Senate Report Said To Fault JPMorgan (NYT)
A report by the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations highlights flaws in the bank’s public disclosures and takes aim at several executives, including Douglas Braunstein, who was chief financial officer at the time of the losses, according to people briefed on the inquiry. The report’s findings — scheduled to be released on March 15 — are expected to fault the executives for allowingJPMorgan to build the bets without fully warning regulators and investors, these people said. The subcommittee, led by Senator Carl Levin, could ask Mr. Braunstein and other senior executives to testify at a hearing this month, according to the people. The subcommittee does not currently intend to call the bank’s chief executive, Jamie Dimon, but Congressional investigators interviewed Mr. Dimon last year.
Citi CEO Is Keeping Score (WSJ)
At a gathering of 300 executives last month at a Hilton Hotel in East Brunswick, N.J., Mr. Corbat proposed a slate of new, more-rigorous ways to track both the performance of individual executives and the third-largest U.S. bank as a whole, said people who were there. His approach includes score cards that will rate top managers across the New York company in five categories. “You are what you measure,” Mr. Corbat told the gathering.
Report Faults FSA Over Rate Rigging (WSJ)
The report, commissioned by the FSA in the wake of the Barclays BARC.LN +1.48%PLC £290 million ($436.1 million) settlement with regulators over attempted rate-rigging, shows the regulator either ignored or failed to follow up on a series of red flags highlighting problems with the rates. Between 2007 and 2009, the FSA said it found 26 pieces of correspondence citing direct references to “lowballing”—where banks understated their borrowing costs to make their funding positions look stronger. These include two telephone calls from Barclays managers flagging problems with rate-setting process. The regulator also said it overlooked an article in The Wall Street Journal highlighting problems with the London interbank offered rate because the article wasn’t widely read within the FSA.
Heinz CEO’s Golden Exit Deal (WSJ)
The total would consist of a $56 million “golden parachute” including bonus payments and other items, $57 million in pension and deferred compensation and $99.7 million of Heinz shares that Mr. Johnson owns or controls, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing Monday.
EU Said To Weigh Extra Years For Irish Rescue Loans (Bloomberg)
The European Union is weighing whether to extend Ireland’s rescue loans by five years or more, buttressing the government’s efforts to become the first country to exit a bailout since the euro-region debt crisis began.
Hotel boots rowdy Rodman over Kim Jong Un scene (NYP)
Dennis Rodman, just back from visiting Kim Jong Un, was escorted out of the Time Hotel in Midtown on Sunday after spending hours at the restaurant bar loudly telling anyone who would listen what a great guy the North Korean dictator is. “He was at the bar at Serafina for three hours,” says a spy. “He kept saying what a nice guy Kim is, and how Kim just wants to talk to President Obama about basketball. He was waving around a signed copy of the dictator’s huge manifesto, telling everyone they should read it.” Added the witness, “Dennis was making a total jerk of himself. He wouldn’t leave, and he wouldn’t let anyone talk to him about shutting up, or what an oppressive country North Korea is. Eventually he had to leave the bar because the bartender was starting to get [bleep]ed-off.”
Ikos Co-Founder Coward Sues Ex-Wife Over Hedge-Fund Software (Bloomberg)
Martin Coward, the co-founder of Ikos Asset Management Ltd., sued his estranged wife, Elena Ambrosiadou, in a U.K. court over the copyright ownership of computer software that runs the hedge fund’s trading platform.
Coward was the “architect” of the “bedrock of the family business,” his lawyers said at the start of a three-week trial in London today. “Practically all of the financial markets expertise at Ikos resided in Coward himself,” said Michael Bloch, Coward’s lawyer. Ikos, which uses computer algorithms to spot profitable trades in futures markets, has been embroiled in lawsuits involving Coward and other former employees around the globe. The estranged couple, who started divorce proceedings in Greece in 2009, have filed more than 40 lawsuits against each other in at least four countries.
Sequester Leaves US In ‘Fantasy’ World: Analyst (CNBC)
Stephen King, chief global economist at HSBC, said that the U.S. was living in a”fantasy world” over its growth forecasts. “If you look at the projections from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) they assume that growth goes back to between 4 to 5 percent in real terms between 2014 and 2018. Their numbers suggest that the U.S. will post the fastest rate of productivity growth of any decade in the last 50 or 60 years,” King told CNBC’s “European Closing Bell.”
Former Lehman Derivatives Banker Helps Paschi Unravel Contracts (WSJ)
Riccardo Banchetti, whose work packaging derivatives at Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. got him the top European job at the firm a week before it failed, is now making a living unraveling the kind of deals he once developed.
Banchetti worked with Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena SpA to uncover 730 million euros ($955 million) of losses that the world’s oldest bank hid through the use of derivatives. The Italian banker, who also advised JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) on its defence against fraud charges over swaps with Milan, has scrutinized more than 10 billion euros of transactions since leaving Lehman, according to a person with knowledge of his activities who asked not to be identified because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly.
Drugs found in Florida suspects’ orifices, deputies say (WPBF)
According to the Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office, a deputy who initiated a traffic stop on a car without brake lights found cocaine in a man’s prosthetic leg. The deputy also found morphine and hydromorphine pills in a woman’s bra and a hypodermic needle hidden in another woman’s buttocks.
Why is that story about RBS losing 9bil a year still at the opening screen? Just taking up valuable real estate.
Better than a Shazar post being there.
And the FSA doesn't even have the excuse of being too busy watching porn. Amateurs.
-The SEC
I got bleeped-off once. back in 'nam. worth every penny.
My nickname in college was The Hypodermic Needle.
I suspect all five measures will be related to squats.
Better than finding a gaggle of Shazars in one of your orifices.
“You are what you measure”…nobody understands me.
- The Ghost of Werner Heisenberg
Can't wait to hear more insight from the brightest financial mind of our generation, Senator Carl "Shitty" Levin.
Really hope you're getting one of those whale pool's for the office this summer!
Don't you mean The Capicolla Catheter?
I've both stayed at the Time hotel in midtown, and seen Dennis Rodman walking seemingly aimlessly directly in front of the main entrance to the CBOT.
You're getting the giant squid.*
*As long as stocks are available.
I like that score card idea that Corbat is implementing at Citi. If it is done right and he has a sense of humor; he should have Topps print up trading cards every quarter. On the front of the card would be the Executive/Managers picture. On the back you would have the box scores for the manager; maybe a small box with a little bio info and career path stuff. There could also be a box devoted to detailing some major fuck-up or success the manager was responsible for and what it cost the shareholder.
In 100 years, the Kweku Adoboli UBS card will be the most valuable card due to everyone thinking his trading loss must be a printing error. I also propose a Minetta's win/loss stat.
Lasagna motherfucker, eat it!
-Sam Jacksonini
Looks like Dealbreaker just renewed their subscription to Florida Today.
Remember, boys! stay away from women! All they want from you is your man-juice! If you ever get the kind of urges that cannot be supressed by hard liquor, then use this!
Same here.
If we're working on Iraq style playing cards, who's the joker?
CEOs of RBS, UBS, Barclays and Bank of America as the 2s.
Then you could start some sort of Fantasy Finance league where you can trade the different managers and laugh when your friends' picks get busted by the SEC or rack up billion dollar losses
How dare that fiction writer Stephen King proclaim we are living in a "fantasy world." He creates fantasy worlds for a living!
UBS Analyst, Analyst
Cool story Hansel
Holmes. Other than that, no concerns.
This seriously needs to happen. Gains/losses through the year get you into the playoffs, which are then decided by bonuses.
Hey, it's not nearly as dumb as Fantasy Golf!
Shazar
Nancy, I think they are referring to baseball cards.
"My cat agrees. Or doesn't."
- the Ghost of Erwin Schrodinger.
I gag on a Shazar every time that moron posts.
I love to do "squats" in the "power rack"
-Shaz