$$$Goldman Sachs Chief Executive Lloyd Blankfein said Thursday the markets' big selloff was an overreaction to news the Federal Reserve may slow its bond purchases later this year. "The market understood, but the market overreacted," Blankfein told CNBC's Maria Bartiromo on "Closing Bell," adding Fed Chief Ben Bernanke made clear in his comments last week that the program could start winding down toward the end of 2013, but only if labor-market conditions greatly improve. "The market, of course, took this as 'Oh, my God. It's the first moment and it was going to be an avalanche.' And of course, that doesn't necessarily have to be the case." [CNBC]
$$$Bank of America rejects AIG bid to reopen $8.5 billion mortgage accord [Reuters]
$$$ "One Saturday evening last fall, some 180 Goldman Sachs employees assembled at a dock along the East River of Manhattan, divided into 20 teams. Standing on a platform overlooking the crowd was Mat Laibowitz, an impresario-mad-scientist-type dressed in a red t-shirt printed with the words Game Master. Laibowitz handed each team captain a white, semi-opaque plastic cube the size of a tissue box and a blue plastic bag containing the following items: a sealed pack of Wacky-Packages-brand bubble gum cards, a glossy foldout with the heading “Seating chart for Kevin Bacon’s wedding,” a slip of paper with a three-stanza poem, and a note that read: Welcome. There are only two rules to Midnight Madness. 1. Do not tamper with the clues. 2. No private motorized transportation." [Quartz]
$$$Leon Cooperman Delivers the Alpha [II]
$$$SEC, ex-Goldman VP Tourre battle over key fraud trial witness [Reuters]
$$$Witch Hunt Burning Turkish Bonds as Erdogan Lashes at Koc [Bloomberg]
