Bailout Nation !

Just saw the news that democrats and Bush has reached an agreement of $15 B bailout for auto-companies to get them over the remaining days of Bush's presidency and then they would have some more $$$ after Obama takes over. USA has become a bailout nation with so many bailouts this year:

• Bear Sterns ($29B)
• FRE/FNM ($200B)
• AIG ($152 B and counting)
• Citigroup ($300B and counting)
• 9 major banks including Goldman, Morgan and Bank of America ($150B and counting)
• Now 3 auto companies ($15 B)
• General bailout pool of $700 B

In all this, I was surprised to see so much discussion for bailing out auto-companies when they are requesting "only" $34 B which is about 1/4 th of what one company AIG consumed. Auto companies at least produce something which folks can use to drive whereas AIG is just selling some derivatives - what double standards this administration has !

Obama has started very impressively in selecting his cabinet - excellent choices for his economic as well as national security teams. This definitely gives quite a bit of confidence to world in general and Americans in particular. We can see that in overall market reaction with Dow stabilizing around 8000+ in spite of extreme bad news on employment front. Most of the indications are breaking multi-decade lows. I think that provides an excellent buying opportunity if one has guts to tolerate the volatility. I had personally experienced the volatility with HIG going from 10 to 19 and coming back below 5. Today it is ip by 100% and touching $15.
Currently I am researching stocks which have good (and reliable) dividend payouts - there are quite a few companies (one example would be HIG or CIT). Some of these companies are yielding more than 10% which is almost unheard of.

That's all for today. Have a good weekend !

/Shyam