S&P below 1,000

Just a quick update on the bet I made with a friend of mine I hinted to a few blogs ago. I was giving the S&P 12 months to touch 1,000 (at the time I made the bet, the S&P was trading around 1,300), and it just touched it yesterday, closing at 996. I’ll collect my pizza when my friend comes back from the red sea. He works in finance, but every time there is something interesting going on, he is missing...

Sponsored search and economic crisis

What we have seen so far in online advertising is a shift from brand spend to direct response spend, i.e. from banner into sponsored search, affiliate marketing and the likes. It does make complete sense. Given the though economic environment, and the pressure in companies on controlling costs while maintaining revenues, a shift from brand spend (i.e. demand generation) toward direct response (i.e. demand...

The 1.8 trillion dollars bailout

CNBC has made an interesting analysis on the US government bailout of the financial crisis. It’s not just 700bn$, more like 1.8trn$. Quick laundry list: 700bn$ recently announced plan to buy assets from bank 150bn$ MBS purchase by Fannie and Freddie 85bn$ for AIG 90bn$ in repayment to JPM for Lehman 200bn$ for Freddie and Fannie 300bn$ for FHA 200bn$ of currently outstanding loans Fed’s issued to...

Wow!

Ok I am sorry and I have to apologise. Been quiet for quite a while, but have been travelling a bit, went on vacation for long and been quite busy with my work. Also, have been quite shocked at what happened recently in the world. Probably about to recover as I write. To summarize: Freedie and Fannie went “bust”. Well, they did. Lehman’s going bust, or something. Next, please. Oil down to 100$ and...

The economy slow down and online advertising

We surely are in an economic slowdown, if not in a recession. Some even say a depression. How long it is going to last isn’t easy to say. Some say months, some say quarters, some others (a few, in fairness) say years. I say at least quarters, and I say recession, without inflation. So what is going to be the effect of such difficult times on advertising? Well, surely a cut in spend. Marketing budgets are...