I’m not the only person who noticed that Mark Zuckerberg is going to have more than the usual amount of control over Facebook (Facebook Facebook Facebook), both unto his grave and beyond. As a conceptual matter I’m kind of down with that though I’m not going to, like, buy shares in the IPO or anything.* But my basic take is that, if you’re going to buy stock in in a poking machine that makes about a penny per user per day, you should be willing to trust Mark Zuckerberg. Because if you were the inventor of Facebook, you would have invented Facebook, or something.
The alternative to giving a hoodied 27-year-old complete control over all aspects of a multibillion dollar business is to have a team of professional managers being all professional and managing by committee and checking each others’ work. It is not clear what is better. I suspect Facebook would not be a $100 billion asset today if it had sold to Yahoo in 2006 though, also, no one has ever accused Yahoo of being professionally managed. But the point is that those are two distinct styles and there are arguments for both. Professionalism has much to recommend it but so does complete domination by one visionary; for instance, founder dominated firms outperform the market.
On the other hand there is a downside to dominant visionaries, as some (non-Zynga-based) hog farmers now know all too well: Continue reading »
The chief risk officer who was brought in to install risk management systems at MF Global after a rogue trading incident in February 2008 is expected to tell Congress Thursday he outlined his concerns about European sovereign debt trades in the fall of 2010…At the hearing, Michael Roseman is expected to say he “expressed my growing concerns with regard to the potential capital risk associated with the growing positions and began to express caution on the growing liquidity risk,” according to a copy of the testimony reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. In mid-September, Roseman told MF Global’s chief executive, Jon Corzine, that he would consult the firm’s board of directors on requests to increase limits on the European trades. According to his written testimony, Roseman is expected to say that by late October of 2010, the positions were approaching $3.5 billion to $4 billion. After discussing his concerns with Corzine and others, the risk scenarios he presented “were challenged as being implausible.” Roseman’s testimony doesn’t specify who aside from Corzine and the board he told of his concerns. [FINS]
JSC has reportedly put his Hoboken hideaway on the market, for reasons that are unclear at this time (and which we should not speculate over. Surely there are some who will be quick to suggest he’s downsizing and freeing up cash in case he needs money for legal fees but we have no idea, do we? Maybe the new venture became a success sooner than anyone thought, and he’s moving to a bigger place. Maybe he’s decided to live in France full-time). Some details, for those interested in a place with a story to tell: Continue reading »
The “jokes” clearly being the most humiliating part of the proceedings. Continue reading »
Former MF Global employees in Chicago recently had the chance to vent their frustration against Jon Corzine — by smacking him with a small wooden bat. At a post-Christmas party Dec. 29, former employees took turns smashing a star-shaped pinata with pictures of Corzine taped on it, according to people who attended the party. Unfortunately, those looking for the missing $1.2 billion in customer funds came up empty-handed: When the pinata broke open, all it contained was slips of paper with “IOU” written on them. A spokesperson for MF Global said the firm had no knowledge of this event. [FINS]
Back in November, shortly after MF Global filed for bankruptcy, many suggested that even if he changed his name and underwent an appearance-altering makeover that included shaving the beard, it would be unlikely that Jon Corzine would ever work again, whether on Wall Street or as a traveling vacuum salesman going door to door to push his product. No, people said– he was finished. Forward his non-existent calls to the couch, where you’d be able to find him on any given morning, eating cereal out of a punch bowl and shouting “Oh shit! Paternity tests don’t lie!” along with the Maury audience before his pre-afternoon nap. How could he possibly find gainful employment again, after all that’d happened, people asked before answering that no, it was impossible. At the time, we cautioned not to underestimate the fire inside JSC, who has never let setbacks define him and who would likely soon demonstrate his conviction in the saying tattooed on his ass- “Each time a door closes, a bigger, more fucking awesome one opens.” Assuming he can cover the rent, that door has come. Continue reading »
…on October 15, two weeks before MF Global filed for bankruptcy, Corzine and his wife, Sharon Elghanayan, were at a birthday party in Paris talking about a château they were about to buy in the South of France. “It’s not in Cap Ferrat,” one person recalls Elghanayan saying, perhaps to mitigate the extravagance. “To buy any decent château is at least a couple of million euros,” explains another person who was at the party, “and that is before the renovation with the air-conditioning and the new kitchen. Sharon was very excited. She said she was flying down there on Monday morning.” [Vanity Fair]
