The Fordson Tractor Pages Forum

A couple of big banks have run aground here.

The governments of Holland, Belgium and Luxemburg are taking a 49% interest in Fortis, one of the largest financial institutions over here. That deal involves a staggering 11.2 billion euros. It was done to prevent a total armageddon of Fortis, which looks after the life savings of millions of people. Fortis will sell the big ABN AMRO bank and the CEO gets the boot.

In the UK, Bradford & Bingley is partly sold and partly nationalized.

In Germany, Hypo Real Estate has acute cashflow problems. The German government and other German banks are pumping money into HRE.

It remains to be seen how all this influences the European and American stock exchanges. Right now the Amsterdam stock exchange is a circus. An economic crisis might be a psychological phenomenon (the economy is as good as wel all want it to be), but if all goes to hell then major problems are ahead.

To be continued.

Hi guys,

I am working in the financial sector in Amsterdam. It has been crazy lately.
I think, it's better to invest in an old tractor, than in shares or bonds on the stock exchange!

Amsterdam stock exchange 9% free fall yesterday....

The New York stock exchange was down 7% today, because the House of Representatives can't agree on a solution to help our failing banks. The European and Asian stock markets' problems seem to be a result of our problems.

My stocks are going up .

Looking to the Dexta's that are for sale, I see prices that are making me dizzy 3K...5k Euro !)

So,

Standard Dexta (incl registration papers): got it for free , now worth 2000 Euro

Narrow dexta (incl registration papers): 725 Euro, now worth 4000 Euro (?)

relax man ...

envy the owners of a county....

Hi Jos
Antique tractor prices are staying pretty steady around here, but they're not selling as fast as they used to. It doesn't matter much to me, because I don't have any for sale, especially not Counties
The good news is that the NYSE is up almost 500 points today. How are the European markets doing?

Slightly up. But this thing ain't over yet.

You're right, Oscar. This won't be over for a long time, but it could start getting better or worse from here, depending on what governments and banks do next.

Don't forget the people who are panicking on this issue and the consumers who are holding back there money. The last category makes the difference I think. The media is blowing this thing extra up, I think, so the consumer becomes afraid to spend there money.

Welcome to the world of $$ exchange

Example!!!!!!!!!
Somewhere in Africa, a man appears with the announcement that he wants to buy some monkeys at 10$ per piece.
People in the village all knew that there are a lot of monkeys in the woods, so they all went out catching ....
The man bought several at 10$ per piece and due to decreased population , the people started slowing down in catching till they stopped.
So the guy announced he would pay 15$ per monkey as of today
This made the people enthusiastic again, and out they went, catching.
But again, the number of monkeys reduces, significantly now, and the people all returned to their old work instead of catching monkeys
New announcement, the bid goes to 20$ and at the end, the number of monkeys became that low, that no monkey was found anymore.
Now the man, announces he would pay 50$ per specimen.
As he had to go to the big city, his assistant would get in charge with buying the monkeys.
Once the man left, the assistant spoke tot the people : Look to all these monkeys the guy has bought from you. I’ll sell them to you at 35$ per specimen and when he comes back, you can sell them at 50$ as he promised.
The people collected all their money, sold everything they possessed and bought all the monkeys in the cages.
The next night, the assiant disappeared.
He was never seen anymore, just like his boss.
The only thing that could be seen were monkeys running in all directions.

Welcome to the world of $$ exchange.

Jos,
That sounds like this happened over here on Wall Street, New York City, only it was investment bankers, and our President's cronies.

Jos,

I saw that exact same "story" in one of those circulating emails a couple of years ago BUT I actually first received it as an 'amusement article' included with all the documentation issued in a compendeum at a Business Seminar I had to attend in 1974 ! Some things never change, eh?

Seriously though, it is times like this when we need to laugh and laugh often or we go nuts!

Regards,
Rick