Kedrosky's Weekend Reading

Turning to earnings, next week we will see results Tuesday from Wal-Mart(WMT Quote) and Home Depot and on Thursday from Hewlett-Packard(HPQ Quote) and Nordstrom(JWN Quote).

Finally, here are some articles, papers, and books worth reading.

• Large mortgages are growing more costly, causing new problems. (New York Times)
• Overview of some of the private equity deals most at risk in new lending environment. (Washington Post)
• Restoring faith in the U.S.'s mortgage markets is the real challenge. (Economist)
• Central banks in the developed world no longer control global money supply. (Economist)
• Margin calls and similarities in black-box quant strategies helped drive markets lower. (Telegraph)
• Gold bugs having a merry time planning for a big 2008. (Telegraph)
• Investors need to avoid the temptation to do too much in response to current market issues. (Washington Post)
• Research: GDP, GDI and noise in getting the current health of the economy. (Federal Reserve Bank)
• VMware has upped the price range for its impending IPO. (Byte & Switch)
• The origins of the U.S. subprime mortgage market. (IMF)
• A new book on the U.S. credit market panic of 1907 seems increasingly timely. (Amazon)
• Central bankers need more information and faster to prevent runs on the bank. (BusinessWeek)
• Pop! goes the credit bubble. (IDD)
• U.S. oil drilling hits 21-year high. (O&G Journal)
• World oil supply is lagging demand in worrisome way. (IEA/Financial Times)
• Goldman's(GS Quote) Global Alpha fund has fallen 26% so far in 2007. (Bloomberg)
• Venezuela's Hugo Chavez says oil is headed for $100 a barrel. (Reuters)
• Retail investors are bearing up better than professionals in the current market volatility. (Reuters)
• Cerberus is set to succeed or fail very publicly. (Fortune)
• On BNP Paribas: "The world almost ended last night." (Fortune)
• Jim Simons at Renaissance warns on recent results. (DealBreaker)
• Higher oil prices may push off peak oil. (CSM)
• iPhone customers say there are dead spots on the device's touch screen. (EE Times)
• Democrats are still having trouble with trade issues in Congress. (Washington Post)
• U.S. 12th-graders are doing better than expected in economics tests. (New York Times)
• Insiders aren't as bearish as many seemingly think. (New York Times)
• Global economy and financial markets: Where next? (IMF)
• Managers suffering as quant similarities revealed. (eFinancial)
• Barron's does lots of bottom-fishing, including at Bear Stearns(BSC Quote). (Barron's)