Keith Watanabe * NET 2.0

This weekend has been a nasty one in terms of the finance world.  Throughout the day, I monitored the results of the financial meltdown of Lehman, Merrill and now AIG.  Merrill will no longer exist and be part of Bank of America, while Lehman declared bankruptcy and will be seeking to sell off their units.  Lastly, AIG made its name from the announcement of seeking capital to re-structure.  Last I checked with Lehman's stock ticker, it was at $.18/share.  Considering 52 weeks ago, it was worth a nice $60/share, this is a massive drop.  But they're essentially dead.

Later, it was announced that various banks would pull their money to create an emergency bail out fund to prevent their entire sector from being quickly wiped out by the immediate sell off of securities.  This is like the old boys network going into a room and panicking as the old boys finally realize that they have to get off their asses.

But here's the real scary part: this all occurred in a matter of hours.  We haven't even seen the light of day once the rest of Asia trades in 4-5 hours.  Worse yet, we haven't even made it through this week nor month.  In my estimate, this is only the beginning of the storm.  It's not even close to the end.

My friend and I over email chatted on the idea that insurance will be hard hit next.  AIG already showed its colors today.  Naturally, all of the life insurance companies will be affected as annuities are composed heavily of stocks, bonds and other forms of securities.

The thing we're looking at is a complete possible meltdown of the finance market that we know.

But truthfully, this is probably a GREAT thing.

I will be the first one to come out and say that despite what's going on, this is probably one of the best things to happen to the world in a long time.  Hopefully, as part of this situation, many of these white collar crooks will be driven out of Wallstreet and other financial markets and slither into jail where they belong.  I say that the US government should punish all these financial institutions by penalizing everyone in there for killing the global economy.  Put all these crooks in jail, rip their assets out and give it back to the common man as restitution.  Then the economy will be back on track.

I honestly hope to see the entire finance markets as we know it blow up in the coming months and turn into something completely different.  I've been saying for a while now that we need a new market, something that is better, more efficient, more impartial, something incorruptible for handling valuation of goods and services.  The stock market is driven by people, people who are corruptible, irrational, greedy and a bane on society.  If we don't do something to amend this soon, nothing will make sense.

I say hit the "restart" button on the whole finance thing and create a new system of valuation.