JPM re-evaluates Bear price while recession concerns deepen

News from Bloomberg:


JPMorgan Quadruples Bear Stearns Bid, Buys 39.5% Stake to Lock Up Purchase


U.S. Stocks Surge as JPMorgan's Raised Bid for Bear Lifts Financial Shares


Treasuries Slump as Rally in Stocks Eases Demand for Government Securities


U.S. Existing Home Sales Unexpectedly Climb; Prices Drop Most in 40 Years


Wall Street Firms Eliminate 34,000 Jobs, Most Since Dot-Com Bust of 2001


Dollar Fluctuations Make Traders Whisper `I' Word as Group of Seven Frets


Goldman, Citigroup Get Fees for Running Failed Auctions of New York Bonds


Gillani Elected Pakistan Premier, Orders Release of Judges Held in Custody


U.S. Death Toll in Iraq War Reaches 4,000 After Four Killed in Bomb Attack


Citigroup Slipping to Also-Ran 10 Years After Becoming Biggest U.S. Bank


Canadian Western Eschews Subprime, Voice Mail to Beat North American Banks


Merck AIDS Vaccine Failure May Doom Future of a Similar U.S. Immunization


Gasoline at Record High Price Never Been a Better Buy, Say Citigroup, FBR


U.K. Home Sellers Must `Get Smart,' Anticipate Price Cuts, Rightmove Says


Moody's, Fitch Weigh Muni Rating Changes on Pressure From States, Congress


Existing Home Sales in U.S. Unexpectedly Rise, First Gain in Seven Months


Asian Central Banks May Invest Reserves in the Region for Better Yields

Truckers Broke, Will Strike Across America

Spectre of Coming Depression haunts Federal Reserve

Recession is a given. Can we avoid depression
When economist Robert Parks predicted early last week that there was more than a 60 percent probability the current financial meltdown in the United States would lead to the "Bush depression," his phone began ringing like crazy with calls from the media."

With banks collapsing, the dollar reeling, the Federal Reserve making up new rules as it goes and observers discussing a new Great Depression, the presidential candidates are still on scripts they wrote a year ago.

MERRILL LYNCH TO LOSE 15 BILLION (again)

A financial crisis unmatched since the Great Depression

UK facing worst financial crisis 'in decades'

Closer To Financial Meltdown

In this pdf file, Table 1 is as follows:

As the article states:

The undeniable truth: In the grand casino of derivatives trading, JPMorgan Chase is overwhelmingly and unabashedly the biggest player of them all. As you can plainly see in the table above, it controls ...

$91.7 trillion in derivatives, or over 53% of all derivatives held by U.S. commercial banks, among which are ...

Nearly $7.8 trillion in the oft-inflammable credit derivatives, or 55.6% of the total.

And all with little more than $1.2 trillion in assets!

http://home.peoplepc.com/psp/newsstory.asp?cat=business&id=20080323/47e5e3d0_3421_1334520080323-1979878187 High Gas Prices Aid Prop-Plane Comeback