Skip to main content

Vampire Squid anyone?

If it were not so sad it would be funny; after the mortgage backed securitization fiasco in which GS played a leading role in mis-stating the facts for their clients -- like they had no role whichsoever on selecting the mortgage pool.

GS's muppets have been playing the games for years, they suspected that the bank was screwing them; now they know.  I had friends who work at GS (note the tense) I always though they have a certain moral fiber (and I don't mean it as a compliment), an ability to see the real world in a way that fits their own reality (thruthiness if you will).

The lastest, thanks to their (soon to be ex) grossly incompetent lawyer (and apparently not much of a human being) was to provide the world with the proof they they treat clients as muppets, unless of course they are favoured clients (read hedge funds).  Turns out that not only did GS actively promote naked shorting (which is in the same ballpark as insurance a house you don't own and then burning it down), but they told their favorit clients what were the big positions.

Turns out a specific company, not a favorite of mine, called Overstock was so popular in the shorting game that at one point more than 100% of the float was shorted (a mathematical impossibility), naked shorting is basically selling something you don't own -- obviously if you can short to infinity (without borrowing the stock so that it can be delivered) you can kill a stock price (you created artificial supply of the stock).

Don't get me wrong I really enjoy GS's "God work" in the financial markets, I really like when they were the main player in insuring that the US housing market would implode, I really enjoyed the way the screwed their clients on that one.  I really enjoyed the way that played the weasel game of Greek financing -- allowing a bankrupt country to hid additional borrowings.

I real enjoy this latest play with the naked short, they way the now admitted to removing expert witnesses by hiring them for "large sums of money" basically ensuring that the wheels stayed greased.

I wonder if congress is going to do anything about these activities -- my guess is that they will pull real hard on the SEC to do nothing, after all GS and its employees are massive contributors to the "democratic process".

One question to America's companies; why are you dealing with these guys -- you would not re-hire a plumber that screwed you over -- what are you waiting for here!  A sign?

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Ok so I lied...a little (revised)

When we began looking at farming in 2013/14 as something we both wanted to do as a "second career" we invested time and money to understand what sector of farming was profitable.  A few things emerged, First, high-quality, source-proven, organic farm products consistently have much higher profit margins.  Secondly, transformation accounted for nearly 80% of total profits, and production and distribution accounted for 20% of profits: Farmers and retailers have low profit margins and the middle bits make all the money. A profitable farm operation needs to be involved in the transformation of its produce.  The low-hanging fruits: cheese and butter.  Milk, generates a profit margin of 5% to 8%, depending on milk quality.  Transformed into cheese and butter, and the profit margin rises to 40% (Taking into account all costs).  Second:  20% of a steer carcass is ground beef quality.  The price is low, because (a) a high percentage of the carcass, and (b)...

Spray painting Taylor Swift G650 aircraft (updated)

 First, a bit of paint will not harm anyone.  These climate activities are going to learn two things in the next few days:  (1) Trespassing at an airport is a felony almost anywhere in the world.  That means criminal prosecution.   (2) removing paint from an aircraft is expensive.   So these climate activists are about to find out the reach of the British criminal system and it will not be pleasant, the UK has very strict laws about that, I would be surprised if cleaning the aircraft of all the paint will cost less than $100,000.     I am sure that when they planned (premeditation) this little show they had a very valid logic to doing this.  Tonight, they are probably realizing the depth of their troubles.   I understand that in the UK it's a minimum one-year jail sentence.    Also, good luck travelling with a criminal trespass charge against you.  I am relatively certain that the airline industry will ...

Janet Yellen from China supporter to Hawk...

There is rarely serious news in the world these days, it seems that most newspapers are filled with headlines and little else, and then Ms Yellen went to China.  Secretary Yellen has long been known in the Biden administration as the voice of moderation when dealing with China, yet as her trip which concluded yesterday a hawk was born:  She warned the Chinese against dumping goods in the United States.    fighting words! The American administration is very concerned about the lack of Chinese domestic consumption.   Even before the COVID-19 epidemic, there were already the beginning signs of a slowdown, automobile sales were off.   China is facing domestic deflation (a clear sign of collapsing demand) China imports few consumer goods, they import raw materials and intermediary goods.   It seems that the American administration is concerned that the Chinese administration will dump consumer goods abroad to keep its manufacturing machinery ...