The Volcker Rule was at the core of many fights last week at Davos. As we wrote, bankers couldn’t agree with each other, lawmakers couldn’t agree either, but still decided to band up against bankers, blah, blah.
Anyway, seems like there wasn’t a lack of booze, as we initially thought, and on the last day of the WEF conference, everybody decided to give it a rest and just find somewhat of an agreement while getting trashed. The fighting was getting old, they were too hungover to continue this BS and they all had come to party after all.
Davos
It’s getting ugly in Davos. As we wrote previously, everybody is mad at everybody and the booze is missing, which is not helping people’s mood. (Except for Vikram, who, as a commenter noted, looks in the CNBC interview “like he’s sitting in the Zen garden of his dreams.”)
“Both the banks and the regulators think they hold all the cards,” said Harvard Economics Professor Kenneth Rogoff. “The bankers think that when the storm passes nothing will have changed and they can go back to business as usual. Regulators think banks have completely lost the political capital and are ignoring public opinion.”
So here’s what really’s pissing off Davos attendees. It’s not some bankers’ behind-the-door plotting. It’s not the endless convos about whether breaking up the banks is a good or a bad thing and it’s not how to help Haiti.
Nope. None of those trivialities. What people are really angry about is that this year -just like last – there won’t be a wine tasting, which has historically been the “highlight of the forum.”
Everybody’s pissed off at everybody at the World Economic Forum. It’s not the love fest it used to be. Not even humanity-lover Bono is showing up this year.
Here’s a roundup:
Barclays President Robert Diamond would like to point out that everyone at the bank is “immensely proud” that the bank didn’t take any direct money from any government anywhere in the world. A word of acknowledgment would be much appreciated, thank you.
“I think that what goes unnoticed is that the banks which stayed strong and were well managed through this are angry at the banks (that) had poor management (and) were allowed to have poor management and ineffective regulations,” Diamond said.
As you’re more than likely aware, the World Economic Forum at Davos kicked off this week. Though Lloyd Blankfein and Jamie Dimon will sadly not be able to attend, Gary Cohn, John Mack, Vikram Pandit, Bob Diamond, Brady Dougan Brian Moynihan will all be there, in addition to Nouriel Roubini, who’s been known to add a certain je ne sais quoi* to most soirees, as well as his wingman, George Soros, and Dan Loeb, who arrived today. Obviously they’re all going to be expected to have some “serious talks” about “real solutions” for how we can make this global financial system thing work, have some sit-downs with Maria, play in the snow and what have you. But if I may, I’d like to offer that perhaps you should take this week as an opportunity to do something more important than all that. Like Dance. Dance, puppets, dance! Dance like nobody’s watching. Dance like Andrew Ross Sorkin’s not taking careful notes regarding who busted out the lawnmower (Vikram) and who got low (Soros). Dance like you’re on ecstasy. At the very least dance like Bill Gates. Promise me that.
JP Morgan has “plenty of capital,” thank you very much.
And if you people don’t stop talking about this nationalization thing, you are going to fuck the whole thing up for us. Someone should just rewrite Basel II, make a nice speech about it and get the hell out of our way. I mean seriously.
Plus, we are the only people lending (to our related entities). So enough with this “you better start lending again” crap. You going to come up here and make me?
Anyhow, are we done yet? I’ve got some skiing I’d like to do.
JP Morgan says has ‘plenty of capital’ [Reuters]
It’s Davos time, and you know what that means. Every talking head with an opinion will be spouting off their big idea(tm) of the day, their mouths forced to move at a rapid pace, opening and closing spasmicly lest an overeager reporter shove a microphone past the point that triggers the gag reflex. Soros, of course, is no exception.
“That (the “bad bank” proposal) will help relieve the situation, but it will not be sufficient to turn it around,” Soros said during a live interview at the Davos economic conference in Switzerland. Instead, Soros said he would create a “good bank” and re-capitalize the good assets.
If it’s not Soros talking about the effects of “the Lehman thing,” it is someone else talking about the effects of “the Lehman thing,” so really, couldn’t we just do without Soros for awhile?
Soros: ‘Bad Bank’ for Troubled Assets Is Bad Idea [CNBC]
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