George Soros — the 81-year-old billionaire being sued by Adriana Ferreyr, his 28-year-old Brazilian former girlfriend — used to seat her at the children’s table at his Sunday brunches in Southampton, N.Y. “He always had one table for the men, one for the women, and one for the kids,” said a friend of the Hungarian investing guru. “The Brazilian was always seated at the kids’ table, and she didn’t look too happy.” [The Daily]
Archive for August 2011
Keefe, Bruyette & Woods CEO Has A Logical Explanation For Why He Bought Crotchless Panties For Women Up And Down The Eastearn Seaboard, If Anyone Would Care To Listen
By Bess Levin
Because John Duffy, the Chief Executive Officer of investment bank Keefe, Bruyette & Woods is a married man, some people, such his estranged wife, would like to know why he “lavished millions of dollars’ worth of homes, jewelry and sexy outfits from Victoria’s Secret on stunning women in three different countries.” Kathy Duffy thinks she already has the answer (the trinkets were part of his “public and notorious adulterous relationships”) and for that reason has chosen to demand more than $20 million in divorce proceedings that have taken place so far. But she’s wrong! John AKA “Duff” wasn’t cheating on her with these ladies and his reason doesn’t even involve invoking the law of different area codes. Those homes he bought in Yonkers and CT? Those Rolexes and “educational supplies” and the mesh chaps? Those weren’t gifts for his gal-pals, those were investments! Continue reading »
Warren Buffett: Stop Coddling The Super Rich (NYT)
WB: “Twelve members of Congress will soon take on the crucial job of rearranging our country’s finances. They’ve been instructed to devise a plan that reduces the 10-year deficit by at least $1.5 trillion. It’s vital, however, that they achieve far more than that. Americans are rapidly losing faith in the ability of Congress to deal with our country’s fiscal problems. Only action that is immediate, real and very substantial will prevent that doubt from morphing into hopelessness. That feeling can create its own reality. Job one for the 12 is to pare down some future promises that even a rich America can’t fulfill. Big money must be saved here. The 12 should then turn to the issue of revenues. I would leave rates for 99.7 percent of taxpayers unchanged and continue the current 2-percentage-point reduction in the employee contribution to the payroll tax. This cut helps the poor and the middle class, who need every break they can get. But for those making more than $1 million — there were 236,883 such households in 2009 — I would raise rates immediately on taxable income in excess of $1 million, including, of course, dividends and capital gains. And for those who make $10 million or more — there were 8,274 in 2009 — I would suggest an additional increase in rate. My friends and I have been coddled long enough by a billionaire-friendly Congress. It’s time for our government to get serious about shared sacrifice.”
SEC Reviews S&P Math, Possible Ratings Leak (Bloomberg)
The Securities and Exchange Commission is scrutinizing the method Standard & Poor’s used to cut the U.S.’s credit rating and whether the firm properly protected the confidential decision, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter.
China: Debt Crisis Could Be Major Turning Point For US (CNBC)
“The worry is that China is going to take over and the West will collapse,” Dr Tim Stanley, a research fellow in American History at Royal Holloway College, told CNBC. “In the last 20 years, there has been a lot of talk along the lines of ‘China doesn’t play fair in world trade.’ That has evolved into ‘China owns the US.’”
Former Fed Economist: World Repeating Japan’s 1997 Mistake (Reuters)
The big mistake that Japan made then, said Richard Koo, was that its government was trying to reduce its budget deficit, while the private sector was still deleveraging — the same policies currently being pursued in the U.S., U.K., Spain and Portugal. “What we learned is that when the private sector is minimizing debt… you need governments to be in there, taking (this debt from) the private sector and putting (it) back into the income stream,” he said.
Bull kills its third man in 10 years during festival in eastern Spain (Guardian)
An inquiry was launched on Sunday after a 29-year-old man was gored to death by a bull during a festival in eastern Spain. The man, whose name was not released, died at a hospital in the town of Xativa on Saturday. A regional government official said an investigation into the goring had been opened. The 500 kilogram bull – named Ratón – has killed two other members of the public during festivals over 10 years. Because of the animal’s reputation, his owners reportedly earn €10,000 (£8,750) each time it appears at a festival. “He’s the one that gets the highest prices,” owner Gregorio de Jesus said of Ratón. “But still he works out the cheapest because wherever he goes organizers double the ticket price.” Continue reading »
Will Dominique Strauss-Kahn-Inspired Law And Order: SVU Episode Include Air The Traffic Controller He Probably Put His Mitts On?
By Bess Levin“Franco Nero will guest-star in the Law & Order: SVU season premiere as an Italian dignitary accused of rape, evoking the Dominique Strauss-Kahn arrest.” [TVG via Daily Intel, earlier: DSK gets pawsy with every person employed by Air France, earlier: DKS roams New York like a cat in heat]
The FT today reports that the SEC is looking into whether there was insider trading based on leaks of S&P’s downgrade on Friday. Which is puzzling – who made S&P insiders?
There’s something going on here that is not quite an insider trading investigation. For one thing, there probably wasn’t insider trading. Continue reading »
Some crack investigative journalism by Bloomberg reveals at least one reason. Continue reading »
Cass Almendral has been having himself a great summer — and he owes it all to his house. Half a mile from the Southampton train station, his eight-bedroom, $4 million 1890s farmhouse, complete with a pool and hot tub, has been the site of many a summer bash. But it’s done more than just serve as a party castle. It’s given Almendral his cachet with the ladies. “If you own a house, you’re at a huge advantage,” he says. “That’s why I’m single. Every summer I can have a huge adventure.” “I’ve had girls who’d take the bus over and linger around, then have sex with anyone who had a house,” says Almendral, the 50-year-old managing director of the Wall Street Solutions Group Inc. “They weren’t hookers. They got by through the kindness of strangers . . . they see the Hamptons as an adventure that’s also a safe, luxurious experience.”…Newbies on the city scene are quickly initiated into the game. “Some girls will pressure girls who are new to the city to be friends with a certain guy because of his Hamptons house,” says a 25-year-old woman who works at an investment banking firm. “It’s an overarching theme of the summer — find a guy with a home and date him.” [NYP]
Burning Passion For George Soros May Get Two Ladies Kicked Out Of Upper East Side Building
By Bess Levin
Yesterday we discussed George Soros’ love life. Specifically his dealings with 28 year-old Brazilian soap star Adriana Ferreyr. After 5 years of what she describes as a “serious and meaningful relationship” (while Soros’ lawyer characterized it as “on-again, off-again and non-exclusive”), Soros promised to buy her an apartment on East 85th Street. He broke things off with Ferreyr a couple days after signing the papers on the pad and then, during pillow talk during one night of “reconciliation,” he allegedly whispered to her that he’d let other woman named Tamikoa Bolton move into her “dream home.” Bad idea! Ferreyr let him know she was pissed, feelings she claims he responded to by attempting to choke her and flinging a lamp at her foot. Now she wants $50 million from Soros and would probably also like the bitch who stole her man to find a new place to live because quite awkwardly, Ferreyr and Bolton are now both living in the building, Bolton in 7C, Ferreyr a few floors down (if Soros, who lives two blocks away and was apparently “furious that Ferreyr found a lease in the building,” thought he was going to be able to get rid of her so quickly, he was sorely mistaken). This has proven slightly awkward.
Things became so testy between the rival women at 30 E. 85th St. — when the scorned Ferreyr managed to rent another apartment there — that each accused the other of harassment, according to court papers. The passive-aggressive catfight between the sultry actress and the sexy licensed pharmacist escalated to the point that Bolton began “slandering her to the board of the building, the management company, doormen and lawyers,” Ferreyr charges in her lawsuit.
While you’d think that a grown-up soap star and sexy licensed pharmacist could put their feelings for the Hungarian hunk of man meat aside, we fear that this is only the beginning and the beginning of the end of their residency in the building. It starts with talking shit to the doorman and you know where it goes from there? Continue reading »
Short sale bans. Is there anything they can’t do?
Maybe. But does it matter? If your position is just that “speculation” on stocks is the moral equivalent of puppy-murder and should never be profitable, then you just say things like “let’s ban short sales” and don’t worry about the details. You take shorting of bank shares as a personal affront, and your goal is not to have functioning markets but just to prove that you’re tough. And your name might be Jean-Pierre Jouyet:
Jean-Pierre Jouyet, head of the AMF, the French securities regulator, said on Thursday night: “They [investors] wanted to test French resistance. This is our response, as always very determined, and it will be so for all those who want to put us to the test.”
But, as we’re seeing with new short sale bans from France, Italy, Spain and Belgium, this approach sometimes has problems, because most short selling takes place in an actual world where other things happen too. Like:
Continue reading »
S&P Makes Downgrade Inquiries (FT)
The Securities and Exchange Commission has asked credit rating agency Standard & Poor’s to disclose who within its ranks knew of its decision to downgrade US debt before it was announced last week, as part of a preliminary look into potential insider trading, people familiar with the matter say.
BofA Chief Sees Top US Officials (WSJ)
Embattled Bank of America Corp. boss Brian Moynihan met privately this week with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Federal Reserve governor Daniel Tarullo amid the bank’s campaign to calm investors and employees about the bank’s dramatic share slump. The separate meetings took place on Wednesday in Washington, said people familiar with the situation. Earlier that day, Mr. Moynihan participated in an unusual public conference call arranged by one of the bank’s largest shareholders, where he offered assurances about the bank’s strategy, financial strength and ability to withstand market volatility.
Short Selling Of Stocks Banned In France, Spain (Bloomberg)
European regulators are divided over how to respond after a rout that sent the region’s bank stocks to their lowest in almost 2 1/2 years this week. Germany and the Netherlands have said they don’t plan further restrictions on short sales, while British regulators said they don’t plan to limit the practice. “In contrast to the regulators’ hopes, the overall evidence indicates that short-selling bans at best left stock prices unaffected and at worst may have contributed to their decline,” said Alessandro Beber, a professor at Cass Business School in London who’s studied short-sales bans in 30 countries.
Analysts: Short Selling Ban Will Not Deter Bears (CNBC)
“There is absolutely no evidence that it will achieve what they want it to achieve,” Nick Carn, founder of Carn Macro Advisors, told CNBC on Friday. “It’s a gesture to try and indicate that the problems are due to some kind of evil conspiracy of one type or another, part of the process that says that speculators are driving down the price of Greek debt or Italian debt. It’s trying to create the same class of person to whom you can then attribute your problems,” he said.
Raters Fail To See Defaults Coming (WSJ)
Out of the 15 government defaults S&P has tracked since 1975, for instance, the firm rated 12 of the countries single-B or higher one year before the event. Yet S&P says historically a single-B rating has had just a 2% average chance of default within a year. Put another way, S&P drastically underestimated one-year default risk in 80% of those cases. Similarly, of the 13 governments rated by Moody’s Investors Service within one year of a default, 11 were rated B or higher. Three of those were rated Ba, Moody’s parlance for double-B, which carries a 0.77% one-year default rate.
Treasury Saves $647 Million In Bond Sales (Bloomberg)
“One would be remiss to try and conclude that anyone is worried about that one-tick downgrade,” said Ian Lyngen, a government bond strategist at CRT Capital Group LLC in Stamford, Connecticut. “What is the yield differential in the market for that one tick? Apparently it’s nothing. If anything, it’s a bullish event for Treasuries.” Continue reading »
German Banking System Suffers From Insufficient Levels of Pay, Jews, Naked-Lady Mud Wrestling
By Matt Levine
Michael Lewis’s tour of Europe lands him in Germany this week, where he writes an unbelievably raunchy epic and relies on an elaborate metaphor to justify some sightseeing that Tabitha Soren might not otherwise approve of:
The Hamburg red-light district had caught [anthropologist Alan] Dundes’s eye because the locals made such a big deal of mud-wrestling. Naked women fought in a metaphorical ring of filth while the spectators wore plastic caps, a sort of head condom, to avoid being splattered. “Thus,” wrote Dundes, “the audience can remain clean while enjoying dirt!” Germans longed to be near the shit, but not in it. This, as it turns out, was an excellent description of their role in the current financial crisis.”
We are not the only ones to find this metaphor a little strained. In any case, when he’s not looking for shitshows of the literal variety, he’s in town to try to figure out why German state-owned Landesbanks lost so much money on subprime CDOs peddled by American banks:
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