The Happy in New Year, was getting out of 2008

The Happy in New Year, was getting out of 2008 while still standing.  Consider what we navigated in 2008 as we swam through the financial guantlet of floating ice.

Early drop in stock market starting the first week of January, then successive bear market rallies with lower highs, and lower lows throughout the year;

Credit Default Swaps exposed for what they truly were -- as Warren Buffet said, CDOs were nuclear..."weapons of mass financial destruction...";

Bear Stearns collapse in early Spring 2008, marks the beginning of the end for investment banks;

Housing prices continue collapse month over month, many homeowners financially underwater;

Commodities (e.g., oil, agriculture, gold) rise radically then fall almost as quickly by year-end;

Financial crises in July 2008 heightens, with shotgun weddings of financial firms with Treasury Department arranged marriages;

China's Olympic moment gives pause and splendor; Chinese government invested huge sums, creates one-of-a-kind experience; however, with the end of the games, comes the end of Chinese internal investment in infrastructure, accompanying unexpected dramatic fall-off in exports, and China economy stalls and falls;

Financial crises turns economic crises in September 2008 and bursts on 9/15/08, Lehman Brothers bankruptcy, AIG failure and government bailout, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac mortgage security failures and government backing;

Credit market freezes, lending halts, order of magnitude of fear not seen since the 1930s;

Stock market crashes in several legs downward, lower highs, and lower lows continues;

Unemployment rises in massive spikes rising above 500k job losses per month in October;

US Presidential Election and landslide turnout for change in November;

US consumer and business purchasing stalls abruptly, capital intensive industries such as automakers fail -- kept on life support by government bailouts and temporary loans;

Retailers beggar each other with discount sales and reduced profits dumping inventory before year-end;

Santa Clause fails to bring a sustainable rally in the stock markets and the broader markets are off 33%-41% for 2008;

Some geographic localities in the USA already show signs of being in deep economic depression -- consider Detroit where in November 2008 the newspaper printed 137 pages of home foreclosure notices and only 4 page of employment notices -- homes can be had for as little as the taxes owed.

The list could go on, but you get the picture.  2008 will go down in the history books as one of the  worst years in financial history in the past 100-years, and the trouble is, the trend is still headed downards in 2009.

Happily, there is some optimism headed into this coming week with President Barrack Obama taking office, giving everyone a welcome breather, and there may be a short period of weeks or months where he has a honeymoon; however if the new President gets any sleep he will be distraught by nightmares of a collapsing economy, and a government with fewer financial and policy bullets to fight the escalating economic problem.  

The best I can tell, most everyone is still focused on preservation of capital andkeeping their jobs.  Some now are starting to look deeper at the ramifications of what's next.  Job losses are expected to accelerate now that the new year is finally here (with some predicting a series of 1 million job loss months in the new year), now that the Christmas retail season is over.  Credit tightening continues for consumers and businesses.  Unemployment will continue to surprise attack many familes that were formerly feeling safe.  

2009 will be the year of Guns and Gardens -- a year when you plow up your grassy backyard and plant a garden hoping to stretch your food dollar a little further, and you purchase a gun to protect your family when municipal budgets shrink and with it police protection and you are left alone in your garden.  The depression era slogan, 'better belly burst than good food waste,' will return, as food the precious commodity will be more expensive by year end.  What is deflation now, will turn to inflation when inventories dry up.  What is cheap at the beginning of the year, may be more expensive by year-end.  

As I have been predicting in this blog, crime will be going up in 2009, with a noticable crime wave occuring by Q4 2009.  Many will have a difficult time with adapting to their reduced earning power and lowered standards of living; a few will resort to crime to make up the difference.  Self-preservation will become a strong theme voiced louder and louder throughout the year.  There will come  a time when the collective crowd will realize that the government cannot help them further.  At that time, the country and rurals may look more attractive to families, certainly there will be safety in fewer numbers and farms.  Thinking practically, investment in bullets and seeds will be good business bets in 2009.

It is time for me to complete the writing of my book -- Economic Misery and Crime Waves -- the future history of the second great depression and the crime wave that followed, and what to do about it.   There are many things that can be done now or soon to avert the worst of the crises, and it is up to our collective genius to pitch in and resolve this matter in a manner that contributes to the greater good, or surely the situation will resolve itself with greater pain if we do nothing.  

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In other news, 

Retail Crime Up Thanks to Down Economy

Jan 8, 2009 10:32 AM, By Patrick Barnard

"It’s no secret that when the economy tanks, retail crime goes up. Especially when it comes to crimes such as shoplifting, returns fraud and use of stolen credit cards. This recession is no exception: According to the Retail Industry Leaders Association’s 2008 Current Crime Trends Survey, retail crimes are trending up and will likely continue to increase through the rest of 2009.  Of the 52 major U.S. retailers that participated in the survey, which was released Dec. 1, 84% reported an increase in theft/amateur shoplifting; 76% reported an increase in financial fraud; and 80% reported an increase in organized retail crime. Retailers also reported a sharp uptick in robberies and burglaries in 2008. “All of the crimes that retailers experience are trending up,” says Paul Jones, vice president asset protection, for RILA. “Taking a shotgun view of this, 2009 looks like it will be a real challenge for retailers: External theft, internal theft, robberies, break-ins, bad checks, stolen credit cards -- all of that type of stuff that hurts the bottom line.”  Jones says “anytime we see an economic decline, those people who abuse the system, who commit crimes, tend to come out in droves. So logic would say that we’re going to see some problems.” Another alarming trend is the rise in retail returns fraud, in which criminals fraudulently return goods for profit. For example, there’s receipt fraud. This is when falsified, stolen, or reused receipts are used to return merchandise.

http://multichannelmerchant.com/retail/01-08-retail-crime-up-thanks-to-down-economy/