I must admit that I dislike those end of the year predictions of what is to happen in the future. Yes, they generate a lot of page views (manna from heaven in regards to advertising driven blogs and news sites). Yes, they do seem to accomplish the non-stated purpose of driving traffic though to articles. Alas… Practically none of them are of any true value, and BoomBustBlog is a valuation site - thus value is of some recompense. Predicting the future is a fool’s game, and one that I prefer not to engage in. With that being said, I will be appearing on CNBC's Street Signs segment today at approximately 2:30 to offer my outlook for 2012. 

What I see happening is not a prediction of the future, but a rational extrapolation of the past and a keen, objective assessment of the present! After all, this is what I do! I'm a realist, thus it is my mantra to be realitic. In this sense, my realism makes me... different. It sets me apart from the crowd and allows me to be offensively honest.

Appearances on venues such as CNBC is aking to the iconoclastic outcast being called in to shake things up a little. I implore all who are interested to look into my track record, which literally runs circles around the sell side Wall Street crowd, and has accurately anticipated nearly every bust, crash and ding over the last 5 years. i have absolutely no hesitation whatsoever in saying this in public, or in the independent and/or mainstream media. Reference Did Reggie Middleton, a Blogger at BoomBustBlog, Best Wall Streets Best of the Best? and then view this informal Q&A I gave on the subject:

"The bank expects the analyst to support the trading and investment banking operations... generate commissions, fees, manage inventory or creates investment banking business".

Sounds like John Perkins' old job description ; / (Confessions of an Economic Hitman)

As for my actual outlook:

1. FIRE sector gets burned... For real! 
   1. Finance - This Is Why BoomBustBlog Is THE Place To Go For Hard Hitting Research: BoomBust BNP Paribas?
   2. Insurance - You Can Rest Assured That The Insurance Industry Is In For Guaranteed Losses! and Our Next Forensic Analysis Subject Is In The Insurance Industry
   3. Real Estate, particularly in teh EU and China -  The Real Estate Recession/Depression is Here, Eurocalypse Style, but in the US as well since we never finished the very necessary correction/collapse that was reflated in 2009. Subscribers should reference the CRE downloads that will be available within 24 hours that illustrate the US REITS and CRE companies that we have identified as "At risk".
2. As clearly predicted in the last quarter of 2009, Another Banking Crisis Is Inevitable? There will be several bank runs, although they may be cleveraly concealed by central banks and governmental authorities. Reference The Anatomy Of A European Bank Run: Look At The Banking Situation BEFORE The Run Occurs! These bank runs will not be confined to the annals of the EU either, reference Yes, The BoomBustBlog Forecast Pan-European Bank Run Has Breached American Soil!!! The US has a greater than 50% chance of seeing additional bank runs, albeit most likely cloaked. Remember, Lehman Brothers, WaMu and Bear Stearns were victims of bank runs, as was MF Global - which many people fail to realize, and it was a highly leveraged bank run to boot - On MF Global, Hyper-Hypothecation That Creates $6b Out $2B And A Central Bank That Couldn't See A Bankruptcy Staring It In The Face. The big name brand banks whom many thought were infallible, actually have many similarities to that of the now bankrupt MF Global, to wit - Goldman, et. al. Suffer From The Same Malady That Collapsed Lehman and MF Global, Worlds 1st and 8th Largest Bankruptcies!
3. A considerable amount of the intellectual and creative talent that was consumed (and summarily wasted in the bubble due to an excessive amount of US GDP generated by paper shuffling) by the finance industry moves over to more productive and useful areas of the economy, ex. tech, education, biotech, manufacturing, etc.
4. A strucutural change will occur in the retail sector that will be masked and hidden by the slowdown caused by the global debt turmoil. We have delved into this in last months postings, reference The Chickens Have Finally Come Home To Roost at Sears, wherein general underperformance conceals a very pertinent underlying trend expliclty illustrated in The Greatest Risk To Retail Commercial Is? Sovereign Debt! Macro Headwinds! Popping Bubbles! Busted Banks! No, It's The Internet!
5. The mobile computing tech race will continue with Google pulling even farther ahead. I was the first to publicly illustrate Google taking the pole position on this one, as far back as the Spring of 2010 - reference The Mobile Computing Wars Are At The Half Time Mark and Google Is Killing Them!
   1. The mobile computing race will congeal around 3 players - Google, Apple, and Microsoft - while ancillary players who used to dominate the industry beg to be taken out to the woodshed! This was clearly forcast over a year ago, providing profitable long and short positions along the way. Reference RIM Gets RAMMED! Again... Remember That Contrarian Call 1st Quarter of 2010?
   2. ... and the gradual realization that Apple is getting outgunned, as one of teh few advisories that correctly predicted an Apple miss last quarter - The Only, and I Mean the Only, Investment/Research House To Warn Of An Apple Miss Is Vindicated!!! 
   3. Google's biggest weakness may show in the propensity for its many rivals to lobby for anti-trust actions in order to slow it down.