Interview with Paul Kasriel

[hayfield]

Re: Interview with Paul Kasriel

Can anyone find out whether Paulson's approx. $1 billion net worth is in gold or treasuries? Then we'd know.

Here's a disclosure from 2005...
http://www.opensecrets.org/pfds/pfd2...99962_2005.pdf
Should be an updated one for 2006 but a quick search did not find it.

[Jim Nickerson]

Re: Interview with Paul Kasriel

Here's a disclosure from 2005...
http://www.opensecrets.org/pfds/pfd2...99962_2005.pdf
Should be an updated one for 2006 but a quick search did not find it.

Good work, Hayfield. What diligence!

Now does anyone have the enthusiasm to decipher what those 51 pages contain? I certainly do not. Perhaps because Charles Mackay asked the question, and you possibly gave him the resource with which to answer it, he will determine and tell us the answer. I think the form was filled out in June of this year, so I would guess that is likely the most current information.

[jk]

Re: Interview with Paul Kasriel

Good work, Hayfield. What diligence!

Now does anyone have the enthusiasm to decipher what those 51 pages contain? I certainly do not. Perhaps because Charles Mackay asked the question, and you possibly gave him the resource with which to answer it, he will determine and tell us the answer. I think the form was filled out in June of this year, so I would guess that is likely the most current information.

just looking at his investments of $5million and up, it's mostly in goldman sachs stock, restricted stock, and options. then there's cash, muni funds, gs investment partnerships and funds [including a piece of goldman's interest in icbc- chinese bank], and half an island off the coast of georgia. the rest is odds and ends. i didn't notice anything that could be construed as gold or commodities, except possibly via some of the hedge funds.

[hayfield]

Re: Interview with Paul Kasriel

Good work, Hayfield. What diligence!

Now does anyone have the enthusiasm to decipher what those 51 pages contain? I certainly do not. Perhaps because Charles Mackay asked the question, and you possibly gave him the resource with which to answer it, he will determine and tell us the answer. I think the form was filled out in June of this year, so I would guess that is likely the most current information.

Page 3
Line 8, Treasury Bills, 5-25M
Line 9, Treasury Notes, 5-25M
That's about all I see that isn't hidden in a hedge fund of mutual fund.
Many of the GS Private Equity and Bridge Street funds in turn invest in other hedge funds (see schedule A)

GS Private Equity 1999 fund invested in "Select Medical Holdings Corporation, the Nature of which cannot ascertained." Reminds me of the South Sea company of similar dispostion, "For carrying on an undertaking of great advantage, but nobody to know what it is."

There's also the Hank Paulson Jr. Trust Fund (page 22), of which he's the unpaid trustee. Doubtful if we'll ever know what's hidden in there


Also, here's Bernanke http://www.opensecrets.org/pfds/pfd2...99968_2005.pdf

[Charles Mackay]

Re: Interview with Paul Kasriel

In a way you could say "Hank the hammer" is positioned for inflation couldn't you? A measely $50M in treasuries!

Also, after listening to EJ's podcast with Mish I learned that his rationale for thinking the FED "wants" more inflation is because that has been their bias since 2001. This is a significant point in my view because had the powers that be wanted a deflationary collapse that would have been the ideal time to implement it. (After the Nasdaq collapse)

[hayfield]

Re: Interview with Paul Kasriel

In a way you could say "Hank the hammer" is positioned for inflation couldn't you? A measely $50M in treasuries!

That paperwork is only accounting for 20-40% of his supposed $1B in assets. We could only speculate what the other 60-80% is in.

Also, after listening to EJ's podcast with Mish I learned that his rationale for thinking the FED "wants" more inflation is because that has been their bias since 2001. This is a significant point in my view because had the powers that be wanted a deflationary collapse that would have been the ideal time to implement it. (After the Nasdaq collapse)

Good point. The Fed chose not to allow deflation, and instead to inflate -- just like every other time the Fed was confronted with an economic issue. This play from their playbook has never failed them before. The fact that the Fed has a silver bullet for every economic condition has built arrogance into the Fed. That same arrogance has spread to the big banks, and the financial-based economy as a whole -- The Fed will ride to the rescue with liquidity/inflation/low-interest-rates. The Fed thinks it's in control, the big banks think so, and the financial-sphere economy thinks so too.

I take it that Eric thinks the Fed is in control. A central tenet of Mish's, and key point of disagreement with Eric, is that the Fed will be powerless this time around. This time, the fed drops rates and no one borrows. They could try loosening lending standards, but how much lower could they go? They could reflate collapsing hedge funds, but the real economy is not helped at all. etc... etc...

I see merit to these arguments. I'm not educated enough in the matter to refute it myself, and I've yet to see a concise disassembly of Mish's position to convince me that the fed IS in control.

Other's have supported this position, specifically, one of the comments on this board pointed us to Hussman's argument of not mere powerlessness, but irrelevance.

[jk]

Re: Interview with Paul Kasriel

hussman's argument applies to the fed as it has functioned to date. it doesn't apply to the non-traditional interventions outlined in bernanke's "why it [deflation] won't happen here" speech.

[Jim Nickerson]

Re: Interview with Paul Kasriel

Deflation will occur (if it does) because the fed believes it's the best thing for the economy.

I take it clearly, blaze, that you believe the Fed can produce whatever outcome it wishes. Does everyone here agree with that? Based on nothing I can quote, I believe there must be some limit to how much the Fed can control, for it to be otherwise suggests the Fed is omnipotent, and I doubt that.

If you have money there's nothing like a depression to scoop up assets and reduce labor costs.

Also, after listening to EJ's podcast with Mish I learned that his rationale for thinking the FED "wants" more inflation is because that has been their bias since 2001. This is a significant point in my view because had the powers that be wanted a deflationary collapse that would have been the ideal time to implement it. (After the Nasdaq collapse)

Charles, to whom does "his" refer?

Charles seems to be on board with blaze that the Fed can control inflation or deflation as it deems to fill the needs of someone, some entities--which I cannot name, but perhaps represent the rich elite.

If one goes along with the inferences by blaze and Charles that the Fed can make deflation happen if deflation serves someone's or some entities' interests, then perhaps a reason the Fed reflated the economy following the 2000 collapse was that the rich elite had lost too much money in that collapse--purely uneducated speculation on my part. I can look at my own circumstances following that collapse and I, thanks to Greenspan's reflationary efforts, am better off now than I probably would have otherwise been had the markets not bounced back--despite the losses to inflation.

I don't know much about the so-called plunge protection team, but if something like it truly exists, who benefitted when it allowed the markets to collapse from 2000 to 2002? I certainly would have benefitted if the "PPT" had not allowed the first bear market of the millinneum. If the rich elite might wish to increase their assets (which presumably is their reason for living, having figured out a way to take their wealth with them to the hereafter), and if they are now in a better position to be holding more liquid assets than at the bottom in 10/2002, and if a deflation now would be in their best interest, then perhaps now we will have a real deflation.

I think the notion of the "PPT" is nonsense as is the notion that the Fed is omnipotent.