Tuesday, August 28, 2007

Time to sell short?

I'm still looking for secondary corroboration of this story, but apparently a group of corporations purchased short-sale options worth $4.5 billion that all expire on September 21st, 2007.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=b96_1188081846&p=1

Yeah, it's a tinfoil-hat site. Looking for a more reliable source as we speak.

EDIT: Less tinfoil-ly link: http://www.financialnews-us.com/?page=ushome&contentid=2448565379

Friday, August 10, 2007

PICKLES!

Okay, this is going to sound like a seriously weird thing to get excited about, but it's been that kind of morning.

In my every-so-humble opinion, the best pickles in the world are Cain's Zingers Baby Dills. They're baby dill pickles with whole cayenne peppers and gloves of garlic. Spicy, crunchy, bite-sized perfection, if you like both hot food and pickles.

I noticed one day that they're not on my grocery store shelves anymore. I started trying to track them down, and found that Cain's pickle line had been sold to Gedney Foods so that they could focus on the mayonnaise business. Gedney still sells the product, but not in New England; they only carry them in the Midwest. However, Gedney's customer service team was kind enough to point me here:

http://www.mybrandsinc.com/ShopOnline/catalog.asp?t=0&s=0&ss=0&p=3314&m=a1&q=12&c=841918

I have a case on the way. :-)

Thursday, August 09, 2007

US GDP

Looks like the US GDP is at about 13.2 trillion for 2006. A 15% tax rate on consumer spending would deliver $1.9 trillion, which would have to be split between federal, state, and local government. Current federal budget is around $4.5 trillion; total of all state budgets in the nation is $1.3 trillion; muncipal budgets are probably in the $1-$2 trillion range, but I haven't found a source set.