Goldman Pillages, Goldman Steals, Goldman Sachs -08/19/09 at 11:07 AM CDTby Judd Bagley

Consider below a simple timeline from one of the strangest periods our financial markets had ever experienced. As you read it, keep in mind that following the demise of Bear Stearns, the strictest interpretation of the so-called investment bank “Bulge Bracket” included just four entities: Goldman Sachs (GS), Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch and ...

SEC Enforcement Director Robert Khuzami Jokes About Causing The Marke... -08/09/09 at 12:11 PM CDTby Perry Rod

In a speech for the New York State Bar, Securities and Exchange Commission Enforcement Director Robert Khuzami made a joke that for some might be more telling that it is funny.  He stated: "I'm pretty proud of my own 100-day accomplishments. So how have things changed? Before I joined the Division in March, the Dow was struggling around 6500 points....

Goldman Sachs Predicts the Future -08/07/09 at 12:18 PM CDTby Perry Rod

Conspiracy theorists will love this.  Yesterday, Jan Hatzius, the chief U.S. economist at Goldman Sachs (GS) revised his forecast of job losses from 300,000 to 250,000. The prediction was very accurate.  Today, we learned that the number turned out to be 247,000. Is it golden analysis or does Goldman somehow own the government, as many have rec...

No Such Thing As Bad Press For Goldman Sachs -07/03/09 at 3:42 PM CDTby Perry Rod

Matt Taibbi has written a scathing piece in Rolling Stone magazine about how Goldman Sachs (GS) is the "Great American Bubble Machine."  He basically makes yet another case that Goldman Sachs makes money by controlling America's politicians and regulators.  He is not the first to make this case. For example in 2006, Kyle Pope, a former writer a...

Barack Obama: Another Captured Pawn of Goldman Sachs' Wall Street -04/27/09 at 6:05 PM CDTby Perry Rod

It isn’t really a conspiracy or a criticism.  It’s just a fact. In 2006, The Los Angeles Times did a story entitled, “Goldman Sachs Rules The World,” pointing out that former President Bush’s team of economic experts were basically a team of former Goldman Sachs executives.  That list included Henry Paulson, who ra...

Banks Eating Each Other Alive -11/24/08 at 1:32 PM CSTby Perry Rod

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that major Wall Street firms placed large bets against Morgan Stanley (MS) using credit-default swaps, two days after Lehman Brothers sought bankruptcy protection. The firms included Merrill Lynch , Citigroup (C) , Deutsche Bank (DB) and UBS, according to the paper. The paper said that a close examination of the ...

Naked Short Sellers Attack Citigroup -11/21/08 at 7:22 PM CSTby Reggie Abaca

America's financial system is a mess and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is to blame. Short sellers, in a concerted effort to defend themselves and abuse the lack of regulation by the SEC, are now targeting Citigroup (C) while our financial journalists, analysts and government regulators continue to do nothing. At Market Rap we've pointed out...

Mark Cuban Charged With Insider Trading - So Are Things Back To Norma... -11/18/08 at 6:55 PM CSTby Perry Rod

For a moment yesterday it felt like things were getting back to normal.  A bulletin hit the wire saying that Dallas Maverick owner Mark Cuban was being charged by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission with insider trading.  Even the stock market went up for a good twenty minutes after the wire hit. But it soon hit me right back - ...

Citigroup Cuts 20% of Workforce -11/17/08 at 10:37 AM CSTby Peter York

50,000 people is a lot of people.  That's 50,000 on top of 20,000 layoffs. Citigroup (C) has cut off approximately 30% of its workforce now amid the economic crisis as cost cutting continues.  The danger of all of it is that this is happening in the crucial holiday period, one week before Thanksgiving.  And it's on top of 5% to 10% cuts byJ...

The SEC Naked Short Selling Cover Up -11/12/08 at 8:15 PM CSTby Perry Rod

Mark Mitchell over at DeepCapture.com is reporting on the SEC cover up involving Gary Aguirre, who in 2006 helped break open the scandal of naked short selling.  Here is his report: There was an article in The New York Times yesterday about the SEC’s disgraceful ruling that it will take no disciplinary action against the SEC cronies at the cen...

Another Day Another Rumor -10/28/08 at 2:00 PM CDTby Reggie Abaca

Hedge funds are starting up another rumor now that Morgan Stanley (MS) and two other firms were being "short squeezed" with their investment into Volkswagen. Goldman Sachs, one of the named, declined to comment, but people inside the company said it had no Volkswagen losses. Morgan Stanley spokesman Mark Lake said frankly that company has no exp...