The Joys of Credit Derivative Humor
posted by Nate Oman
I enjoy NPR’s Marketplace. At times, their efforts to be witty get a little cute, but I thoroughly enjoyed this one-act play on credit derivatives. Here’s a taste:
Seller: … have I got the product for you. It’s called a reverse sub-micro-standard mortgage shadow security and — do you hold a degree in rocket science?Buyer: Nope.
Seller: Hmm. Well then, simply put, what we do is take semi-insured debts that’ve been sold to us from inelastic bubble markets, vertically resell, then unbundle the revenues according to Moody’s astro-logarithm.
Buyer: Astro …
Seller: Astro-logarithm, which gives a monetized valuation that has itself been subdivided into A-3 and G-minus pumpkin patch. You following?
Buyer: Not at all!
Seller: Great; me neither, really! This thing was invented by some eggheads we keep in a cave.
And so on. How can you not love a financial crisis that produces credit derivative humor?
October 1, 2008 at 10:58 pm
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Responses (1)
Rob - October 9, 2008 at 9:47 am
Well then, simply put, what we do is take semi-insured debts that’ve been sold to us from inelastic bubble markets, vertically resell, then unbundle the revenues according to Moody’s astro-logarithm.
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