Comments on: Rethinking Insurable Interest, Redux

By: Ridge Runner

Ridge Runner — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 15:05:26 +0000

‘Those of us who do not believe in “morals” have suffered too long at the tyranny of the smugly self-righteous’

Sociopaths mostly inflict suffering on those around them, which is what makes for the peculiar culture of prisons, where high concentrations of such individuals tend to occur.

Perhaps the best resolution for this unhappy population would be to define boundaries for a large reserve area, staffing the boundaries with a suitably trained and motivated border guard, and encouraging such non-believers in morals to emigrate to this territory of their own, where they can prey on each other rather than their “moralistic” neighbors, and thereby escape incarceration at a great savings to the non-sociopath public.

This is about as close to a “win-win” solution as one might achieve with those who refuse to recognize the legitimacy of social constraints on their behavior. Life would likely be turbulent and short in this territory, but at least the residents would not have to put up with any pesky “morals” to cramp their style.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisocial_personality_disorder

By: Erich Riesenberg

Erich Riesenberg — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 02:15:31 +0000

Wouldn’t setting up a counterparty exchange eliminate the problems with CDS in general? As margin calls surge, the CDS would get closed out.

Of course, it doesn’t seem like many of the entities supporting exchanges want to take on CDS risk, which is telling, and self regulating.

At least, regulated entites such as banks and insurance companies should be required to conduct CDS business only with counterparty exchanges.

By: PaulinKansasCity

PaulinKansasCity — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 23:17:15 +0000

WE can all debate on “social good”; gambling a great example. Remember; the markets real purpose is capital formation; excessive speculation can turn it into a bankruptcy liquidation pricing market. The turn of the 20th century probably is a good example of what those markets would look like; If our markets must be that way so be it; but be prepared to live in a world of limited credit. I wouldn’t mind living init necessarily; but who wants to go into a transition of that magnitude; look at Russia 1998 and 1999 and see what happens. One man’s opinion.

By: PaulinKansasCity

PaulinKansasCity — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 23:13:07 +0000

Everyday competition (unfortunately) has to be defined. Insurable interest was the result of insurance companies (correctly) understanding that if you insure your neighbor’s home or life it would eventually cripple/end the industry and insuranc does serve a general social good of stability. Notice the exclusion of nuclear war, terrorism, etc. Some things the nation has to collectively insure (eg FDIC) for stability purposes. Insurable interest for lives is obvious; but if it wasn’t enough companies would have failed quickly that the idea would not have lasted. Now for CDS; not have capital requirements and nothing massively disruptive happening (until now) allowed the mess to get bigger and bigger. But people underestimate what that market can do in a fear sense; bid up the CDS contracts (which it appears can be done easily as they are not overly liquid) can cause fear to rollover debt; that happened and the highly leveraged nature of our system started imploding. These tools can be used to destroy a company; shorting not so easily if done with the uptick rule and the borrow rules (not enforced). Puts and Calls have time expiration; it appeasr CDS really do not (I am no expert; i rely on people like Dave). There is no “free market”; all markets have rules of conduct. Contract Law is basic to all commerce as a man’s word is not good enough when it comes to money.

By: Ben Williams

Ben Williams — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 19:11:49 +0000

The first thing I think of in insurable interest is puts — how are equity puts different here than CDSs?

Second, “In the same way, corporations have a right to not have to worry about being harmed by those that might have an economic interest in their demise” — sounds a lot like everyday competition to me.

By: ccm

ccm — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 16:50:37 +0000

I agree that a prohibition on OTC CDS is excessive: they should simply be made unenforceable in a court of law. I think a distinction needs to be made between the right of contract (which does not need to be limited) and the right to have the power of the State applied in enforcing your contract (which is needless-to-say a legislative/judicial decision).

By: IF

IF — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 16:46:24 +0000

“In the same way, corporations have a right to not have to worry about being harmed by those that might have an economic interest in their demise”

How do you kill a corporation? A low stock price or high CDS should not kill a company (at least a non-financial). Isn’t the problem with CDS that companies like AIG thought they could get free lunch by writing a lot of CDS at too low premium leading to a _systemic_ effect (effectively killing AIG et al and not the companies the CDS were written on). It seems to me you have it backwards on who is getting killed by the CDS. If I am wrong, name me one non-financial that was “murdered” because of AIG, JPM etc CDS bets.

By: KK

KK — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 15:41:20 +0000

80% of CDS are owned by “investors” (speculators) that don’t own the underlying bonds. This has been a recipe for disaster. I am all for insurable interest in the CDS market, with a tranparent exchange.

By: Kurt Osis

Kurt Osis — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 14:34:46 +0000

P.S. Don’t the aforementioned stake holders deserve the ability to hedge their exposure? Why shouldn’t a pensioner be able to buy a credit default swap on his employer? Or municipality on a major corporation headquartered in its jurisdiction or a supplier on its major customer?

By: Kurt Osis

Kurt Osis — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 14:29:03 +0000

David:

Can you please justify this statement “gambling should be opposed on public policy grounds.”

What next? You have to own stock in order to buy a put?

Those of us who do not believe in “morals” have suffered too long at the tyranny of the smugly self-righteous, this is going too far. The only difference between gambling and investing is self delusion. Next we’ll be banning bonds “on public policy grounds” because its immoral to make money off of money. And soon sharia law. This is just like a long nightmare that won’t end.