Economics and Investing:

Now, the truth comes out: Banks Won Concessions on Tests. I figured the “tests” were rigged, but not quite so blatantly. And here are some more details on the “Buddy-Buddy” Creative Accounting: Fed cut banks’ deficits after negotiations: report. (Thanks to Roger Y. for the links.)

Reader D.D. sent his one: Next challenge for banks: Credit card losses Number usually tracks unemployment, but this time it may be worse

Items from The Economatrix:

Global Financial & Economic Crisis: How Much Time Do We Have Left? “The US-Dollar has been technically hyper inflated, even though no one is saying “the king is nude!!”… Not yet, anyway…”

Imminent Global Stock Market Crash to Support US Dollar

The Clock is Ticking on the US Dollar and Bond Markets

BofE Braces For Third Wave of Financial Crisis

Desperate Baby Boomers Return to Work

Peter Schiff: Don’t Be Fooled By Inflation

Short Sales: Banks Block Way Out of Foreclosure Crisis

Experts Say GM Bankruptcy is Almost Inevitable

Real Estate Crash Shifting to Commercial Properties

Welcome to the Frozen Economy This is a flashback of a piece from July of 2008. It shows how tough the times were in Maine then, before the big crash. Very interesting reading. “My neighbors are like deer caught in the headlights: frozen in fear as something sinister, implacable, and wholly unanticipated lurches toward them. A reckoning has begun to unfurl like a dark flower, slowly at first, then gathering urgency and force. This is not a short detour after all, but an untraveled road to an unknown place from which there is no return, no escape…and we are not prepared.”

On The Subject of Bottoms “Also worth noting is the fact that the yield curve is steepening in the U.S. and in other countries where governments are cranking up the printing presses, signaling that investors are losing faith in those who control the public purse strings.”