JP Morgan economists say global oil demand finally shrinking

Some fun facts just in from JP Morgan’s economics team (I can’t find it online, but it presumably will show up eventually here): * Emerging market economies accounted for the majority of global oil consumption for the first time in 2007 * Oil consumption was actually down in the developed world in both 2006 and [...]

New column: David Einhorn, Lehman Brothers, and financial morality

My new column is online and in the issue of Time with the excellent cover story about a fence by the Next Editor of the Washington Post (well, maybe) inside. It begins: Last October, I stood in the back of a packed Manhattan ballroom listening to hedge-fund manager David Einhorn explain to an audience what [...]

How to escape your crushing mortgage

Here’s the beginning of that story I mentioned yesterday: Nearly 9% of all U.S. mortgages–or 4.8 million loans–are past due or in some stage of foreclosure. So when a company claims to offer distressed homeowners both relief from their mortgages and revenge against the bankers who saddled them with too much debt (“Give the lenders [...]

Should we be holding on to all that oil until we really need it?

In a comment to my post on offshore drilling, odograph writes (and my Dad agrees): If I could ask reporters to do one thing, it would be to always frame coastal reserves in terms of current consumption. There is a strong (predictably irrational?) tendency to only mention the one-time gift this oil might give us [...]