"We Are Wall Street"

[georgephillip]

"We are Wall Street. It's our job to make money. Whether it's a commodity, stock, bond, or some hypothetical piece of fake paper, it doesn't matter. We would trade baseball cards if it were profitable...

"Go ahead and continue to take us down, but you're only going to hurt yourselves. What's going to happen when we can't find jobs on the street anymore?

"Guess what: We're going to take yours.

"...We aren't dinosaurs. We are smarter and more vicious than that, and we are going to survive."

From part of an e-mail pinging around trading desks (first?) reported in the Financial Times that I found on Z-Space.

 

[georgephillip]

Once upon a time bankers borrowed money at 3% made loans at 6% and were on their local golf courses by 3:00PM.

This was a time when synthetic derivatives were considered gambling, and therefore illegal.

On his way out of town in 2000, Bill Clinton signed the Commodities Futures Modernization Act which pre-empted state law enforcement against these derivatives.

William Quirk, a professor at the University of South Carolina School of Law, thinks it's time to send the bankers back to the links and get them out of the casino.

Quirk sees two solutions to our Great Crisis where the derivatives market is currently about $600 trillion or about ten times the world economy.

Repeal the immunity that Democrats and Republicans bestowed on Wall Street in 2000.

Bring back Glass-Steagall, the Depression-era reform that separated speculation from commercial banking.

Quirk also believes the current financial regulation bill moving through congress is "just window dressing."

"...If you want to be serious about too big to fail, you need to break up the big banks. Otherwise, it's not worth the paper it's written on."

"The big banks have had their own way since 1990...Anything they've wanted they have gotten..."

Republicans AND Democrats: Not a dimes worth of difference when it comes to big banks.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

I have 2 friends each of whom built a career one at Lehman and the other at Bear Stearns. If you want to know how you get true fiscal discipline talk with someone who lost the fortune they built up over 15+ years because their bank went under.

It's really simple: if you are FDIC insured, you are barred from trading derivatives either directly or through a subsidiary. If you want to risk your own capital, have fun but don't come to me for a bail out

 

[georgephillip]

What bubble potential do you see for Cap and Trade?

Good Republicans like Henry Paulson and good Democrats like Al Gore seem to be on the same page when it comes to "...the idea of turning a free, colorless, and odorless gas into a product (attractive) to money people."

 

[Gadawg73]

Clinton signed the law.
Republicans took most of the campaign contributions, were lobbied the most, introduced the bill and gathered support to pass it.
The executive does not pass legislation.

 

[georgephillip]

It seems like Republicans and Democrats are two wings of the Wall Street party.

Huey Long saw it almost eighty years ago when he compared Washington to a restaurant that served only one dish. There were Republican waiters lining one wall and Democrat waiters along the other.

But no matter which party delivered your order "...all the grub comes from Wall Street's kitchen."

Any "Change" we see in our lifetimes will start with FLUSHING as many Republicans AND Democrats from the congress as possible starting November 2nd.

 

[Toro]

As far as I am concerned, nobody from Wall Street should be allowed inside the Beltway, let alone the halls of power. They have fucked up so bad.

As for "We're smarter than you, we'll take your job" I still know derivatives traders who are unemployed two years later. I had dinner at an upscale restaurant a block from the water in Greenwich not too long ago and was waited on by an ex-investment banker. (He makes good money in tips!) A colleague of mine whose brother was a derivatives salesmen for 15 years recently opened up a pizzeria. So I wouldn't be too worried about ex-bankers taking our jobs, unless maybe you're a waiter or a pizzeria owner.

 

[Paulie]

As far as I am concerned, nobody from Wall Street should be allowed inside the Beltway, let alone the halls of power. They have fucked up so bad.

As for "We're smarter than you, we'll take your job" I still know derivatives traders who are unemployed two years later. I had dinner at an upscale restaurant a block from the water in Greenwich not too long ago and was waited on by an ex-investment banker. (He makes good money in tips!) A colleague of mine whose brother was a derivatives salesmen for 15 years recently opened up a pizzeria. So I wouldn't be too worried about ex-bankers taking our jobs, unless maybe you're a waiter or a pizzeria owner.

Those geeks couldn't do what I do if their lives depended on it.

 

[Toro]

As far as I am concerned, nobody from Wall Street should be allowed inside the Beltway, let alone the halls of power. They have fucked up so bad.

As for "We're smarter than you, we'll take your job" I still know derivatives traders who are unemployed two years later. I had dinner at an upscale restaurant a block from the water in Greenwich not too long ago and was waited on by an ex-investment banker. (He makes good money in tips!) A colleague of mine whose brother was a derivatives salesmen for 15 years recently opened up a pizzeria. So I wouldn't be too worried about ex-bankers taking our jobs, unless maybe you're a waiter or a pizzeria owner.

Those geeks couldn't do what I do if their lives depended on it.

Society would be much better served if they took their skills into technology or healthcare rather than trying to figure out how package esoteric products into even more incomprehensible structures.

Finding new and clever ways to leverage a bank to the absolute hilt does no one much good except the guys getting paid the multi-million dollar bonuses to do so.

 

[georgephillip]

What, if any, are the connections between Wall Street, war and environmental destruction?

If it's true that Peter Sutherland, chairman of BP's board for the last decade, once headed Goldman Sachs International, there's at least an apparent conflict of interest in Sutherland's dual roles at BP and the Goldman giant.

Both institutions were heavily involved, in 1990 and 2000, in deregulating energy futures trades from oversight by the Commodities Futures and Exchange Commission. Both gained materially as oil prices went from $18 per barrel in 1988 to $110 per barrel in 2008.

Another BP alliance, this one with Halliburton was forged in Iraq but some of its dividends may be on display today in the Gulf of Mexico just as they were in 2009 in Australia's sea of Timor.

"It remains for progressives (and others) to move beyond a single-issue focus and make the connections between Wall Street, war, and environmental destruction."