Financial Engineering
- Chicago made headlines at the end of February after Moody’s downgraded the city’s general obligation bond rating to Baa2. Moody’s has cut Chicago’s rating five notches in less than two years. This downgrade, however, placed the city’s credit below the termination triggers on some of its outstanding interest rate swaps. The city has been working to renegotiate the terms of those contracts with its counter-parties.
If Chicago’s general obligation rating falls below investment grade, the city’s credit deterioration will become a self-fulfilling prophesy. The city risks nearly $400 million of swap termination payments and the acceleration of its $294 million of outstanding short-term debt.
Unsurprisingly, some of Chicago’s bonds are already trading at junk levels.
The article is rather lengthy, but it covers the city's financial situation more thoroughly that anything we've read recently, from the short terms pitfalls, the scoop-and-toss refunding, all the way to a Chapter 9 bankruptcy. Give it a read - the better educated we all are during the upcoming Rahm-times, the better off we might be.
Labels: money questions
posted by SCC at 12:33 AM
29 Comments:
All I see is financial doom for Chicago. Time to get while the getting is good.
Most voted for Richie M. Daley..Mayor for 22 years...Y'all couldn't be told. He did all the damage and you enjoyed every bit of it till now the money ran out...except now they are going to burn money again in the River this summer...$100,000.00 worth of
it..in honor of the miserable Chicago Fire where many lives were lost. Shame. That surely is a down-grade...burning money in the River. Where is Moody's?
Yeah...
It's a hard kick in the ass to all you ignorant m/fers who were so fucking desperate to annoint Rahm as some kind of municipal finance guru because he parlayed insider information and contacts gleaned from his times in the White House into a personal fortune.
"Boooo!
Rahm has a plan and the other guy doesn't!"
Rahm had both sets of municipal books with which to
take the mayoral candidate quiz.
Garcia and his financial people weren't afforded the same courtesy.
Incumbency, shit-assery and trainloads of outsider money to keep Rahm in office, made the difference.
Darn...
And we were hoping to see some deserving dirty m/ fers dancing at the end of a gallows rope.
This is why I don't understand how anyone in the media could say Emanuel has done anything positive regarding our economic situation in Chicago.
Under Emanuel, our finances have steadily worsened, while Rahm spends more and more money that we simply don't have.
Random musings:
Thanks Rich Daley.
Does anyone think Chuy would have had the smarts to work through this mess?
Jon Stewart be damned, He is clueless about Chicago politics and finances.
This is why Rahm got re-elected.
"The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
― Margaret Thatcher
Is the state of IL in much better shape?
I can see the headline, 40 years later,
Obama to Chicago - Drop Dead!
Who knew?
Rahm not good with finances!
That's an oxymoron.
Maybe the city should hire her? She seems to know what's goin on! Nah, she's no one that nobody sent!
Order up. Mikey Madigan sandwich with special sauce!
The most idiotic thing Chicago did was for the CPS to "balance" its budget by pretending there's 14 months in a year. If you did that for a private corporation you'd be going to jail. No surprise the downgraded happened after that.
By all mean keep dumping money into Maggie Daley Park
In a way, that forced contribution to the pension fund may hasten a decision. Forced into the payment, then either ask for bankruptcy or a federal receivership appointment. Federal receivership was used in the 1970s when New York was on the verge of bankruptcy.
Are the low information m/fers still working their jaws about first responders gotta take a bad haircut and take it in the shorts because "it's their fault" Chicago is a financial mess?
Or have we moved from that dumb shit in light of THIS.
Chicago's bond rating is:
Baad!!!
It's ashamed that Rahm only received 65,000 more votes than "Chuy". Next time Mickey Mouse could run and beat him.
OT https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/michael-t-slager-support-fund
^So far the PO in South Carolina only has $1380 raised for his defense. I think he's going to need quite a bit more. Wilson raised a hell of a lot more, and didn't need to fight as hard as this guy will need to. Just think about his family (pregnant wife) getting by with out him.
What I don't understand is why coppers who are maxed (I will have 29 years in oct papers in retiring the 15oct). Why do you stay? After all you pay out in taxes pension insurance etc you will make a little over $8,000 per year plus overtime blood money hours! Some say " we won't have a pension as its only funded fully for about 5 years) but that's 5 years worth of pension you will not get back boys and girls! What happens when you stay past your max pension? You risk losing our job, being caught on tape doing something that if the media and of course the bosses throw you to the wolves, you go to jail, get sued civility bye house bye savings bye family!
Bottom line retire when you can enjoy whatever life you have left, many according to stats don't collect a lot of pension checks as it is!
Richie Daley deserves much of the blame, but Rahm was one of his underlings. He aided and abetted the Daley regime. Moreover, Rahm wasted his first term doing next to nothing to improve matters. He accused Garcia of being clueless and without a plan, but what is Rahm's plan? To bail out of Chicago and fly back to Washington as soon as possible? His entire interest in the mayoralty was that it gave him an important title and cover for the fact that he was about to be kicked out of the White House in 2010. He was the fall guy for the loss of the US House that year.
Aren't there fourteen months in a year?
And not a one in jail.
Anonymous said...
Is the state of IL in much better shape?
4/10/2015 04:24:00 AM
For those who are not paying attention: many cities in this country are in similar shape. A dozen cities in Illinois alone are looking at bankruptcy to get out from under mountains of pension debt and high employee pay and benefits. The country is drowning in debt and will have to raise taxes just to pay social security and medicate. So much is going on financially it is starting to look like a national collapse, NJ, NY and CA are in deep trouble as is Illinois, with Illinois in the worst shape. Every democratic controlled state in drowning in debt .
Anonymous said...
All I see is financial doom for Chicago. Time to get while the getting is good.
4/10/2015 12:42:00 AM
You can get out but that will not protect your pension
Baad!!!
It's ashamed that Rahm only received 65,000 more votes than "Chuy". Next time Mickey Mouse could run and beat him.
4/10/2015 12:59:00 PM
Thats what they said this time. He still won by double digits. Put in a good candidate and maybe he will be beat.
Anonymous said...
What I don't understand is why coppers who are maxed (I will have 29 years in oct papers in retiring the 15oct). Why do you stay? After all you pay out in taxes pension insurance etc you will make a little over $8,000 per year plus overtime blood money hours! Some say " we won't have a pension as its only funded fully for about 5 years) but that's 5 years worth of pension you will not get back boys and girls! What happens when you stay past your max pension? You risk losing our job, being caught on tape doing something that if the media and of course the bosses throw you to the wolves, you go to jail, get sued civility bye house bye savings bye family!
Bottom line retire when you can enjoy whatever life you have left, many according to stats don't collect a lot of pension checks as it is!
4/10/2015 01:59:00 PM
Everyone has a right to stay and retire when they choose. There are numerous reasons to stay. Kids in college or just to prepare yourself to be better off financially during retirement. The job gets easier after 30 years. With seniority you can transfer to a good district and usually if you want you can bid inside to avoid all those doomsday scenarios you described. There is no fit all for everyone,its not for you to understand why, just do what you feel is right for you and let everyone else decide what is right for them.
The real shame is this post only generated 21 comments so far.
Could that be an indicator that the manjority of Coppers are as disinterested and simple-minded as the media, Daley Inc. and Rahm & Co. portray them as being?
Could it point to an uncomfortable truth that the majority of Coppers DID in fact vote for Rahm?
If such is the case, you can forget about the fantasy of CPD ever having the collective balls to stand up to being fucked with like NYPD.
Too many m/fers willing to live on their knees and take VRI bribe money in lieu of a fully staffed street presence.
Which is going to be gutted even farther when Flamin' Tutu and McHighlyPaidPantShitter make another 1/4 to 1/3 of this department disappear so they'll have something to gloat about when they ride out of town in 2019.
What they will have accomplished by then as far as destroying and rebooting a Police Department and the officers still standing by then will be a bound and published masterwork...
CPD was considered the toughest nut to crack and they did it.
They're shocked actually because it was so damned easy...
You wild-assed, out-of-control old school, conservative free-thinkers on this blog will either leave or be punished into submission and there will be no one giving a fuck enough to right wrongs or counter the false narrative on your behalf.
The War against Policemen and their concerns appears to have been a rout?
Wait until Rahm and the complicit media propaganda apparatus rest and get refreshed during "halftime."
The second half is going to be more of a shit-show than the first four years.
Every man for himself in accordance to what his conscience can bear and that what he feels squares him (or not) with his God...
Hmmmm...
Rahm sent out a "Let's Work Together" feeler to Karen "Eff You!" Lewis...
His brain trust must've impressed upon him about how fucked-up the optics would be if he fucked with the teachers and pushed them to strike again.
Heh...
A plump, middle-aged school marm is able to give Rahm al-Ghoul pause.
Policemen... Supposedly the most dangerous men in this city to approach, let alone fuck with; have been walked to a stand-still.
No wonder so many are laughing up their sleeves
in derision.
Police like you have no friends.
Survive.
Escape.
Why do we stay after 29 years and one day my friend, is because some of us still don't get the medical benefit that fellow officers with only 20 years recieve, only because their 55. Next question my friend.
I was just going to post about the lack of comments but I was beaten.
The poster at 12:34 PM on 11Apr15 hit the nail on the head unfortunately. How easy was it for Rahm and his minions to make us his bitches? And the 10 hour day? Consider it a done deal. Your family life be damned. Remember the old roll call videos? They all ended with "and the most important thing is that you go home to your families". Funny how we haven't seen that in a video in years.
Post a Comment
<< Home