Worst year since depression

They say 2008 was the worse year since the great depression. I agree, the problem is that things are going to get worse. Expect unemployment to go up, the price of houses to go down. I mean with more people out of work in 2009 what did you expect?

As always the band aids will not fix the problem. Look at GM, will a few billion cause them to build high quality cars that people want to buy? You already know the answer. If the people want huge expensive Hummers, then GM is the place to go. However, people need small fuel efficient vehicles, like a Yaris.

2009 will be what we know is coming - IMPACT!

consumer confidence at all time low

As the job market gets worse, consumer confidence in the Dec hit an all time low. It is as if the bad news just gets worse. When we were around at this time last year, I predicted that things would be bad in 2008 and get worse in 2009. Still, it is almost like things are getting worse on a daily basis. In fact, we went from a nasty November to a dismal December.

recap for 2008

Today at midday the DOWn Jones Industrial Average was DOW 120 points. However, it trimmed its losses to only about 32 points. For the year the Dow lost 36%, the S&P 41%, and the NASDAQ 43%. Please remember that Bernie Madoff was the former chairman of the NASDAQ. This crook stole 50 billion from charities, but compared to the banksters that took 750 billion of the people's money he is small potatoes.

US retail traffic down 24%

What sounds like a scratched CD or a broken records, I must repeat, US retail sales down 24%. This Christmas was terrible. Sales were horrible, weather was awful, and now many stores and malls are closing. Store owners are telling me that sales are way down and that they have trouble paying their rent.

Expect things to get worse in 2009 as the economic crisis goes from bad to worse. Using remote viewing it is possible to see future events and so far the road ahead look really bad, as in no food in grocery stores and no fuel at the filling station.

99 years later Woolworth closes its doors

Sadly there was no bailout for the storied retailer or its 27,000 employees. Woolworth was always a good corporate citizen, but instead tax payer money goes to bail out the banksters that cause our current economic crisis.

It is sad to see retail giant Woolworths close its doors. Hope that we can all learn to be frugal and use care when spending money. It was mounting debt that crushed the ratailer.

Can the Fed fix the recession?

It seems that we are entering uncharted waters. Finally a recession so strong that the power of the Fed cannot stop it. This ugly recession is worse than others before it. That is because it is a depression. It is more than a few jobs lost. Whole industries will fall apart. Entire towns will fail. For many this is the beginning of th time of troubles.

Hot Cocoa?

It is often on a cold Christmas morning that people like to drink some hot cocoa. Well, that is not a good idea, you see they just found melamine in cocoa. A giant recall due to this toxic substance that now seems ubiquitous in our supply of treats. I believe that cows were given feed with melamine and this causes kidney disease in people. Probably some of the powdered milk mix got in the French Vanilla Cocoa.

People in the future will have to plant their own food due to contamination. John Titor did warn us of this problem. We must remain ever watchful.

What ancient peoples can tell us

We know that the Tazmanians who greeted explorers in the 1600's were a primitive people. Tazmanians had no fire, clothes, or pottery. They lived in crude shelters made of sticks and grasses. Sadly, most were wiped out by the colonists. Today, we know little about their language or culture.

It is important for people to realize that things in the future will be what we make them. Many people believe that we always had the wheel, but the empires of mesoamerica did not use the wheel. There are many discoveries that are held back by people not having a mind open to new possibilities.

Pottery benefits from the pottery wheel and you need fire to harden the soft clay. To make certain advances we must make other advances first. I believe that getting to other planets will allow us to see new vistas and broaden our horizons.

A sad Christmas for retailers

Retail stores are desperate to lure shoppers during the worst holiday shopping season ever, except for the Great Depression, are cutting prices to the bone and keeping their stores open thru midnight. As the most severe recession in the last quarter century intensifies, our jobless rate is rising. This means there will be fewer consumers in the next quarter to buy from retail stores. Stores expect already weak sales to become even more so, leading to the soft summer of 2009.

Many people blame real estate for the mess we are in. Others say that things can't get worse. Well, the can and they will. Real estate prices will go down, more banks will fail, and financial armageddon will hit.

Toyota loss

Back in August 2008 when oil was $147/b and gasoline was over $4/gallon sales of the Toyota Prius were red hot. Well, yesterday I saw the owner of a used car lots, more than one. He is full of hybrid cars. Like ten Toyota Prius hybrid cars unsold and sitting there. They are not selling because gas is now under $2/gal. Sales of Ford F150 Pickup trucks is up!

Toyota reports first ever operating loss. This tells us that people are not buying hybrids; they are not buying small cars anymore, instead they are back to getting the old big ass SUV. People please, we hit peak oil in 2005. The price of oil will go up, gasoline will be rationed in the future.

After Steve Jobs who will run Apple?

Predicting the last day and hour of Steve Jobs is not easy, but we can be certain that the end is not far of. The question is - who will run Apple after Steve Jobs is gone? What we know is that when Steve left after for a while the company nearly went under. It lost it way and became bland. The company that is now famous for an i-revolution as in imac, ipod, and iphone, became boring.

Unless we get a fresh new face that promises bold new moves, then Apple will slowly fade away into the sunset when Steve Jobs is gone.

economy is worse

well, some claim all I predict is gloom and doom, want drama from sad events, but the news is very bad. Turns out the economy is worse than predicted, much worse. Many retail owners are hanging by a thread. Yesterday one retail person told me that he is planning to close down his store. He cannot pay the rent and business is slow.

The one good news is that gasoline is cheap, now under a buck and a half per gallon. This means more money in the pocket of consumers, but it will not last long, the future price of fuel is up.

Peak coal soon?

We have all heard of peak oil and how bad it is going to be. Although with gasoline close to a dollar a gallon that seems far away. Actually, we hit peak oil in 2005. However here comes an even worse problem. The move to electric cars might not be such a good idea, you see, we have a lot less coal than we thought.

OK, so peak coal is coming. What does that mean? Well, over 50% of our electricity is made burning coal, that grimy dirty fuel that we hate so much. Without coal, our technology is kaput. World coal reserves are far small than we thought. It seems like news keeps getting worse.

Tranche Warfare

The mortgage meltdown led to tranche warfare. Well, in these interesting times we see banks going under and the 750 billion bank bailout did little to prop up the financial system. In fact, our economic crisis is getting worse.

It is this inability to get loans that spread from subprime to prime to now auto loans. If people cannot buy new cars then Detroit goes under. Today prez Bush talked about an orderly bankruptcy of the big three. Back in 2005 when I predicted GM would go under the debunkers laughed, now they claim it is like shooting fish in a barrel. A barrel of what? OIL? Tell you what, oil today is under 40/b. I still remember Detroit blaming high gas prices for their troubles.

Gasoline has gone from $4.39/gallon in August 2008 to now in December 2008 a paltry $1.39/gal for gas. Tranche warfare indeed...Get ready for trouble ahead...


Jubak’s Journal: Big Oil’s bet on prices

DOWn 100 points

The Down Jones Industrial Average was dow nearly 100 points, 99.80 to be exact and our economic crisis gets worse everyday as the global financial outlook continues deteriorating. A dramatic drop in corporate earnings means that stocks will move lower next year.

Good news is that today oil fell below 40/b and is still falling on weak demand. The OPEC record cut of 2.2 million barrels per day was not enough to turn the tide against a weak demand.

Go for the gold, not Goldman

Goldman Sachs posted its first ever loss today. Many expected it, but it is still a shock. Well, some say that the loss was far smaller than expected, but I predicted that the economic crisis would get worse. Expect things in 2009 to get worse as we move deeper into depression.

Manufacturing is Down

It is not only GM, but Ford and Chrysler are both seeing a slump. Domestic automakers slashed their rate of assembly for new cars to the lowest level in more than 18 years. Industrial Production Sags due to a diminished demand for american manufactured goods. Banks are also finding a diminished demand for auto loans, even used car lots have cut back inventory in expectation of weak Christmas sales.

Retail sales down

It should not surprise anyone, but retail sales fell for the fifth straight month and things are getting worse as we go deeper into depression. The decline in sales will further depress growth and lead to an overall financial catstrophe.

rumor or truemor?

Is GM going under? Carpocalypse, your name is General Motors. Here is a map of Domestic automakers, I mean US carpocalypse, err car manufacturing plants that may soon close.

Auto Bailout Crashes

Get ready for the DOWN Jones Industrial Average to go DOW again today. DOW component GM will go DOWn more than usual. The automobile bailout bill crashed today. Instead CNN chose to cover or shall I say uncover the fact that Jennifer MANiston is doing a magazine cover wearing only a tie.

Real news is not important, REEL news is. GM is in big trouble today, and WAGONer should build cover wagons not cars. It is time.

US jobless claims up to 26-year record

Things are getting worse. The jobless claims jump to 26-year peak and this is just the beginning of a complete collapse of the economy. This is a month when companies will typically add workers. If 2007 was mortgage meltdown, and 2008 was credit crunch, then 2009 will be economic emergency.

Office Depot in trouble

The business supply giant is forced to layoff over 2,000 workers and close over 100 stores to cut its losses. Office Depot in cost-saving mode plans to return to profit some time in 2010 or 2011. It plans further layoffs in 2009 and also to close six major distribution centers.

Going DOWn

Right now our DOWN Jones Industrial Average is DOW 250 points and sadly our skies will continue to darken as black thunder clouds roll in. Well, soon shall see that as the bread lines go longer that DOWsides workers on the dole cannot spur sales or pull us our of our economic crisis.

Unemployment at 15 year high

The current situation is on a downward spiral. Job losses of over half a million last month and worry that the big three automakers could fail has sent the economic crisis into overdrive.

The cars of the future

Perhaps they do not fly, but in a not too distant tomorrow electric cars may rule our roads. The cars of the future are going to use green technology to cut down on the contamination of our environment. What will soon happen is that breakthrough technology will allow ultracaps also known as ultracapacitors to store massive amounts of power. The big drawback of the chemical storage battery is that it is bulky, heavy, expensive, and can only be cycled several hundred times (discharge/recharge). Enter the ultracap with over one million cycles. Also the ultracap can charge in seconds rather than minutes.

The expense of an ultracap will go down as the technology becomes more established see how SSD replaced HD.

Workers take over factory in Chicago

Electrical workers at a windows company in Chicago stage a sit down strike. The firm fired them and did not pay them. Time is running out for our economy.

Worst job loss in 34 years

The numbers are horrible with the biggest monthly job loss in 34 years. Sales are way down and firms are cutting back on spending. What little good news the drop in oil prices is due to economic slowdown and financial meltdown. It is truly a crisis.

Google crushes microsoft

The news is in and it could not be much worse for micro soft. Giant Google is stomping on it like a day old doughnut. The biggest blow is that MicroSoft did even worse in search than Yahoo. I expect Balmer to resign. He can start by taking a one dollar per year salary like the head of GM. In fact, micro soft is turning into the GM of the internet.

Chrysler says we may face depression

Forget recession that is so last year, Jim Press, Chrysler's vice chairman says "If we have a catastrophic failure of one of these car companies, in this tender environment for the economy, it's a huge blow. It could trigger a depression."

Very scary, but I did warn you about this. Things are getting ugly out there. It will be a long cold winter.

sears in crisis

Both sears and k-mart had massive losses as we move deeper into recession. The losses at sears were worse than expected. People are finally waking up to reality. The future I see is grim.

Construction down

The housing market instead of turning around went still lower, manufacturing is at a 26 year, and the stock market is DOWn again - over 400 points right now.

Stocks fall sharply as Christmas sales are way down and consumers worry that we are in a deflationary depression. The DOWnward spiral is getting worse.