Goldman Sachs Spends 40 Percent More On Lobbying In Second Quarter

The "vampire squid" is stretching its tentacles.

As Goldman Sachs faced arguably one of its most challenging quarter in decades -- on several fronts, from SEC charges and lagging profits to financial regulatory reform and renewed scrutiny of all its activities -- the firm increased its spending on lobbying by almost 40% in the second quarter of 2010 and has already spent almost as much in the first half of this year as it did in all of 2009.

In its most recent lobbying report filed last night, Goldman spent $1.58 million to influence Congress and the White House on a host of issues including Wall Street reform -- specifically derivatives regulation, bank tax and financial risk management -- the much-debated unemployment benefits extension, municipal finance, small business funding, climate change legislation and transportation funding.

Goldman paid a number of prominent lobbying firms, many of them staffed by former Congressional aides and lawmakers -- the Gephardt Group led by former House Majority Leader Richard Gephardt ($50,000), Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher ($20,000) and the Harold Ford Group founded by former Congressman Harold Ford Sr. ($30,000).

Overall, Wall Street ramped up its lobbying in the quarter in a furious attempt "at derailing or diluting the financial reform legislation that Congress finally enacted this month," reports Reuters. At the bill's signing ceremony on Wednesday morning, President Obama noted that battle: "To get there, we had to overcome an array of powerful lobbyists."

JPMorgan Chase increased its lobbying spending from $1.51 million in the first quarter to $1.52 in the second quarter; Wells Fargo $1.02 million to $1.3 million; Bank of America $940,000 to $1.09 million; Citigroup $1.44 million to $1.47 million.

Comments

[pchrun]

07:15 PM on 07/25/2010

SEC Investigation Reveals Goldman Sachs Engaged in Deceit, Firm Proudly States That Deceit Is Just the “Tip of the Iceberg”

Read about the Goldman Sachs secret sauce and their three main drivers of profitability.

VERY FUNNY

http://www.dailygoat.com/?p=1992

[bmike]

11:36 PM on 07/21/2010

repub are trying to get you rich guys more money.No not so you can hire more Americans but so you can stack it on top of the stacks you already have.

[NeverUndecided]

11:30 PM on 07/21/2010

Just when did bribery and/or influence peddling come to be called "lobbying"?

[valkyre]

10:53 PM on 07/21/2010

Of course they did. They get great returns on lobbying. Haven't they come out with Leveraged Lobbying Vehicles and Regulation Fault Swaps yet?

[raydeanturner]

10:48 PM on 07/21/2010

They needed to make sure their seven representatives in the White House were able to have an input into writing the new "Financial non-reform" bill. Some of their former lobbyists even work in the White House despite what the POTUS said on numerous occasions previously. America's being scammed by both political parties and 1/2 of us don't even realize it. We're all too busy blaming the other 1/2 while all the politicians and big businesses continue to fleece us, and loot the treasury at the same time.

Maybe we have become the "useful idiots" while we just sit around and take it from both sides.

[cornelison]

10:48 PM on 07/21/2010

Call it "The Breitbart Effect."

[freedom4allau]

10:31 PM on 07/21/2010

This is reprehensible.

[Cynical Citizen]

09:47 PM on 07/21/2010

Forty years ago, we put a man on the moon, but we can't get Lobbyist out of Washington...

[cornelison]

10:49 PM on 07/21/2010

They should have been the ones on Apollo 13.

[Violinhunter]

09:29 PM on 07/21/2010

I can no longer think of Wall Street without thinking of France, 1789, at the same time. When (not if) food stamps and unemployment checks stop, who knows....

[mcmutter]

09:26 PM on 07/21/2010

Money IS free speech ... don't forget to thank the damm Supremes ....

[textynn]

09:19 PM on 07/21/2010

Fraud Merchants running your American financial system.? Crime does pay and there's no risk for them whatsoever. There will be no end to the exploitation. Making them pay 550 million is like making a regular person pay $2.50 after scamming people for thousands.

Why would known fraud criminals be allowed to influence and control the American government and its monetary system. The only reason is America is run by rotten royalty with all the implications of royalty. No accountability and total indifference to the peasants they force to subsidize them.

[raydeanturner]

10:52 PM on 07/21/2010

Exactly - simple manipulative divide and conquor Bernays strategy - while the banks and politicians on both sides take us and the treasury for everything we have left.

[lvdragonlady]

09:13 PM on 07/21/2010

WHEN is America going to outlaw lobbyists??? They serve only their masters and no other useful purpose and they are destroying America!

[mcmutter]

09:27 PM on 07/21/2010

its free speech ... your right to petition lawmakers ... the Constitution says so ...

[valkyre]

11:12 PM on 07/21/2010

Which is odd, since the guys that wrote the constitution didn't interprit it that way. For the first century after the revolutionary war the few corporations that were granted a charter could not make any political or charitable contributions nor spend money to influence law-making.

Those guys that wrote the constitution had just fought a war to get out from under English corporate exploitation, so they were careful to limit the power their own companies could accumulate. Corporate charters (licenses to exist) were granted for a limited time and very specific business purposes and could be revoked sooner then their experation for exceding their chartered purpose, violating laws, or causing public damage. Officers of the corporation were held responsible for anything illegal that happened at their company. And lobbying was illegall.

[nopilikia]

09:05 PM on 07/21/2010

Who say's money can't buy you love. GS bought a lotta love from Congress in the "reform" bill.

[michaelws]

08:38 PM on 07/21/2010

GS is a proven parasite that cannot be satiated until there is nothing left...at which time they will say they didn't know...how could anyone have predicted...?

We must find a way to stop this firm. They are financial ter-ror-ists. When will we learn?

Every finance professional knows that GS is an amoral firm...interested in only one thing...the furthering of GS...at the expense of anything it can exploit.

[Cynical Citizen]

08:23 PM on 07/21/2010

OK folks, what do we do?
If we wait for November, it might be too late...
(Some say it's already is...)
The politicians are already bought... The supreme court is bought...
If we continue to wait any longer, we would be able to afford the pitchforks and torches...
Which are already imported...

[michaelws]

08:39 PM on 07/21/2010

if you find a way to stop this firm...let me know...I will gladly sign on to help.