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Articles by Ryan Chittum | Email the Author

 

1. The Audit

   Audit Roundup: Wall Street Assembly Line

   October 29, 2008 09:22 AM

   Bloomberg has a nice, long look at securitization (part of a series on Wall Street’s debt-making). Particularly interesting is what it reports was the role of money-market funds in funding the securities that created the crisis: ... Continue reading

2. The Audit

   Audit Roundup: Crime and Punishment

   October 28, 2008 09:22 AM

   The Journal’s Dennis Berman looks at how difficult it may be to prosecute executives for the financial collapse, despite what was said about the post-Enron laws that supposedly made wrongdoing more difficult. Those looking for retribution against the executives... Continue reading

3. The Audit

   Audit Roundup: How Low Can It Go?

   October 27, 2008 09:20 AM

   The Times is good today in looking at how some prognosticators are racing to outdo each other predicting how far the market will fall. It’s kind of amazing to see experts quoted in a major paper saying the Dow... Continue reading

4. The Audit

   Audit Roundup: Greenspan’s Mea Culpa

   October 24, 2008 09:21 AM

   The press, along with everyone else, has finally turned on Alan Greenspan, and it looks like there’s no going back. The shocking news from yesterday came when Greenspan testified to Congress that he was wrong about deregulation and that his... Continue reading

5. The Audit

   Audit Roundup: Hank on the Hot Seat

   October 23, 2008 09:22 AM

   The New York Times has an excellent bit of insta-history this morning, scoring an interview with Treasury Secretary Paulson to find out why he let Lehman Brothers fail. Paulson says he had no choice, that Lehman’s debts were more... Continue reading

6. The Audit

   Audit Roundup: Reeling ‘Em In

   October 22, 2008 09:21 AM

   The New York Times has an excellent story on how banks are luring struggling Americans into ever-more debt by assembling their private information to create detailed and amazingly timed pitches. Singling out even struggling American consumers like Ms. Jerez... Continue reading

7. The Audit

   Audit Roundup: Derivative Dilemma

   October 21, 2008 09:22 AM

   The Wall Street Journal is good this morning in writing that more trouble is brewing in the derivatives markets. One of the reasons this stuff was allowed to get so out of control was that no one really understood... Continue reading

8. The Audit

   Audit Roundup: Oil Turmoil

   October 20, 2008 09:29 AM

   The bust has already sent oil prices tumbling, but here’s a shocking headline from Bloomberg: Options contracts are pointing to $50 a barrel oil by the end of the year. Crude was at more than $147 just three months... Continue reading

9. The Audit

   Audit Roundup: Working Class Blues

   October 17, 2008 09:20 AM

   The Washington Post has a solid story this morning on the hardships facing the working class—illustrating them with the story of a Virginian named Regino Romero. But with the economy sputtering, inflation increasing to levels not seen in nearly... Continue reading

10. The Audit

    Audit Roundup: Don’t Forget Housing

    October 16, 2008 09:29 AM

    The Times says the housing rout is far from over, with prices likely to decline for another year. The current housing downturn is much more national in scope and severe than any other in the postwar period, partly because... Continue reading

11. The Audit

    A Depressing Look Back

    October 15, 2008 02:45 PM

    The Washington Post has some enlightening historical reporting today on a series of Clinton Administration battles that left the market for derivatives unregulated, contributing mightily to the current crisis. The story follows a New York Times piece we... Continue reading

12. The Audit

    Audit Roundup: WSJ on “Tough Guy” Paulson

    October 15, 2008 09:24 AM

    The Times and the Journal post their behind-the-scenes stories of the meeting where the government told the nation’s top bankers it would be buying part of their companies to give them needed capital. The Journal for a... Continue reading

13. The Audit

    Audit Roundup: WSJ Digs into Hospitals

    October 14, 2008 09:18 AM

    The Journal has some smart stories today, including the continuation of its excellent reporting on nonprofit hospitals acting like for-profit companies. Ascension Health, the country's largest nonprofit hospital system, says its mission is to... Continue reading

14. The Audit

    Change Resistant

    October 13, 2008 11:36 AM

    Journalism at this late stage of a presidential race usually doesn’t provide much more insight into the human condition than what can be dug out of campaign machinations, horse-race jockeying, and polls, polls, polls. So it’s somewhat startling (in a... Continue reading

15. The Audit

    Audit Roundup: Obama and the Crash

    October 13, 2008 09:27 AM

    CNBC’s Charlie Gasparino tosses off a boneheaded column today in the NY Post suggesting the market is cratering because it thinks Barack Obama is going to win the election. And, as it looks increasingly likely that Obama will be... Continue reading

16. The Audit

    Audit Roundup: Back to the Boats

    October 10, 2008 09:08 AM

    The Journal has a fantastic story on page one about the devastating impact of the crisis on Iceland. After privatizing its banks a few years ago, they went wild, driving super-charged growth by getting off-shore deposits and leveraging up... Continue reading

17. The Audit

    My Foreclosure

    October 9, 2008 10:38 AM

    As a business-media critic, I sometimes get caught up in the crush of events and forget that at the heart of this crisis are an estimated four million people who will lose their homes through foreclosure. Which is odd,... Continue reading

18. The Audit

    Audit Roundup: Times Have Changed for Greenspan

    October 9, 2008 09:23 AM

    The Times absolutely unloads on Alan Greenspan (whom the business press lionized for decades) in a huge page-one piece, blaming him for a blind faith in non-regulation of markets—particularly involving derivatives— that helped created the financial crisis. ... Continue reading

19. The Audit

    Audit Roundup: Doubting the Candidates

    October 8, 2008 09:34 AM

    Steven Pearlstein of the Washington Post is good this morning (on a very tight deadline) on the unimpressiveness of both presidential candidates in the debate last night. Nobody’s rising to the historic occasion here. At least McCain pivoted somewhat... Continue reading

20. The Audit

    Audit Roundup: The Fannie/Freddie Smokescreen

    October 7, 2008 09:16 AM

    Barry Ritholtz at The Big Picture continues to smack down the Wall Street apologists trying to shift blame to Fannie and Freddie. Fan and Fred are hardly blameless institutions, but they’re not much more than smokescreens for the... Continue reading

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