Victory Investment

Archive for November, 2010

New York, June 17th, 2008 — Opalesque, the world’s largest subscription-based publisher covering the alternative investment industry, has launched the sixth issue of its acclaimed regional Roundtable scripts, the “Opalesque New York Roundtable” (download here: http://www.opalesque.com/index.php?act=static&and=RoundtableNY)

Some hedge funds have already started to position themselves as a merchant bank with investment banking capabilities to originate structures. This allows the manager to change cash flows as he wants them, and to be a principal investor. Hedge funds have started to build their own channels of origination and enter direct lending.

These hedge funds will be able to build a strong financial services company-type balance sheet – a “real” corporate balance sheet to borrow and raise equity against. Are hedge funds crossing into the banking world? What does that mean for investors and the financial industry?

Readers of the Opalesque New York Roundtable will get first hand intelligence on:  

What is the future of today’s hedge funds?
What is ‘permitted disintermediation’? Will hedge funds be the new banks?
What will happen in the distressed space? Where is the economy heading?
‘We are seeing tremendous opportunities in multiple asset classes, some we have not seen in almost a decade’ – where are these opportunities? Or is the current floor not a floor at all?  Why AIG is setting up a hedge fund seeding joint venture now?

1.Glenn August, President Oak Hill Advisers LP

2.Tom Priore, CEO of ICP

3.Justin B. Dew, Managing Director, Clinton Group

4.George A. Kellner, Kellner DiLeo & Co., Managing Director, Chief Executive Officer

5.Keith M. Moore, PhD, Kellner DiLeo & Co., Principal, Portfolio Manager, Merger Arbitrage and Opportunities Funds and Director of Risk Management and Quantitative Analysis

1.Girish Reddy, Managing Partner of Prisma Capital Partners

2.Antonio Munoz, CEO EIM USA

3.Rob Discolo, Head of Hedge Fund Strategies Group at AIG

4.Kevin Heller, Head of Research, Focus Group

The Opalesque New York Roundtable Script can be downloaded here: http://www.opalesque.com/index.php?act=static&and=RoundtableNY |

All other previously published Opalesque Roundtable Scripts (New Zealand (March 17th), Australia (March 25th), Singapore Roundtable (April 24th), Hong Kong (May 1st), Japan (June 2nd)) can be downloaded here: http://www.opalesque.com/index.php?act=archiveRT

, moderates the Opalesque Roundtables. Matthias Knab is an internationally recognized expert on hedge funds and alternatives and has frequently served as chairman of hedge fund conferences in New York, Tokyo, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Miami, Bahamas, Stockholm, Dubai etc. In addition, he has presented or moderated at hedge fund events in Sydney, Cape Town, Madrid, and Bombay, and lectured at numerous universities on the subjects of hedge funds and the state of the global alternative asset management industry.

Opalesque leads the finance media space for its in-depth and innovative products. Since February 2003, Opalesque is publishing Alternative Market Briefing, the premium news service on hedge funds and alternatives. The launch of these Briefings was a revolution in the hedge fund media space (“Opalesque changed the world by bringing transparency where there was opacity and by delivering an accurate professional reporting service.” – Nigel Blanchard, Culross) combining proprietary news with the “clipping service” approach of integrating third party news. Each week, Opalesque publications are read by more than 400,000 industry professionals in over 100 countries.

Opalesque is the only daily hedge fund publisher which is actually read by the elite managers themselves (http://www.opalesque.com/op_testimonials.html). For more information, please go to http://www.opalesque.com.

A daily newsletter on the global hedge fund industry, highly praised for its completeness and timely delivery of the most important daily news for professionals dealing with hedge funds. Alternative Market Briefing offers both a quick overview and in-depth coverage. Subscribers can also access the industry’s largest news archive ( 27,000+ articles ) on hedge funds and related topics.

Opalesque A SQUARE = Alternative Alternatives is the first web publication, globally, that is dedicated exclusively to alternative investments. A SQUARE’s weekly selection feature unique investment opportunities that bear virtually no correlation to the main stream hedge fund strategies and/or distinguish themselves by virtue of their “alternative” motive – social, behavioural, natural resources, sustainable /environment related investing.

With its “research that reveals” approach, fast facts and investment oriented analysis, A SQUARE offers diversification and complementary ideas for: private, high net-worth and institutional investors, pension funds and endowments, portfolio and hedge funds managers.

Delivers three times a week a global perspective/overview on all major markets, including Equity Indices, Fixed Income, Currencies, and Commodities. Opalesque Technical Research is unique compared to most available research which is fundamental in nature, and not technically (chart) oriented.

In an Opalesque Roundtable, we unite some of the leading hedge fund managers (single and multi strategy managers) as well as representatives of the local investor base (institutions, fund of funds, advisers) to gain unique insights into the specific idiosyncrasies and developments, the issues and advantages of individual global hedge fund centers.

No matter if you are a hedge fund investor looking for new talent, a hedge fund interested in diversifying your investor base or a service provider looking for new clients, you will get to know some of the leading heads of each hedge fund center and find invaluable information and intelligence right on your desk, without any travel involved.

 

 

 

 

Despite a recent slowdown, the U.S. real estate market continues to be a popular investment destination for foreign investors. Attracted by a desirable return on investment, many foreign nations continue to invest heavily in the U.S. residential and commercial real estate markets. In fact, in 2005, foreign investment in U.S. real estate reached 1.83 trillion.

To evaluate the impact of foreign investment on the U.S. real estate market, the National Association of Realtors (NAR) produced a 2006 report entitled ‘Foreign Investment in U.S. Real Estate: Current Trends and Historical Perspective.’ The report provides insights into the trends in foreign real estate investment, its impact on the U.S. economy, and the major countries that participate in U.S. real estate investment. Below are some highlights from the NAR report.

According to the U.S. Department of Commerce, the top seven countries that had significant holdings in U.S. real estate as of 2005 were:

Germany – 13 %
Latin America – 13 %
Australia – 11 %
Japan -10 %
United Kingdom – 10 %
Canada – 6 %
Netherlands – 6 %

The U.S. economy is wide open to foreign investors. Both investors and Americans significantly benefit from all this foreign investment. The NAR study estimates that without foreign investments in the securities market, the long-term lending rates would be four percentage points higher than the current rate, which would adversely impact the U.S. real estate market.

Foreign direct investment into the U.S. not only creates more jobs but also contributes to the demand for U.S. real estate. In fact, foreign investment may be responsible for creating two million U.S. jobs by the end of 2006, which further bolsters the demand for U.S. real estate.

Permanent and temporary immigration of foreign-born workers into the U.S. further bolsters the demand for real estate. According to the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University, 1.2 million net immigrants are expected to arrive in the United States annually. This immigration pattern is expected to offset the decrease in housing demand by post baby-boomer generations.

In summary, the impact of foreign investment and immigration into the U.S. will continue to play a major role in the U.S. real estate market.

From Highest CD Rates we are providing today an update on the Frost Bank CD rates. This is the largest Texas owned and operated bank in the state. Their commitment to Texas and its people have not wavered since it first opened its doors in 1868. Frost Bank has more than 100 financial centers in the Austin, Corpus Christi, Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston, Rio Grande Valley and San Antonio regions. Frost provides a full range of commercial and consumer banking products, investment and brokerage services, insurance products and investment banking services.

The Frost Bank certificate of deposit rates are in a tiered format so the more you invest, the greater your return will be. These CD’s can be purchased online, over the phone or at one of the Frost Bank branch office. Whichever is more convenient for you.  The tiered sections from Frost are for deposits from ,000 to ,999.99 for the first tier and the second is for deposit greater than 0,000.

The current CD rates available online are for the 180 day CD is an APY of 0.20% and 0.25% respectively. The 1 year CD is earning an APY of 0.30% and 0.35%. The 2 year CD is earning an APY of 0.55% and 0.60%.

The current CD rates available at one of the branch offices or over the phone include the 90 day CD that is earning an APY of 0.15% and 0.20% respectively. The 180 day CD is earning an APY of 0.20% and 0.25%. The one year CD is earning an APY of 0.30% and 0.35%. The 18 month CD is earning an APY of 0.50% and 0.55%. The best CD rates are from the 2 year CD that is earning an APY of 0.55% and 0.60% respectively.

Frost Bank elected not to apply for federal funding under the TARP in October 2008 as they are well capitalized and didn’t want to dilute their shareholder value. They have sailed with ease during the economic meltdown.

The bridge had been rated structurally deficient by the U.S. government as far back as 1990, and it was only one of more than 70,000 bridges across the country with that rating. The American Society of Civil Engineers estimated that it would take nearly 0 billion to fix the country’s failing bridges over the next two decades. Minnesota and other states have the manpower and the materials to rebuild. What they lack is only the money to do it. Municipal governments have to borrow money by issuing bonds, and the interest they must pay on these bonds is going up.

On March 13, 2008, Erik Sirri, director of the SEC’s division of trading and markets, told Congress that the credit crisis has spread to municipal bond auctions. “There is no question that the recent dislocations in the municipal bond markets have created unanticipated hardships for municipal issuers and in some cases dramatically increased their borrowing costs,” Sirri said. The inability of cities and states to sell municipal bonds to investors at reasonable interest rates seriously threatens plans to build new roads, schools, airports and other public works projects.1

Although the cost of borrowing is going up for municipal governments, this is not because they are bad credit risks. In fact, they are extremely good credit risks. Creditors know where to find them, and local governments have the power to tax to pay their bills. The problem lies with the bond insurers called “monolines,” which have ventured into the very risky mortgage-backed securities market. This has put the insurers’ triple-A ratings in jeopardy, along with the ratings of the municipal bonds they insure.

While borrowing costs for municipal governments are skyrocketing, the interest rate the Federal Reserve charges to banks has been going down, even though banks are proving to be much riskier investments than local governments. The Federal Reserve is a private banking corporation that is owned by other banks. It was established in 1913 to prevent bank runs and otherwise keep the banks from getting into trouble for over-leveraging (lending out many times their assets), and that remains its principal function today. The Federal Reserve recently extended 0 billion in financing to 20 top investment banks at wholesale rates, but these low rates are not being passed on to municipal governments or home buyers. The Federal Reserve is evidently working for the banks more than for taxpayers or local governments.Thinking Outside the Box: The Minnesota Transportation Act

Many people are getting tired of waiting for the Federal Reserve and the federal government to act, and one of them is a Minnesota resident named Byron Dale. Dale has drafted a bill called “the Minnesota Transportation Act” (MTA), which is scheduled for hearing before the Minnesota Senate Transportation Committee on March 25, 2008. If adopted, the bill could represent a major innovation in the way state and local projects are funded. It would mandate Minnesota’s Transportation Department and State-chartered banks to enter into an agreement providing that the banks would advance funds for legislatively-approved transportation projects in the same way that banks make commercial loans – simply by “monetizing” the projects themselves. Banks routinely monetize the promissory notes of borrowers just by making book entries to a checking account and saying “you have a new deposit with us.” (More on this below.)

Under the MTA, the state-chartered banks would create a pass-through account titled an Asset Monetization Account (AMA), monetizing the bid value of projects. This would be done in the same way that banks monetize collateral, except that the deposit would go on the bank’s books as an asset rather than a liability, turning the bid value of the project into “money” without debt. This money would be debited electronically out of the AMA and credited to the State’s Transportation Account (STA), from which it would then be debited out and credited in to the contractor’s bank account in a state bank, according to the terms of the contract. The contractor would spend this money to complete the project. The money would flow into Minnesota’s economy, where it would provide for better, safer, more durable roads and bridges. It would be used to purchase goods and services, benefiting business. It would go to pay taxes, helping the State balance its budget. And it would flow back into the state-chartered banks as interest on outstanding loans, reducing the number of loan defaults and improving the profits of the state-chartered banks. In this way, says Dale, the MTA would benefit every segment of society.Too Radical? Maybe Not . . .

Dale says he has been proposing this sort of state funding alternative for years; but only now, with the looming liquidity crisis, have legislators begun to take him seriously. His plan may not be such a radical departure from existing practice as it sounds. Commercial banks are already in the business of creating money. Except for coins, our entire money supply is now created by banks in the form of loans.2 Indeed, banks create all the money they lend. This was confirmed by the Chicago Federal Reserve in a booklet called “Modern Money Mechanics,” which states:

“Of course, [banks] do not really pay out loans from the money they receive as deposits. If they did this, no additional money would be created. What they do when they make loans is to accept promissory notes in exchange for credits to the borrowers’ transaction accounts. Loans (assets) and deposits (liabilities) both rise [by the same amount].”3

Many other authorities have confirmed this money-creating mechanism of commercial banks.4 State-chartered banks get their authority to create money from the State, and the State has the authority to determine the purpose for which banks create money. State banks are now permitted to create money to monetize a mortgage or other promise to repay. They could as easily be authorized to “monetize” the promise of contractors to deliver labor and materials to the State in the form of road and bridge repair and construction.

The argument against this creative approach is that it would be inflationary, but would it? Inflation results when “demand” (money) increases faster than “supply” (goods and services); and in this case goods and services would be increasing along with the money available to spend, keeping the money supply in balance and prices stable. In fact, it is the lending of money created out of thin air that is inflationary, because banks create the principal but not the interest necessary to pay back their loans. Additional loans must therefore continually be taken out just to service the “money” (or debt) that is already in the money supply; and this newly-created money goes into the pockets of middlemen rather than contributing to the productivity of the community. “Demand” (money) thus goes up without a corresponding increase in “supply,” creating price inflation.

The solution to this conundrum is to authorize banks to monetize the production of real goods and services, creating supply and demand at the same time. There is substantial precedent for this approach, stretching as far back as the early American colonies:

* In the early eighteenth century, the colony of Pennsylvania issued money that was both lent and spent by the local government into the economy, producing an unprecedented period of prosperity. This was done not only without producing price inflation but without taxing the people.

* When Abraham Lincoln needed money to fund the American Civil War, rather than paying 25 to 36 percent interest charges, he avoided going into debt by printing Greenback dollars that were “legal tender” in themselves. Again, historians of the period attest that this issue of Greenbacks was not responsible for price inflation.

* A successful infrastructure program funded with interest-free “national credit” was instituted in New Zealand after it elected its first Labor government in the 1930s. Credit issued by its nationalized central bank allowed New Zealand to thrive at a time when the rest of the world was struggling with poverty and lack of productivity.

* The island state of Guernsey, located in the British Channel Islands, has been funding infrastructure with government-issued money for over 200 years, without creating price inflation and without government debt.5 But Is It Constitutional?

These governments could create the money they needed because they were sovereign entities, but what about individual States governed by a federal Constitution? In the United States, the U.S. Constitution controls. But that august document says very little about the creation of money – so little that banks have stepped in and taken over the business by default. Here are the sole Constitutional provisions directly addressing the creation of money:

Article I, Section 8, Clause 5

: The Congress shall have Power…To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures.
Article I, Section 10, Clause 1

: No State shall…coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debt.

Congress has been given the power to coin money, but minting coins is not the same thing as issuing paper money, checkbook money, accounting-entry money, or electronic money – the forms of money used most often today. Arguably, “to coin” money was an archaic way of saying “to create” money, but then what is to be made of the clause stating, “No state shall . . . make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debt”? “Coin” here clearly means precious metal coins, period.

That clause is interesting for another reason: when was the last time you heard of a State paying its debts in gold or silver coin? States routinely pay their debts with the bank-created accounting-entry money that now composes over 97 percent of the U.S. money supply (M3), and that form of money is omitted from the Constitution altogether. The States therefore violate the Constitution every day, something they must do if they are to pay their debts at all, since gold and silver coins are no longer in general circulation. The Constitution obviously needs to be amended to suit the times. Meanwhile, the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution (part of the Bill of Rights) provides:

X – Rights of the States under Constitution

: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
Creating checkbook money is not specifically delegated to the United States, so it must be delegated to the States, unless it is specifically prohibited to them. What about the provision that “No State shall . . . emit Bills of Credit”? According to “the ‘Lectric Law Library,” “bills of credit are declared to mean promissory notes . . . . Bills of credit may be defined to be paper issued and intended to circulate through the community for its ordinary purposes as money redeemable at a future day.” Bills of credit are promises to pay later rather than what is being discussed here: checkbook money issued as “legal tender” – the sort of dollars banks issue every day when they make commercial loans. The Constitution does not say who is authorized to issue this sort of money – whether in paper, electronic or accounting-entry form – so under the Tenth Amendment, this right is reserved to the States and to the People.

As the credit crisis deepens and exposes the inability of the existing banking structure to meet the public’s needs, creative funding plans similar to the proposed MTA could be popping up in communities around the country. If the U.S. Congress and the privately-owned Federal Reserve will not issue the funds necessary for bridge and road repair and other urgent public projects, we can encourage our State legislators to fill the breach; and if they won’t do it, we the people can get together, apply for a bank charter, and create the funding ourselves. (See E. Brown, “How to Start Your Own Bank,” webofdebt.wordpress.com, February 23, 2008.)

Ellen Brown, J.D., developed her research skills as an attorney practicing civil litigation in Los Angeles. In “Web of Debt,” her latest book, she turns those skills to an analysis of the Federal Reserve and “the money trust.” She shows how this private cartel has usurped the power to create money from the people themselves, and how we the people can get it back. The website is http://www.webofdebt.com/

Her eleven books include the bestselling “Nature’s Pharmacy,” co-authored with Dr. Lynne Walker, which has sold 285,000 copies.