While Wall Street publicly is dismantling its dedicated proprietary trading desks, some veterans of the Street are skeptical that the banks will really stop trading with their own money. They say banks could continue making house bets by disguising proprietary trading as making markets for clients. House bets, when they are mixed with client trades, are more difficult for regulators to detect. “To me, it is all smoke and mirrors,” one former Goldman managing director said. “The truth is that most of the position-taking occurs at the market-making level.” [Reuters]
Breaking: Banks May Actually Just Pretend Publicly To Be Playing By New Rules, Proceed To Do Whatever They Damn Well Please
By Bess LevinComments (19)
Leave a comment
You can log in with your account or comment as a guest below.
Speaking of Goldman, thoughts on CNBC’s special last night?
So rules made by people who don’t understand finance are proving nonsensical/unenforceable? Wow. Next someone will tell me that it’s going to be difficult to determine if, under the new securitization rules, an issuer is really maintaining it’s mandatory 5% retained part “unhedged.”
sucked. GS rolls with the media the way DiCaprio rolls with his women.
nucky wouldn’t stand for this
This would never have happened if it weren’t for the economies, the shorting sellers, and other things i seen when i was looking at TV.
-M. Street
Flint, MI
And don’t forget those credit card default swats!
on the dvr… will report later.
I think Fannie and Freddie had something to do with this as well. Where are the two of them hiding?
http://proposition13.blogspot.com/2010/10/packetmotion-superfluidity.html
This is the only instance I can recall wherein knee-jerk government regulations have failed to achieve their intended objectives.
- Paul Sarbanes
“publically”?
That’s not even the worst of it; with cold weather fast approaching we’re almost certain to see the reemergence of shorts cellars and other nefarious Wall Street clothing storage facilities.
mind blowing stuff Bess
I think I’m going back to sleep/work. Wake me when something happens.
Damn straight.
Don’t forget Goldman Sack and all of the CEOs of the Treasury Department.
- M. Waters, Compton, CA
hence the sarcastic use of the term ‘breaking’
Yup, it would help to use the usual “breaking news” flashing lights above the title next time. I almost missed this in my rush to read about Cliff.
If I see one more of your meaningless comments with a link to a penny-stock pumping blog, I’m going to hunt you down and send a foot through your screen.
- Everyone here
in FI flow if you have no view on a bond you just pick it up from an IDB and do a trade flat with no PnL to keep clients happy and make sure you’re in the flow. If you have a view on it, you buy it for book or short it. Thats how flow desks work, but thats not exactly new…..