An extremely volatile economy with dampened spirits and investor confidence at the deepest trench. An year of extremities. Fuel hitting 147/barrel before plummeting to 30 something. Stocks fluctuating as spikes in an Electrocardiogram. Investment Banks wiped out - Lehman Brothers and Bear Sterns collapsed while Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley chose to become bank holding companies; Merrill Lynch was gobbled by Bank of America. This ended the era of Investment Banks in the United States. WAMU was the largest bank failure in US. 25 Banks have closed down in 2008. Here is the 2008 failed banks list. (Source: FDIC)
More than half a dozen airlines have shut business. Automobile companies are fighting for survival and some of them are staring down the barrel. CEOs of these companies are like deer caught-in-headlights. IT sector's outlook is bleak. Start-ups and mid-size companies are in severe cash crunch. And ofcourse, there are housing, real-estate and mortgage issues that plague the economy.
Personally, I feel we have moved over the worst part of this recession. I hope the proposed bailout works soon and get the economy back on track. Whatever the measures are, to restore investors' confidence and eventually the economy, results will not be achieved overnight. It will be a slow but steady way upwards hopefully from mid-2009.
Here is me wishing everyone a prosperous, refreshing and a very Happy New Year.
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