national-global

All I Want for Christmas is a Copy of the Volcker Rule

11/18/13

Receiving Wide Coverage ...

Holiday Reading: The long-simmering battle between five federal agencies over the Volcker Rule appears to be in its final stage. The current draft is around 1,000 pages, and it's expected to be finalized before the end of the year. The basic dynamics here — with the Fed and the SEC pushing for looser restrictions, while the CFTC seeks tighter rules — are old news. But the New York Times has a detailed...

[more]

Moody's Downgrades 4 Major Banks; GAO Study Finds Big Bank Benefits; CIA Collecting Data on Money Transfers

11/15/13

Receiving Wide Coverage ...

Downgraded: Moody's downgraded four major U.S. banks — JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and Bank of New York Mellon — Thursday, after the rating agency concluded that the government has become less likely to bail out big firms. "The lower credit ratings could raise the cost of capital for the banks, many of which were already downgraded by Moody's following another major review undertaken last year," the FT reports. Wall Street...

[more]

#AskJPM Twitter Q&A Cancelled for Being 'Bad Idea'; Yellen Testifies

11/14/13

Receiving Wide Coverage ... Oh, JPM: JPMorgan Chase has officially cancelled its terrible idea/Twitter takeover with vice chairman Jimmy Lee after the open invitation to #AskJPM questions on the social media site backfired. Profusely. ("Right when the engagement numbers were through the roof?!" tweeted Forbes' Alex Konrad in response to the cancellation.) "The original idea — which had been kicked around the firm over the last few weeks … was to come up with an out-of-the-box…

[more]

Regulators Regulating Consultants; Yellen Confirmation Curtain-Raisers; Stuff Lloyd Blankfein Says

11/13/13

Receiving Wide Coverage ...

Unveiled: The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency issued detailed guidelines for bank consultants, or "Wall Street's shadow regulators" (hmmm, where have we heard that term before?) on Tuesday. The guidelines require, among other things, that banks "disclose all work a consultant performed for the institution over the past three years" and "document disciplinary actions taken against the consultant and the resources the firm has to complete an assignment" in an...

[more]

TARP Head Gets Nod to Chair CFTC

11/12/13

Receiving Wide Coverage ... Former TARP Head Tapped for CFTC Post: President Obama Tuesday will nominate Timothy Massad, the assistant Treasury secretary who oversaw the Troubled Asset Relief Program, to serve as chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. If confirmed by the Senate, Massad will take over an agency in the midst of a massive post-financial crisis overhaul led by current chairman Gary Gensler, whose term ends at the end of the year. As head…

[more]

Enough About Twitter's IPO Already; Is Forex the New Libor?

11/08/13

Receiving Wide Coverage ...

The Bird Is the Word: The Morning Scan is as sick of hearing about the Twitter IPO as you probably are, but it still dominates business news pages this morning. The social network's shares jumped nearly 75% on their first day of trading, in sharp contrast to the Facebook debacle last year. Hence the FT's take: "Tech industry enters new era with Twitter's IPO success. … The shadow of Facebook's troubled IPO...

[more]

Banks Clean Up in Twitter's IPO; JPM Recruits More Controversy

11/07/13

Receiving Wide Coverage …

Atwitter About Twitter: The social-media network that's an unholy hybrid of news, opinions and procrastination priced its much-awaited initial public offering at $26 per share, above its underwriters' estimated range, for an initial valuation of $18 billion. (That's about $129 million per character that you're publishing for free in a typical 140-character Tweet.) Depending on how many shares are sold today in its first day of trading, the IPO is expected to...

[more]

CFPB Revs Up Auto-Loan Probe; AIG Preps Another Mortgage Suit

11/06/13

Receiving Wide Coverage ... You had to figure that with an election night, and lots of other distractions such as the continued buzz over the SAC Capital plea deal, commercial banks would get a break for at least one 24-hour news cycle. Wrong. Scan the major dailies, and there are threats coming from all directions, including regulatory probes, lawsuits and fines. Even Bitcoin is going to get scrutiny on Capitol Hill. …

[more]

SAC Capital's Guilty Plea and $1.8B Fine Not Enough?

11/05/13

Receiving Wide Coverage ...

SAC Brought Down: The papers reported late Monday that hedge-fund group SAC Capital Advisors will plead guilty to insider trading and pay $1.2 billion as part of a decade-long investigation, which included a previous $600 million payment, bringing the total fees to $1.8 billion. Though it was a record fine and high-profile win for U.S. prosecutors, the Journal and the Times focused on how the firm's founder, Steven Cohen, appeared off the...

[more]

More Big Banks Disclose Forex Probe; Co-op Bank's Radical Restructuring Plan

11/04/13

Receiving Wide Coverage ...

HSBC Discloses Probe During Earnings: HBSC reported a 28% rise in third quarter net profit on Monday largely related to falling loan charges. The bank also became "the latest to admit that it was the subject of an investigation by several authorities into its conduct in the foreign exchange market," Dealbook notes. Per the Journal, "HSBC had not suspended anyone in connection with the probe and ... none of the traders named...

[more]