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Pink Picks
FT Alphaville — ... I readily acknowledge that we will still have tough decisions to make and will also make individual errors and I am sorry for that. Human judgment inevitably leads to some errors – both when we say yes and when we say no. Meredith Whitney: America must keep consumer liquidity flowing After observing the US economy so derailed, I feel that I must act as a citizen of this great country to attempt to offer solutions to this economic train wreck we are all involved in. ...

Meredith Whitney Sounds Like Nouriel Roubini
naked capitalism — ... In a comment in today's Financial Times, Whitney gives some recommendations for the financial services industry, all of which are sensible. But the most striking part of the piece is her downbeat reading: ...

Yes Meredith, we know you’re worried about credit cards
FT Alphaville — ... she’s worried about the credit card industry, says aversion to risk will deprive consumers of more than $2,000bn (Nov 10). Exhibit B - Whitney’s team at Oppenheimer release a note title “Consolidated lending market poses risk to overall consumer liquidity”; says credit cards are “second key source of consumer liquidity, the first being jobs” (Nov 30) Exhibit C - Whitney pens opinion piece in the FT in which she says she is more bearish than ever, and is quite worried about…credit cards (Dec 1) Ok, ok, we’re listening. Selected elements of Ms Whitney’s (triumvirate) ...

The Wrong Decline In Credit Availability
Moon of Alabama — ... 18 months due to risk aversion and regulatory changes, leading to sharp declines in consumer spending, prominent banking analyst Meredith Whitney said. The credit card is the second key source of consumer liquidity, the first being jobs, the Oppenheimer & Co analyst noted. "In other words, we expect available consumer liquidity in the form of credit-card lines to decline by 45 percent." A possible solution is re-localizing credit. Whitney writes in the Financial Times: First, re-regionalise lending. Since the early ...

NBER dates recession to december 2007
Decline and Fall of Western Civilization — but it still hasn't acknowledged that we are in a depression, and one which is growing desperately deeper with every passing datapoint. today we might cite the ISM, via john jansen. or meredith whitney's commentary in the financial times, via ed harrison of credit writedowns. I estimate that the mortgage market will shrink for the first time in US history and that the credit card market will be 18 months behind it. While just over 70 per cent of US households have access to credit cards, 90 per cent of these people use credit cards ...

Understanding “De-leveraging,” Meredith Whitney on Credit Cards
Rolfe Winkler — ... If you want to understand de-leveraging, you could do worse than Meredith Whitney’s op-ed in yesterday’s Financial Times.  She noted that $3 trillion of credit had been “expunged” from the economy so far this year.  She also said credit card lines could be substantially reduced: ...

Skill Loss in Banking
naked capitalism — ... for knowledge of the borrower and his community. Does he understand what he is getting into? How stable is his employer? What are the prospects for the local economy? Those are important considerations, and they require judgment. That may still in the end be used as an input to a more structured decision process. but overly automating borrower assessment has resulted in information loss. It's hardly a surprise that the quality of decisions deteriorated. Meredith Whitney has pointed to this issue, but it has received surprisingly little attention: Since ...