Mark-to-Market is a love it or hate it sort of topic. Either you think its critical to proper disclosure or you think its tearing the financial system apart. Either way, you probably will want to pay attention to what happens when the US Accounting Board and the SEC emerge from their tender love-making session, and who is wearing a grin.
Updates, along with FAS 157 discussion, to come!
US accounting board, SEC discuss fair value [Reuters]
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 2:00PM
Mark to Gary Busey's assesment
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 2:08PM
Get rid of Fair Accounting and make this thing go away for Moses' sake.
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 2:08PM
Get rid of Fair Accounting and make this thing go away for Moses' sake!
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 2:09PM
Ummm...didn't LEH go down because everyone called bullshit on their "mark to market" marks. So in a HTM world people will still do the same exercise and call bullshit on the historical book values. I fail to see how this is a solution.
Posted by StupidEquityGuy , Sep 30, 2008 2:09PM
So are there any implications for stupid guys who drive equity funds? We already use MTM daily. It is kind of funny how the client has to use MTM, but the Vendor can not handle the pricing risk themselves.
~SEG
Maybe it is time to have a jubilee and chuck the bankers under the bus...
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 2:15PM
Too long, didn't mark.
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 2:17PM
Suspending mark-to-market is not a solution. It might hide certain problems as @2 is suggesting.
Ultimately and in the long term, any accounting rule does little to affect the real profitability of a company - what it does though is shift the balance of information. And where you want this balance is what you should be thinking about when setting your accounting rules
Posted by FUNdamental , Sep 30, 2008 2:18PM
Those dirty accountants had their hands all over enron too!! They are terrorist organizations!!! Hang the accountants. These mindless drones of order are killing American ingenuity and entrepreneurship. America, fuck yeah!!!!
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 2:19PM
Just tweak the underlying algorithm or model to produce the results you want/need.
I'm sure there's some Enron analysts that could help you bankers out.
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 2:19PM
Don't you know that the suspension of MTM accounting started yesterday? Therefore, we really did not lose more than a trillion dollars, as the fundamental value of equities is much higher than yesterday's close.
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 2:22PM
Will the new MTM rules allow me to lend more against my house? The wife needs a naked cherub fountain on the front lawn.
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 2:22PM
Will the new MTM rules allow me to borrow more against my house? The wife needs a naked cherub fountain on the front lawn.
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 2:28PM
Tried this; doesn't work
-DF
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 3:16PM
What the fuck is the SEC doing?
SEG has it right on.
Yes the problem is the short sellers and the only accounting rule which actually forces financial institutions to mark their balance sheets with any truth.
Wow i already have more confidence.
I have an idea: why don't we just pass a law that says the market cannot go down.
Isn't it great when losing teams try and change the rules half way through the season. Instead of changing players and playing a better fundamental game.
Posted by NotNasser , Sep 30, 2008 3:32PM
Ahhh. An accounting debate. It's been so long.
Now, for this of us for whom this isn't quite nerdy enough, can we please have another discussion about proxy access rules sometime soon???
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 3:50PM
Deloitte is going to conduct massive layoffs - mark that to market.
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 4:39PM
@14 is a genius (because he thinks like me...)
"I have an idea: why don't we just pass a law that says the market cannot go down."
I've been arguing this for several weeks: why settle for trifles like banning short selling and prohibiting MTM? Make it a felony to sell anything below cost! Issue a gag order against whoever it is that calculates the DJ Average from publishing unless the market is up at least 0.5%!
And these are just starter ideas; I'm sure the combined genius of Washington and Wall Street can come up with several other, brilliant, out of the box, revolutionary ideas that will guarantee - guarantee! - that the outrages perpetrated recently will never happen again.
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 4:43PM
@14 is a genius (because he thinks like me...)
"I have an idea: why don't we just pass a law that says the market cannot go down."
I've been arguing this for several weeks: why settle for trifles like banning short selling and prohibiting MTM? Make it a felony to sell anything below cost! Issue a gag order against whoever it is that calculates the DJ Average from publishing unless the market is up at least 0.5%!
And these are just starter ideas; I'm sure the combined genius of Washington and Wall Street can come up with several other, brilliant, out of the box, revolutionary ideas that will guarantee - guarantee! - that the outrages perpetrated recently will never happen again.
Posted by guest , Sep 30, 2008 4:45PM
@14 is a genius (because he thinks like me...)
"I have an idea: why don't we just pass a law that says the market cannot go down."
I've been arguing this for several weeks: why settle for trifles like banning short selling and prohibiting MTM? Make it a felony to sell anything below cost! Issue a gag order against whoever it is that calculates the DJ Average from publishing unless the market is up at least 0.5%!
And these are just starter ideas; I'm sure the combined genius of Washington and Wall Street can come up with several other, brilliant, out of the box, revolutionary ideas that will guarantee - guarantee! - that the outrages perpetrated recently will never happen again.
Posted by NotNasser , Oct 01, 2008 12:07PM
u only have to hit "post" once, genius.