In case you missed it the first time, Glenn Schorr is leaving UBS.
Earlier: Glenn Schorr Leaving UBS
Archive for March 2009
Their work has been cut down for them pretty significantly but no matter. The gov has no idea what it’s doing and needs their help!
At least two high-profile plaintiffs attorneys are considering filing lawsuits over the recent controversies surrounding $165 million in retention bonuses that American International Group Inc. paid to its executives.
In a March 19 letter to Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner, Darren Robbins, name partner at San Diego’s Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins, said several of the firm’s pension fund clients have directed him to “advise the Treasury Department of our mandate to take appropriate steps on behalf of AIG against the members of AIG’s board of directors.”
So far, AIG has received $170 billion in bailout funds from the U.S. government, which owns 80 percent of the insurance firm. On Friday, legislators in Congress voted to impose a 90 percent tax on the bonuses. Similar legislation has been introduced in the Senate.
In his letter, Robbins noted that President Obama, expressing his “outrage” over the developments at AIG, directed Geithner to “pursue every legal avenue” to block the bonuses. “Although limitations may exist with respect to available legislative and regulatory remedies, the Treasury Department has legal recourse as AIG’s largest stakeholder,” the letter states. “These rights should be exercised.”
Robbins told The National Law Journal that he wrote the letter to offer his services to file a lawsuit on behalf of the U.S. government.
“They seem to be somewhat flummoxed by the inability of the various constituencies in the government to obtain redress for the misappropriation of what is a significant amount of money,” he said.
High-Profile Plaintiffs Attorneys Start to Beat the War Drums Over AIG Bonuses [Law.com]
Having spent most of our time Lloyd Watching, we haven’t observed Goldman President Gary Cohn in the brush too much. Gotta say though, we are digging his style. Watch here how he finds the loophole during a talk with the WSJ re: which bank will be the *FIRST* to repay its TARP money, (verbally) throws the interviewer on his back and says “No, sir, we will indeed quibble over semantics.” (We also enjoy the uncanny resemblance to Champ Kind, who will play him in the movie.)
WSJ: One question on everyone’s mind’s and us and other have raised it several times in the last few days is…does Goldman become the first to give back TARP money?
Cohn: I don’t know.
WSJ [confused]: Why not?
Cohn: I can’t speak for everyone else who has it. [Since the question was, "will GS be the first," and, conceivably, for all we know, Ken Lewis could be paying BAC's money back right this second, making GS the second to repay.]
WSJ: But you’re the president of Goldman Sachs [can't you speak for yourself?]
Cohn: There may be someone giving it back right now.
WSJ: [Figuring out where he's going with this] Could be.
Cohn: Could be.
[stare each other down]
Cohn: I would have no idea. If you got all the TARP recipients up here maybe we could come up with an answer to that.
Holy shit, right? Didn’t see that coming. Anyway, apparently those AIG employees that we found out last night turned over their bonuses? There’s talk it might’ve been through a series of, OMG, scare tactics by the Attorney General, who may have threatened to reveal names if he didn’t get the money!
The “Damning” Evidence [CNBC, PDF]
Or, don’t, whichever. The Financial Times reports that Snehal Amin, one of five founding partners at The Children’s Investment Fund, is not sticking it out for the kids, but rather peacing, and leaving the firm with one original partner, Chris Hohn. TCI was down forty three percent in 2008, and down four percent year to date through February. According to people who keep up with things of this nature, “everyone is running for the doors,” as in personnel, not investors, though maybe them too! (JK…just keeping you honest, Hohn.)
TCI Co-Founder Quits [FINalternatives]
No word where the analyst is headed, and though it’s a long shot, our fingers are obviously crossed it’s to Meredith Whitney Advisors.
Update: Confirmed by UBS.
As you know, Bernie Madoff and the wife own a bunch of homes around the world, including the Upper East Side penthouse, the Palm Beach manse, and a crash pad in Jersey City where Ponzi-Boy would go to blow off steam when Ruth was getting really harpy. Apparently there’s also a nice little place on the French Riviera, called “Chateau des Pins Villa 2,” in the resort town of Cap d’Antibes where the dynamic duo would spend at least a few days a year when the mood struck to hit up some nude beaches. Anyway, U.S. prosecutors were planning on taking the place over in an effort to get some coin for Madoff’s victims but apparently their French doppelgängers have another plan. They want the place and the million it could go for, too, and according to David Sheehan, a lawyer involved in liquidating Madoff’s assets, “Things are moving very quickly in this arena…We’re told the French are going to grab the chateau.” Are we going to let them? Maybe! That or neither will get the place, and the judge sentencing Ponz-B on June 16 will turn it into a B&B and force Madoff to be the innkeeper.
Drawbridge Global Macro Fund LP (Liquid Pool & Illiquid Pool):
AQR Global Stock Selection Offshore Ltd.
We started watching the latest episode of “The Safecracker” and intended to begin live blogging it, but we were transfixed immediately by the undulating waves on his Crackness’ forehead. Branded there like a quantum interference pattern, emanating from the twin slits of two Pink Floydesque eyebrows, as the single photons of bailout are at once reducing the cost of home ownership, and reflating asset prices in his brain. Excuse us for a few minutes while we gaze upon the physical paradox of the forehead wrinkles in time.
Maxine Waters has jarred us out of our contemplation of the great cosmic order with her particularly insane brand of chaos theory.
Waters: Mr. Geithner, your CEO is from Goldman Sachs?
The Safecracker: My CEO?
We wonder, who is the CEO of the Treasury? Who is the boss of you, Your Crackness?
Waters: The talk is, that this small group of decision makers at the center of it is Goldman Sachs because people are thinking or believing that Goldman Sachs, because of the connections, is having a lot to do with the decisions are being made. (phew) We believe that Goldman Sachs will again be one of those that will be the beneficiary.
The Safecracker: I think it is deeply unfair to suggest that Goldman Sachs is a den of poisonous, bloodsucking vipers.
Carolyn Maloney: I’m doing a study on failure. You know, I have a PhD in fail. Yes it was from the University of Phoenix, but I think we all know they are the foremost authority on fail. Can you give me the government analysis that determined that Lehman should fail? The death warrant. You know? The fail warrant?
Beard: What? Uh, sure. I’ll look.
Bachmann: Mr. Chair, can I have an answer on my inane and misguided question?
His Frankness: No, you can go pound salt.
Jenkins: How much more money is AIG going to need?
Dudley: We have no fucking clue.
Castle: So Dodd is fucked on this bonus language. How about you? Are your fingerprints on that?
The Safecracker: I wore a tie today.
Ackerman: Those AIG traitors should have returned twice their bonuses. Greed is the problem. We need to legislate away greed. Greed plus innovation is very dangerous. Let’s kill them both. My white carnation is the new yellow bracelet. It stands against greed. And intelligence. I couldn’t figure out how to put it into my button hole so I just stapled it onto my suit.
Royce: I lost my jacket in the morning Congressional poker game.
Sherman: I cannot believe we are letting this populist uproar to fade. How are we going to get this back roaring? Geithner, you. How about you publish the current and future salary info on all the TARP recipients? Are you going to give us the chart? Or are you going to hide the ball?
The Safecracker: I am not going to hide the ball
Sherman: So are you going to give us the chart?
The Safecracker: I’ll think about it.
Sherman: So you’re not?
The Safecracker: I said I would think about it.
Sherman: What the hell is Cash-Carry (your quarterback) still doing running the compensation standards? When are we going to get regs to prevent anyone anywhere from making a million dollars ever?
Lucas: So, investors are going to make millions on this bailout?
The Safecracker: The taxpayer too.
Lucas (puzzled look): Hmmmph.
Meeks: Should we regulate credit default swaps?
The Safecracker: Let me uncork my standard, bottled speech on central clearinghouses.
Meeks: Are Wall Street jobs going to head to London now that we’ve threatened these employees with dismemberment and death?
The Safecracker: Uh… maybe.
Paul: We didn’t have capitalism. We had the Federal Reserve messing up the entire system. (Lather, rinse, repeat. x4). Didn’t we have too much government here? Who’s to blame. Market, or crony capitalism?
Beard: I don’t blame capitalism. Panics are a reality.
Moore: The Inspector General of TARP believes that taxpayer exposure is near $3 trillion. What the hell?
The Safecracker: That figure is the total loan figure. You’d have to assume a total loss for that to be realized. And that is never… going… to… ever… happen… I’m… totally… serious.
Lynch: Let’s sue AIG for these bonuses. Isn’t this a fraudulent conveyance?
The Safecracker: We are looking very carefully at all legal avenues to go back and see if we can get these back. I can’t tell you today that we’ve found a way to do it. But we are on it.
Beard: We’ll check. I hope we can.
Dudley: We’ll try.
