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STORIES:
Burned-down
houses become tombs for countless squatters in Detroit - (www.motorcitymuckraker.com)
An untold number of bodies
are buried beneath the charred rubble of burned-down houses and buildings in
Detroit. Even when neighbors tell investigators that squatters are living in
vacant buildings ravaged by fire, the city rarely does more than a cursory
search. Police are charged with the task of searching for bodies after a fire
is out, but for whatever reason, they rarely excavate for a more detailed
inspection, the Muckraker has learned in interviews with firefighters and after
six months of documenting fire scenes. On Friday night, Ronnie Owens saw the
familiar face of a squatter walking into a nearby abandoned apartment building
on 14th Street on the west side. It was the same man who had been sleeping
there for the past six months, he said.
Critical warning: Banks crash the economy again - (www.marketwatch.com) Ominous voice: “Critical
Warning No. 6” again, “Something bigger than the credit crisis of 2008 is
headed our way. For most people, it will hit them like a brick wall. It will
touch Americans harder and deeper than anything else we’ve seen since the Great
Depression.”… The latest rally numbers are deceiving, worry investors because
Critical Warning No. 6 reminds us why we can’t trust Wall Street. The fact is,
measured on an inflation-adjusted basis, Wall Street lost more than 20% of
America’s retirement money in the 2000-2010 decade. And even a new Dow record
topping its 2007 record of 14,164 won’t make up for the 35% inflation since the
2000 crash.
10-year Treasury yield tops 2% - (money.cnn.com) The 10-year Treasury yield
briefly rose above 2% for the first time in nine months Monday, as investors
sold government debt following an encouraging report on durable goods orders. "There's
a sense that the economy is getting healthier, and the durable goods numbers
were bearish for Treasuries," said David Coard, head of fixed income
trading at The Williams Capital Group. Data from the Census Bureau showed that
orders for big-ticket items ranging from vehicles and aircraft to machinery,
computers and appliances rose 4.6% in December, much higher than the 1.6% rise
forecast by analysts. Even excluding transportation goods, orders were up a
healthy 1.3%.
Hard Times: Dijon France
Sells Half of Prized Wine Collection to Help Those Appealing for Social Aid
- (www.globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com)
The city of Dijon has just sold off half
of its prized municipal wine cellar to help fund local social spending –
including a bottle of 1999 Burgundy knocked down at auction for €4,800 to a
Chinese buyer. In total, the capital of the Burgundy region raised €151,620
from the “historic sale” of 3,500 bottles that were part of a collection built
up since the 1960s, it announced in a statement on Monday. President François
Hollande’s Socialist government has spent most of its first eight months in
office earning a reputation for ramping up taxes on the rich to cover the
country’s budget deficit. But Mr Hollande has warned local authorities that they
must also shoulder some of the burden by accepting a spending squeeze as the
government seeks to cut €60bn by 2017.
Fannie
Adds Bailout For Underwaters Walkaways: Mortgages - (www.bloomberg.com) Fannie Mae (FNMA)
and Freddie
Mac will let some borrowers who kept up payments as their homes
lost value erase their debts by giving up the properties, helping Americans
escape underwater loans while adding to losses at the mortgage giants bailed
out with $190 billion of taxpayer money. Non-delinquent borrowers with illness,
job changes or other reasons they need to move will become eligible in March to
apply for a so-called deed-in-lieu transaction that erases the shortfall
between a property's value and the size of its mortgage. It follows a change in
November that lets on-time borrowers sell properties for less than they owe,
known as short sales, wiping out the remaining mortgage debt. Normally, the
lenders could pursue people to recoup their losses
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