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huffdaddy
Joined: 25 Nov 2005
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 Posted: Tue Jan 22, 2008 12:24 am Post subject: |
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| Gatsby wrote: |
I hope I am wrong, and surely most everyone hopes this gloomy scenario is wrong. History shows it is hard to wreck the U.S. economy, but not impossible. |
And how many puts do you have, Gatsby?
FWIW, as of right now, the S&P's down about 70, NASDAQ about 100. |
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Gatsby
Joined: 09 Feb 2007
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| Posted: Tue Jan 22, 2008 6:08 am Post subject: |
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huffdaddy wrote:
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And how many puts do you have, Gatsby?
FWIW, as of right now, the S&P's down about 70, NASDAQ about 100. |
It's not what I think that counts; it's what the market thinks. And what people like George Soros thinks.
For the rest of you, remember: Do not look to Dave's posters for financial advice.
It is now Tuesday, 9:53 a.m. EST, New York time (11:53 p.m. in Korea). The NYSE has been open less than half an hour, the first time it has been open since Friday.
Here is what is in the news:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/22/AR2008012200518.html?hpid=topnews
| Quote: |
Fed Cuts Key Interest Rate as Global Markets Drop for Second Day
Sell-Offs on All Major Exchanges
By Howard Schneider, Neil Irwin and Ariana Eunjung Cha
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, January 22, 2008; 9:27 AM
The Federal Reserve cut a key U.S. interest rate by three-quarters of a percentage point this morning as a global stock sell-off continued on Wall Street today, with the Dow Jones industrial average dropping more than 400 points in its opening minutes.
The rate cut, decided by the Fed's Open Market Committe in an emergency videoconference on Monday night, is larger even than the interest rate reduction that the central bank made following the 2001 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.
It is also the largest single rate cut in at least 18 years for a bank that prefers to move in smaller quarter- and half-percentage point increments. The new federal funds rate of 3.5 percent will effect a broad array of lending, from the amount consumers pay on credit cards to the rate for auto loans and some bank lines of credit.
Coming more than a week before the Fed's next scheduled meeting on interest rate policy, the action reflects the central bank's judgment of a weakening economy coupled with a financial sector that has "continued to deteriorate."
The nation's largest banks and financial companies have been pummeled in recent months by losses linked to risky subprime mortgages. The situation has forced them to write down by tens of billions of dollars the value of a broad array of investments, and also prompted them to become less free to lend to business and even to each other.
The Fed has taken several steps to try to ensure cash continues to flow, including a series of prior interest rate reductions last fall.
But Tuesday's action was of a different order, reflecting a shift by the Fed into full recession-fighting mode, said Ian Shepherdson, chief U.S. economist with the High Frequency Economics consulting firm.
"The economy is still staring recession in the face, but at least the Fed now gets it," Shepherdson.
In a press release accompanying announcement of the rate cut, the Fed said it had taken the move because "incoming information" showed that a downturn in the U.S. housing market was growing worse, unemployment had begun to rise, and the overall economy was weakening.
On Friday, the Bush administration announced a package of $150 billion in tax benefits designed to encourage spending and help stimulate an economy that appears to be slowing to a crawl - and which in some parts of the country already is displaying signs of recession.
In a speech to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce this morning, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson called for quick action on that proposal. Following the federal reserve action, he said it should serve as a "confidence builder" for investors who have driven global stocks down sharply in recent days.
"Our central bank is nimble and able to respond quickly to market conditions . . . That should be a confidence builder," Paulson said.
Stocks across Asia registered their second consecutive day of precipitous decline on Tuesday, and Wall Street was pointed towards a sharply lower opening as fears grew that a weakening U.S. economy could derail growth worldwide.
European markets, which briefly touched positive territory after steep losses on Monday, also turned negative after two large U.S. banks reported sharply lower profits.
Bank of America said that its fourth quarter profit fell 95 percent, to $268 million, compared to the same period a year ago. The decline in earnings, which included a write down of $5.28 billion in assets tied to risky, subprime home mortgages, missed analysts' predictions. Wachovia Corp.'s profit for the quarter fell by 98 percent, to $51 million, compared to the same period in 2006.
As traders digested the news of the last 48 hours, U.S. stock futures at one point indicated an opening drop in excess of 500 points for the Dow Jones industrial average, promising to extend a run of triple digit losses that has pushed the index down ten percent since the start of the year.
That began to moderate after announcement of the Fed move -- but not by much.
The global sell-off has involved some of the worst market declines since Sept. 11, 2001 and has erased more than $5 trillion in value from stock markets this year.
Tuesday's declines in Asia were even more severe than those on Monday and several markets hit multiyear lows. Indian shares plunged so quickly -- nearly 11 percent -- that its stock markets halted trading soon after opening. In South Korea, volatile futures prices prompted the main Kospi market to briefly suspend program selling orders at midday. The Australian market suffered its worst one-day fall ever, while Japan's Nikkei fell 5.65 percent to its lowest point since 2005. It is down nearly 18 percent this year.
In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng Index was down 8.65 percent Tuesday, after dropping 5.49 percent on Monday. It's off 19 percent this year and is 30 percent lower than a peak in late October.
European markets were also adding to Monday's losses, though the pace of decline had moderated. London's FTSE 100, which lost 5.48 percent on Monday, was down 0.22 percent at midday. Germany's DAX index, down 7.16 percent on Monday, was off an additional 2.28 percent.
"This is an expression of panic -- really nothing less than panic about prospects for the U.S. economy," said Stephen Green, senior economist with Standard Chartered Bank.
For months, some economists had argued that Asian countries remained largely insulated from the problems in the United States because of strong growth in China and India. But recently, companies and financial institutions in those countries have announced that they, too, contain significant exposure to the subprime mortgage securities that have collapsed in the United States.
"People are really scared about the depth and the potential side effects of this recession from the U.S. The data is really bad," Green said.
"Where the bottom is now is anyone's guess," said Wesley Fogel, a market strategist for HSBC.
Officials at the Treasury Department, in the Federal Reserve system and at major stock exchanges worked the phones yesterday -- calling one another and their counterparts around the world. They were preparing for what looks likely to be a volatile week on Wall Street: Futures markets yesterday forecast a 4.5 percent drop in the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index when exchanges open this morning.
A Treasury spokeswoman said only that the department is always monitoring markets and in touch with participants. A spokeswoman for the Fed declined to comment.
The markets fell as fears spread that massive losses on loans made to U.S. home buyers would cascade through the world financial system. Some of the firms that play important, but usually invisible, roles in the global financial architecture are turning out to be exposed to the downturn in the housing market in such a way that their ability to function is threatened.
The companies that insure bond investors against defaults are having to make massive payouts. One, ACA Financial, owes $60 billion that it cannot afford to pay and has been taken over by the Maryland insurance regulator. Its credit rating has been lowered.
The problems among bond insurers have meant that a wide variety of financial institutions cannot count on receiving payments due them, causing further losses.
Other news yesterday shows just how widely the damage has spread. A Chinese newspaper reported that the Bank of China is exposed to subprime U.S. mortgage loans to a degree it had not previously disclosed and may have to write down the value of its $8 billion in such investments. Several large European banks have taken similar hits.
Those losses could have importance beyond the hit they cause to the banks' share prices. Banks and other financial institutions play an important role in an economic downturn: lending to businesses and consumers so they can help the economy get back on track. The multibillion-dollar losses could make them unable to play that role.
Moreover, foreign investors have been plowing capital into U.S. banks to help them continue lending, which made the losses particularly worrisome, some analysts said.
"Those infusions of capital have been crucial to maintaining performance to date," said Joseph Mason, a finance professor at Drexel University in Philadelphia. "If foreign investors should significantly retreat from U.S. markets, that leaves us to our own recovery. In that case, the current credit crunch will continue to bite and we maintain a very high risk of recession."
Many economists have argued that continued growth in the rest of the world -- especially in fast-growing markets like China -- will help ease the pain of the slowdown in U.S. growth.
With their houses less valuable, U.S. consumers may start spending less, goes this logic, while Asian and European consumers will do just fine, preventing a global economic slump. Yesterday, analysts worried that this theory won't hold up.
"People are scared, and they are reacting with behaviors which are based on psychology," said David Kotok, investment chief of Cumberland Advisors. "Some of that can be seen in the stock market, but they are also changing consumer behaviors."
Many market analysts argued that stock markets in developing countries have appeared to be overvalued for some time, which would suggest that some of the market declines were necessary. For example, even after yesterday's 5.1 percent drop, the Shanghai composite index in China has risen more than fivefold in the past three years, sparking worries of a bubble.
"Many of the markets, especially the European and Asian markets, have been priced for eternal growth," said Axel Merk of the Merk Hard Currency Fund.
European officials stressed the underlying strength of their economies, arguing that they can continue to thrive despite weakness in the American economy.
"It seems that the markets are considering the possibility of a more pronounced slowdown, even a recession in the U.S.," European Union Monetary Affairs Commissioner Joaqu¿n Almunia told reporters yesterday. "I hope they will pay attention also to the real information . . . because, at least in Europe, the economic fundamentals of our economies are sound."
Most world markets were digesting for the first time the Bush administration's proposal to try to stimulate the U.S. economy with tax benefits. (It was announced Friday, after Asian and European markets had already closed.)
Traders around the world seemed to have little faith that the plan would arrest the slowdown in the U.S. economy, even if some version of it is passed by Congress.
"Foreign markets are doubtful about the ability of Congress to move quickly, and foreign markets have watched the Federal Reserve move slowly in August, September, October and November," Kotok said. "So the concern from abroad is that the U.S. has been too slow and done too little and is now playing catch-up."
White House spokesman Tony Fratto said in a statement yesterday that, while he wouldn't comment on daily market moves, "We're confident that the global economy will continue to grow, and that the US economy will return to stronger growth with the economic policies the President called for."
Congressional leaders yesterday acknowledged how serious the European and Asian sell-offs were and said they may have to rethink the size of the stimulus and its content. Democrats still favor tilting the package toward middle-class and poorer Americans, who would be the quickest to spend any tax refunds or government checks. But Republicans have been pushing for more incentives for investors and business, a possible reaction to the stock-market jitters.
"I don't want to use the word 'panicky,' but you can't look at the size of these [losses] and not be extremely nervous," said Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), a former investment banker. Emanuel cautioned that policymakers should not be chasing the markets, trying to reverse losses already in the books.
Toyota and Honda were down more than 5 percent as the sharply rising yen -- at a 2 1/2 -year high against the dollar -- increased fear of slowing sales in the United States. "There is a sudden sentiment shift to a worst-case, most pessimistic view," said Naoki Kamiyama, Japan equity strategist at Morgan Stanley. "The market has lost faith in a second-half recovery." |
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/21/AR2008012102436.html?hpid=topnews
| Quote: |
More Room to Fall
Steven Pearlstein
Tuesday, January 22, 2008; A01
With the explosive growth in developing countries such as China and India, and a modest revival of business in Europe, economists have begun to suggest that the global economy is no longer so reliant on the United States.
But judging from yesterday's global stock market meltdown, all this talk of "decoupling" may have been a bit premature. For though it may no longer be true that a healthy U.S. economy can single-handedly keep the global economy humming, it still looks to be a necessary ingredient to global prosperity.
As markets open this morning, investors will be desperate for some signal from economic policymakers that they share their concern about the global impact of a U.S. recession. Trading in U.S. stock futures yesterday suggested that the Dow Jones industrial average would fall more than 500 points at the opening bell, while in Tokyo this morning, early trading put the Nikkei average down almost 4 percent. Those developments increased the possibility that the Federal Reserve, European Central Bank, Bank of England and Bank of Canada might respond with a coordinated cut in interest rates.
Central bankers still have real concerns about too-high inflation and the appearance that they are being railroaded by investors demanding a return to the days of cheap money. But they may conclude that the greater danger lies in a disorderly unwinding of the global credit bubble that could spiral out of control.
Moreover, in yesterday's stampede out of stocks, investors sought refuge in the safety of government bonds, which had the effect of driving down interest rates. A rate cut would merely confirm what the markets have already concluded and the quiet criticism that the central banks have been "behind the curve."
During the financial market disturbance last summer, economic policymakers were mostly concerned about liquidity -- the availability of short-term money as banks husband their cash rather than lend to one another. But after aggressive efforts by the central banks to make hundreds of billions of dollars available to banks on easy terms, the liquidity crisis has largely abated.
The problem now is a more serious one -- a credit crisis in which commercial banks, investment banks, insurance companies and hedge funds all around the world are being forced to write off billions of dollars from American subprime mortgages and more exotic securities. The stronger ones have enough capital, or can raise it, so that their viability is not jeopardized by these losses. But if even a few of the weaker ones collapse and are unable to repay loans or make good on their commitments, it would have a domino effect that could threaten still more institutions and trigger another wave of panicked selling.
It is those considerations, as much as a sudden realization over the weekend that the U.S. economy was tipping into recession, that drove yesterday's sell-off. Leading the way down were shares of big banks and insurance companies, which fell 6 to 10 percent.
While most of the big U.S. financial institutions have acknowledged major write-offs, most European banks have not, and rumors of what's in store have just begun.
In Germany, where the DAX index fell by more than 7 percent, Hypo Real Estate Holding, a relatively obscure lender, shocked markets last week with news that it had lost $570 million on its holdings of collateralized debt obligations. Its shares fell 33 percent. Yesterday, WestLB, Germany's third-biggest lender, said it would post a $1.45 billion loss after suffering trading losses on subprime mortgage securities.
Here in the United States, the spotlight is on a group of firms that traded heavily in what are called credit default swaps -- contracts that, in effect, offer to insure corporate bonds, takeover loans and asset-backed securities against default. The buyers of these insurance contracts included banks, pension funds, hedge funds and investment houses that used the swaps to hedge their bets or construct elaborate, computer-driven trading strategies. Now, the prospect that one or more of the insurers may not be able to make good on the insurance has rattled their customers and their lenders, who in some cases are one and the same.
One of those insurers, ACA, is effectively under the receivership of Maryland's insurance commissioner after losing more than $1 billion in the third quarter and seeing its credit rating drop from AAA to CCC in a single move. Merrill Lynch has been forced to write down $1.9 billion to reflect the likelihood of an ACA default, while the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce said it would have to issue $2.75 billion in additional stock to offset losses it thought it had insured against with ACA.
Over the weekend, ACA reached a standstill agreement with creditors and counterparties who agreed to give it 30 days to raise additional capital or unwind its $60 billion in credit default swaps.
Also facing possible ratings downgrades -- and with that, the increased possibility of default-- are ACA's largest rivals, MBIA and Ambac. Together, those firms insure more than $2 trillion in loans, bonds and other securities. Because the credit-default-swaps market is almost completely unregulated, it's anyone's guess who is at the other end of those swaps.
Although most of the focus has been on the unwinding of the credit bubble here in the United States, there are problems with bubbles in other parts of the world. Those, too, played a role in yesterday's stock market rout.
In India, for example, demand for shares has been so frenzied that last week's initial public offering by Reliance Power had 10 investors clamoring for each share that was offered. Not surprisingly, Reliance was one of the biggest losers in yesterday's rout as selling shaved 7.4 percent from the Bombay Stock Exchange's benchmark index of 30 companies.
In China, where demand for shares is so brisk that the Shanghai stock index has more than doubled in each of the past two years, officials recently concluded that one way to cool things down was to increase the supply of shares being traded. It may have been no coincidence, then, that yesterday's 5.14 percent plunge came on the same day that three major share offerings were announced, including $20 billion by Pinan, the insurer.
Stock markets in Russia and Brazil too were hit hard yesterday, each falling by about 7 percent.
This kind of contagion is rarely a one-off event. Indeed, in Europe and Japan, yesterday's rout was merely an acceleration of a sell-off that began months ago. It's unlikely that the bottom has been reached.
As Bill Conway, a founder of the Carlyle Group and the investment guru of the private-equity firm, told The Post's Thomas Heath last week: "We are nearer the beginning than we are the end . . . The economy is going to be relatively weaker, at least for another year, than it has been the last five years. There are very significant problems ahead." |
Last edited by Gatsby on Tue Jan 22, 2008 6:21 am; edited 3 times in total |
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huffdaddy
Joined: 25 Nov 2005
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| Posted: Tue Jan 22, 2008 6:18 am Post subject: |
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| Gatsby wrote: |
It's not what I think that counts; it's what the market thinks. And what people like George Soros thinks. |
You could've made some serious $$$ if you'd laid some puts down a month ago. Money talks, BS walks.
BTW, do you really need to quote the entire article? There are quote limits for a reason. |
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Gatsby
Joined: 09 Feb 2007
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| Posted: Tue Jan 22, 2008 6:25 am Post subject: |
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Yes.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/22/business/23cnd-stox.html?hp
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January 22, 2008
U.S. Markets Open With a Steep Fall
By VIKAS BAJAJ and KEITH BRADSHER
Stocks opened sharply lower on Wall Street Tuesday morning after markets fell around the world over the last two days.
After opening down by more than 460 points, the Dow Jones industrial average was off about 240 points, or 2 percent, at 9:50 a.m. Other indexes were showing declines of 2 to 2.5 percent � a big drop, but not as steep as futures markets had indicated earlier.
The difference was a surprise and large cut in interest rates by the Federal Reserve, a week before a regularly scheduled meeting, announced a little over an hour before the market opened. Markets in Europe trimmed some of their earlier losses after the Fed move, but fell back again.
In an apparent bid to head off a big sell-off in American markets, which were closed Monday in observance of Martin Luther King�s birthday, the Fed lowered its target for the federal funds rate on overnight loans between banks to 3.5 percent, from 4.25 percent.
�There can be no doubt that the timing of this morning�s move is aimed at supporting global financial markets after yesterday�s global equity meltdown,� Joshua Shapiro, chief United States economist at MFR Inc., wrote in a research note Tuesday morning.
In its statement, the Fed said: �The committee took this action in view of a weakening of the economic outlook and increasing downside risks to growth. While strains in short-term funding markets have eased somewhat, broader financial market conditions have continued to deteriorate and credit has tightened further for some businesses and households.�
�Moreover,� the statement continued, �incoming information indicates a deepening of the housing contraction as well as some softening in labor markets.�
In a related action, the Fed approved a 75 basis-point decrease in the discount rate, to 4 percent.
Stock markets across Asia plunged even farther and faster on Tuesday than they had on Monday, as anxious sellers dumped huge numbers of shares on worries that an economic slowdown in the United States could drag down growth around the world.
The European stock markets initially followed their Asian counterparts lower, plunging at the opening and then see-sawing back and forth in frenzied trading as investors looked to the start on Wall Street for direction. After the Fed announcement, they had made up those losses and moved into positive territory, then fell back again. The rate cut was too late for Asian markets, which had already closed.
A decade after a credit crisis in Southeast Asia triggered an �Asian contagion� of stock market declines around the world, the credit crisis in the United States is now producing an �American contagion� to which no stock market seems immune.
Heavy selling hit each Asian and European stock market as soon as it opened. Some of Asia�s easternmost exchanges, which had closed on Monday before the sharpest declines occurred in India and then Europe, suffered particularly steep drops.
The Japanese stock market dropped 5.7 percent, for the worst two-day loss in 17 years, while the Australian stock market tumbled 7.1 percent, its worst single-day loss in nearly two decades. The Shanghai market lost 7.2 percent while the Hang Seng index in Hong Kong plummeted 8.7 percent.
�At this stage, you can say there is panic selling in the market,� said Kwong Man Bun, the chief operating officer of KGI Asia Ltd., a large Asian futures broker. �We don�t think the Hang Seng index has found its bottom yet; the index will continue to go down and will only find its bottom when external markets � namely, the U.S. market � stabilize.�
Jane Coffey, head of equities at Royal London Asset Management in London, said there was some sense that the sell-off in global markets might have been overdone on Monday. She said the partial recovery in Europe in the late morning had been in part fueled by the possibility that the Federal Reserve could act to cut interest rates, perhaps before the open on Wall Street, and that prediction was borne out. One of the biggest losers on Monday and again on Tuesday was India. Trading on the Bombay Stock Exchange was halted for an hour on Tuesday after the Sensex index dropped 11.5 percent shortly after the opening.
Finance Minister P. Chidambaram of India tried to soothe markets with a news conference. �My advice to investors is to stay calm,� he said, adding that India�s economy was slated to grow 9 percent this year and 8.5 percent next year.
Investors did not immediately heed his words, though, and when the market reopened the Sensex fell to more than 12 percent below Monday�s close. But the market rebounded sharply in the afternoon to show a loss of 5 percent.
Across the Asian region, government officials and economists alike blamed the selling on worries about the United States economy, while expressing lingering hopes that the region�s economies would not suffer quite as much in the months ahead as the American economy. Markets in the United States were closed on Monday for the observance of Martin Luther King�s Birthday, but will open Tuesday morning.
�The prospects for ongoing growth in Asia and the developing markets are assisting us to withstand the fallout occurring elsewhere,� said Wayne Swan, Australia�s federal treasurer. He blamed the broader market decline on continued worries about the full scope of problems stemming from losses on subprime mortgages in the United States.
But some economists are much gloomier, and question whether Asia�s fortunes have really �decoupled� from the United States at all.
�Asian, including Southeast Asian, economies, will slow as a result of weakening economic growth in the U.S. and Europe,� said Yiping Huang, the head of Asia and Pacific economic and market analysis at Citigroup.
He added that he did not believe that Asian economies had decoupled at all from the American economy, because so many companies now have closely integrated operations around the world.
The breadth of the selling on Tuesday reflected worries that Asian economies would not escape unscathed. While trade within Asia has expanded rapidly over the past decade, much of it still consists of raw materials and components that are shipped among countries before final assembly, usually in China, and then exported to the United States or the European Union.
While the European Union overtook the United States as China�s largest export market early last year, there have been growing signs this month of a possible economic slowdown as well in Europe. European banks have also sustained heavy losses on mortgage-backed securities from the United States, and the regions exports are starting to face difficulty from the strength of the euro.
Some economists maintain that China, with 11.5 percent economic growth, actually needs the slower pace of exports that an American economic slowdown would bring. Weaker exports would help the Chinese economy avoid overheating, they contend, and prevent further increases in inflation, which hit 6.9 percent at the consumer level in November.
�A U.S. recession is good for the Chinese economy,� Qing Wang, an economist in the Hong Kong office of Morgan Stanley, said in a telephone interview after the close of most Asian trading on Tuesday.
Mr. Huang at Citigroup was more pessimistic about the effect on China of slower exports. �Sharp slowing of external demand could in fact lead to overcapacity, margin squeeze and deflationary pressures in China,� he said in an e-mail message.
For the rest of Asia, an American recession could pose a serious problem � particularly southeast Asia, which has never fully recovered from the Asian financial crisis in 1997 and 1998. Indonesia�s stock market in Jakarta plunged 9.22 percent on Tuesday.
Stockbrokers said that investors were selling heavily for many reasons. Some individuals had to raise money to meet margin calls because they had purchased shares with borrowed money, while some fund managers dumped shares to raise money to meet redemption requests from their investors, said Peter Lai, the securities sales director in the Hong Kong office of DBS Vickers, an Asian retail brokerage.
Fears of what will happen when American stock markets open for trading on Tuesday contributed to the weakness in Asia,
�With the U.S. markets out, there was just nothing to act as a brake on the Japanese market, � said Kazunori Takahashi, head of equity market research at Daiwa Securities SMBC in Tokyo. �The market just spiraled downwards.�
Futures contracts traded in Asia suggested growing expectations through the day that losses in New York will be severe.
�Definitely this is detrimental to the sentiment of the whole market,� Mr. Lai said. |
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huffdaddy
Joined: 25 Nov 2005
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| Posted: Tue Jan 22, 2008 6:31 am Post subject: |
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Is that a "yes" as in "Yes, I'm too stupid to select the relevant information and stay within the quote limits," or "Yes" as in "Yes, I have no respect for the other users, and I'll post whatever I want, whenever I want"? |
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igotthisguitar
Joined: 08 Apr 2003
Location: South Korea (Permanent Vacation)
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| Posted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 2:40 pm Post subject: |
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U.S. War Costs In Iraq Up: Report
By Richard Cowan
Wed Jan 23, 3:23 PM ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Iraq war may not dominate U.S. news reports as the carnage drops, but a new report underscores the financial burden of persistent combat that is helping run up the government's credit card.
"Funding for U.S. operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and other activities in the war on terrorism expanded significantly in 2007," the Congressional Budget Office said in a report released on Wednesday.
War funding, which averaged about $93 billion a year from 2003 through 2005, rose to $120 billion in 2006 and $171 billion in 2007 and President George W. Bush has asked for $193 billion in 2008, the nonpartisan office wrote.
"It keeps going up, up and away," Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad said of the money spent in Iraq since U.S. troops invaded in 2003.
"We're seeing the war costs continue to spiral upward. It is the additional troops plus additional costs per troop plus the over-reliance on private contractors, which also explodes the costs," said Conrad, a North Dakota Democrat who opposed the war.
Since the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, Congress has written checks for $691 billion to pay for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and such related activities as Iraq reconstruction, the CBO said.
There are around 158,000 U.S. troops in Iraq and 27,000 in Afghanistan.
$11 BILLION A MONTH
CONT'D ...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/iraq_usa_spending_dc;_ylt=AmXuDXH1qXhh2UwrcK9Cn3thr7sF |
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