instilling real change requires a gutsier approach than what the Fed, the Treasury and the Congress have so far shown. Frankly speaking, (as an Obama supporter during his campaign) I am disappointed with the stimulus package as is. This is not even half of what the economy needed to have a real shot at recovery in the 2nd half of 2009.

More and more I am thinking the insolvent banks should be practically nationalized. Obama has the political credit to end this hostage situation and hopefully Tim Geithner will stop playing hide and seek before it is too late.

Nassim Taleb's point in saying "Banks ultimately are utilities." is right on. They surely are at the conclusion of an amnesiac era in their history where they developed a Dr. Jekyll of sorts in the form of Structured Investment Vehicles. They continued on to bet the whole farm on it only to be saluted off to million dollar bonuses -- in many cases undeservedly so.