A clear look at how to capture investment profits during difficult financial times The U.S. economy has become crippled by the credit and real estate catastrophe. Even though we've all been affected by the calamity and have heard no shortage of news about it, it still seems unfathomable and utterly incomprehensible to most people that the actions of certain mortgage brokers, bankers, ratings agencies, and investment banks could break the economic engine of the world. Now, for the first time, and in terms everyone can grasp, noted analysts and value investing experts Whitney Tilson and Glenn Tongue explain not only how it happened, but shows that the tsunami of credit problems isn't over. The second wave has yet to come. But if you know catastrophe is looming, you can sidestep the train wreck-and even profit. You just need to understand how bad times present opportunity and where to look. More Mortgage Meltdown can help you achieve this goal. The book
- Breaks down the complex mortgage products and rocket-science securities Wall Street created
- Addresses how to find investment opportunities within the rubble and position your portfolio to take advantage of the crisis
- Explains exactly how the combination of aggressive lending, government missteps, and Wall Street trading practices created the perfect economic storm
- Shows you why the crisis is not yet over and what we can expect going forward
More Mortgage Meltdown can help you understand the events that have unfolded, and put you in a better position to profit from the opportunities that arise during these tough financial times. |
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 Strong Insight into the Mortgage Crisis |
| Review Date: June 21, 2010 |
| Reviewer: Daily Reckoning, Baltimore, MD, USA |
America, it seems, just went crazy -- borrowers, lenders, nearly everybody. These anecdotes and others are told in a new book titled More Mortgage Meltdown by money managers Whitney Tilson and Glenn Tongue.
But what caused the mania and how we got there is less to the point than what happens from here. That is what Mortgage Meltdown seeks to answer.
"If the problems in the mortgage market were limited to subprime loans, then the carnage would be mostly behind us," the authors note. Subprime loans were the riskiest mortgage loans. Prime loans were where the borrower made a substantial down payment and had good credit history. Subprime loans, by contrast, were to borrowers of poor credit quality and spotty job histories.
The bigger problem is that the mortgage bubble infected a number of areas beyond just subprime. The subprime crisis was the first to drop, like a marathon dancer that falls to the floor exhausted. But there are still other dancers on the floor ready to topple over too.
Review by a writer for Agora Financial, publisher of economic and financial analysis including Financial Reckoning Day Fallout: Surviving Today's Global Depression, The New Empire of Debt: The Rise and Fall of an Epic Financial Bubble, and I.O.U.S.A.: One Nation. Under Stress. In Debt. |
Two Great Books in One
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| Review Date: January 17, 2010 |
| Reviewer: Jacob Wolinsky, monsey, ny |
I have been doing a series of book reviews on the financial crisis.. My latest book is More Mortgage Meltdown by Whitney Tilson and Glenn Tongue. Whitney Tilson helped author Poor Charlie's Almanack a book about Charlie Munger. In addition to being an author, Tilson is a financial columnist for several publicans including the Financial Times. He also manages several value mutual funds. Tilson is the CEO of Value Insight, a value investment newsletter and chairman of the Value Investing Congress.
I have no idea how Whitney Tilson found the time to write More Mortgage Meltdown, but he did a good job. The book is really two books in one.
The first part of the book describes the mess we are on and how we got there. Tilson published the book in early 2009; however he was bearish on real estate far before the book was published. Tilson provides extensive data on the housing bubble and demonstrates how the trend was clearly unsustainable. The author also does a good job explaining the differences between Subprime, Alt-A, Prime, option ARM loans. Tilson is very bearish in March 2009 he estimated $3.8 trillion in total losses to the worldwide financial system. This is even more than Dr Doom Nouriel Roubini who estimated $3.5 trillion in early 2009.
The second part of the book starts with a short introduction to value investing. Tilson then provides an in depth analysis of six different investments of his. The six investments are three stocks the author was long, two stocks short and a pool of distressed mortgages. The three stocks the author was long are Berkshire Hathaway, American Express (Tilson seems to be a fan of Buffett), and Resource America ( a small cap stock). The two stocks he was short are MBIA and Wells Fargo.
Tilson writes that several weeks before the book was published he reversed his short on Wells Fargo, and went long. This tells me something very important about the author. When someone is bearish on the economy as Tilson clearly is, many times they will not buy stocks regardless of price. Tilson was bearish on Wells Fargo but realized at a certain price even a distressed company can be a good buy. This is one of Benjamin Graham's most important "although there are good and bad companies, there is no such thing as a good stock; there are only good stock prices, which come and go." When I realized Tilson was following in the footsteps of Graham, I knew I could trust his advice.
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Superb review and analysis of root causes for current crisis
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| Review Date: January 11, 2010 |
| Reviewer: George E. Thomas, New York, NY |
| Absolutely superb review of the underlying causes of the current mortgage crisis. Funny to look at some of the data and charts (in retrospect) and wonder what people were thinking about. The first few chapters provide a very user friendly walk through key statistics, measures and ratios that were completely out of normal/observed ranges. Very informative, accessible and well researched. |
Whitney Tilson is A Leading Expert on the Future of Housing
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| Review Date: January 10, 2010 |
| Reviewer: Amazonian, Westport CT |
| Stop everything you are doing and order this book and go to the charts section of [...] and then go to [...] and enter your home address and see a chart of your home value. Whiteny Tilson is a cornerstone in the Value Investing community and has taken on the unpleasant task of documenting the why's, how's, and who's of the mortgage crisis. But the future is even scarier. The updated charts on his website really hone in on the growing defaults of the Prime and Alt A borrowers. Whitney's obsession in this area will prove valuable to those that listen. Rare to see such a young man devote such an incredible amount of time and effort to protecting us all. Thank you Whitney and Glenn. I get you guys and am looking forward to seeing how this all works out. Good luck to all. |
A time-sensitive must read for any investment minded individual
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| Review Date: November 21, 2009 |
| Reviewer: T. Snider, Los Angeles, CA |
| For those who naively subscribe to the consensus of denial that the worst is behind us, we ain't seen nuthin' yet. I have urged friends and loved ones to read this book post haste. This book is exceptionally potent in information, analysis and insight and Mr. Tilson et al have digested vast amounts of sophisticated data into a comprehensive format that has been made accessible in layman's terms and thoroughly illustrated with graphs and relevant examples. That Mr. Tilson has made available to us in print, his sought after expertise by firms wiling to pay thousands for it, is an act of benevolence on his part. The information in this book is absolutely critical to anyone who has money invested in anything outside a mattress. It will inform your decisions and help shape your investment initiatives whether they are securities, real estate or other. At the risk of employing yet another cliché, if you do not read this book and inform yourself of the pending calamity off the near horizon, you'll be sorry. |
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More Mortgage Meltdown: 6 Ways to Profit in These Bad Times
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