•California in ‘fiscal emergency’ – Can’t really decide which state capital has more clowns per capita, Sacramento or Albany [BBC]
•Former HealthSouth executive gets prison time – 3 months. Meh [AP via Miami Herald]
•Big Pay Packages Return to Wall Street – Paging Congressman Frank [WSJ]
Related Posts
Scoping | 07.17.09
• What’s email? – Paulson doesn’t use it, thanks for asking. Next question. [FT Alphaville]
• Bank of America Posts a Profit on Trading Gains – “Bank of America, one of the nation’s largest and most troubled banks, announced on Friday a $3.2 billion second-quarter profit, a figure that exceeded analyst expectations.” Ken Lewis will be starting happy hour a little earlier than usual on this Friday. Circa now. [New York Times]
• Citigroup profit soars on Smith Barney sale – “Citi’s profit was not driven by improved trading like other banks, and instead came from the gain on the sale of its Smith Barney unit and the increasing values of some of its riskier assets that had plunged during the credit crisis. The New York-based bank recorded an after-tax gain of $6.7 billion on the sale of a majority stake in its Smith Barney brokerage unit to Morgan Stanley.” Selling profitable assets usually ends up looking good. This should not be surprising. [AP via Miami Herald]
Scoping | 07.23.09
• Obama Approval 49% Among U.S. Investors, 87% Overseas – “President Barack Obama has rock- star appeal among the investing class — except in his own country.” [Bloomberg]
• Investment Bank Helps Boost Credit Suisse’s Net Income – Reigning in on the company wide Shake Shack outings is probably helpful too. [WSJ]
• One-time gain boosts Ford results – Don’t call it a comeback [BBC]
• Manure means money to handlers gathered in Iowa – Sometimes there’s money in shit [AP via Miami Herald]
• Bardem Turns Down Role in ‘Wall Street’ Sequel – “The actor Javier Bardem has turned down a role in the sequel to Oliver Stone’s seminal 1980s treatise on greed, “Wall Street.” Mr. Bardem, who won an Oscar in 2008 for his performance in “No Country for Old Men,” was to have played the world’s villain du jour: a hedge fund manager.” [DealBook]
Scoping | 07.20.09
• CIT Is Said to Obtain Urgent Loan to Prevent Bankruptcy – “Directors of the CIT Group, one of the nation’s leading lenders to small and midsize businesses, approved a deal Sunday evening with some of the bank’s major bondholders to help it avert a bankruptcy filing through a $3 billion emergency loan, according to people briefed on the matter.” Bullet dodged. [New York Times]
• Scam victims ‘easily persuaded’ – “The scams the OFT has been highlighting range from the so-called Nigerian or advance free frauds, to bogus lotteries, fake clairvoyants and health cures, bogus investments and crooked racing tipsters.” Nigerian emails do have a certain charming prose that is difficult to resist. [BBC]
• Sweden’s SEB bank posts 2Q loss – No doubt had some exposure to the Latvian souls brokers [AP via Miami Herald]
• Charles Schwab denies Cuomo’s fraud allegations – “Charles Schwab Corp, the largest U.S. online brokerage, denied allegations by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo of civil fraud in its marketing and sale of Auction Rate Securities (ARS).” Also, some less serious charges include running commercials with creepy half-human, half-cartoons moving and talking seriously about their depleted 401(k)s. [Reuters]
• Evidence shows there’s no such thing as ‘recession-proof’ jobs – Bankruptcy lawyers might be the lone exception. Good luck getting into that. [Chicago Tribune]