And on an even more serious note, for which you should brace yourselves, Taleb has announced he will not be going to Davos this year. Why? Because he’s sick of the name dropping fame whores in attendance who don’t know anything about debt, like he does. Black Swan will be making better use of his time “at home with my fireplace and notebook and library,” where he will fix our economy while less serious people– NT hates to name names but “Rouriel Noubini” he mouths– will be in Switzerland banging economist groupies. Continue reading »
Archive for December 2010
“I’m 44 years old, my plan is to be a billionaire by 50, which these days, that’s very doable,” the actor, recovering drug addict and born again Christian who filed for bankruptcy last year told Daily Intel‘s Chris Rovzar. “And once I achieve that goal, my plan would be to be the George Soros for Jesus.”
Morgan Stanley CEO James Gorman Threatens To Personally Fire Anyone Caught Leaking Bonus Information
By Bess Levin
By its own estimation, Morgan Stanley’s bonuses are set to suck this year. The best employees have been told to hope for is a year on year decrease of 10 to 30 percent. And for his own part, chief exec James Gorman has been fairly vocal about the need for Wall Street to get to a place where failure isn’t rewarded isn’t rewarded as richly as success. Since some of Morgan Stanley’s business have not exactly succeeded with flying colors this year, it should follow that their staff will be compensated accordingly. Perhaps anticipating that there will be some unhappy campers, Jim has suddenly decided that while it’s no secret most people’s pay will be in the toilet, which he supports, Morgan Stanley must suppress this information from the outside world. How is Gorman planning on going about enforcing the new rule? Brute fucking force. Continue reading »
Bloomberg reports that Dr. Doom has a new pussy palace, on East First Street. Continue reading »
Lenny Dykstra: “I Went Under, Took Care Of Business, And Now I’m Doing What I’ve Got To Do”
By Bess Levin
“I’m about one thing,” Lenny Dykstra told Howard Eskin in minute one of a glorious interview on 610 AM Sports Talk in Philadelphia yesterday afternoon. “And that’s walking the talk.” The talking that Dykstra has been doing over the past several years, ever since he got thrown out of his house and filed for bankruptcy, has centered around two things: 1) taking on what he describes as the “criminals” at JPMorgan, whose “predatory lending” practices caused him to be foreclosed on and 2) his big comeback. Both points were addressed in this chat. With regard to the former, he not only plans to take JPM to court, but he’s made it his mission to protect people like himself from these “crooks.” To that end, LD has started a “mortgage forensic research firm,” known as Predatory Lending Recovery, LLC, which despite not yet having any clients and only one testimonial, Len claims is a billion dollar business. And as for making a comeback? Fuck that shit, Lenny says. He’s already back. Here are some other things the self-described “lightning rod for money” had to say:
* “It took me 2 years to get through this death chamber that they call bankruptcy”
* Howard: “How did you lose all your money?” Lenny: “It’s called predatory lending. Look, I don’t want to get into this New World Order stuff. I’m a regular guy. I don’t believe in ghosts, I’m not afraid of the dark. Never in my life did I think there was a thing called corporate crime. But JPMorgan? They’re criminals. Fireman’s Fund? They’re criminals. I didn’t get stupid overnight. I don’t read much because it’s so bad for my eyes. But I see some of this stuff and it’s insanity.” Howard: “That’s a pretty big accusation against JPMorgan.” Lenny: “It’s more than accusation- it’s the facts!”
* “I’m a lightning rod for money; after we’re done talking today when you’re walking to your car you’ll probably find 100 bucks.” Continue reading »
Whitney Tilson sent out T2 Partner’s analysis of Netflix yesterday, explaining why it’s their “largest bearish bet.” If you have any thoughts on why they’re right or wrong, he’s all ears. Continue reading »
“Contrary to speculation in the media, redemptions have been immaterial — amounting to less than 10 percent of our capital base,” the fund said in a letter to clients. “As you can appreciate, we simply cannot respond to every rumor circulating in the media,” Level Global continued. “We can, however, reiterate what we have already said — that we are not a target of the government’s investigation and that we are cooperating fully.” [Reuters]
Since becoming Treasury Secretary, Tim Geithner has taken a whole lot of shit, from both the outside world and internally at work. His boss makes “jokes” in public about dogs pissing on him, chief executives openly speak of his uselessness and hardly a day goes by without a story claiming he’s getting fired and replaced by (take your pick) Jamie Dimon, Mike Bloomberg, or Jojo the idiot circus boy. Basically, his tenure in Washington has become one long blow of the sad trombone. TG has taken most of it in stride but guess what, people? The jabs? They add up. And today’s, courtesy of Bloomberg BusinessWeek, just might be the one that pushes him over the edge and by over the edge, we mean into a plastic surgeon’s office. Continue reading »
Congress Sends Tax Bill To Obama (WSJ)
The bill goes to the White House for President Barack Obama’s signature after the House overcame persistent liberal opposition and passed it with an unexpectedly large bipartisan majority of 277-148. The measure passed the Senate earlier in the week also with an overwhelming majority.
Diamond To Become Barclays Chief Three Months Earlier (Bloomberg)
Diamond, 59, will become CEO on Jan. 1, the London-based bank said in a statement today. Barclays said in September Diamond would succeed John Varley as CEO on March 31, 2011.
Probe Nabs Tech Analysts (WSJ)
In their most significant move yet in a sweeping insider-trading investigation, federal prosecutors charged four corporate managers with peddling financial details about prominent technology companies and with leaking secrets about popular consumer products such as Apple Inc.’s iPhone in exchange for cash. “The information trafficked by the four ‘consultants’ went way beyond permissible market research,” said Janice Fedarcyk, a Federal Bureau of Investigation assistant director in charge. “It was insider information.”
Insider Trading Arrests Point Prosecutors To Hedge Funds (Bloomberg)
“Few hedge fund managers have the investment skill to deliver the benefits that they promise,” James Fanto, a professor at Brooklyn Law School in New York, said in an e-mail. “They have to find an edge however they can — in this case through the expert networks,” said Fanto, who teaches banking, corporate and securities law…“If you think you shouldn’t be talking about it –don’t,” an unidentified Primary Global employee tells Shimoon during one call, according to the complaint. “That would really suck if you recorded all the calls,” Shimoon replies.
UBS Internal Memo Responds To Dress Code Jibes (Reuters)
UBS sought to downplay a new dress code policy, broken by Dealbreaker and widely lampooned in the international press for detailed instructions to staff extending as far as the colour of their underwear and the care of nasal hair. The memo said the dress code was first created in 2009 for reception staff, event attendants and chauffeurs, but was being extended to customer-facing staff in Switzerland to help the bank present a consistent image. The effort to smarten up staff is part of a wider campaign to improve the public image of the country’s top bank, bailed out by the government after writing down more than 50 billion Swiss francs ($52.2 billion) of toxic assets in the crisis.
Keith Meister, Former Icahn Lieutenant, Starts Hedge Fund (Dealbook)
Keith Meister, who was widely described as the billionaire activist investor Carl C. Icahn’s right-hand man, is starting an event-driven hedge fund that will be seeded by Soros Fund Management, people who have been briefed on the matter say.
Mark Madoff’s Name Became Too Big A Burden To Bear (NYT)
Most frustrating of all, this person said, was the fact that neither he nor anyone who knew him could publicly defend him. “There were all these comments from the trustee about how he was an incompetent boob, and to have all the people who knew otherwise muzzled by their lawyers — it was very, very hard.” No one in the financial world, the only world where he had ever worked, would publicly risk giving a job to a Madoff.
Ireland Debt Downgraded (WSJ)
The five-notch downgrade was made as “Ireland’s sovereign creditworthiness has suffered from the repeated crystallization of bank-related contingent liabilities on the government’s balance sheet,” said Dietmar Hornung, vice president, senior credit officer at Moody’s. Continue reading »
