Over the past week I have received thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of emails from my two subscribers asking the same questions (my staff will reply to each of you personally): 

Q. You're an idiot!

That's not a question.  

Q. What indicators do you use?

That's only available to RealMoney Hockey Silver subscribers.  But in an effort to get into the Christmas spirit I have decided to give away a couple of stocking stuffers.  Because there are investors, position traders and swing traders, each with their own goals, it requires me to talk about each of these separately.  Remember, this site does not give investment advice and you should always do your "homework" and look at the "fundies" (sarcasm)

There are so many indicators, quantitative analysis techniques, economic data, weather patterns and especially Mad Money that are the driving forces in the market.  The market is always evolving and what worked in the last cycle probably will not work in the current cycle.  However this doesn't stop the money managers (who are itching to go shopping like a woman on Black Friday) polluting the airwaves with more valuation calls based on those historical relationships of earnings/dividends/treasuries/etc.  All of this is too complicated and frankly most comparisions are lagging in nature.  There are easier methods (sarcasm).

Avoid information overload and analysis-paralysis when looking at the market.  Let's face it, neither you nor I can ever match the rigorous analysis provided by the staff at TheStreet.com (sarcasm).  However, we can use this expertise to our advantage: 

Q. How will I know when to sell?

Here is an excerpt of a recent newsletter that went out to RealMoney Hockey Gold Subscribers (note: My staff makes these graphics up on the fly).

Here is a Video Presentation From My Trading Seminar describing my how it only takes me 7 minutes a day to see if I need exit my counter-trend position trades using 2 steps.

Step 1. Go to this link and see if this book is still in stock.

Step 2. Go to this link to check out the recap

I will acknowledge the second step is not without pain.  Please consult a physican before attempting.

In the second of this two-part series I will introduce a state-of-the-art technical analysis using Obamanachi waves, a tool that, up until now, only RealMoney Hockey Platinum Subscribers had access to.

Obviously there is no RealMoneyHockey 

Nov. 25 (Bloomberg) -- Zale Corp., the biggest U.S. jewelry chain by stores, plummeted as much as 42 percent in New York trading after reporting a wider loss from continuing operations in the first quarter and rescinding its forecast for the year ending July 31.

Luxury sales may drop next year for the first time in a decade, consulting firm Bain & Co. said last month. Sales of products including Harley-Davidson Inc.motorcycles and Hermes International SCA handbags are slowing as stock prices fall and home values slide. Retailers face what may be the worst holiday-shopping season in six years, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers.

Of course others have long before mentioned the CDS bet on the big 3 (Mish, Bloomberg, etc..) and recently I had made mention of it as well...

I wrote in  GM's Gone From Suck To Blow

... a failure of GM would result in about $1 Trillion in credit default swaps being triggered,  which would crush the banks in a heartbeat.  If people thought the Lehman default settlement was reason to worry, you a'int seen nothing yet.  In my opinion, this is the reason GM can't be allowed to fail.  

and in Citi  

Remember, over a trillion in CDS on GM alone...  However, why on earth would CONgress put all this money in AIG/C/etc... then do a pre-packaged bankruptcy of the automakers which will pretty much wipe out all of that $180B?  Just thinking outloud here.

And finally in The Geithner Rally: Pfft

Perhaps this time instead of figuring out how to keep AIG afloat, maybe they can let them go bankrupt.  It's the only way to avoid putting money into a bottomless pit with all the CDS they insure. 

Here is a great article that turned out today from Institutional Risk Analytics (Hat tip Naked Capitalism):

Few observers outside Wall Street understand that the hundreds of billions of dollars pumped into AIG by the Fed of NY and Treasury, funds used to keep the creditors from a default, has been used to fund the payout at face value of credit default swap contracts or "CDS," insurance written by AIG against senior traunches of collateralized debt obligations or "CDOs." The Paulson/Geithner model for dealing with troubled financial institutions such as AIG with net unfunded obligations to pay CDS contracts seems to be to simply provide the needed liquidity and hope for the best. Fed and AIG officials have even been attempting to purchase the CDOs insured by AIG in an attempt to tear up the CDS contracts. But these efforts only focus on a small part of AIG's CDS book.

...

The Paulson/Geithner bailout model as manifest by the AIG situation is untenable and illustrates why President-elect Obama badly needs a new face at Treasury. A face with real financial credentials, somebody like Fannie Mae CEO Herb Allison. A banker with real world transactional experience, somebody who will know precisely how to deal with the last bubble that needs to be lanced - CDS.....

.... until we rid the markets of CDS, there will be no restoring investor confidence in financial institutions....

Q: Does anybody really believe that the global central banks and the politicians that stand behind them are going to provide the liquidity to fund $15 trillion or more in CDS payouts? Remember, only a small portion of these positions are actually hedging exposure in the form of the underlying securities. The rest are speculative, in some cases 10, 20 of 30 times the underlying basis. Yet the position taken by Treasury Secretary Paulson and implemented by Tim Geithner (and the Fed Board in Washington, to be fair) is that these leveraged wagers should be paid in full.

Our answer to this cowardly view is that AIG needs to be put into bankruptcy....pay true hedge positions at face value, but the specs get pennies on the dollar of the face of CDS. And the specs should take the pennies gratefully and run before the crowd of angry citizens with the torches and pitchforks catch up to them.

President-elect Obama and the American people have a choice: embrace financial sanity and safety and soundness by deflating the last, biggest speculative bubble using the time-tested mechanism of insolvency. Or we can muddle along for the next decade or more, using the Paulson/Geithner model of financial rescue for the AIG CDS Ponzi scheme and embrace the Japanese model of economic stagnation....

Our friends at Katten Muchin Rosenman in Chicago wrote last week in their excellent Client Advisory: "On November 13, 2008, Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and its U.S. affiliates in bankruptcy, including Lehman Brothers Special Financing and Lehman Brothers Commercial Paper (collectively, "Lehman") filed a motion asking that certain expedited procedures be put in place to allow Lehman to assume, assign or terminate the thousands of executory derivative contracts to which they are a party. If Lehman's motion is granted, counterparties to transactions that have not been terminated will have very little time to react and will likely find themselves with new counterparties and no further recourse to Lehman because, by assigning contracts to third parties, Lehman will effectively receive, by normal operation of the Bankruptcy Code, a novation."

The bankruptcy court process also allows for parties to terminate or "rip up" CDS contracts, something that has also been fully enabled by the DTCC. The bankruptcy can dispose and the DTCC will confirm....

By embracing Geithner, President-elect Barack Obama is endorsing the ill-advised scheme to support AIG directed by Hank Paulson et al at Goldman Sachs and executed by Tim Geithner and Ben Bernanke. News reports have already documented the ties between GS and AIG, and the backroom machinations by Paulson to get the deal done...

The bailout of AIG represents the last desperate rearguard action by the CDS dealers and the happy squirrels at ISDA, the keepers of the flame of Wall Street financial engineering. Hopefully somebody will pull President-elect Obama aside and give him the facts on this mess before reality bites us all in the collective arse with, say, a bankruptcy filing by GM (NYSE:GM).

You see, there are trillions of dollars in outstanding CDS contracts for the Big Three automakers, their suppliers and financing vehicles. A filing by GM is not only going to put the real economy into cardiac arrest but will also start a chain reaction meltdown in the CDS markets as other automakers, vendors and finance units like GMAC are also sucked into the quicksand of bankruptcy. You knew when the vendor insurers pulled back from GM a few weeks ago that the jig was up.

And many of these CDS contracts were written two, three and four years ago, at annual spreads and upfront fees far smaller than the 90 plus percent payouts that will likely be required upon a GM default. That's the dirty little secret we peripherally discussed in our interview last week with Bill Janeway, namely that most of these CDS contracts were never priced correctly to reflect the true probability of default. In a true insurance market with capital and reserve requirements, the spreads on CDS would be multiples of those demanded today for such highly correlated risks. Or to put it in fair value accounting terms, pricing CDS vs. the current yield on the underlying basis is a fool's game. Truth is not beauty, price is not value.

If you assume a recovery value of say 20% against all of the CDS tied to the auto industry, directly and indirectly, that is a really big number. The spreads on GM today suggest recovery rates in single digits, making the potential cash payout on the CDS even larger.

As Bloomberg News reported in August: "A default by one of the automakers would trigger writedowns and losses in the $1.2 trillion market for collateralized debt obligations that pool derivatives linked to corporate debt… Credit-default swaps on GM and Ford were included in more than 80 percent of CDOs created before they lost their investment-grade debt rankings in 2005, according to data compiled by Standard & Poor's."...

The impending blowback from a CDS unwind at less than face amount is one of the reasons that the financial markets have been pummeling the equity values of the larger banks last week. Any bank with a large derivatives trading book is likely to be mortally wounded as the CDS markets finally collapse. We don't see problems with interest rate or currency contracts, by the way, only the great CDS Ponzi scheme is at issue - hopefully, if authorities around the world act with purpose on rendering extinct CDS contracts as they exist today. Call it a Christmas present to the entire world.

From Rooters:

The inventory of existing homes for sale slipped 0.9 percent to 4.23 million from 4.27 million in September. The median national home price declined 11.3 percent from a year ago to $183,300, the lowest since March 2004, the NAR said.

However, the percentage drop in prices was the biggest since the NAR started keeping records in 1968. Distressed sales are accounting for about 45 percent of existing home sales.

It's been a while since we've revisited this great call 9 months ago.  You can't afford to miss it.

Source: CRB Infotech

Let us first consider an important relationship of Gold/Crude during secular bull/bear markets as well as super-cycles.  The 40-some-odd year average is roughly 16.50 as shown in chart #1.  In mid 2005 and 2008 we saw this ratio drop below 6 which is insanely low.  "Black Gold", as it was being referred to, was being treated as an asset class along side of gold.  However, when the shit hit the fan it became obvious which of the two was actually an asset class.  As of Friday's close the Gold/Crude ratio is now at 16, erasing an 8 year downtrend in just 4 months.  Had you been long gold/short crude you would be better off than Citi.  In fact, it is my humble opinion this trade will work for the foreseable future, as a new super-cycle has been born.  Expect to see similar peaks in the ratio over the next decade.  

I like to Gold Miners here in th near-term, providing the market has follow-through and a counter-trend rally ensues.  These have had a terrible beat-down the last couple of months, along with everything else.  Goldcorp is just one of my personal favorites which I currently hold.  It was up like 3 brazillion percent on Friday.  The miners should outperform the metal itself over the next several weeks providing there is a market rally.  I own both, longterm on the metal, trading the miners.

I found this interesting and wanted to illustrate a measured move on the TLT weekly, as well the the daily which completed the larger measured move last week.  Despite several calls for a Treasury bubble, most shorts crapped their pants on Thursday.  I do have a calendar spread (Nov/Dec) so with a little luck here TLT pulls back with a rally.  Worst case scenario I can try to become a bank holding company and exchange these toxic puts for some Treasuries.  

As far as the Treasury Bubble goes, Mish warns shorts before the recent moves:

Those looking for a "bubble in bonds", need look no further than Japan. 10 year bonds at 1.5% are proof of how low yields can go. Those who see a bond bubble in the US, right here right now, are barking up the wrong tree.

Perhaps now, and only here, shorting treasuries gives a decent risk/reward.

John Markman writes (Hat Tip Big Picture):

Shares of Warren Buffett’s insurance holding company are on the ropes this month, plunging 30% in part because the famed investor dabbled in an area of the market he has long publicly derided: derivatives. And due to a tangled web of financial relationships, they may be taking Goldman Sachs shares down with them.

Investors are concerned about a $37-billion bet that Buffett made last year that U.S. and world equity values would be higher in 15 to 20 years than they were then, when the Dow Jones Industrials were trading around 13,000. Through his firm, Berkshire Hathaway, Buffett sold option contracts, known as “naked puts” to an undisclosed group of investors for around $4.85 billion, reportedly using Goldman as broker.

The buyers saw the puts as a type of insurance that would pay off royally if stocks fell over the next decade. They were seen by Buffett as an easy way to pocket a quick $4 billion-plus, which was booked much like an insurance premium, even though he is famous for scoffing at derivatives as “weapons of mass financial destruction.”

But easy money is the worst kind. The problem is that stocks worldwide have gone downhill in a hurry, and with a lot of the sort of volatility that makes put contracts swell in value. And due to accounting rules, this has made Buffett already need to mark down a $6.7 billion loss on the trade even though the trade has another 14 years to work out.

Because of its solid-gold credit rating, Berkshire Hathaway was not required to put up collateral to make this trade. But now rumors are flying on Wall Street that the owners of the contracts have demanded that broker Goldman Sachs put up collateral for the rest of the amount due. Since the value of the trade could be enormous, the collateral demands are said to be very large, and fears that Goldman will struggle to make good on its obligation has panicked shareholders.

Indeed one theory making the rounds this week is that Buffett put $5 billion into Goldman at around $125 per share in September not as an investment but to help provide funds for the collateral.

It's official.  Today's rally was soley the result of Obama picking Geithner as the new Treasury Secretary.  And here I was thinking this entire time it was something to do with the fact the market was down 20% in a week and triple-witching, or perhaps forced liquidation has settled (for now).  Silly me.  

“It’s a resounding ‘yes’ from Wall Street,” said Peter Kenny, managing director for institutional sales at Knight Equity Markets in Jersey City, New Jersey. “There’s confidence in a person who is up and coming and recognized as an authority on a very complex problem. There’s confidence in what he’s displayed so far, in terms of his leadership and management skill.”

Thurgy: Where have we heard this before?  Oh, right.  Bernanke and the Great Depression. 

Obama’s nominations would need to be confirmed by the Senate after he takes office on Jan. 20. President George W. Bush’s Treasury secretary,Henry Paulson, has pledged to work with his successor during the transition. Summers, along with former Fed Chairman Paul Volcker, were cited as candidates for the Treasury job by people close to the Obama camp earlier this month.

Thurgy: Damnit, why not Volcker!  What we need is some tough love.  Not someone hell-bent on preventing deflation.  What's this nonsense I'm hearing on television on delfation still just a 'remote' possibility?  Your choices: Deflation or Hyper-Inflation.  Both have pain, only one comes out with gain.  Anyway, Paulson and Geithner have long been working together, you like the result?

As head of the New York Fed, Geithner has served as the central bank’s top liaison with Wall Street. Geithner oversaw meetings at his bank to attempt to head off Lehman’s failure in September, later hosting gatherings on how to resolve AIG.

Thurgy:  Is this his credentials?  Failing to head off a failure in Lehman and the soon-to-be failed AIG.  Oh,  those gatherings he hosted with AIG only included Goldman (yeah,old news).  But he does speak Chineese, which is a HUGE plus right now.    Perhaps this time instead of figuring out how to keep AIG afloat, maybe they can let them go bankrupt.  It's the only way to avoid putting money into a bottomless pit with all the CDS they insure.   Speaking of Goldman.  Peculiar action when they quickly ran from 51 down to 47.  Sizeable amount of the Dec 40 PUT were trading during this time.  Does GS still have $20B in exposure to AIG in the event of a default?  Or is GS price action a result of a possible Citi merger?  TGLP?

Could they be the one's with the most CDS exposure to the Big 3?  Off balance sheet?  Remember, over a trillion in CDS on GM alone...  However, why on earth would CONgress put all this money in AIG/C/etc... then do a pre-packaged bankruptcy of the automakers which will pretty much wipe out all of that $180B?  Just thinking outloud here.

The bulls gave it their best Tuesday with their late day rally. However after Wednesday the S&P broke out of the triangle, all eyes are on the cluster of support from 770-790 area. I think it's safe to say we are 'oversold'. RSI/MACD/ATR are registering levels not seen since near the bottom of the last bear market.  Can we go lower, yes.  Can we have another rip-your-face-off options expiration rally like the last two months?  Possible.

Edit: This blogger editor/format blows

Late day rally sent the SPX up nearly 1%.  Futures and SPY continued to rally until the 4:15 close up another 0.5%.  However, the advance/decline line leaves a lot to be desired for a rally as Energy names carried the weight.  Also, the 10 and 30 year bonds suggested some dislocation in the credit markets... I'm calling Shennangians on the rally.

I highlighted some entry points (or exit points for me, since I was short) in the chart above.  Several indicators/oscillators were also hinting of this move prior to it's happening (not shown).

Is $55/crude bringing in some value seekers?  I overheard a thnkorswim trader on Bloomberg saying that "oil at 50$ seems to be a floor because...ya know...50$ has always been cheap for a long time..."  Outstanding analysis!!!!!!  I'm quoting from memory but that's pretty much what was said.  Let's take a look:

Source: Bespoke Investment Group

While there may be a counter-trend rally in Crude, it's still should be viewed as  just that.  When was the last time the United States, UK, Germany, Ireland, Spain, Italy, Estonia, Latvia, Hungary, Japan, Hong Kong, Iceland (froze over), South Korea, Brazil, Canada, New Zealand were all in a recession - at the same time?  Russia, Nyet (not yet). China, hard landing. France, hiding.

It is these very cross-currents that, imho, have most under-estimating the downside risks in equities.

Still, a year-end rally is not out of the question.  I welcome the shorting opportunities.

PPI'S BIGGEST DROP EVER  From Bespoke

Today's release of October PPI showed the largest month-over-month decline on record (-2.8%), which easily beat the prior extreme from October 2001 of -1.6%.  With today's Producer Price Index showing costs dropping at a record rate, all comparisons of the current period to the 1970s pretty much go out the window.

FOCUS ON 'BAD DEFLATION'.   These articles are several years old but still applicable:

Deflation: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly  by Don Luskin

...Paulsen writes that "good deflation" is when businesses are "able to constantly produce goods at lower and lower prices due to cost-cutting initiatives and efficiency gains. This has allowed GDP growth to remain strong, profit growth to surge and unemployment to fall without inflationary consequence."

...

Moving on now to "bad deflation," Paulsen writes that currently "…bad deflation has emerged because even though selling price inflation is still trending lower, corporations can no longer keep up with cost reductions and/or efficiency gains."Paulsen continues, "The world has been driven by a deflationary force since 1990 -- a force that represented bad deflation for Japan at the same time as it represented good deflation for the United States. The same deflationary trend which constantly defeated Japan in its effort to revive its economy had, simultaneously, been responsible for the ‘miracle 90s' U.S. economy… What seems to be happening, however, is bad deflation in the east is creeping westward!"

,,,

Put this way, we can respond to the single biggest misconception about deflation that has appeared repeatedly in the press: that "falling prices are good for consumers." Perhaps we could say that this is true when we have "good falling prices," that is, due to productivity gains. But it is manifestly untrue when we have "bad falling prices." When prices fall because the central bank revalues the monetary unit of account, your gains in your capacity as a consumer are offset by your losses in your capacity as a producer. And everyone is both, so at best you break even.

But the press accounts usually overlook the core issue that really makes monetary deflation so bad. If you are a borrower, you are contractually committed to making loan payments that represent more and more purchasing power -- while at the same time the asset you bought with the loan to begin with is declining in nominal price. If you are a lender, chances are that your borrower will default on your loan to him under such conditions. And it's not just debtor/creditor relationships: any long-term contract for goods or services denominated in nominal dollars will have the same problem.The entire economy suffers from the cascading dislocations triggered by these defaults. It's why "bad falling prices" means monetary deflation isn't just bad -- it's "ugly." 

Good Deflation and Bad Deflation  From EconoWatch

For an in-depth understanding of the concept of Deflation, one needs to be well-acquainted with the two primary types or conditions of Deflations, namely the Good Deflation and Bad Deflation. In fact, both Good Deflation and Bad Deflation facilitate a clear understand of the nature of Deflation and its characteristic features. 

Under normal circumstances, Deflation does not seem to be a good phenomenon, affecting the economy of a nation. At times, it is looked upon as a situation even worse than an economic depression. Theoretically, Deflation refers to low price of goods, which is indeed a matter of great relief to the consumers. But in reality, it is the Good and Bad Deflations which affect the economy of a nation. 

About Bad Deflation:

Bad Deflation is born out of trifling demands. It is an economic situation characterized by reduction in the prices not due to developments in the productivities, but because of a lack of demand induced by crashing down of the stock market. In fact, Deflation becomes bad when the consumers save their money for future uncertainties, or in the expectation that prices may lower further.

Its implications and consequences:

It is the cumulative process of very little generation of demand which affects the population of a country at the time of Bad Deflation. Detection of Bad Deflation thus requires an in-depth study of the overall economic conditions of a nation and not just the price of goods. 

Owing to Bad Deflation, the consumers who are the potential purchasers become unwilling to invest and buy, considering the future of their money and the country's economy. This leads to a fast fall in the prices, worsening the overall economic conditions further. Under the impact of Bad Deflation, the recessions are virtually all transformed into depressions. In reality, it is not the price fall of Bad Inflation which matters, but the serious consequences it gives birth to.

What is Good Deflation?

Good Deflation should not be considered as a hypothetical situation. It is very much a real condition of the economy, characterized by substantial growth and development in some sectors of a country, despite the fact that the prices of products in these sectors has been reducing since a long span of time. 

In fact, Good Deflation results from technological progresses, which initiates excess supply of goods.

Its role:

From the consumer's point of view, Good Deflation is immensely beneficial as it helps those commercial sectors like the bank to deal with sinking prices. The banking sector of a country faces such as a situation, when the value of the collateral (securities) for loans decreases remarkably, having low sale value than what was earlier expected. This condition is far more aggravated by public debts and unemployment problem, which display rising trends. 

This situation is controlled to considerable extents by the advent of Good Deflation. In the theoretical sense, Good Deflation does not allow the distribution of corporate gains among the employees, in the form of increase in their wages. Instead, decrease in the prices owing to Deflation is transferred to the consumers. This leads to uniform allocation of the profits, involving those also, who are not directly associated with production. 

The debtors should evade price fall, which appears to them in the form of low rates of interest. 

Good Deflation can only work when people have full faith in the future of the concept, which is closely related with the consumption and investments on their part. In fact, the customers consume and invest to meet their requirements and not the price expectations. 

For Good Deflation to exist in an economy, it is required that there is no interference of any strong union, who may insist on productivity gain on behalf of the employees.

Reuters:

The economy faces a slump deeper than the Great Depression and a growing deficit threatens the credit of the United States itself, former Goldman Sachs chairman John Whitehead, said at the Reuters Global Finance Summit on Wednesday.

Whitehead, 86, said the prospect of worsening consumer credit woes combined with an overtaxed federal government make him fear that the current slump is far from over.

"I think it would be worse than the depression," Whitehead said. "We're talking about reducing the credit of the United States of America, which is the backbone of the economic system." Whitehead encountered plenty of crises during his 38 years at the investment banking firm and was a young boy during the 1930s.

Whitehead warned the country's financial strength is at risk due to the sweeping demand for tax relief and a long list of major government spending plans.

"I see nothing but large increases in the deficit, all of which are serving to decrease the credit standing of America," said Whitehead, who served as chairman of the Lower Manhattan Development Corp after the World Trade Center was destroyed during the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Whitehead, who helped make Goldman a top-tier Wall Street firm and led its international expansion, left in 1984 to become a deputy secretary of state under Ronald Reagan.

He warned that the country's record deficit is poised to balloon as the public calls on government for more support.

"Before I go to sleep at night, I wonder if tomorrow is the day Moody's and S&P will announce a downgrade of U.S. government bonds," he said. "Eventually U.S. government bonds would no longer be the triple-A credit that they've always been."

There are at least ten "trillion dollar problems," facing the United States, he said, including social security, expanding health insurance, rebuilding infrastructure and increased spending on green energy. At the same time, the public does not want to pay for it.

"The public is not prepared to increase taxes. Both parties were for reducing taxes, reducing income to government, and both parties favored a number of new programs -- all very costly and all done by the government," he said.

Large deficits can weaken the country's credit and increase its borrowing costs, which already constitute a significant part of funding to cover expenses. Whitehead said it could take "several years" for the current problems to be resolved.

Whitehead said he is speaking out on this topic because he is concerned no lawmakers are against these new spending programs and none will stand up and call for higher taxes.

"I just want to get people thinking about this, and to realize this is a road to disaster," said Whitehead. "I've always been a positive person and optimistic, but I don't see a solution here."

PE Wire said (Nov 14),  this may just be the video of the year.

0:37 Recession will last for years, consumer will seize

1:20 Art Laffer being a tard

2:50 Home prices are unsustainable, In 2007 there will be credit problems

3:40 Schiff gets laughed at

4:00 Ben Stein says financials are best buy of his life

4:30 Schiff says this is just getting started

4:50 Party is over

6:00 Pundits say worse is behind us, financials cheap.

7:10 Schiff says STAY AWAY from financials

8:00 By the election we will be in a severe recession

9:30 Yeah, 2008 will be a big year, for loses.

Nov. 14 (Broomberg) -- Jim Cramer, Action Alert PLUS and TheStreet.com's largest shareholder, said in the letter to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson that the government should consider allowing Cramerica access to the TARP.

“I don’t care where stocks are going, I care where they were a year ago, and I don’t want people to stop watching Mad Money,” Cramer told Curry.  “I’m worried about my employment, I’m worried about my Amazon.com ranking.  I can’t have you at risk over at Fox Business.”

Ratings have declined 6 straight months on CNBC's "Mad Money."  ``My charitable trust is in the crapper from all the Goldman Sachs shares I was buying above $200 and my subscription services are in decline.", Cramer said while sipping some cheap scotch.  ``It takes everything I have now just to say booyah."

When asked how long Mad Money could last if it did not receive a bailout,  Cramer screamed from the linoleum floor, ``Do you want me to go on the Today Show again and body drop this market?!?  THEY'RE NUTS, THEY KNOW NOTHING. THIS IS ARMAGEDDON!"

*UPDATE*

Frank Says Congress Will Weigh Cramerica Stimulus Plan (Update2)



Nov. 16 (Broomberg) -- The U.S. Congress will consider a Cramerica stimulus package , House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank said.

``We are going to do a stimulus this week,'' Frank, a Massachusetts Democrat, said on the ABC News today.  ``We're not asking the taxpayers to throw good money after bad,'' and that there will be ``protections about getting it repaid,'' adding that it was too early to discuss bill details. ``The consequences of not doing it will be worse.   A collapse of Cramerica would be the worst possible thing that could happen at a time when we are already weakened."  Despite what would appear to be a rush to get a bill out Frank explained, ``I assure you that the same amount of time will go into this bill as any other.  It was just cramed into a few days.  We will have a bill ready to put in front of Congress by Wednesday.  However, due to an upcoming Jewish holiday we will not be able to vote on this emergency legislation until the following week."

``We definitely need a stimulus package,'' Senator Charles Schumer, a New York Democrat who heads Congress's Joint Economic Committee, said on CNN. ``Cramerica is in real trouble and a stimulus package makes real sense.  The only way we are going put a floor under the market is to put money into the hands of Cramerica, who will no doubt buy stocks.  This guarantees money will flow back into the market instead of imprudent hoarding like the banks are doing."  Senator Dodd and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi also gave the plan a nod.

After learning of the news, Cramer released a statement on TheStreet.com saying "Ba-ba-ba-ba-BOOYAH! THEY KNOW SOMETHING!".

Hosted by Tyler Mathisen, "Had Net Worth" provides avenues for viewers who had wealth to get the most out of the assets they have left, if any. Simply, there is no other program like this on television. This is a program that speaks to the ex-affluent. Mathisen and his guests celebrate the very best a frugal life has to offer, from coupon clipping and thrift stores to incredible TV dinners and sam's choice cola . Mathisen reports the very latest news on unemployment as well as news on tax evasion, fraud and foreclosure.

In an about-face, CNBC will be introducing bold and unprecedented programming changes to the network in response to recent market turmoil.

When asked why the flip-flop on the program Tyler Mathisen said he has no regrets for the revised plan. ``I will never apologize for changing a strategy or an approach if the facts change,'' he said.

Mathisen said he has no timeline for the remaining ``High Net Worth" programs, and reiterated that he's ``comfortable" that ``Had Net Worth" is ``what we need" to stabalize the ratings. Despite the change, Fitch today announced that it has placed CNBC on Ratings Watch Negative citing continued bottom calling since Feb 2008. Denis Kneil said, ``Look, we are in a bottoming process. Sure this process is 9 months old, but that's only because the Fraidy-Cats keep selling". Kneil reminded us that ``as long as you have an eleventy-year outlook you have nothing to worry about". ``Markets always come back over time. The Nikkei is just an anomaly".

"Consumers are beginning to tap into the idea of Internet access on-the-go and richer media features that are becoming more difficult to navigate on a small screen," Rubin said.

Thurgy: Consumers are beginning to "tap out", UFC style.  How long will those $80 service plans fly to text MY BFF ROSE?

Apple posted a 26 percent rise in fourth-quarter profit last month as sales of 6.89 million iPhones beat analysts' estimates. The iPhone accounted for 39 percent of total sales of $11.7 billion, when setting aside an accounting standard in which revenue from the iPhone and the Apple TV set-top box is spread out over two years.

Thurgy: Well, at least we know just how much their revenue will be impacted now.  But this has long been discounted for in the share price, well some of it anyway.  Look for a potential bear flag forming on the daily.

Just days after Friedman Billings Ramsey analyst Craig Berger claimed Apple’s fiscal first-quarter iPhone production would be more than 40 percent lower than production in its third, Maynard Um, an analyst for UBS Investment Research, said recent supply chain “chatter” around iPhone component orders indicates that production levels for the device may have declined by as much as 2.3 million units. “Our checks indicate various iPhone supply chain cuts by 1.7 million units to 2.3 million,” Um wrote, adding that if that’s the case, Apple (AAPL) will likely ship between four million and five million iPhones in the fourth quarter–down roughly two million units from the preceding quarter.

Thurgy: Ok, so production cuts of around 10% are normal after holiday seasons.  40% is NOT normal.  This production cut has not been confirmed but would not suprise me in the least if it turns out to be the case.  After all, Best Buy cuts outlook amid 'seismic' consumer-spending dropoff

Pelosi Calls for `Emergency' Aid to U.S. Automakers

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she wants ``immediate action'' to give automakers additional aid ... The failure of ``one or more of the major American automobile manufacturers'' would have a ``devastating impact on our economy,'' Pelosi said in a statement ...

Thurgy: What Pelosi is really saying is that a failure of GM would result in about $1 Trillion in credit default swaps being triggered,  which would crush the banks in a heartbeat.  If people thought the Lehman default settlement was reason to worry, you a'int seen nothing yet.  In my opinion, this is the reason GM can't be allowed to fail.   Let's have a gander at their performance over the last few years:

• Third-Quarter 2008: -$2.5 billion
  
• Second-Quarter 2008: -$15.5 billion
  
• First-Quarter 2008: -$3.3 billion 
  
• Fourth-Quarter 2007:  -$722 million
  
• Third-Quarter 2007: -$39 billion
  
• Second-Quarter 2007: $891 million  
  
• First-Quarter 2007: $62 million
  
• Fourth-Quarter 2006: $950 million
  
• Third-Quarter 2006: -$115 million 
  
• Second-Quarter 2006:  -$3.2 billion
  
• First-Quarter 2006: $152 million 
  
• Fourth-Quarter 2005: -$8.6 billion
• Third-Quarter 2005: -$1.6 billion 
  
• Second-Quarter 2005: -$286 million
  
• First-Quarter 2005: -$1.1 billion
  

The argument for a bailout is to save jobs and tax revenue from GM.  Umm, what revenue?  However, if they did file for bankruptcy, this does not mean the lights are turned off and everyone loses their job.   But clearly this company has been ran into the ground for quite a while.  Why throw good money after bad?