November 12th Edition

Good Morning All,

Markets are mixed to ugly around the world and are likely to remain so through the weekend meetings of the G20 in Washington.There is little of a concrete nature that will come from this event, at least not in the short term, but the sense that world leaders are talking to each other will be pervasive if not pursuasive. Unfortuneatly Obama and his economic team will not be attending because as the President elect has said there is "only one President at a time". The absurdity of the 10 week transition period from election to the assumption of office in America must be corrected as the danger of this anachronistic practice becomes ever more evident in these stressful times.

One idea that may find purchase at these meetings is the creation of a World Financial Organization mandated to write and enforce a set of international rules on supervision and regulation of financial transactions. Similar to other such organizations as the IMF and WTO its potential success will depend upon those who back it up. Bretton Woods ll this may not be but I expect that a new world order will arise from the ashes of this past decade just as one did in the aftermath of the Second Great War.

Markets are searching for a bottom and in my view we have already seen the woodshed, one more whipping out back of it may well be in the cards afterwhich we will burn the damn thing down. The greater the fear, the greater the resolve; we are not a collectively stupid mass of humanity and we will get out of this mess and be better for its having happened.