lets cut the crap aside here tonight, page-56

From the FT:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/604d71dc-c853-11dc-94a6-0000779fd2ac.html


“In the past few weeks, the froth had been knocked off the markets but we haven’t seen real pain – until today,” said Ian Harnett, managing director of Absolute Strategy Research. “It now has the feel of some forced liquidation and forced capitulation.”

He said the latest wave of selling was similar to previous periods of financial turmoil in 1989-1990 and the early part of the decade – when the dotcom bubble burst– when investors in non-financial sectors started to capitulate along with previously hard-hit financials.

Ms Hudson said: “Ambac’s downgrade and fears of more to come is symptomatic of something bigger. The whole financial structure of the real economy is under threat.”

Michael Cox, of the Royal Bank of Scotland, said: “We now believe that there are no public markets open to the monolines in their quest to raise capital....The only potential solution we can see that would enable triple-A ratings to be retained now is a co-ordinated bail-out by interested parties – banks and/or politicians.”