To: Morgan Stanley
From: John Goff
RE: Thanks a billion

OK, OK, thanks $951 million. It was really great to have you take this albatross off my hands a couple of years ago. The timing could not have been better for me. And now, after your outstanding stewardship, I’m pleased to retake the helm at Crescent Real Estate Equities Co. now. Two-and-a-half years sitting by the pool, counting your my $6.5 billion is enough.

My new partners at Barclays want to thank you as well. They’ve proven pretty savvy over the last couple of years, but even they couldn’t have imagined how well this would turn out for them. After all, they lent you $2 billion to buy a disaster. They never would have guessed they’d get to take over such a valuable real-estate portfolio just as the market begins to turn around.

Somebody is finally doing something about those corrupt, self-serving companies that we all rely on to tell us just how risky this stupid bond is. Ohio is suing the ratings agencies.

With the Feds spitting the bit on regulating an industry that never saw a mortgage-backed security or collateralized debt obligation it didn’t want to give a triple-A rating and that showed the most remarkable propensity for figuring things out right after the credit markets imploded, Richard Cordray, attorney general of the Buckeye State, is following the Andy Cuomo’s lead and attacking Fitch Ratings, Moody’s Investors Service and Standard & Poor’s.

Hot on the heels of the first mortgage-backed securities deal in several decades, the initial public offering market has begun to stir after its period of economic crisis-induced dormancy.

First to the post is British asset manager Gartmore Group, which said it will list on the London Stock Exchange next month. The reported £500 million stock sale will be used to cut debt, but also to allow its private equity masters, Hellman & Friedman, to finally earn a damned profit three-and-a-half years after financing Gartmore’s management buyout.

Naked short-selling has been blamed for many a market evil in recent years. Not so much any good.

Well, here’s one in the controversial practice’s corner: South Korea may allow institutional investors to short-sell bonds in an effort to boost liquidity in its nascent fixed-income market. Now, it isn’t the short-selling, per se, that will boost liquidity, but the move could win Seoul a coveted place in Citigroup’s World Government Bond Index. And then, just try to keep the money from rolling in.

Castle Hallenstein: Home Sweet HomeCitigroup’s former $100 million man has been freed from the tyranny of life as a serf under Czar Kenneth I. But if he wants to keep the nine-figure bonus checks rolling in under his new masters at Occidental Petroleum, he’s gonna need some new patrons.

Now, Citi chose to sell Hall’s business, Phibro, to Occidental for a few nickels rather than simply spin it off as an independent hedge fund. Still, Hall knows where the money is (a lot of it is hidden in the keep of his German castle) and he’s asked the Blackstone Group to find it.

The ranks of the elect are growing: Goldman Sachs has named 272 new managing directors.

Apotheosis for God’s chosen few is scheduled for New Year’s Day. Thereafter, it’s all milk, honey and million-dollar bonuses, but they’ve earned it, so sayeth the Prophet Blankfein.

Writeth the prophet in the e-mail announcing the promotions, the newly-minted MDs have richly earned their place in Heaven, for they are among the Blessed who helped preserve God’s bank during the late difficulties, and will “be integral to our service to clients, the strength of our reputation and the long-term success of the firm.”

Yea. Let their names be recorded in the Book of Life.

Goldman Sachs Names 272 Managing Directors For Next Year [Dow Jones via CNN Money]

Update: Full list (courtesy of FINalternatives) after the jump.

The luckiest man on earthHere at Dealbreaker, our opinion of Bank of America is pretty clear. The company is a dysfunctional mess and, despite being the biggest bank in the country, can’t seem to find anyone interested in taking its top job.

Those incorrigible contrarians at Breakingviews have a different take on the Worst Job on Wall Street.

There may actually be no better job in finance than the hot-seat of BofA.

Interesting. Go on.

Regulators are hardly friendly with BofA or Ken Lewis, its outgoing chief. Its board needs an overhaul, a senior management team of big shots is already in place, and there’s huge work to be done integrating its many poorly-timed acquisitions.

Right. And, now, the upside:

Given their well-known incorruptibility and infallibility, is it any wonder that ratings agencies would take exception to any suggestion that they might do wrong?

Well, that’s exactly what those outback yahoos in Australia seem to be implying. So Moody’s Investors Service and Standard & Poor’s are picking up (most of) their toys and going home, withdrawing their applications to offer corporate debt ratings. The lily-white ratings agencies object to a new rule, coming into force on Jan 1., that would turn over disputes between the all-knowing and their idiot retail investor clients to a financial ombudsman.

But that “would effectively be second-guessing S&P’s analysts,” S&P cries! “This would ultimately create investor confusion and harm financial markets.” And S&P has never done anything like that.

Deutsche Bank moved a step closer towards buying parts of ABN Amro, while the Dutch government moved a step closer (albeit an expensive one) to ridding itself of the state-owned bank and a former Deutsche Bank CEO moved a step closer to jail on a busy Thursday for west European banking.

The Germans have agreed to pay €700 million to buy what it wants from its ill-fated western neighbor, as well as assume €950 million in financial guarantees. ABN Amro, which the Dutch government plans to merge with Fortis Bank, gets stuck with potential credit losses of €1.6 billion.

The deal—which Dutch finance minister Wouter Bos says is a foregone conclusion, despite the need for parliamentary approval—is expected to close next year. And while Deutsche Bank apparently didn’t need any help to make it happen, the same cannot be said of ABN Amro.

What a day for Ken Lewis & Co.! First, one of the savviest hedge fund managers out there gives BofA a big thumbs up (take that, Steve Cohen and Jim Simons). Next, someone we’ve actually heard of kinda sorta suggested he might take the Worst Job on Wall Street (BofA is, after all, a public company).

Now, the very ratings agency that kneecapped UBS earlier today said it is not quite as pessimistic about BofA.

Moody’s Investors Service said that Bank of America doesn’t suck quite as much as some people may have suggested, upgrading the outlook on its financial strength regulation. Sure, it upgraded it from the ominous-sounding D to the not-exactly-confidence-inspiring C-minus, but that’s better than D, right?