Category Archives: The Economy

Happy Now?

Posted on by

I believe in the law of unintended consequences.

When the government went on its jihad against corporate travel and perk excess — it would create lots of bad ripples in the travel — tourist based economies.  It would hurt tax payers — not help taxpayers. It would hurt hotels; airlines — theme parks — casinos — dining establishments — credit and charge card companies.  Who would it help?  Politicians that get air time for saying optically correct things; without understanding the unintended consequences of their media stances.

So — here you go — check out this terrific work and the top 20 unemployed communities in America.

I was shocked to see that more than a dozen cities were in just California and Florida; with Las Vegas too — that made for the bulk of the cities.  Sad to say — Detroit is number 1 — in unemployment.

But Miami?  Tampa? San Francisco? San Diego? Orlando? Las Vegas?

Happy now?

Get out there and travel this holiday season — have some family fun — stimulate the economy.  The world is still on sale.

Debit Instead of Credit Cards

Posted on by

Here is a terrific article about a new trend in consumer spending habits. It focuses on the convenience of use of debit cards vs. high interest credit cards.

This augers well for us at Revolution Money. We have built a next generation payments platform and one that combines online and offline. You can connect your checking account to the piece of plastic.

The card - Revolution Card - is a credit card. It is also a debit card. And it is an ATM card. And it can connect to your online PayPal-like account from us. All in one.

It works like a debit card in that it is PIN based. Because it is PIN based, it is safe and secure. It doesn’t have an account number on it. It doesn’t have your name on it. It doesn’t have your signature on it.

Debit is a big part of the payments future. Being able to load your dollars from your online account into your personal account and pay for products and services from your prepaid or debit account is going to be massively important to consumers.

More Signs

Posted on by

Is there a sustained recovery afoot?

Twitter is valued quite highly.

Google stock is about to hit $500 again.

The Today Show this morning had a real estate segment talking about nice homes for sale in the million dollar range.

Several of my companies are in some strategic discussions with big strategic partners.

As the song says, “Something is happening here, but we don’t know what it is. Do you Mr. Jones?”

White House on GM’s Chapter 11 Filing

Posted on by
Here is a release from the White House on GM’s Chapter 11 filing as reported by the Washington Post. According to the release, today is just another day at the office. It is all in the “ordinary course”. Read it by clicking here.
 
And now GM will only have to sell 10 million cars per year to break even instead of 16 million cars per year. I don’t know about you BUT that sounds like a lot of cars that have to be sold annually just to break even.
 
Do you think GM will sell 35,000 to 40,000 cars today? That is what they have to do every single work day – including Saturdays – to break even!

A Perfect 11 – Ugh!

Posted on by
The media throws around the term Chapter 11 a lot to discuss bankruptcy and what General Motors will go through starting today. See the Wiki for a good snapshot of Chapter 11 filings. Click here.
 
 True bankruptcy is usually in Chapter 7 where a company is liquidated. Boom. Done. It is over.
Chapter 11 is now being positioned as a big mulligan in the sky - a big reboot - a big whoops, sorry - let us start over – for big companies. This is very troubling to me. Chapter 11 is usually a bad thing for a company but now it is starting to be looked at as a good thing and that is a terrible thing.
 

Random Weekend Thoughts on Many Subjects

Posted on by

Twas great to see that BOTH Alex Ovechkin and Mike Green were named first team All Stars  by the Sporting News.  Click here to see the voting and lineup.  I don’t think the Washington  Capitals have ever had two  players in the top six first team All Stars in the league in our history as a franchise — so kudos to our young core of players for being recognized by the experts and the league itself.

This vote follows on the news of Alex Ovechkin being voted NHL player of the  year in the NHL — which I provided a link to the story last week. Continue reading →

Signs – Signs – Everywhere are Signs!

Posted on by

It was a good week in business, Google had what I believe was a terrific quarter with huge profits and its stock is closing in again on $400 per share.

Rosetta Stone, a local DC based company filed for an IPO and its share price soared at the end of the week to $28 plus from this week’s opening of $12. Congratulations to them! Way to go.

And Citibank had a profitable quarter. Big banks are slowly and surely reaping the benefits of all of that pruning and those big write-offs and the government’s intervention and cash to prop them up.

 These are three tangible signs that a turnaround has really started. Don’t miss the signs.

The Audacity of Nope

Posted on by

I was on a plane this weekend and read a bunch of magazines. I was starting to feel good that we had hit bottom and were starting to trend upwards in so many different ways – jobs, loans, home sales, stock market and attitude.

But then I read The Economist cover story on the April 4th issue called “Under Attack – Get the Rich - The Rise and Fall of the Wealthy”. According to our friends at The Economist, if you have a net worth – all in - of more than $1 million, you are part of the problem and your days are numbered. :-)

Continue reading →