What does Adam Carolla think of the Occupy Wall Street movement? Glad you asked. According the former Loveline co-host, who expounded on the topic on his podcast yesterday, we are dealing with “the first wave of self-entitled pricks who think the world owes them a living.” You know what it reminds him of? If you “extrapolate this, it’s essentially what the terrorists did with us,” Carolla said. “They see us with our hot tubs, driving our big cars around, having our parties…chicks looking hot…fake boobs all around…and say fuck it, Allah’s gonna take care of these guys and then Allah doesn’t take care of shit and they come down and blow our buildings up. It’s one culture can’t live next to another culture that’s thriving.” How did we get here? The way Carolla sees it, we can thank a new phenomenon called “envy” which is “a big issue that didn’t used to exist in this country.” Continue reading »
Archive for December 2011
Cuts have gone down at the House of Dougan. Continue reading »
Unemployment Slips To 8.6% (WSJ)
The U.S. labor market strengthened in November as private employers continued to add jobs at a healthy pace, while the unemployment rate fell to its lowest level since March 2009. Nonfarm payrolls rose by 120,000 last month, the U.S. Labor Department reported Friday in its monthly survey of employers. Private companies added 140,000 jobs, while the public sector—federal, state and local governments—lost 20,000 jobs. The unemployment rate, obtained by a separate survey of U.S. households, fell to 8.6% in November from 9.0% the previous month. The rate hadn’t been below 9% since March, when it was 8.8%. The rate is now lower than at any point since March 2009, when it was 8.6% as well. In another positive development, October’s figure for nonfarm payrolls was revised upward to show a gain of 100,000 from a previously reported 80,000, while September was revised up to a 210,000 gain from 158,000.
A Euro Crisis Deal Emerges (WSJ)
In his first appearance before the European Parliament since taking the ECB helm last month, Mr. Draghi offered a road map for policy makers. He called on euro-zone governments to quickly craft a “new fiscal compact,” calling it “the most important element to start restoring credibility.” He added that “other elements might follow, but the sequencing matters.”
Merkel Says Joint Euro Bonds Unthinkable (Bloomberg)
Also: “Marathon runners often say that a marathon gets especially tough and strenuous after about 35 kilometers (22 miles),” Merkel told the lower house of parliament in a speech previewing the European Union summit. “But they also say you can last the whole course if you’re aware of the magnitude of the task from the start.”
Banks See Emerging-Market Rally on ‘Cheap’ Stocks (Bloomberg)
Morgan Stanley’s Jonathan Garner lifted his recommendation to “maximum overweight” for the first time since October 2008, according to a report today. Citigroup Inc.’s Markus Rosgen said Asian stocks may surge 30 percent, while Credit Suisse Group AG’s Sakthi Siva predicted 10 percent gains. Antoine van Agtmael, who coined the term “emerging markets” in 1981 and now oversees $7.4 billion at Ashmore EMM LLC, said the stocks are “cheap.” Pacific Investment Management Co.’s Masha Gordon has been buying equities most reliant on economic growth.
Zynga Looks To Raise $1 Billion (WSJ)
Online games developer Zynga Inc. set the terms of its planned initial public offering Friday, seeking as much as $1 billion by selling 100 million shares at a price between $8.50 and $10. At the $10 end of its IPO range, Zynga commands a valuation of nearly $7 billion, according to an updated prospectus filed Friday.
House Panel Eyes MF Subpoena; Corzine May Be Target (Reuters)
The House Agriculture Committee has scheduled a Dec. 8 hearing to examine the bankruptcy. In a statement late Thursday, it said it will meet on Friday “to consider the issuance of a subpoena to compel the attendance of a witness at the subsequent hearing to examine the MF Global bankruptcy.”
Drunk RIM employees disrupt Beijing-bound flight (The Star)
Two drunken Research In Motion employees forced an Air Canada flight from Toronto to Beijing to make an unscheduled stop in Vancouver, disrupting travel plans of more than 300 people. George Campbell, 45, of Conestogo, Ont., and Paul Alexander Wilson, 38, of Kitchener, pleaded guilty to one charge of mischief in Richmond Provincial Court on Wednesday. They were each given suspended sentences and one year’s probation, and ordered to pay restitution to Air Canada of $35,878 each, and barred from having any contact with Air Canada crews or flying that carrier during the probation period. The incident began Monday night aboard Air Canada Flight 31, a non-stop flight from Toronto to Beijing, where the unruly passengers consumed “too much alcohol” and “disobeyed” the flight crew, according to Richmond RCMP…After forcibly restraining the two men, the crew notified the RCMP of the decision at 6:30 p.m. on Monday, and the plane landed at about 10:21 p.m. in Vancouver. Continue reading »
You may remember that a while back the SEC decided to modernize its computer capabilities by deleting all the porn* and replacing it with algorithms that could catch other algorithms, sort of like Tron. Apparently that worked:
On Thursday, a new “analytics” division tasked with mining hedge fund data announced actions against six individuals and three hedge fund firms for alleged fraud.
“We’re using risk analytics and unconventional methods to help achieve the holy grail of securities law enforcement – earlier detection and prevention,” said Robert Khuzami, Director of the SEC’s Division of Enforcement. “This approach, especially in the absence of a tip or complaint, minimizes both the number of victims and the amount of loss while increasing the chance of recovering funds and charging the perpetrators.”
Here’s how the SEC describes its, er, data mining** division: Continue reading »
Duke University Grads Waste Plenty Of “Unique Intelligence” Working On Wall Street Too, You Know
By Bess Levin
As you may have heard, over the last several months, various college newspapers have run opinion pieces by students lamenting the fact that many of their peers take jobs on Wall Street following graduation, where their talents are wasted. Dartmouth kicked things off in August, with others following in suit, particularly at Ivy League universities, from which the financial industry heavily recruits. Not to be left out of the fun, Duke University’s Chronicle Editorial Board today bemoaned the Duke “factory” which “inputs smart and well-intentioned kids, and churns out instruments for the Wall Street machine.” Continue reading »
This weekend will be the Galleon founder’s last one on the outside for a while. Continue reading »
You may remember that, earlier this week, Bloomberg reported that in June 2008, with the world’s financial system in the balance, then-Treasury Secretary (and Goldman Sachs alum) Hank Paulson (1) rode in an elevator and (2) upon disembarking from said elevator told a bunch of his friends who had WORKED AT GOLDMAN WITH HIM about how he was going to nationalize Fannie and Freddie (which he did about two months later) so his friends should short the hell out of the GSEs, which they then proceeded to do, or not do, since “The managers attending the meeting were thus given a choice opportunity to trade on that information. There’s no evidence that they did so after the meeting; tracking firm-specific short stock sales isn’t possible using public documents.”
So that happened. Fast forward to September 2011, when, with the world’s financial system in the balance, New York Fed president (and COINCIDENTALLY ALSO a Goldman Sachs alum) William Dudley met with some other hedge fund friends to ask them about what to do about Europe. And again about two months later, the Fed did some stuff about Europe. Very suspicious.
The Wall Street Journal reported on this meeting today and, while the article loses some points for not describing whether Dudley stepped off an elevator, jogged up a flight of stairs, or clambered in a window to arrive at the meeting, it’s actually remarkably fair in explaining how much you should freak out about this (not that much), as well as in foreshadowing how much people will freak out about it (quite a bit):
Continue reading »
Harvard Students: Leave Goldman Sachs/Harvard Students Who Want To Work At Goldman Sachs Alone!
By Bess Levin
Back in August, a Dartmouth undergraduate wrote an editorial taking issue with “faceless hedge funds” and his peers in New Hampshire who “flock to Wall Street to perpetuate class-based systems of power and dominance.” And, as the new semester began, it turned out that Dartmouth boy wasn’t alone. At campuses across the country but particularly at Ivy League schools, those less than thrilled with Wall Street, and the prospect of their fellow students taking jobs there, have let it out. As a result, many would now prefer to disclose a raging case of gonorrhea or being born with only 7 toes, than the dirty little secret that they hope to gain employment in the financial services industry, for fear of mocking and scorn. After a group of Occupy Harvard protesters “attempted to disrupt a Goldman Sachs recruiting event at the Office of Career Services” on Monday, though, the school newspaper had decided it’d had enough. A strongly-worded editorial was in order.
… while many experts agree that Goldman was part of the problematic system that created the financial crisis, Occupy Harvard’s targeting of a Goldman Sachs recruiting event presents a facile and trivializing interpretation of the root causes of the economic catastrophe and debases our national conversation on the issue.
They went on. Continue reading »
A reader/FEC enthusiast asks: “Today’s Living Social deal for five Big Macs and five large fries BEGS for a New Normal eating challenge. Someone has to have a hungry analyst, right?” Continue reading »
More Charges Coming In Insider Trading Probe (Reuters, related)
A year after four hedge funds were raided as part of a sweeping probe into insider trading, agents are ready to arrest as many as three people who worked at the raided funds, sources familiar with the investigation said. These arrests are expected to take place in the coming weeks, and some of the people will plead guilty to charges of insider trading, the sources said. Speculation has been mounting for weeks that the government was ready to make its next move against people who traded technology stocks at hedge funds Diamondback Capital Management and Level Global Investors, according to people at hedge funds, industry analysts, lawyers and law enforcement officials. At least one former Level Global worker is cooperating with authorities in the matter.
Charges Expected In Insider Probe (WSJ)
Investigators are focusing on an analyst at mutual-fund firm Neuberger Berman Group LLC and traders who worked at hedge funds Diamondback Capital Management LLC and Level Global Investors LP, the people say. Law-enforcement officials expect charges against the individuals to be filed by mid-December, the people say.
Jobless Claims Climb Back Over 400,000 (WSJ)
Initial jobless claims climbed by 6,000 to a seasonally adjusted 402,000 in the week ended Nov. 26, the highest level in more than a month, the Labor Department said Thursday. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones Newswires had forecast claims would fall by 3,000 to 390,000. For the week ended Nov. 19, claims were revised to 396,000 from an originally reported 393,000. Claims are now up two weeks in a row.
Euro-Zone Debt Is ‘System Risk’ (WSJ)
The euro zone’s debt problems will cause widespread economic damage in a way “characteristic of a systemic crisis,” Bank of England Governor Mervyn King said on Thursday. He said the currency bloc’s crisis is causing damage to governments and banks around the world. “We are seeing first hand the costs of financial instability,” he said. “No-one could deny the current situation is extraordinarily serious and threatening,” Mr. King said following the publication of the BOE’s twice-yearly Financial Stability Report. He added that the situation could deteriorate to the point the euro zone is forced to break up.
Goldman Analysts: Despair Will Turn To Hope In 2012 (CNBC)
“We think in the near term the market has further to fall as recession is further priced in and earnings downgrades accelerate,” Peter Oppenheimer, the chief European equity strategist at Goldman Sachs, wrote in a research note on Thursday. After losses for stocks in the first quarter Oppenheimer expects a rally before the end of the first half of the year with major indices finishing the year 10 percent up on current levels. “The timing of this rebound, however, is difficult to predict as it is party dependent on policy developments,” he said. The euro zone economy will contract by 0.8 percent in 2012 according to Goldman Sachs economists, with a “sharp, albeit short-lived, recession in Germany and France and a persistent and much deeper one in the peripheral euro zone countries.” Despite the recession, some kind of resolution to the euro zone debt crisis will lead to a rally for stocks and a narrowing of bond spreads according to Oppenheimer.
SocGen Said To Cut At Least 200 Jobs In US (Bloomberg)
Naseem Haffar, who was hired as U.S. head of loan sales and trading in March 2010, and New York-based senior credit traders Joseph Finnern and Zachary Chavis were among those dismissed, said the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the matter is private. Cuts may amount to 10 percent to 20 percent of the firm’s 2,000 workers in its U.S. corporate and investment bank.
Dominque Strauss-Kahn says ‘uninhibited but legal’ sex life cost him the Presidency of France (DM)
The former head of the International Monetary Fund claimed today that his bid to become President of France was lost because of his ‘uninhibited’ but otherwise ‘legal’ sex life. Speaking for the first time about the two attempted rape allegations which effectively ended his career, Dominique Strauss-Kahn said that having casual oral sex with a New York hotel maid was something he regretted deeply. The 62-year-old admits that his ‘flesh is weak’, but insists he has never paid for sex with any of the young women he regularly met at orgies across the world. Continue reading »
