This is the kind of thing that we all REALLY have emails for… those random times when you recieve the most obvious bit of spam mail into your normal account that just screams “this is bullshit, your money i want!” (bad grammar included…)

Im not even going to warn people against this email… if somebody was to fall for this they deserve to lose everything!

Enjoy

“I am MR Isaac Caleb bank manager of BOA Bank in Burkina faso.I would like you to
indicate your interest to receive the transfer of 10.5 M Dollars. I will like
you to stand as the next of kin to my late Descease customer whose account is
presently dormant, for claim this is a very serious issued i am assureing you
that this transactrion is real , Once again i want to beg you in the name of
GOD not to let me down as soon as this fund hit in to your bank account.
I am a family man with the fear of GOD i train up my children in way of ALMINTHY
Best Regard
Awaiting to hear soon
MrIsaac Caleb”

Here’s how repulsed I’ve been by the inane decoupling of risk and reward in the financial markets over the past five years: I quit. I spent a decade clawing my way into prominence as a financial journalist and commentator–a television gig, books, a column in this magazine. And the reason I quit opining about finance for a living basically boils down to disgust. Mostly with Alan Greenspan’s pathetic desire to preserve his own reputation by flooding the globe with cheap dollars, no matter what the long-term costs. But also with the market’s willingness to accommodate those dollars, regardless of how obvious it became that such madness was unsustainable. When I wrote in Esquire’s October 1998 cover story that this market was going to crash and stay crashed, I mocked the idea that “Greenspan at the wheel” guaranteed an ever-strengthening of the economy. I said “stock prices are ridiculous,” but I had no idea that our Federal Reserve chairman and the presidents who employed him and the financial institutions that were fattened by his largesse were jointly capable of such delusion. We all have our favorite example: a friend with horrible credit who suddenly lives in a big house with a no-money-down, interest-only mortgage. Deadbeats defaulting on their mortgages so they can make their car payments. A homeowner besieged by his own bank–his partner in ownership–to take a home-equity loan that’ll boost his loan-to-value ratio to 110 percent. A stupid business expanding so fast that it literally has stores on opposite corners (both of which sell coffee for three times what the Pakistani guy across the street sells it for), because banks are begging it to take cheap cash.

And now I’m happy. Not that people are hurting or that retirement accounts have been massacred or that many will lose livelihoods. No, I’m happy about the return of a little bit of goddamn common sense. The next treasury secretary will inherit a dramatically changed financial landscape. He will have to resist the temptation to create regulations that slow American business to a crawl. The idea that we can achieve reward while forbidding risk is as childish as the idea that put us in this pickle–that all the reward had been achieved without assuming risk. He should immediately erase the bailout safety net: You lever your bank past the point of danger, you don’t get bailed out, you get taken over. And prosecuted.

And the next Fed chairman, or this guy if he stays on, should be a big enough man to accept the “blame” if his tenure includes a recession. Allowing the dust to settle from time to time–which Greenspan lacked the courage to do–will separate the viable ideas and reasonable expansion plans from the interest-only loans and Starbucks.

The sky is not falling. Things are going to be fine. This tectonic shift will probably spell the permanent end of several cherished American financial axioms. And we’ll be better off for their demise.

Myth: Investment banks are an indispensable source of “innovation” and liquidity.

There are now no (major) investment banks. And no one will miss them. Like lawyers, these parasites basically create nothing, add no value. And now they don’t exist. The global financial system will survive not giving tranches of ten thousand combined mortgages from the farthest-flung sections of America. And whoever invented these CDOs, these “collateralized debt obligations,” should . . . find meaningful work.

Myth: Home ownership is an unalloyed good.

It’s not. Not just because it’s expensive and illiquid, but because it’s inappropriate for many kinds of people. And I don’t mean just in a class-division way. (Although that’s true, too, and Fannie and Freddie never should have been tasked with the social mission to “improve” the lots of poor people by saddling them with loans they couldn’t repay.) I mean for economic reasons. Fifty percent is about the maximum number of households that should ever own homes in a society. A modern, efficient workforce needs its members to be mobile and nimble and not tethered to homes they barely own and cannot sell.

Myth: “Deregulation” caused this.

We’re so, so, so not deregulated. The institutions that are failing are some of the most heavily regulated in the world. Investment banks are regulated by the SEC, the Federal Trade Commission, state attorneys general, and state banking commissions. But too many regulators are as bad as no regulators–none of them feels responsible since a failure can be blamed on all the others. Hedge funds are a great example. For years, people have been crying about the wild world of hedge funds. But hedge funds have actually held up well during this meltdown. Effective regulations are needed and possible. But any rush to clamp down willy-nilly will result in an even deeper freeze on liquidity and push this crisis deeper and longer.If you’re an investment banker or a mortgage broker, yes, these will be prolonged and difficult times. You should consider coaching Little League. But the rest of us? On October 10, I bought GE stock for $18.77 and Altria for $16.58–wildly profitable companies with price-earnings ratios under 10 and yields of about 7 percent. There are great American companies paying out suddenly valuable American dollars as dividends. I just can’t cry too hard when the stock market is holding the greatest sale of my lifetime. It’s enough to make me want to write a bullish finance column.

By esquire.com

Una idea, un sotano, 10 dólares y un rotulador. Eso es lo que necesitó Charlie Kratzer para decorar de una forma tan original y genial su sotano. Y para muestra, un botón.

Man's basement

Para observar todo el sótano, dirigirse al artículo original aquí

Não se assuste. Não estou em uma campanha revolucionária contra o multi-table no poker online. É mais uma auto-recomendação para melhorar meus ganhos.

Nesse começo de mês, tive alguns bons resultados que somados ao bônus da Titan Poker tinham elevado a banca dos 860 dólares do último post à 940 doletas. Era já um resultado expressivo para 5 dias de Titan. Isso foi na quarta-feira passada. Estava jogando sempre 2 mesas e com alguma sorte, deu tudo certo no começo. A partir daí, a coisa degringolou. Foram tantas bad beats e socos na parede que eu tive que fazer uma parada emergencial pra salvar a banca, senão teria que descer de limite, coisa que não me agradaria nem um pouco. Parei de jogar na quinta-feira com 700 dólares. Dei meus dois dias de descanso.

Quem leu todos os posts do blog sabe que uma das minha filosofias no poker é tentar jogar pelo jogo e não pela quantidade. Quero jogar o meu melhor, não libertar bônus e fazer pontos. É lógico que ter esse artiífcio para auxiliar no crescimento da banca é excelente, mas outra vez tive que colocar na cabeça que o mais importante era melhorar meu jogo. Por isso decidi parar com o multi-table, porque eu simplismente não consigo jogar mais do que uma mesa ao mesmo tempo, e ter lucro com isso a longo prazo. Os ups e downs bruscos são muito mais constantes, coisa que ainda não tenho preparo psicológico pra suportar.

Desde domingo, então venho jogando apenas uma mesa e os resultados começam a aparecer. Juntamente ao crescimento da minha base de dados da Titan, o que permitiu melhor leitura dos adversários, jogar apenas uma mesa foi um trunfo na recuperação dos prejuízos e nova guinada na banca.

Até a próxima.

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