The Summer of Financial Unlove: Heads Up But Hold On To Your Wallet And Other Mixed Metaphors

No Chicken Little, the sky is not falling.  But a whole bunch of other stuff is. 

Moody’s, Standard & Poor’s and Fitch rating services dropped recommendations on over $5 Billion worth of subprime mortgage backed securities.

As bond ratings fell, so did the value of the bonds, resulting in losses as much as 50 percent.  See Subprime Bond Market to connect the dots.

Mortgage companies dropped out of the phone book as they either shut down or filed bankruptcy.  This is a scary site, pun intended:  www.mortgagedaily.com

Investors dropped their faith in Wall Street and began a round of litigation seeking to recover damages for their losses.

Lenders dropped laisser-faire loan standards and announced loan applications would need to be supported with documentation of income.  Too chicken little, too chicken late.

Wells Fargo dropped subprime lending from its portfolio.  Done, fini.  Anatomy of a Confession 

  
Countrywide Financial, the nation’s largest mortgage lender says housing prices are dropping to the greatest post depression level ever.  Top Lender Sees Mortgage Woes for ‘Good’ Risks 

Moody’s dropped a bunch of money on attorney fees defending its CFO in a class action lawsuit in federal court in northern Illinois.  Blood In The Water; available July 28, 2007.

The dollar drops to new lows in value against the Euro.  Appearing daily in newspapers and websites in your neighborhood.

Some say the Federal Reserve Bank dropped the ball and permitted this whole mess of subprime and Alt A lending to get out of hand.  You be the judge.  Remarks by Chairman Ben S. Bernanke to the 2007 International Monetary Conference  

CNN reports that Wall Street executives are dropping any hope of recovery before late 2009.

If this were baseball, these guys would be in the showers.