Fanniefredderung

Or maybe I should spell it Fanniefrädderung, which has the benefit of being more explicitly Wagnerian if harder for non German-speakers to pronounce. It’s now the Curious Capitalist’s official name for the predicament facing mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Just thought of it myself (and did a quick Google search to make sure nobody had beaten me to it.)

This reminds me of my abrupt abandonment of a project a few months back to come up with a name for this whole stinkin’ never-ending real-estate/credit-market/economic semi-debacle. I loved a lot of the suggestions I got from commenters here and elsewhere, but soon despaired of ever coming up with one that was catchy and original and descriptive and likely to catch on.

Well, at least there’s always “Jenga,” Duncan Black‘s family-friendly name for the mess.

Yeah, I know it’s not a great picture. I took it with my Blackberry, which has a lot of pocket lint on the lens.

It was taken this Monday morning. The financial world seemed about to collapse, and I was dropping Curious Capitalist Jr. off at day camp. He made a beeline for the table with the Jenga box on it. Which seemed ominously appropriate.

The Creepy Dudes of Wall Street: Are Finance Guys Losing Their Mojo on the Dating Scene, Too?

It’s tough to tell when an internet phenomenon reaches actual meme status. But, in the case of the “creepy finance guy,” I think we can finally call it.

This week saw yet another jaw-dropping tale of Wall Street prattishness, this time in the form of a post-date survey. Yep, a finance dude went on a date with a lady. And then he asked her for constructive feedback.

Independent

Catchy name! But aren’t you being a bit inconsistent? In your earlier posts you pointed out (rightly, in my opinion) that Fannie and Freedie were more the victims of the housing market crash than the reasons for it.
Justin Fox

Well, first, a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.

Second, I like Fanniefredderung because it doesn’t really take sides. It’s the twilight of the mortgage gods, whether or not they’re to blame. Now I agree that at the moment, with the Fanniefreddieplex accounting for 172% of net mortgage lending, it doesn’t look much like twilight. But I’ve got to think that they’ll never be what they once were. Either they’ll become much more explicitly government-controlled entities (the likeliest result, I imagine) or they’ll be broken up into little bits.
That Anonymous Dude

Fanniefredderunggate would be more modern. everything needs a gate tacked on the end…
Justin Fox

No no no, I hate the -gate! My secret agenda is to replace it with -dämmerung (or some variation thereof) as the default scandal/debacle suffix.
Independent

Justin Fox: “Well, first, a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds. ”

Are all consistencies foolish? Wonder what Emerson would have to say about foolish inconsistencies?
That Anonymous Dude

“No no no, I hate the -gate! My secret agenda is to replace it with -dämmerung (or some variation thereof) as the default scandal/debacle suffix.”

I am fairly certain at this point in time that journalism students spend an entire semester (possibly two) learning how to correctly coin a phrase for a scandal and then add -gate to the end of it.
SpotWeld

Three Loans for the credit-cards with balances mounting,
Seven for the Morgage Lenders in their rush to meet demand,
Nine for Student Borrowers doomed to drag out forever,
One for the Big Feb in Washinton
In the Land of Credit where the Projections fail.
One Loan to debit them all, One Loan to fee them,
One Loan to drag them down and in the future deflate them
In the Land of Credit where the Projections fail.
Bryan from Houston

Justin,

Too coin an old phrase we have something akin to Reagan’s “Voodoo Economics.”

Instead, what we now have is either a Voodoo Capitalist Cycle or a Chernobyl Effect.

Finally, I’ll quit with the Mortgage Market Meltdown.
That Anonymous Dude

i vote for chernobyl economics
Justin Fox

I prefer Tschernobylökonomie
Bryan from Houston

I second the call for Chernobyl Economic Cycle.
http://curiouscapitalist.blogs.time.com/2008/11/18/the-bankruptcy-by-some-other-name-solution-at-gm/ The Curious Capitalist – TIME.com » Blog Archive The bankruptcy-by-some-other-name solution at GM «

[...] which doesn’t really count–has caught on. (I’m especially distraught about GMerdämmerung. First Fanniefredderung fails to make it to the big-time, and now this. I’ve had it with this country’s anti-Wagner bias!) [...]