Lloyd Blankfein: “I’m Doing God’s Work” (Times Online)
An impish grin spreads across Blankfein’s face. Call him a fat cat who mocks the public. Call him wicked. Call him what you will. He is, he says, just a banker “doing God’s work.” [...] “I know I could slit my wrists and people would cheer,” Blankfein says. But then, he slowly begins to argue the case for modern banking. “We’re very important,” he says, abandoning self-flagellation. “We help companies to grow by helping them to raise capital. Companies that grow create wealth. This, in turn, allows people to have jobs that create more growth and more wealth. It’s a virtuous cycle.” To drive home his point, he makes a remarkably bold claim. “We have a social purpose.”
Wall Street Record Bonuses Return As Big 3 May Pay $30 Billion (Bloomberg)
More than 2007′s $26.8 billion and up 60 percent from last year. Some people feel the need to harsh on the good time: “Wall Street is beginning to resemble Clark Gable as Rhett Butler in the film ‘Gone With the Wind’: ‘Quite frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn,’” Paul Hodgson, a senior research associate on compensation at the Portland, Maine-based Corporate Library, said in an e-mail. “It doesn’t seem as if even political threat, disastrous PR, envy, rising unemployment rates and home repossessions is enough to get any of these people to refuse the bonuses they have ‘earned.’”
Executives Wary After Arrests (NYT)
Apparently hedge fund managers have been calling their lawyers to check out what’s legal and what is grounds for a perp walk in the wake of recent arrests. For now, they’re going to try really hard to be good. “Right now we’re still at Defcon 2,” said Anthony L. Perricone, a lawyer at Jones Day who advises hedge funds. “They’re going to err on the side of conservatism.”
JPMorgan’s Dimon Hires Father For Bear Stearns Brokerage (Bloomberg)
Theodore “Ted” Dimon, the 78-year-old father of JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s chief executive officer, quit Bank of America Corp.’s Merrill Lynch unit Friday to join his son’s firm, according to a person familiar with the matter. The elder Dimon and his five-member broker team will join Bear Stearns Private Client Services, a unit acquired by his son in the March 2008 takeover of the failed investment bank. He will report to Michael Lee, head of the unit’s New York office.
Robot Hamsters Hottest Toys This Christmas (FT)
“It’s not just hamsters,” Mr Hornsby said. “We are bringing out the clans: chipmunks, squirrels, hedgehogs, rabbits … We have all sorts of cute things coming.”
Some people aren’t pleased to see Goldman employees vaccinated for H1N1 (NBC)
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Where is everyone?
In jail. Try to keep up.
in jail? really?
He looks so pederastic in that pic
In honor of UBS being mentioned in the bonus story, I just though I’d throw this out there: UBS Sucks
Are the squirrels and such black, jewish, women or what? My M.D. Mark klein wants me to start due diligence asap
are hamsters and gerbils considered bioequivalent?
- Barney Frank
God = beezlebub.
what a beezlebub, champ?
I’ll take two of those gerbil things.
Mr. Slave
Lloyd B:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Dictionnaire_Infernal_-_Behemoth.jpg
@5 you’re doing God’s work.
Mr. Blankfein actually said he was “doing Cthulhu’s work.”
The Times regrets the error.
“The men and women who arrive in the watery dawn sunshine, walk quickly from their black Lincoln town cars to the (85 Broad) lobby.”
Hmm…Watery dawn sunshine, walking quickly.
Pissed-off, capable Mainstreeters who really want to do God’s work will realize that it is in that “Watery Dawn Sunshine” that the objects of their scorn are most vulnerable.
The Guy from Delaware
p.s. No surprises here folks. TGFD’s sentiments are well known.
If I were the senior Mr. Dimon I’d walk into my new boss, Mr. Lee’s office, drop trough, take a dump on the floor, burp in his face and say, “What are you going to do about it, Boss Man!!!???”.
LOL! Too funny. What a nightmare for Lee….
What’s interesting about that NYT story is one reporter, Zach Kouwe, is known as a mouth piece for T.H.Lee. He gets fed private equity deal news ahead of public announcements, tells other hedge funds, and then reports it. Most of this was done while he worked for the NY Post. So it’s no wonder he just wrote a piece that tried to tell the reader that it’s legal for journalist to leak material non-public news to hedge funds before they print it. The question is does Kouwe (or other journalist) also trade on that news?
burnett just compared one insurance company in a market to the government being a single payer? Completely different you idiot. Hamster delivering news>Burnett.
thank God for bloomberg.
Hamsters are heavenly.
Richard (sic) Gear
“Air-in” Burnett is not the future.
Regards,
Brian Roberts
Where can I get more info on these robotic hamsters? I’m wondering whether they are waterproof, and if they come with a guaranty.
-DK
@tgfd
calm the f*ck down bro, seriously that is not ok.
@Anal_yst: funny how LB can’t avoid effing up his PR even in a fluff piece. You should step back from the ivory tower and realize how pissed America is right now. The ‘big 3′ are royally effing up by doling out huge bonuses this year. They likely realize we’re on the eve of destruction.
Not TGFD
Doin Gid’s wuhk? Kimen, LLoyd, the vegemite goes in yer pie hole.
~Prudisser of a seartin news show in Austrailiar.
G-d’s work
Gentiles
@17
You are ,obviously,a regular CNBC viewer hence you caught that.