Financial crisis hits IndyMac

As per a report from AP. IndyMac Bank is been placed under FDIC and will reopen on Monday (07/14/08) as IndyMac Federal Bank FSB.

This turmoil will hit more who are faced with the ever growing foreclosure crisis and the soon to be retired people who have had placed money and bought shares of such financial institutions. This people may have to rethink about retirement as the the funds will be shrinking and the inflation soars. Lets hope senate passes the "Foreclosure rescue plan" soon to save the people and the banks some time to recuperate.

Can using GPS save greens on gas?

Yesterday i bought a Magellan 4250 GPS from Circuit City. I had been avoiding incurring this expense thinking i will use Google maps or MapQuest to reach the destination, but in spite of this paper copies i have gone in circles and missed the destination on number of occasion. Okay, I'm not directionally challenged, but due to detours as summer is the favorite time to repair the roads, i have wasted gas and time.
I plan to recover the cost of the unit ( i bought a open box item so it was cheap far less then $300.00) within 2 yrs time by avoiding getting lost and saving gas.

What do you guys think has the time come to categorize a GPS as a "Need" and not a "Want" and can it save some money?

JP Morgan Chase to acquire Bears Stearns

JPMorgan Chase announced today that it will acquire the investment bank Bears Stearns in an transaction for stock to stock exchange. On the basis of the closing stock price of March 15th, 2008 the value per share comes to merge $2.00 . Based on a report from BBC business site, Bears Stearns had a sub-prime loss of US$3.2 bn and lately JP Morgan Chase with the backing from Federal Bank of New York was to provide some emergency funds.

Another article on BBC says that Bears Stearns is(was?) the Wall Street's fifth largest investment bank and there where speculations that it was finding hard to come up with funds for its daily operations. The shares dropped 46% on Friday (March 14th, 2008) on the news that the banks is driven to insolvency by the hedge funds clients.

Looking back to my post i wrote on February 28th,2008 about the grim banking forecast, it looks like the reality of banks facing the sub-prime mess is hitting close to home.