Update #1/ week of September 28, 2009

Good Morning Everyone and Happy Monday! What’s happening in the stock market this morning? Good question . . . there’s no economic news releases today, and no corporate announcements of note. The only thing that’s happening of any positive consequence is some M&A activity. Mergers and Acquisitions are viewed as a positive scenario for the stock market as it shows companies have money and are willing to spend it based on a bright outlook for the future. On the other hand, this is a good time to pick up companies that need some help or are “on the bubble.”

Clearly there is plenty of cash out sitting in the safe at investment houses, and bull traders are willing to spend it (since there is basically no chance of return most anywhere else) and take advantage of a quiet session to recoup some of the losses from last week. Is this sustainable? One wouldn’t think so, but this is an awfully difficult market to predict – we’re certainly in uncharted territory. In my humble opinion, what’s happening today is just fluff. There’s no basis for it, and the equity rally will be short lived.

Credit markets were in a mood to improve this morning until the stock market took off like it did and was able to hold on to its gains for a few hours. Thus, the credit market now has retreated to hedge their bets and wait and see what happens later today and throughout the week. Pricing is actually slightly better on most note offerings this morning compared to Friday morning’s rate sheet. So, we’ll take it for now, we were due a little betterment after Friday’s good day on the credit side.

The 30 year conforming pricing on the top of page 1 is yielding a cost of just over 1 point at 4.5%! Pretty hot pricing! Remember, we assume no impounds in our pricing.

I will be in the office all day today, and am available for your pricing or loan scenario questions. Call me here or better yet email me . . . and have a terrific Monday and a very profitable week!