Well, we’ve closed out the books on another year with the Baby Boomer herd continuing to thin. We have a new president soon taking over and promising to solve all our problems on Day 1, and I’ve got one he could help me with: how to fold up properly a form fitting bedsheet.
Saw an article the other day about some legislators in some states were calling for their state to set up some form of reserves to support crypto currency. It jogged an old memory from the misty past about how history repeats itself. In the 1960s in Houston there was a developer named Frank Sharp who developed Sharpstown in Southwest Houston along with Sharpstown Shopping Center and Sharpstown State Bank. The main loan customer of the bank was Frank Sharp with a ton of bad loans on the books. Around 1970 as the bank examiners were rattling chains outside the doors, Frank came up with the idea that instead of federal insurance, the State of Texas could come up with an insurance fund that supported banks and the examiners could be told to hit the road.
To accomplish this Herculean task Frank sent a sack with ownership certificates to everybody of influence in Austin to help pass this legislation. Once this story broke open in the media the careers of the top people in state government were destroyed, the bank was closed up by the examiners and Frank Sharp was sent to prison.
As the current financial markets keep roaring along, the experts say we have learned from our mistakes and they will never happen again.
