Archive for August 2010

  • 31 Aug 2010 at 5:30 PM

Write-Offs: 08.31.10

By

$$$ Goldman swims downstream for PetroAlgae IPO [Reuters]

$$$ Wall Street Insiders Want Out [CBNC]

$$$ “The exercise series, open to the public, begins with Wall Street Ball Street on Oct. 21. From 2 p.m. to 6 p.m., participants will be a schooled in the art of squash, which, “Wall Street” aficionados will recall, was played literally and metaphorically by Gordon Gekko and Bud Fox. After the squash lessons, guests will sample Scotch flights, nibble hors d’oeuvres and get shoeshines while watching the quintessential ’80s film (because lunch is for wimps). Cigar smokers can puff away on the rooftop. Suspenders and slicked-back hair are optional.” [LATimes via BI] Read more »

  • 31 Aug 2010 at 5:21 PM

Wall Street Males Apparently Sneakier About Sexism These Days

By

Many women report that sexism is still rife on Wall Street, albeit less overt. Sexual discrimination charges by women at finance companies dropped 28% from 2000 to 2009, according to data from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. But the number of charges per woman in the industry climbed during the recession in 2008 and 2009. Monica Murphy…an entrepreneur who worked at Goldman for six years, said the social aspect of the job was awkward. “I always was invited out, as were the other younger women, but oftentimes you didn’t want to go,” she said. “It was a strange thing to be 24 and to be going to drinks with 45-year-old men.” Muntean said that many of her female coworkers got smaller bonuses because they didn’t golf or pal around with male managing directors. “There were a couple that tried to be buddy-buddy with the guys, but it never really worked,” she said. “It wasn’t like the ’60s, getting slapped on the butt all the time. It was very subtle.” [FINS]

Of course, there are exceptions.

Housekeeping: Joe Kernen Is On Vacation And Someone Needs To Brush Up On His/Her KingPin Quotes

By

From time to time, as it’s right next to the box I need to click to open a new post, I like to check out what terms non-regular readers have searched to end up on this here site. Ping Jiang is a frequent one, as is a rotating cast of CNBC anchorettes, in addition to some that are less expected but certainly welcome, like “dogs playing poker” and “Vladimir Siforov.” Here are today’s: Read more »

  • 31 Aug 2010 at 3:01 PM

Bonus Watch: Cornell Endowment Chiefs

By

Nice work if you can get it. Read more »

  • 31 Aug 2010 at 1:45 PM

Paul Krugman: Dan Loeb & Co Are Mad At Obama Because They’re A Bunch Of Petty Little Rich Boys

By

Last Friday, Third Point founder Dan Loeb released his latest quarterly letter, in which the Third Point founder redirects the feelings he once had for Ken Griffin on the current administration. Paul Krugman read it and he’s pretty sure he knows why Loeb and, for that matter, all the other financial services employees who donated to Obama’s presidential run have lately been switching teams. Sayeth the Professor:

…they went for Obama because he seemed like their kind of guy, then turned on him with a vengeance because they think he’s looking at them funny. Based on what I know, that’s about right. I talked to some financial-industry backers of Obama back during primary season; they really didn’t know or care much about policy issues, but were in love with Obama over his style — and also over the prospect of being in his inner circle, something they knew wouldn’t happen with Hillary. Now they’re mad because they don’t feel that they’re getting enough stroking.

Read more »

  • 31 Aug 2010 at 9:20 AM

New Trend On Wall Street Involves Chopping Wood, Hypothermia, If You’ve Got The Balls

By

Are you sick of the relentless pussification of Wall Street? Does it just burn you up inside that the majority of your co-workers consider eating 8 items from the vending machine over the course of 12 hours a challenge, which most of them would fail miserably and not be put in a burlap sack and beaten? Do you want harken back to a time when instead of being asked to participate in some dinky little JPMorgan 5k “challenge” or harangued into taking a Pilates class with one of your colleagues and getting your nails done after, you were going around the office signing people up for a feat of strength involving rolling around in the dirt, being lit on fire, and possibly dying? You’re not alone. Read more »

  • 30 Aug 2010 at 7:03 PM

Write-Offs: 08.30.10

By

$$$ Short-Sellers Take Long Vacation [WSJ]

$$$ Citigroup Will Meet With Mayo After Analyst Complains in Report [Bloomberg]

$$$ 12 Unconventional Ways To Save The Economy [NYO]

$$$ Tiger In The City [NYP]

  • 30 Aug 2010 at 6:15 PM

Austan Goolsbee: There Won’t Be A Double-Dip *If* You Do Exactly As We Say

By


[CNN via BI]

  • 30 Aug 2010 at 5:41 PM

Get Paid To Shoot Someone From UBS

By

Looking for a new gig (or a gig period)? Disheartened by the dearth of openings in the industry at the moment? Itching for the chance to get all up in UBS’s face? If you’re under 37, in “prime physical condition” and can shoot a gun, the IRS wants you for its Criminal Investigation Divsion, which is now hiring. [FINS]

  • 30 Aug 2010 at 4:20 PM
  • MBAs

Have Women Pay To Worship Your Harvard Business School-Educated Ass

By

Are you looking for “love”? Did you attend HBS? Did you do so with the idea in mind that once you graduated, women would be so infatuated with the notion that your cock once took leadership and organizational behavior that you’d be beating them off with a stick? Have things not exactly panned out that way? Take heart! DateHarvardsq.com is here to help. The new dating site matches males who have Harvard MBAs with discerning females who do not. The best part, if you’re a cheap bastard and/or really taken by yourself, is that all the men have to do is sign up, free of charge, and the chicks have to pay for the honor of possibly dating you. Here’s a featured member: Read more »

  • 30 Aug 2010 at 4:10 PM

Going Through Lehman’s Books Was Like Playing Elaborate Game Of MadLibs, Said Barclays Exec

By

Barclays Plc had no idea how big Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.’s futures-and-options trading business was when it considered taking over the defunct bank’s derivatives trades at exchanges in 2008, a Barclays executive said. “Lehman’s books were in such a mess that I don’t think they knew where they were,” Elizabeth James, a director of Barclays’s futures business, testified today in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan. James worked on Barclays’s purchase of Lehman’s brokerage during the 2008 financial crisis. She said she received an e-mail from former Barclays trading executive Stephen King saying Lehman had “absolutely no idea” if it had sold $2 billion more options than it had bought, or whether it owned $4 billion more than it had sold. [Bloomberg via DI]