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Posted
Sep 29 2009, 04:13 PM
by
James Dlugosch
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
This morning I saw an interesting interview with Alan “Ace” Greenberg, former chief executive of Bear Stearns, on CNBC. Asked to comment on the views of JP Morgan (JPM) Chief Jamie Dimon, Greenberg demurred and backed the banking genius 100%.
“Whatever Jamie says, I agree,” he said. Bing: More on JP Morgan
You will not often find Wall Street executives reluctant to share opinions. These guys have strong egos, and Ace has one of the biggest. His deference to Dimon is very telling
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Posted
Sep 01 2009, 06:26 PM
by
Jon Markman
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
When the century-old investment bank Lehman Brothers collapsed a year ago, it spawned not just a global financial firestorm but a cottage industry of insider accounts of where it all went wrong. Three major books have been published and more are on the way -- each proposing to tell us the darkest secrets of the world's worst-run brokerage. (My take on it: New column.)
Any endeavor that pits Type A personalities against each other in a battle for control of the public discourse is bound to be competitive, and one like this in which reputations are at stake will naturally be especially fierce. That makes the effort by Lawrence G. McDonald, a former vice president at Lehman, particularly compelling, as he was first out of the gate.
In a late-night conversation from his vacation in Paris, the former fixed-income trader told me that the book, "A Colossal Failure of Common Sense," took him and co-author Patrick Robinson one hundred and seventy-three 17-hour days to research and write -- including Christmas and New Year's. Not that anyone's counting. Because he was first off the starting line with a publishing contract and a plan, he managed to grab co-workers for interviews "at a golden moment of frustration," he says, a time when they wanted the bad apples at Lehman exposed. The bottom line is about what you'd imagine: An overmatched boss failed to listen to smarter underlings and drove the company into the ground. The details are amazing, which makes the read compelling even if you feel you know the whole story already.
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Posted
Jun 29 2009, 09:00 AM
by
Minyanville
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
IEA Cuts 5-Year Oil Outlook
Crude oil futures are slightly higher this morning even after the International Energy Agency said oil consumption likely won’t reach last year’s levels until 2012, the organization said in its Medium Term Oil Market Report. According to Bloomberg, the Paris-based agency cut its oil demand estimates for every year through 2013 by approximately 3 million barrels a day because of the deep economic recession in developed economies as well as slowed growth in China and India.
Average oil consumption will stay below 85.76 million barrels a day and won’t break that mark until 2012. This reduced demand is postponing the threat of a supply shortfall, the IEA said. Relative to medium-term profiles in previous years, “this scenario paints a delayed picture of a threatened ‘supply crunch’ later in the period.”
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Posted
Jun 18 2009, 11:43 AM
by
Minyanville
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
Research in Motion (RIMM) is set to report earnings after the bell, and option traders appear ready for a rockin' good time. It appears people are betting on a repeat performance of the huge gap higher, following last quarter’s positive earnings (which sent shares up some $13 the next day).
Yesterday saw nearly 5 times the average daily option volume with a preponderance of call buying. Open interest in the June calls, which expire tomorrow, increased by 35,000 contracts. The options are currently pricing in about a $6 or 7.5% move. In fact, one player -- possibly with memories of last quarter’s 20% price surge following the earnings release --seems to think the options are cheap and is underestimating the magnitude of any ensuing move.
Rather than pick a direction, the strategist purchased 25,000 of the June $80 calls and 25,000 of the June puts for a total net debit of around $6 for the strangle. This means he needs shares to trade below $69 or above $86 to begin seeing a profit. With Research in Motion currently trading around $77, that translates into an $8, or 10.5%, price move.
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Posted
May 21 2009, 07:05 AM
by
Andrew Rosenbaum
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
Standard & Poor's says in a note on Thursday that the United Kingdom is in danger of losing its top-level, triple-A debt rating.
The problem: Way too much debt. In fact, the U.K.'s debt may soon be as big as the gross domestic product of the entire country.
That would mean, theoretically, that everything residents of the country produce should have to go to pay its sovereign debt --that would be true if the U.K. were a person like you and me, but of course sovereign debt doesn't work like a credit card bill.
The U.K. is not exactly a debt-repudiating banana republic. In fact, the government of Great Britain hasn't changed since about the year 1066, when William the Conqueror invaded. And it's a Group of 7 nation, making it one of the most important economies in the world.
Has something gone very wrong in the U.K.?
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Posted
Apr 23 2009, 09:19 PM
by
Andrew Rosenbaum
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
You would think that investors would reward stocks when companies show strong earnings -- and punish those that don't.
Nothing could be further from the truth. If you want proof that stock trading isn't a science, you can find it by looking at some of the loopy moves investors make after stocks announce their earnings.
Here are three such examples from this earnings season so far
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Posted
Apr 22 2009, 10:34 AM
by
Jon Markman
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
At a time when accurate information on public companies is more important than ever, there are few independent data providers to invest in. Dow Jones was swallowed up by News Corp., and Bloomberg is private. That leaves Morningstar, Thomson Reuters and FactSet, all of which are good choices -- but only one of which is fully focused on the professional community.
That would be FactSet, and it is my favorite of the group. Think of the Connecticut-based financial information provider as a smaller, nimbler version of Bloomberg but without the dedicated terminals. (Company website). It has performed the best of the bunch this year too, rising 11% vs. -7% for Thomson and around 1% for Morningstar.
One could assume that the financial crisis boded horribly for earnings of all companies that even breathe that air, but FactSet is one of the exceptions. A few weeks ago it reported a double digit increase in revenue -- 11.6%, $156.6 million -- that surprised almost everyone. It lost only 4% of subscribers over the quarter, reflecting a strong loyalty between FDS and its clients. Analysts suspect that if FDS can not only survive in the downturn, but turn out over 10% more in revenue, it's set to make even bigger waves when the economy improves.
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Posted
Mar 13 2009, 08:38 AM
by
Charley Blaine
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
Before CNBC's "Mad Money" Jim Cramer went on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" Thursday night, he pounded on pie dough with a roller during a visit with domestic diva Martha Stewart.
"Daily Show" host Jon Stewart got into fighting trim with pop quizzes on the definitions of various financial terms, like price-earnings ratios and Tier 1 Capital.
But when Cramer actually appeared on the show, he was as gentle as, well, a kitten.
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Posted
Jan 26 2009, 03:53 AM
by
Douglas McIntyre
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
The Pfizer (PFE) deal to buy Wyeth (WYE) for $68 billion looks like a single M&A deal which will break the drought in investment banking activity, but only for a day.
The conventional wisdom is that acquisitions in a recession are too risky. They require capital and integrating companies is hard even when the economy is strong. Pfizer will borrow $22 billion to consummate the transaction.
The reasons behind the Pfizer transaction apply to a broad cross section of industries and underscores why there is about to be a significant up-tick in M&A activity, one which could not have been expected just a month ago
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Posted
Dec 09 2008, 02:14 PM
by
Minyanville
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
Unprecedented. Unpredictable. Unparalleled. Extraordinary.
These are the adjectives offered by mortgage industry executives defending their relative innocence in the collapse of the housing industry. Conditions, they argue, deteriorated so rapidly and in such unpredictable ways they couldn't possibly batten down the hatches fast enough.
As it turns out, that's not exactly true.
The Washington Post reports that chief executive offers at both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac ignored warnings about their firms' exposure to risky loans. The findings of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform are being discussed today on Capitol Hill.
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