Is There a Change In the Weather at Goldman Sachs?
Perhaps, just perhaps, the opprobrium heaped on Goldman Sachs these many weeks and months has begun to take hold on what had been to date the tone deaf leadership and bizarre rationalizations such as that of Lord Brian Griffiths, Vice Chairman of Goldman Sachs Intl. who instructed us last week that, "We have to tolerate the inequality as a way to achieve greater prosperity for all." This while millions have lost their jobs and have had their homes foreclosed. No, I am not making this up. Goldman's way of dealing with the issues at hand, the issues of reward and fairness, the potential of it all becoming a total disaster to its public image and reputation, even the unbelievable has become sadly believable.
A news item appeared this week that at least seems to offer reasonable hope that Goldman is beginning to use its good fortune to help remedy the foundering fortunes of Main Street America. By helping institutions that deal directly with the mainstream of America's day to day economy is where Goldman can play a truly constructive role. And if the news item is being read correctly, it appears that is what may indeed be happening.
On Friday CNBC reported "CIT Reaches a Tentative Deal With Goldman".
Now CIT is a financial institution on whom myriad small and mid-size American businesses depend to finance their working capital. CIT provides them funding against accounts receivable and inventory of goods and materials without which many small and medium sized firms could not operate. This especially in the current fractured banking environment.
These are businesses and companies to which Goldman would normally have little or no access nor commercial interface. Yet, through working with CIT, Goldman would be able to assist a core part of the American economy, a part of the economy that needs all the help it can get.
Because of the economy, CIT is struggling to restructure billions in debt and stay out of bankruptcy. Unlike Goldman, Morgan Stanley, AIG, Citigroup its failure might not present a systemic and catastrophic risk to the entire financial system. For that reason, government assistance to a CIT restructuring has not been as freely forthcoming as it has to the large banking/insurance/speculation entities.
And here is where Goldman is about to play a highly purposeful role. That by assisting CIT it will be assisting Main Street business's the length and breadth of the land.
According to the news report, Goldman and CIT have reached a tentative agreement over a disputed $3 billion loan. Goldman's accommodation on this issue would open the door for CIT to get billions of new financing from its bondholders, which it could then use to reorganize. In so doing, a vital financing link on which many small to mid size American businesses are dependent, would continue to play its key role. The alternative would add further enormous stress to the American economy.
Just perhaps, Goldman has come around to understanding that given the public support it has received from the government's implicit guarantee that it is too big to fail, and on (please see "Goldman Turns Into A Financial Frankenstein While The Fed Snoozes Away" 10.17.09) that it has responsibilities and at the very least moral obligations that go beyond the bottom line and maximizing the bonus pool. How this all plays out remains to be seen, but if nothing else, in how it does, we will learn a great deal about the players.
Robert Reich: Breaking Up the Big Banks, and Why Congress Won't Do It
Two ideas are floating around Washington regarding how to handle 'too big to fail' banks, but only one is supported by the Treasury and the White House. Unfortunately, it's the wrong one.
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Nothing has changed just look at the oil/gas prices. There is no reason for the oil to be in the $ 80 range when we are flooded with it. Goldman used our bailout to buy up as much oil as they could and then rent tankers off-shore, and now they are driving up the price. Can you trust them ever - I don't think so.
It's a well-calculated PR move, they hope, by which they'll stand to make more in the long run.
Please do not think the squid knows anything of moral obligation.
if they do the bond, it will be to roll their own debt and take a huge fee for running the deal (like pimpco did a few weeks ago). they will then roll their credit default swap hedge and win either way.
these people at goldman are a danger to the United States of America, pure and simple.
has Blankfein paid off the FDIC supported bonds yet?
I didn't think so.
Before you get your hopes up, take a look at this:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/warning/view/
We're watching the same ole scams, perpetrated by the same ole people, with the same ole no-response. The exact same financial "catastrophe" we experienced in 2008 occurred in 1998. The only difference was that bankers were able to cover it up on their own that time.
The derivatives markets are little more than a crap shoot that can break the country over night. Yet here we are more than a year after Wall Street robbed the nation and there are still more than a half a quadrillion dollars (that's more than 500 trillion dollars) of these floating around, unregulated and now apparently backed by the U.S. government. Meanwhile, "conservatives" whine about an 11 trillion dollar national debt and a decade of health care for 1 trillion dollars.
Wake up America!
I hate GS; but I have to admit that rehabilitating CIT is actually a "smart" move and very helpful.
Be afraid bankers the people are coming
What's in it for them. They aint doing nothing resembling even a semblance of good without getting something big out of it that we don't know about.
The logic boggles the mind. Learsy seems to be offering up a cheer for GS as it grows even bigger, entering financial sectors it had no interest in, before.
While old dogs may learn new 'tricks' - Do leopards ever really change their spots??
What more do we need to know about these players? They are robber barons. They pay politicians to write the laws that make their robbery legal. They take from the poor and give to the rich so the rich can get richer, not so they will stimulate job creation. The money they make leaves the country and is used to buy less-fortunate companies that don't have access to the money printers to bail them out. Seriously, there is nothing more we need to learn about these players that we can't already see. Their number one and only goal is to increase profits for their shareholders. If Goldman is "helping" CIT you can bet they are making a profit someway, somehow. No doubt about it. Conscience? Are you kidding me?
GS has made a big deal out of paying back their (possibly unwanted) TARP funds in order to justify the obscene pay they plan to shower on their senior staff. Until they withdraw from using the TALF, their protestations ring quite hollow to me. Via the TALF program, you and I are pretty much guaranteeing more of the same outsized profits at GS going forward.
http://www.newyorkfed.org/markets/talf_faq.html#12
One is reminded of the Great Slydini
"It was like seeing a man walk up a wall. Nothing prepared you for it. Right at the start, a solid, heavy silver dollar, held before my eyes, vanished into thinnest air. And by no method I knew of. Certainly no sleeves."
http://cavett.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/27/conjuring-slydini/
Hat tip to Dick Cavett and to you for using the word "opprobruim".
The only thing Goldman Sachs will use its good fortune for is to make a bigger fortune. Goldman Sachs' executives and former executives are responsible for the largest robbery in history. They should be arrested and put on trial for massive fraud and robbery.
And you are telling me Goldman Sachs is doing this out of the kindness in their heart? They don't stand to gain any benefit? I'd like to see the terms of the deal before we give them any humanitarian awards or parades in their honor..
The bankers are the Mafia in slightly better clothing. Stop deluding yourself....
I think that the chances that they have developed a conscience at Goldman Sachs is about as likely as me winning the Miss Universe competition at age 58.
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