Rolfe Winkler

Consumer protection agency in doubt (Paletta, WSJ) Chris Dodd appears willing to trade the CFPA in exchange for Republican support of his financial reform bill.

Manhattan apt rents drop 9.4% in Q4 (Gittelsohn, Bloomberg) Great stimulus for the NY economy.

Volcker calls for support in fighting bank lobby on reforms (Harper, Bloomberg) Looking to get a copy of this speech to post later today.

Can online comments affect your credit? Yup. (Sandberg, SF Chronicle) More an oddity than a trend, but interesting nonetheless.

CBO: Fannie/Freddie cost government $291 billion in ’09 (Golobay, HW) The full report from CBO is here. CBO estimates the total cost of subsidizing Fan/Fred will only be $99 billion more through the end of 2019. Meanwhile most of the housing stock in the U.S. will end up on the government’s balance sheet.

JP Morgan loan losses overshadow higher profit (Comlay, Reuters) The bank reported earnings that beat analyst estimates, but the reasons for the beat — lower taxes and lower bonus accruals in JPM’s investment bank — are considered “low quality” because they aren’t sustainable sources of profit. And lower bonus accruals may sound good from a populist point of view, but they don’t really help anyone other than bank shareholders who get to retain the earnings.

Monologue wars (Gawker) Late night hasn’t been this interesting in years. The 10@10 segment with Jimmy Kimmel on Leno is gold. In related news, Conan’s show is for sale on Craigslist.

Roger Ebert vs. Rush Limbaugh (SunTimes)

The Exorcist (imgur)

Windpipe transplant renews Belgian’s life (AP) A Belgian woman has a working windpipe after surgeons implanted the trachea from a dead man into her arm, where it grew new blood vessels before being transplanted into her throat.

For the next time you’re playing H-O-R-S-E. And the handshake at 0:18 is possibly more impressive than the shot….

Jamie gets a deal! (Bloomberg) Prof. Linus Wilson had been estimated that warrants the government got as part of its TARP bailout for JP Morgan were worth $11-$37.  They ended up selling for $10.75. The lower price is most likely because these are not common securities, are illiquid, and therefore worth less than we all thought. Can’t really complain. The market spoke. Dimon looks smart for refusing to negotiate bilaterally with Treasury to repurchase them. Treasury was driving too hard a bargain. IIn retrospect, that means the deals on TARP warrants for the likes of AmEx and Goldman ended up going off much better for taxpayers. But Hank Paulson still did far worse negotiating with banks for emergency capital than Warren Buffett. Shame.

Ginnie Mae’s growth puts taxpayers on the hook (Grow/Goldfarb, WaPo…via Patrick) Ginnie packages FHA mortgages into mortgage-backed securities. It’s the next Fannie/Freddie….

Stratfor: It’s not just Greece, other Eurozone countries (Delivingne, Money Game)

Wealth rebound in Q3, is it sustainable? (EconomPIC data) More fun from the Fed’s flow of funds report.

Why women are hottest in coutries with too few dudes (Hooking up smart) Supply and demand at work.

Craigslist and eBay in legal fight (Hals, Reuters)

The Morgan Freeman chain of command (Maxim)

Bad choice of ClipArt (imgur)

I find this hilarious….a pretty emotional reaction to Return of the Jedi….”do they put R2D2 back together?”