Archives: June 2009

George Soros: Obama Team Falls Short in Financial System Overhaul

Posted by: Mara Der Hovanesian on June 30, Categories: bailout

George Soros spoke to a full house of bankers, lawyers, Wall Street types and journalists this morning at Bryant Park Grill behind the landmark New York Public Library this morning....

Investors' Interest in Toxic Assets Perks Up

Posted by: Mara Der Hovanesian on June 29, Categories: toxic assets

Some folks say they are seeing small, but encouraging signs that sophisticated investors are kicking the tires of so-called toxic real estate assets still languishing on big banks’ balance sheets....

Executives Feeling Downbeat about Their Companies

Posted by: David Henry on June 25, Categories:

In a sign of a weak foundation for the economy and stock market, corporate financial officers told surveyors earlier this month that they are less optimistic about their own companies...

Stock Market Too Giddy for its Own Good

Posted by: Mara Der Hovanesian on June 24, Categories: stocks

Get real--pleads Mauro Guillen, director of the prestigious Lauder Institute at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Guillen told me in a recent phone conversation that while the...

An IPO Deluge? Not Exactly

Posted by: Peter Carbonara on June 23, Categories:

You couldn't by any stretch of the imagination call it a flood. Still there are more IPOs scheduled to come to market this week then there have been in about...

Stock Losses in Oughts as Bad as in 1930s Depression

Posted by: David Henry on June 22, Categories:

There are still six months left in this decade, but it is not too soon to start drafting its obituary. Howard Silverblatt, senior index analyst at Standard & Poor’s, is...

Public Pension Money Managers Opportunistic

Posted by: Mara Der Hovanesian on June 17, Categories: pensions

There are two kinds of investors in times of market dislocations: those that go running, and those that go gunning. In a new survey by Greenwich Associates, a research consultant,...

Big Banks Pay Back TARP Funds—But Still Get Government Aid

Posted by: Adrienne Carter on June 17, Categories: bailout

Ever since the government gave the O.K. for 10 big banks to pay back the bailout funds, the firms have been rushing to return the money. But that doesn’t mean...

The Financing of Detention

Posted by: Jessica Silver-Greenberg on June 17, Categories:

The private prison industry has moved its sights, from bread and butter incarceration, to the new gold rush: immigrant detention. You might have thought that a seemingly left-leaning Obama administration...

Credit Scores, a Scarlet Letter?

Posted by: Jessica Silver-Greenberg on June 17, Categories:

Don’t forget to pay your credit card bill on time, and certainly don’t let that electric bill languish because delinquent payments could imperil your ability to get insurance. Yep, that’s...

What Companies Will Never Tell You

Posted by: David Henry on June 16, Categories: regulation

The Financial Accounting Standards Board is working on a new rule that would clearly require companies to tell investors when there is a substantial doubt that their company will continue...

Private Equity Investors Still Have the Blues

Posted by: Peter Carbonara on June 15, Categories: private equity

There have been a few glimmers of good news in private equity lately (middle market deals, banking deals etc.)but the silver linings are a long way from swallowing the clouds.

Feeling Greedy? Do You Really Want the Stock Market to Soar?

Posted by: David Henry on June 12, Categories: stocks

If there’s a time for greed in the financial markets, this isn’t it. The spring rallies of relief over dodging depression have probably carried stock and credit markets about as...

With Securitization Down and Out, Home Prices Will Falter

Posted by: Mara Der Hovanesian on June 11, Categories: banking

Big banks keep making big noises at any opportunity about how they're doing their bit to keep the economy going and making new loans. MBS analyst Laurie Goodman at Amherst...

CalPERs considers more private equity

Posted by: Peter Carbonara on June 10, Categories:

One of the things private equity folks have been saying to console themselves and their limited partners lately is that a recession is the best time to invest.

A Credit Card Fee Bonanza

Posted by: Jessica Silver-Greenberg on June 10, Categories:

President Barack Obama signed a piece of critical consumer protection legislation last month: the Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure Act. The law reigns in credit card companies’ billing practices...

Returning Bailout Money Just a SideShow

Posted by: Mara Der Hovanesian on June 09, Categories: bailout

Treasury will allow 10 of the nation’s largest banks to repay $68 billion in government bailout money. One of them, JPMorgan Chase (JPM) quickly put out a press release quoting...

Bank Stress Tests: The Government Isn't Going Far Enough

Posted by: Mara Der Hovanesian on June 09, Categories: banking

There are a couple of things that strike me as odd and even disturbing about the new congressional oversight report on the recent bank stress tests. First, the “adverse scenario”...

Will a Financial Products Safety Commission Work?

Posted by: Jessica Silver-Greenberg on June 05, Categories:

It’s been said before, but it’s worth reiterating. During the heady years of the credit and housing bubble, financial innovation seemed harmless, exciting, even lucrative. Wall Street experimented with new...

U.S. Cracks Down on International Bribery Rings

Posted by: Mara Der Hovanesian on June 04, Categories: investigations

Jim Mintz of The Mintz Group, a business investigations firm in New York, recently surveyed the landscape for international bribery by looking at Foreign Corrupt Practices Act charges filed in...

How Mark-to-Model Rules Are Killing The Government's Plan to Buy Banks Bad Assets

Posted by: Adrienne Carter on June 04, Categories: banking

Is the government putting off the day of reckoning? The Wall Street Journal has a great story yesterday on how lobbyists pushed Congress to change the accounting rules. According to...

Mortgages and Managed Markets

Posted by: David Henry on June 03, Categories: credit

A nagging question about the healing now taking place in banking and the markets is what happens when the government starts withdrawing the financial medications that saved the economy? Because...

Credit Default Swaps on Citi Bonds Still "Stubbornly" High

Posted by: Mara Der Hovanesian on June 03, Categories: Citigroup

In case you hadn’t noticed, investors are getting a lot more comfortable with risk in the financial sector—albeit with one standout: Citigroup. Tim Backshall at Credit Derivatives Research notes today...

The Private Equity Cash Question

Posted by: Adrienne Carter on June 02, Categories: private equity

When will private equity put its money to work? As BusinessWeek reported last month, private equity is sitting on roughly $1 trillion in cash—capital that could help revive the economy....