Archive for July 2010

  • 08 Jul 2010 at 9:30 AM

Opening Bell: 07.08.10

By Dealbreaker

Hedge Funds `Frozen in Headlights’ Cut Trading (Bloomberg)
“People are in cash for the most part and nobody’s really taking out any big bets,” said Blaze Tankersley, chief market strategist at Bay Crest Partners LLC, a brokerage firm in New York. “Nobody wants to take risk in either direction. It’s a weird time in the market.” Barton Biggs, whose purchase of stocks in March 2009 gave Traxis Partners LLC a 38 percent gain last year, said last week he sold about half his stock investments because of concern governments around the world are curtailing stimulus measures too soon. “I’m not wildly bearish, but I don’t want to have a lot of risk at this point,” Biggs, who manages $1.4 billion, said in a telephone interview. “I’m not putting my money into anything. I’m raising cash.”

Paulson’s Advantage Fund Lost 6.9 Percent In June (Bloomberg)
The fund has now lost 8.8 percent through the first half of 2010

Goldman And Morgan Stanley Saw Turbulent Q2 (Reuters)
Analysts have cut their earnings estimates for the two investment banks in recent weeks, citing concerns about fixed income trading, as well as merger advisory revenue and stock trading. “This will be one of the most difficult trading quarters since the credit crisis,” said Roger Freeman, an analyst with Barclays Capital. “This quarter is a stark reminder that we have some major macro unanswered questions, be it the stability of the U.S. and the global economic recovery.”

BP Tries To Reassure Shareholders (NYT)
It’ll never happen again okay? You believe us right? RIGHT? Who loves ya?

Man Group Bleeds Assets (Reuters)
Man, in the process of buying smaller rival GLG Partners, said on Thursday total assets under management — on which fund firms earn fees — fell 2.2 percent over the three months to end-June to $38.5 billion (25.3 billion pounds). Net client withdrawals were $1 billion.

What To Expect From The LeBronference Call (WSJ)
The show will begin with a brief video introduction of Mr. James’s career, followed by a complete rebroadcast of the fourth quarter of Game 6 of the Eastern Conference semifinals against Boston. Continue reading »

  • 07 Jul 2010 at 6:30 PM

Write-Offs: 07.07.10

By Bess Levin

$$$ “Financial engineering by Wall Street has been a huge part of hospital’s financial problems and has even translated into a lack of hospital beds,” said Brian McGough, a managing director of health-care investments at Bank of Montreal Capital Markets in Chicago. [WSJ]

$$$ Goldman, Morgan Stanley Face Profits Squeeze From Bonds [Reuters]

$$$ TARP Program Profitable for US [CNBC]

$$$ Waiting on LeBron Drives Madison Square Options [Bloomberg]

  • 07 Jul 2010 at 4:26 PM

SENDING OUT AN S.O.S: WHO WILL GIVE THIS A HANDOUT/JOB?

By Bess Levin

Scott Nicholson is a 24 year-old Colgate alum who’s yet to have a job since graduating college in 2008. He’s famous today not because he’s unemployed– lots of relatively recent grads are sans employment so he’s not special in that respect– but because he’s the main character in a delightful Times story about his journey to find a job that fits the mold of his dreams. The “unemployed” status, you see, is a tool of Scott’s own making. He could’ve had a job– five months ago, the Hanover Insurance Group offered him one as an associate claims adjuster in their Worcester, at $40,000 a year– but he decided to turn it down.

Rather than waste early years in dead-end work, he reasoned, he would hold out for a corporate position that would draw on his college training and put him, as he sees it, on the bottom rungs of a career ladder.

A lofty goal but as he is living at home with his parents in Grafton, Massachusetts, rent and expenses free, Scott figured he had all the time in the world to make it happen. That was until a certain couplea jerks decided to start fucking with his master plan. Continue reading »

  • 07 Jul 2010 at 3:06 PM
  • Banks

Lobbyist For Small Banks Wants Industry To Wake Up!

By Bess Levin

You think the JPMorgans and the Goldmans and the Citis give a baker’s fuck about you? Think again! They’re just using you. Won’t remember your name in the morning, if in fact they don’t sneak out in the middle of the night. I’m sorry but it’s a fact. Continue reading »

  • 07 Jul 2010 at 2:08 PM

Emails That Have The Potential To CHANGE OUR LIVES

By Bess Levin

Sinner

As is I’m sure the case for many of you fine people, on a daily basis, a whole lot of garbage ends up in my inbox, most of it unsolicited. Sometimes though, on rare occasions, there is the potential for universe-altering gold. Such as the following: Continue reading »

  • 07 Jul 2010 at 1:45 PM

Last Day To Nominate Your Favorite Hedge Fund IR Dime

By Bess Levin

The more you put into this, the more you’ll get out. Send your picks here. Subject line: “Hedge Fund IR Dimes.”

  • 07 Jul 2010 at 1:03 PM

“Who Is George Soros?”

By Bess Levin

Is he “a financier”? The participants in the comedy sketch below give a tiny bit of credence to that theory but in the grander scheme of things, posit that Soros is “a drug pusher” who wants to increase violent crime in California’s black communities by legalizing the distribution of “his poison.” Continue reading »

  • 07 Jul 2010 at 12:48 PM

Area Woman Not Impressed By Lloyd Blankfein’s Latest Charitable Donations

By Bess Levin

The Lloyd and Laura Blankfein Foundation gave $1.7 million to charity last year (up from $1.3 million in 2009). Some of these monetary gifts went to “Dorot, a New York nonprofit that aids the elderly, the Animal Rescue Fund of the Hamptons and New York Cares, which mobilizes volunteers to help the city’s disadvantaged,” while LB’s alma mater, Harvard Law School, the Ethical Culture Fieldston School, where his kids went to school, and the Bridgehampton Fire Department on Long Island, on call June-August in case a fire in Lloyd’s loins needs putting out, also got some clams. Without having spoken with them, it’s probably safe to say all the recipients appreciated the money. One person, perhaps feeling left out of the Blankfeins Make It Rain party, could not give less of a rat’s ass and is pretty sure you shouldn’t either, at least until we get some answers. Continue reading »

  • 07 Jul 2010 at 11:57 AM

JPMorgan Bosses Take Road Less Traveled When Dealing With Problem Employee

By Bess Levin

When Kevin Dillon started working for JPMorgan in March 2008 as a “client processing specialist,” everybody liked him just fine. Better than fine, in fact. He was praised by his superiors, he received glowing reviews and in just a few months time, he was slated to receive a bonus and a promotion. This was all, however, before he filed a report citing “highly questionable accounting and management practices” at Highland Capital Management LP and recommending that JPM cease “facilitating Highland’s improper practices.” In doing so, Dillon was forcing his bosses to make a decision re: how to deal with the findings. They could 1) follow his suggestion and cut the hedge fund loose or 2) acknowledge the findings and decide to do nothing about them. In this case, Dill’s bosses decided to go with the second option, telling him they were “aware of Highland’s improper practices [but] that nothing would be done to remedy the issue.”

As I’m sure many of you know, however, when you’ve got a situation like a Kevin Dillon situation, it does not end there. Because if there’s one thing I’ve found in my multiple decades long career on Wall Street is that a guy like Dillon is gonna be trouble. He won’t just accept your decision to look the other way, which is admittedly annoying but something you can deal with if you’ve got the skills or someone coaching you from the sidelines (me).

First off, you can’t fire a Dillon-type straight-away, because it’ll be too obvious. This is something that requires a more subtle touch. You will want to, of course, make work life unpalatable for the employee in question, so taking away his bonus, promoting incompetents over him and offering negative but purposely vague reviews is a given. That’ll go a long way in psyching out said problem employee. But if you really want to break him…if you really want to leave your mark…if you really want to, in the event this thing ends up a lawsuit, make a name for yourself, give the readers something to aspire to and have people say “that guy may be a whack-job and potentially a racist but he knew how to deal with people,” you’ll try something like this. Continue reading »

  • 07 Jul 2010 at 10:30 AM
  • MBAs

Things That Are Happening On Park Avenue This Morning

By Bess Levin

  • 07 Jul 2010 at 9:30 AM

Opening Bell: 07.07.10

By Dealbreaker

EU Lawmakers Back Cap On Bank Bonuses (WSJ)
Under the new rules—part of which will be in place in January—cash bonuses would be capped at 30% of a total bonus, or 20% for particularly high bonuses. A large part of a bonus must also be deferred so it can be recovered if investments don’t perform as expected, the Parliament said. Bonuses would be linked to salaries, with each bank setting a limit following broad EU guidelines.

Geithner Confident US in Recovery Despite Market Jitters (Reuters)
“We’ve seen a little concern about Europe wash across the American economy,” he said. The Treasury chief reiterated his view that Europe would manage its debt problems, adding that officials there were “taking the steps that they need to make sure that they’re growing again.” Asked about the downturn in stock markets in recent weeks, Geithner said markets had seen a long run of improvement that boosted confidence, but added: “You know, recoveries are never even, never steady.” Geithner said he believed that the financial reform bill now before Congress “looks like it’s going to pass,” adding that the legislation would better protect Americans from financial fraud and abuse and will limit risk-taking by financial institutions.

BP Would Be Open To Abu Dhabi Stake (WSJ)
Mr. Hayward flew into Abu Dhabi on Tuesday for meetings with officials including the crown prince and also spoke to the company’s employees in the emirate in a town-hall gathering, according to a person familiar with his itinerary. “He’d be happy for Abu Dhabi to take a 10% equity stake,” said the person, who asked not to be identified.

Global Investment Bank Earnings Set For Steep Dip (FT)
Howard Chen, an analyst at Credit Suisse, expects revenues from operations in fixed income, currency and commodities at Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley to have fallen more than 30 per cent from the first three months of the year. “The sovereign debt crisis stoked a return of investor risk aversion in May, stalling the recovery in the capital markets cycle and spawning pessimism [over] a recovery in the global economy,” Brad Hintz at Bernstein Research wrote in a recent note.

Harass suit by former JPMorgan exec (NYP)
Devinder X. Kumar, a former executive at JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s securities unit, sued the firm for $8 million, claiming he was retaliated against for rejecting a “blatant sexual overture” from his supervisor, according to papers filed yesterday in New York state Supreme Court in Manhattan. Kumar, former vice president of investment banking technology, claims in the suit that a male supervisor made an unwelcome advance and that his work environment became hostile. In the complaint, he said the bank failed to take any disciplinary or remedial action to stop the supervisor’s conduct.

Report: ESPN to air LeBron’s decision Thursday (CNBC)
He’s also on Twitter, if you give a rat’s ass. “Hello World, the Real King James is in the Building,” said the first tweet from KingJames, which by 11 p.m. EDT had more than 187,000 followers. Continue reading »