Unfounded rumor of the afternoon: apparently big cuts are said to be expected by the end of the year. Continue reading »
Nomura
How Long Before Nomura Realizes Its True Passion, Expands Into Jam & Jelly Production, And Ditches This Banking Crap?
By Bess Levin
This is how it starts. Continue reading »
Nomura Management Does Not Discriminate When It Comes To Referring To Women’s Racks As “Honkers”?
By Bess Levin
Last November we mentioned that Maureen Murphy and Anna Francis, two female Nomura employees (legacy Lehman girls), had sued the bank claiming that “sexist Japanese company chiefs effectively sidelined them because they were women and not Japanese.” Murphy, a senior analyst earning £55,000-a-year said that on one occasion a male colleague told her women “belonged at home cleaning floors” and that one woman trader had her breasts referred to as “honkers” during a meeting (actual alleged quote: “Oh, you don’t have your honkers out today”). Today a judge threw out their case. Continue reading »
As we’ve discussed before, Nomura’s acquisition of Lehman’s internal operations has not gone as smoothly as everyone had hoped. The Lehman employees are being very difficult, all but refusing to submit to their new employer’s way of doing things. Particularly the women. Despite being told that short sleeves are not acceptable, as they are the clothes of whores, these Lehman ladies apparently spent the summer just absolutely slutting it up. I’m talking sleeveless tops. I’m talking silk shirts. I’m talking bright nail polish. Well no more! The summer’s over, and you’ve had your kicks. It’s time to lock it up and know what else? This goes for any of the men straddling the line between “upstanding businessman” and gigolo. And don’t give me this shit that you couldn’t understand the memo. One short sleeve, one red nail– and I mean one– and you’re gone.
We began the phase with the all too familiar “We are well capitalized. We don’t foresee additional equity raises being required in the foreseeable future, except in the event of something unforeseen.” This was followed within 30 days with an unforeseen event, another major equity raise and related dilution to existing shareholders.
Next up, the phase best described as “We are announcing write downs that effectively wipe out the last 24 months of earnings. Fortunately, we are also doing an equity raise which gives us 120% of this capital and we don’t expect any further write downs.” This was followed in the same quarter by even larger write downs and another equity raise along with all the pain to shareholders that entails
We then moved into “Though we are not now in a crisis of any kind, and I want to really emphasize that, not… in… a crisis… we now have enough capital to deal with any crisis we are not in or any unforeseen event that hasn’t yet been an eventuality we have had to face.” This was followed by an equity raise.
We then moved into “The financial system at large is in the midst of a crisis. Fortunately, since we planned for this unforeseen event, we have enough capital to weather these difficult times.” A question on the call would invariably spring out: “Are you facing a liquidity crisis?” Answer: “None of our clients or our partners have lost faith in our financial strength.” Q. “So, you aren’t in a liquidity crisis?” A. “We have several employee retention plans in the works, including a deal with the Shake Shack for half price coupons for top earners.” Of course, at that very moment, the firm was getting the last subscription agreement documents signed.
After that was “We are in the middle of a liquidity crisis. Several partners have pulled their lines of credit. We have taken several steps to avoid any downgrade or counterparty credit issues and we believe our strong capital base will show how silly these fears are.” A downgrade and a preferred stock offering with 12% accruing dividends becomes public days later.
Now we have entered another stage of the credit crisis.
“From a very optimistic point of view, the financial liquidity crisis has subsided, for the time being, and the focus has shifted to the real economy,” said Kenichi Watanabe, chief executive of Nomura.
We are officially in the “The crisis is over” phase. Expect unexpected equity raises any day now.
Nomura chief says liquidity crisis over [The Financial Times]
Nomura Holdings has apparently agreed to buy the European operations of Lehman Brothers. Supposedly management just held a meeting with IBD, and announced that 500 out of the roughly 700+ person staff will be retained, with one month of severance offered to those left of the deal.
