Comments on: Baseline Blocking

By: HSG at MIT

HSG at MIT — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 04:47:45 +0000

That is pretty funny, actually–in that ‘you’ve got to be kidding way’. I wonder if the new MS recruits from Sloan know this?

By: Valerie Gagnon

Valerie Gagnon — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 19:49:58 +0000

If Per Kurowski is right and this is just one silly misunderstanding between the force of Democracy and well…..Morgan Stanley, why not clear the water and send a signed petition demanding for an explanation and requesting access.

By: BB

BB — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 23:15:59 +0000

I’m thinking more like the Axis of Evil…

By: Ted K

Ted K — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 22:40:20 +0000

I couldn’t agree more with Mr. Twiner’s post. As far as I know credit unions haven’t had any problems with bad loans, or the percentage of capital on their books. I am surprised more people aren’t moving some money to credit unions now. They have rules for who can join, but if you have a government job, it’s pretty much a cinch to get in. I never had a government job and I got in because my father worked for the public school system. Maybe they figure with their bank deposits insured to $250,000 by the FDIC it doesn’t make any difference, but I tell you, in MY MIND I feel much safer with my money in a credit union. The interest rates on accounts are higher, the service is better, and the specific one I go to has an annual meeting for all depositors where every one gets a gift and a chance for a big prize like a savings bond.

By: Nadine MacLane

Nadine MacLane — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 16:49:37 +0000

The other comments were good, but this one had me laughing out loud.

By: rjjrdq

rjjrdq — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 02:42:10 +0000

The company I work for blocks some of the larger blog hosting sites. I’ll try this site tomorrow and see what happens.

By: rollotomasi

rollotomasi — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 02:24:23 +0000

Add another vote for ‘adult material.’ But I just come here for the articles. Really.

By: oliver

oliver — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 01:52:54 +0000

Extremist. Telling the truth is practically sedition these days. Keep up the good work!

By: Per Kurowski

Per Kurowski — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 01:48:16 +0000

It is said: “A reader reports his firm has blocked Internet access to BaselineScenario.com, and his requests to change this policy have so far gone unheeded.”

Boy you sure have got some helpless and frail readers with crazy imagination… or might he now be laughing his heart out?

You have seen the responses and you have not answered any of them and so do you really want to imply that a Morgan Stanley would take its time to issue instructions to specifically block their employees from gaining access to the Baseline Scenario during work hours because the Baseline Scenario or Simon Johnson conform an especially dangerous treath to them? Come on… is it not a bit early for April fool’s day?

This country is going to go through some very dangerous moments that require a lot of level headed thinking and it most definitely does not really need posts like this.

By: Richard Ray

Richard Ray — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 01:27:21 +0000

…and the letter ‘Z’.

By: jussumbody

jussumbody — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 00:44:27 +0000

Did they just categorize you as tasteless?! Not sure what a keylogger is, but you didn’t seem to fit any of the other categories. What is keylogging? Is it exciting? Does it hurt? If I google it, will the FBI break down my door?

By: anon

anon — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 23:15:17 +0000

if you may be able to commiserate with the guardian, given barclay’s recent censorship of supporting documents in the guardian’s story about tax avoidance

By: chacona

chacona — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 22:31:07 +0000

Nooo….It is just what Brad Setser said (Sunday, March 15th, 2009):

‘The monthly TIC data suggests that China started to buy large quantities of US equities through Hong Kong in the spring of 2007. The big rise in China’s equity holdings in the June 2007 survey (equities rose from $4 billion in June 2006 to $29 billion in June 2007) offered the first hint of this shift in strategy. The Hong Kong flows suggest that China kept on buying through the first stage of the subprime crisis. Large purchases through Hong Kong didn’t come to an end until July 2008.

That, of course, implies that China bough a lot of equities just before the market fell sharply. Bad timing.

Anderlini reports that SAFE may have had as much as 15% of its portfolio in global equities and corporate bonds at one point last year:

“By that point Safe had moved well over 15 per cent of the country’s $1,800bn reserves into riskier assets, including equities and corporate bonds, according to people familiar with its strategy.”

15% in global equities and corporate bonds is high for a traditional central bank reserve manager. 15% of $1.8 trillion (China’s end-June reserves) is also $270 billion. If most of that was in equities, only ADIA would have had a larger equity portfolio.

The survey data also implies that SAFE has suffered far larger aggregate losses on its equity portfolio – should that portfolio ever be marked to market – than the CIC suffered on its investments in Blackstone and Morgan Stanley. The CIC put $3 billion into Blackstone and $5 billion into Morgan Stanley, far less than SAFE put into a more diversified equity portfolio.’

Which is to say that Morgan Stanley is now protected by the Great Firewall….

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 22:23:44 +0000

“Malicious Web Sites” of course.

By: Roy from Brooklyn

Roy from Brooklyn — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 22:07:46 +0000

Perhaps this is besides the point, but this block can easily be bypassed by using the Google cached copy:

http://74.125.95.132/search?q=cache:5idFUlLHySAJ:baselinescenario.com/+the+baseline+scenario&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

(or just search for baseline scenario and click on “cached”)