Opening Bell: 2.9.17

Here's what Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein is telling clients about uncertainty in the market (BI)

"It's a vanity, always, at any given moment, to think, 'My goodness we have challenges of a dimension we've never seen before — the world is more uncertain,'" Blankfein said. "It's always seems uncertain when you're living in it, and it always seems so simple and sure when you're looking back at it."

The World According to a Free-Range Short Seller With Nothing to Lose (BBG)

At Concordia’s shareholder meeting in April 2016, according to local media reports, then-CEO Thompson said, “If you are a chicken farmer, your chickens will come home to roost.” Cohodes interpreted this as a threat. As for those chickens, sure, Cohodes’s eggs may sell for $13 a dozen at Bi-Rite Market in San Francisco, but he warns Thompson and other targets, present and future, not to under­estimate him. “Yeah, I have chickens, and yeah, I sell eggs in the city, but I spend about 1/32nd of my day doing chicken work,” he says. “I’m happy that he thinks I’m a chicken farmer. But I’m still intensely focused on some stuff. I will knock their heads off.”

Anthony Scaramucci tries to save job prospects with White House visit (NYP)

The Mooch’s job prospects could also be aided by buyout king Stephen Schwarzman, whose Blackstone Group last fall sold a stake in the Hilton hotel chain to HNA for $6.2 billion. Schwarzman may have backed The Mooch in recent meetings with Trump, sources said. Still, The Mooch has to win over Priebus who was, perhaps, the Wall Streeter’s most vocal critic, sources said. It was Priebus who put up the roadblock, three sources close to the situation said.

Steve Young Is an Athlete Who’s Actually Good at Finance (BBG)

Lots of professional athletes retire and attempt a second career in finance. Many fail. Others hang on as front-office window dressing, celebrity their only value. Young turns out to be the rare ex-jock who’s actually good at private equity—doing original research to find takeover targets, learning how to model deals in Microsoft Excel, and helping to manage the companies after acquisition. HGGC has generated an average annual yield of 66 percent over the last three years.

Trump Fixes Flaw in Post-Crisis Regulatory Crackdown (WSJ)

The most notable hit has been to mortgages to less creditworthy home buyers. In one 2014 study, Goldman Sachs found that the cost of credit where regulation and litigation have bit hardest, such as small- and medium-size business loans, credit cards and home equity loans, had risen relative to those loans with comparatively less regulatory burden, such as autos and large companies. In a 2015 followup, Goldman argued regulation has created a “two-speed” economy that favors big companies over small business and startups.

Inside the crash of Fling, the startup whose founder partied on an island while his company burned through $21 million (BI)

Nardone kicked other male users off the platform who posted inappropriate photos of themselves on the app. "They couldn’t even have a photograph with their shirt off," said a former employee. "Unless it was him. He would then boost himself to everybody on the [Fling] database."

As Goldman Embraces Automation, Even the Masters of the Universe Are Threatened (MIT)

At its height back in 2000, the U.S. cash equities trading desk at Goldman Sachs’s New York headquarters employed 600 traders, buying and selling stock on the orders of the investment bank’s large clients. Today there are just two equity traders left. Automated trading programs have taken over the rest of the work, supported by 200 computer engineers.

Steve Bannon Wanted Mel Gibson for His Movie About Nazis, Abortion, ‘Mutants’ (Daily Beast)

In its penultimate segment, the film examines “post-humanity,” “the Fountain of Youth,” and “The New Immortals”—who are “living happily… ever-after,” apparently thanks in part to “spare body parts for sale.” That’s followed by a “CODA” described only as “THE SINGULARITY,” and a final four-minute segment, described only as NOVUS ORDO SECULORUM—a slight variant of the Latin motto that translates to “New Order of the Ages” and appears just below the pyramid with an eye on the back of our one-dollar bills.