With the recent news about the stock market plunge/bleeding, are we heading towards another financial crisis?

How will this affect the housing and economy in Singapore?

Originally posted by WHATODO:

With the recent news about the stock market plunge/bleeding, are we heading towards another financial crisis?

Sub Prime mortgage crisis.

WASHINGTON - The subprime mortgage crisis is not likely to end anytime soon -- and could create losses of between $50 billion and $100 billion, Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke told the Senate Banking Committee today.

"Rising delinquencies and foreclosures are creating personal, economic and social distress for many homeowners and communties," he said, "problems that likely will get worse before the get better."

And, he noted, "the credit losses associated with subprime have come to light and they are fairly significant.

"Some estimates are in the order of between $50 and $100 billion of losses associated with subprime credit products."

Committee Chairman Christopher J. Dodd, D-Conn., found some hope in the Fed's newly aggressive attitude toward lenders, as well as fresh efforts to get more and better information to consumers.

He said he was "pleased" that Bernanke was taking some steps, but added "I want to see more action."

So did others.

"We're deeply concerned that the sub-prime problem is not going to just be contained so easily, but could deeply spread and have some repercussions out there," said Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Alabama, top Republican on the committee.

Bernanke, though, would not provide much solace.

"There are clearly going to be significant financial losses associated with the faults and delinquincies on these mortgages," he said. "As a result, the credit quality of [many products] that include in them substantial amounts of subprime mortgage papers is being downgraded."

The Fed has been moving quickly to address possible unfair and deceptive practices by lenders, and held a hearing last month to discuss pre-payment penalties, the use of escrow accounts for taxes and insurance and other issues.

Other reviews are underway, as Bernanke Thursday proposed changes that would "address concerns about mortgage loan advertisements and solicitations that may be incomplete or misleading."

And, Bernanke said, those rules would "provide mortgage disclosures more quickly, so that consumers can get the information they need when it is most useful to them."

Source: http://www.courant.com/business/hcu-subprime0719,0,4480607.story

It’s only a tumble, not yet to the extend of a crash.

Maybe it's a good time to short the US dollar.

the end may come at the end of the year and will affect only US economy, and those kena by its ripples. tech companies might continue to soar but manufacturing companies might want to shift their focus to EMEA.

Originally posted by maurizio13:

Maybe it's a good time to short the US dollar.

yes.

Originally posted by ^tamago^:

the end comes at the end of the month and will affect only US economy, and those kena by its ripples. tech companies might continue to soar but manufacturing companies might want to shift their focus to EMEA.

Anything financial that affects US affects the world.

Next week I be a currency trader

Originally posted by maurizio13:

Anything financial that affects US affects the world.

the impact that US has on the world economy is weakening. foreign reserves are slowly moving over to euros...

i hope it happens soon so i can go in to the market to buy properties and stocks

wish me good luck

Originally posted by ^tamago^:

the end may come at the end of the year and will affect only US economy, and those kena by its ripples. tech companies might continue to soar but manufacturing companies might want to shift their focus to EMEA.

What's EMEA?

Originally posted by hmsg:

What's EMEA?

europe and middle east asia.

When people still remember financial crisis, then it will not happen. Financial Crisis always happen when you last expect it.

Blame it on the lenders in the States that created all these cheap loans to hook lower-income Americans and exposing themselves to greater risk.

Analogous to banks offering credit cards all over the place at the moment here.

Originally posted by LazerLordz:

Blame it on the lenders in the States that created all these cheap loans to hook lower-income Americans and exposing themselves to greater risk.

Analogous to banks offering credit cards all over the place at the moment here.

It will do wonders to the world if suddenly all the US Treasury bonds are useless.

Currency trading hor, is as bad as gambling at the casino hor… actually worse because at the casino, you gamble what you have but with currencies trading, you gamble with what you do not have… (highly leveraged margin trading)

Originally posted by AndrewPKYap:

Currency trading hor, is as bad as gambling at the casino hor... actually worse because at the casino, you gamble what you have but with currencies trading, you gamble with what you do not have... (highly leveraged margin trading)

absolutely right, but in casino, you lose you go bankrupt, in currencies trading, you lose, somebody else go bankrupt, you just get kicked out of the job.

Originally posted by sgdiehard:

absolutely right, but in casino, you lose you go bankrupt, in currencies trading, you lose, somebody else go bankrupt, you just get kicked out of the job.

huh, you mean, work as a currency trading broker? hehehe very evil lor....

with regards to the topic title: "Will there be another Financial Crisis?" my observation is that when everyone is expecting it, it won't happen for the simple reason that people are expecting it and taking preventive measures.

Sure, there will be fall outs but not to the extent of a full blown FINANCIAL CRISIS.

Individual crisis, definitely. Only the individuals (or individual countries, individual companies) can prevent it, like making sure that their cash flow will not be affected so badly by the fall out until it brings them to their knees.

What you can do is ensure that your personal debt level is affordable and can withstand reasonable shocks.

just to add... if possible, no debt is best...

The biggest joke will be if the US Dollar goes too far down south. Those countries who bought tonnes of US Treasury Bonds will suddenly realise that they are useless and start selling them.

Then the relic of the Reagan era will return to bite the US so hard, I wonder if it will even squeak one bit.

Ask the cat. If it knows who is to die next, perhaps it can tell whether this stock market crash is a crisis to come or not.

NEW YORK (AFP) - He is a two-year-old cat and looks innocent enough. But at the nursing home where he lives in the US state of Rhode Island, Oscar has developed a reputation as an angel of death.

Since being adopted as a kitten by staff at the advanced dementia unit of Providence's Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, Oscar has revealed a rather morbid tendency to pick which patient is going to die next.

According to David Dosa, a geriatrician at Rhode Island Hospital in Providence, Oscar makes regular rounds, looking in on patients and giving them a quick sniff, before either moving on or settling down for a cuddle.

So accurate have his predictions been, that as soon as the white and tabby harbinger of death curls up with one of the patients, staff immediately start summoning family and clergy to the soon-to-be deathbed.

"No one dies on the third floor unless Oscar pays a visit and stays awhile," Dosa wrote in the New England Journal of Medicine.

"His mere presence at the bedside is viewed by physicians and nursing home staff as an almost absolute indicator of impending death, allowing staff members to adequately notify families," he added.

"Thus far, he has presided over the deaths of more than 25 residents."

Dosa did not offer any explanation for Oscar's uncanny powers of prognostication, which patients were not yet believed to have spotted.

I say BUY next week.

Originally posted by Daddy!!:

I say BUY next week.

Buy and you will carry this baby long time. This is only the tip of the iceberg,Joe.

Dow is off 208pts with S&P 500 off 23.7pts .....Expect more hedge funds selling with the technicals turning bearish.

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- U.S. stocks will continue to fall next week, in continuation of a sell-off that saw the Dow Jones Industrial Average experience its worst week in over four years, due to nervousness that the easy-money binge of the last few years has come to an end.

Another heavy week of earnings, including 99 reports from S&P 500 companies, capped by the all-important July employment report on Friday, also awaits investors.
But stocks will remain vulnerable to any new signs of distress from hedge funds hit by their exposure to bad U.S. home loans, as well as from credit markets, where Wall Street firms and corporations are finding it harder and harder to obtain financing.
"We're finishing up earnings season and the general tone has been positive," said Owen Fitzpatrick, head of the U.S. equities group at Deutsche Bank. "But it's been overwhelmed by the whole subprime and credit-market issues."