Down Markets a Blessing For Some

According to Reuters - Hedge funds see big gains in distressed investing. Quoting managers of some of the larger hedge funds, they are buying, and there is not enough capital to take all of the opportunities that they have found.

Giants Go To The SuperBowl

Always the underdog, the Giants win again, in overtime.

NFL Game Center: Post Game - New York Giants at Green Bay Packers - 2007 Conference Championships

Supreme Court Rejects Scheme Liability in Stoneridge

The long awaited decision in Stoneridge Investment Partners, LLC vs. Scientific-Atlanta, Inc. was issued today. The Supreme Court, in a 5-3 decision, rejected the concept that secondary actors, such as bankers, auditors, vendors and attorneys, who do not themselves make misleading statements, are liable to assisting the company that does make misleading statements.

The case is significant, as the defendants in the case did in fact make misleading statements, in that they assisted the issuer's fraud. It is therefore an expansion of Central Bank, which holds that there is no aiding and abetting liability under 10b-5.

The decision is here.

Giants Go To The Championship Game!

What a great game. Big Blue wins, Owens does NOTHING in the second half, and the defense shows, with a decimated secondary, just how good they are.

Bring on the Cheeseheads!

BigLaw Lay Offs

So, you break your back, and your wallet. You graduate from law school, pass the bar exam, get a job at BigLaw, for big hours and big bucks. Sure, you are doing the crap work, getting paid less per hour than your construction worker buddies, but hey, you got a career in law and in another 7...err.....8.....uh...9 or 10 years you might be a non-equity partner.

Then your fantasy bubble bursts.

You are being layed off.............

Yup, Cadwalader is laying off 35 associates, nearly 10% of its lawyers are gone, with three month's severance. Nice deal, great show of support for those new associates you recruited.

According to the article, more layoffs are coming - at least some of BigLaw, including one of my favorite BigLaws did buyouts and took care of their associates. Apparently not all are going to do so.

FINRA Fines 19 Firms a Total of $2.8 Million for Inaccurate Advertised Trade Volume Information

FINRA fined the firms after it compared the firms' advertised trade volume with the firms' executed trade volume found substantial overstatements for each firm in one or more of the securities reviewed.

The firms' overstated trade volumes were made available to market participants by the service providers. The service providers also used the firms' inaccurate advertised trade volumes to compile rankings and reports, including reports that rank the most active broker-dealers by security.

So, these firms misrepresented the volume of their business in their advertisements. In other words, they lied to the investing public. Pretty serious stuff, I wonder why the individuals responsible for these misresentations were not barred from the industry.

Oh wait, the explanation is later on in the press release. Some of the firms involved were CIBC, Lehman, Merrill Lynch, Robert W. Baird & Co., Inc., Thomas Weisel Partners, LLC, UBS, Bear, Stearns, BMO Capital, Cowen, Deutsche Bank, and RBC Capital Markets Corp.). The big boys committing the big violations, and everyone walking away with a small fine.

Oh yeah, FINRA also found that, prior to September 2006, all of the firms lacked an adequate supervisory system and procedures for communicating trade volume to such services. Do they EVER not find inadequate procedures when they fine a firm? Not that I am complaining, since all that does is generate some work for my firm in reviewing and re-writing procedures, but if you were to read FINRA press releases, you would believe that no one has a decent set of supervisory procedures!

Or maybe it is just a way to jack up the fines by adding "another" violation. Hmmmm.