"Disregard them," says Barry Ritholtz, CEO of Fusion IQ, who notes the existing home sales number was juiced by sales of cheap condos and various government programs. Meanwhile, the Case-Shiller results were below expectations.

We are "not even close" to a bottom in housing, says Ritholtz, who estimates national house prices remain 15-20% overvalued, based on the traditional metrics of: median income-to-median sales price, the cost of owning vs. renting, and housing stock as a percent of GDP.

"Until we start seeing a healthy housing market that can stand on its own, without government props, without distressed properties selling 60% off peak levels - that's how you know the bottom is in," says the blogger and Bailout Nation author. (Full disclosure: I edited Ritholtz's book and was paid for my contributions.)

The likely best-case-scenario for housing is...

Click "more" to view the rest of the post and embed the video.» More

The economic recovery isn't as strong as first thought. Revised GDP figures released this morning show the economy grew at a 2.8% annualized pace in the third quarter, less than the 3.5% initially reported. The revision was in-line with expectations but shows the economy didn't have as much momentum heading into the fourth quarter as previously believed.

Unlike Wall Street traders, consumers seem to know the recovery is "anemic," as Barry Ritholtz, CEO of Fusion IQ, describes it. The Conference Board's latest confident survey shows Americans feel worse about the current economic situation than they did in March, when the stock market was making new lows. (Thanks to Dan Greenhaus of Miller Tabak for pointing this out this last fact.)

Yet, stocks are still near their highs of the year. Going into the final hours of trading Tuesday, stocks were in the red but well off the lows of the day.

What's driving the disconnect between Wall Street and Main Street?

Ritholtz says it's a classic example of bad news being good news on Wall Street. "We're in a cycle that's not based on profitability, not based on expanding economy but based on all sorts of government supports," he says. "Bad news is going to be good news for the next couple of quarters probably."

That's because...

From The Business Insider, Nov. 24, 2009:

The FDIC fund that insures bank deposits is $8.2 billion in the hole.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. released its latest set of grim banking data moments ago. The FDIC had to set aside $21.7 billion for expected losses on future bank failures as the total number of "problem" banks rose to 552 from 416.

There were glimmers of hope. While bad loans continue to beat up bank balance sheets, revenues are returning to the banking sector. Overall, the banking sector was profitable after a $4.3 billion loss in the second quarter and saw just $879 million in earnings last year.

More coverage from The Business Insider:

• FDIC Will Keep Backstopping Banks...Just in Case
• FDIC Says Banks Need to Cough Up $45 Billion for Insurance Fund

Not happy with your bank? The feeling is likely mutual.

Don't be surprised if your bank soon decides they don't want your business anymore, says Rochdale Securities bank analyst Dick Bove.

Why?

Bank regulators and Congress are looking at ways at making the system more safe and sound in order to avoid another meltdown. What on the surface seems like a wise and prudent decision, however may have unintended consequences, most notably higher fees for bounced checks, credit card balances and the like.

"The way a bank discourages a customer from doing business with it is to make the cost of doing business so high the customer gets upset and leaves," Bove says. "I think that’s the methodology," although some unprofitable accounts will be closed by the banks, as American Express has been doing. (AmEx canceled 3.3 million cards globally in the second and third quarters, TheStreet.com reports.)

Bove says as much as 30% of U.S. households could find themselves being forced out of their banks since they're not deemed profitable.

As the government moves to make the cost of banking higher for the banks, they're going to have to pass on those costs to the consumer," Bove says. "If the consumer doesn’t like it, the consumer is going to have to rely on these less-established methodologies of getting finance and moving money."

With the financial sector ETF up about 135% from its March lows, some of the banking sector's most notable bears are on the prowl again:

• Last week, Meredith Whitney told CNBC "I haven't been this bearish in a year" and was even more downbeat in an interview with Bloomberg radio: "The banks are still grossly overvalued," she said. "People are expecting something great to happen in 2010 and I think they are going to be severely disappointed."
• Last month, IRA's Chris Whalen told Tech Ticker the fourth-quarter is going to be a "bloodbath" for the bank earnings.

Dick Bove, banking analyst at Rochdale Securities, doesn't disagree the sector's earnings are likely to be weak in the fourth-quarter and first half of 2010. But as is so often the case, he's willing to provide the bullish ying to the bearish yang of Whitney and Whalen.

"The potential growth you get from buying these stocks at the current time is so attractive that it's worthwhile buying them and closing your eyes concerning what earnings are going to be this quarter or the following quarter," Bove tells Henry and me in the accompanying video.

That comment pertains generally to the sector, save regional banks, and especially investment banks exposed to the "explosion of M&A activity" Bove sees in 2010, including Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Evercore Partners and Lazard.

Incredibly, the quote above was made specifically in reference to Bank of America and Citigroup, the two struggling giants of U.S. banking...

Click "more" to view the rest of the post and embed the video.» More

Suddenly, it's the least attractive job in the country.

Bank of America has been searching for a new CEO for months, ever since battered Ken Lewis announced that he was stepping down.  But no one wants the job. 

Why not?

Because they'll have to listen to annoying government bureaucrats vilify them all day, says analyst Dick Bove of Rochdale Securities.  Because they'll be unable to hire top people because of pay constraints.  Because they'll be forced to chop up the company instead of reaping the rewards of scale.  Because they'll be limited to a pay package that would make the average dime-a-dozen Wall Street managing director go bitching to his boss about how he was being underpaid.

All of which means, Bove says, that Bank of America's board once again looks incompetent. ...

Click "more" to view the full post and embed the video.

Peter Schiff's views as an author, investor and free market idealist are no secret: Abolish the Fed, buy gold and avoid the dollar. With that in mind, Sunday night was something of a dream come true for the President of Euro Pacific Capital.

Thanks To Princeton University's Business Today, Schiff went head to head in New York City with St. Louis Federal Reserve President James Bullard and former Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Alan Blinder in a panel titled, "Challenges of the Global Slowdown: Redefining Government Regulation."

It might as well have been called "Schiff Blames the Fed for the Financial Crisis."

We caught up with Schiff after the panel to discuss some of the points mentioned in greater detail. (Click here for our one-on-one intereview with Bullard from the confab.)

Schiff on capitalism

The irony here is that Bullard is being characterized as a dove when, in fact, the opposite may be true. This is no small matter since Bullard will become a voting member of the FOMC in 2010.

So let's review:

The dollar weakness Monday morning was attributed, in part, to Bullard's comments that he would like to see the Fed continue its program of buying mortgage-backed and other asset-backed securities, rather than let it expire on March 31, as currently planned.

As with last week's brouhaha over his comments about the Fed possibly staying on hold until 2012, the headlines about the asset-buying program miss some of the nuance of Bullard's view.

Bullard recommends continuing the program "at a very low level," Dow Jones reports, adding: "As long as we are at zero [percent], we'd be able to send signals to the markets about what we are thinking about the economy, and how much accommodation the economy needs at various points, by adjusting the asset purchases."

In other words, if the asset-buying program is kept open, it can be another tool for the Fed to communicate with the market by means other than moving the Fed funds rate.

After spending some time with Bullard Sunday evening, it's pretty clear to me that he's no dove. As you'll see in the accompanying video, Bullard is very concerned about the potential for asset bubbles and the Fed's role in creating them...

Click "more" to view the rest of the post and embed the video.» More

From The Business Insider, Nov. 23, 2009:

Microsoft (MSFT) wants to pay News Corp (NWS) and other large publishers to de-list their Web sites from Google's (GOOG) search index, the Financial Times reports.

The idea is to force Google (GOOG) to pay for content, thinning its currently fat margins.

Problem is, we can't imagine Google going for it.

For one, the FT reports that Google’s UK director Matt Brittin told a conference last week that Google did not need news content to survive.

“Economically it’s not a big part of how we generate revenue,” he said

For another, we can't imagine links to worthwhile stories originating from News Corp not finding their way onto sites that will happily remain indexed in Google's search engine free of charge.

Still, if News Corp were to "de-list" from Google, we'd expect to see all kinds of ads touting Bing as the only place to find the Wall Street Journal and MySpace pages online. Maybe that'd swing search engine share some, but we doubt it.

More coverage from The Business Insider:

• Droid price drops to $120
• AOL unveils new brand, new logos

From The Business Insider, Nov. 23, 2009:

The New York Times -- not usually the first publication you'd think of when it comes to calling for fiscal prudence -- sounds the alarm over the government's massive debt load.

The premise is that, although we're fine now, borrowing money cheaply, we've got a huge refi coming up, and there's an excellent chance it will be way more expensive.

With the national debt now topping $12 trillion, the White House estimates that the government’s tab for servicing the debt will exceed $700 billion a year in 2019, up from $202 billion this year, even if annual budget deficits shrink drastically. Other forecasters say the figure could be much higher.

In concrete terms, an additional $500 billion a year in interest expense would total more than the combined federal budgets this year for education, energy, homeland security and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

A really astounding fact, noted in the article...

Click "more" to view the full post.

More coverage from The Busines Insider:

• Ben Bernanke's 1938 parallel
• Goldman super bullish on China