Dealscape

Summer reading: 'A VC' & other tech deal blogs

2009-07-03T16:00:00Z

A rainy three-day weekend creates the perfect opportunity to visit some of our favorite blogs from the New York technology startup scene. -- Mary Kathleen Flynn

A VC: Musings of a VC in NYC
Written by: Fred Wilson, co-founder with Brad Burnham of Union Square Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm focused on Web 2.0 startups, such as Twitter Inc. and Tumblr Inc.
Why read? Provides a great primer on venture capital. Also offers insights and updates on Union Square's portfolio companies and other promising startups.
Recommended post: The Venture Capital Math Problem. It generated 250-plus comments, some of which are almost as insightful as the post they inspired.

This is Going to Be Big
Written by: Charlie O'Donnell, co-founder of career development site Path101 Inc.; founder of nextNY, a grass-roots community group for tech-savvy 20- and 30-somethings; former analyst at Union Square Ventures.
Why read? Candid reports from an entrepreneur who draws on experience from both sides of the investment equation. Plus a glimpse into the New York tech social scene.
Recommended posts: Venture Realities: Startup financing from the frontlines and She dreams in digital: dating on and off the grid

Trends: Find them, ride them and get off! Stocks, venture and civilization
Written by: Howard Lindzon, co-founder of StockTwits; creator of Wallstrip; founder of Social Leverage, a group that invests in social media startups.
Why read? Colorful commentary from an irreverent entrepreneur and investor. Plus some of the most creative cussing we've come across.
Recommended post: Twitter Files for an IPO....TWEET as Ticker Symbol?

Five Years Too Late
Written by: Stuart Ellman and Eric Wiesen, partners at RRE Ventures, a VC firm that has raised more than $1 billion, invested in 115 companies and had 30 positive exits over the past 15 years.
Why read? A voice, or two, of reason in the venture capital landscape.
Recommended posts: The Perfect Storm, which provides the LP perspective via Ellman, and The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same, a guest post by RRE co-founder Jim Robinson IV that puts the current hand-wringing about the state of the VC inudstry in historical perspective.

Think/Musings
Written by: John Borthwick, co-founder with Andrew Weissman of Betaworks, an innovative firm that both develops Web 2.0 startups (such as Summize, sold to Twitter last year, and Bitly) as well as investing in others, such as Someecards.
Why read? Best analysis of the "Now Web" we've seen. If you still don't get why Twitter and other real-time services are game changers, start reading Borthwick's blog.
Recommended posts: Creative destruction... Google slayed by the Notificator?

La Bonita boss makes plea for her job

2009-07-03T14:30:14Z

Management turnover in a Chapter 11 case is often unavoidable, especially when lenders end up with a majority stake in a reorganized entity. In such cases, one of the stipulations of the deal is that the buyer gets to put its representatives on a revamped board of directors.

Though this may cause many executives to grumble, Tammy Young, president and CEO of bankrupt La Bonita Ole Inc., has taken a completely different tack.

La Bonita Ole, which makes flour, corn and whole wheat tortillas, has been operating under bankruptcy protection since July 16, 2008. However, in a statement posted on Wednesday, the company said that it "may be facing a permanent shift in owner/management," with lender SunTrust Bank hoping to sell the company.

Documents filed with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Middle District of Florida in Tampa indicated that two competing plans have been filed in the case -- one by SunTrust and the other by the debtor. Should SunTrust's plan go through, Young would lose her stake, and Jeffrey Granger would be appointed the debtor's president and only director.

But Young isn't going to go quietly. La Bonita has launched a "Save The Tortillas!" campaign to help her keep ownership of the company and current management intact.

The campaign includes Wednesday's statement, a Web site, a Facebook page and a YouTube video featuring Young's mother.

She seems to be targeting SunTrust, specifically.

"Wouldn't it be cool as heck if SunTrust could become a banking hero ... keeping one more American entrepreneur in business instead of out of business?" Young says in a video posted on the Web site.

Young is hoping that the campaign generates "an overwhelming show of public support for the company and her cause" leading up to the confirmation hearings for the two plans on Aug. 19, according to Wednesday's statement.

As for SunTrust, the bank appears none too pleased. It already filed a motion in court asking that La Bonita halt the "false and misleading information" it's disseminating on the Web site and its accompanying links. The motion was partly approved and partly denied on July 1, pending certain modifications to the information. But the Web site and the videos are still going strong.

It'll be interesting to see if Young's embarrassment strategy works, especially since she doesn't seem the least bit humiliated herself about La Bonita being in bankruptcy to begin with. - Ben Fidler

Tech M&A, IPO markets are hardly healthy yet

2009-07-03T12:15:31Z

It seems tech dealmakers and investors should be optimistic as we step into the second quarter, what with Wednesday's successful IPO of LogMeIn Inc. (NASDAQ:LOGM) and a handful of other new offerings in the past couple weeks. (The Deal Pipeline subscribers can read more about the LogMeIn offering here.) But leave it to empirical data and those who gather it to quash hope.

Overall, the second quarter looked pretty good, with the number of tech M&A deals and the aggregate amount spent hitting their highest levels since June 2008. But last month tells a different story, according to figures from the 451 Group. While the 517 deals worth an aggregate $40.7 billion announced in the April-May period represented an average deal size of $78 million, that figure plummeted to $33 million (based on 233 deals and an aggregate purchase price of $7.7 billion.

Analyst Brenon Daly blames the drop in deal size on the fact that many deals during the month involved struggling tech companies.

On the IPO front, the National Venture Capital Association wasn't particularly rosy either. In second-quarter numbers it released Wednesday with Thomson Reuters, the group noted that while the number of VC-backed IPOs is the highest it's been since the first quarter of 2008, the thin pipeline of privately backed companies is troubling.

"It will be some time before we can even be in a position to return to healthy IPO activity levels," said NVCA president Mark Heesen.

Though we are all seeing signs of stabilization, it seems the road back to some kind of normalcy is going to be a long one. - Olaf de Senerpont Domis

Bank of America starts taking IOUs

2009-07-02T17:44:17Z

Bank of America Corp. (NYSE:BAC) has taken plenty of criticism over the past 12 months on many things that range from the bailout-backed takeover of Merrill Lynch & Co. to outrageous bonuses. But in its defense, BofA is now doing something friendly for some of its largest stakeholders -- the taxpayers. BofA announced Wednesday that it would start accepting IOU payments from California customers as that state's government remains locked in a budget fight.

Bank of America recognizes the State of California budget crisis will impact our clients and customers. To support our customers, while giving the state legislature additional time to pass a budget, we will accept California state-registered warrants - or IOUs - from existing customers and clients. Based on state disbursement estimates, we will accept the registered warrants through July 10, the bank said in a statement.

The decision by Bank of America may put pressure on other large and regional banks to follow suit. The grinding of the California state government to a halt is sure to have an adverse effect on the bottom lines of large Wall Street banks, who all have a presence in the world's 10th-largest economy, as well as the area's regional banks. But just how large of an effect remains to be seen as state legislators continue to bicker over budget cuts versus tax increases. - George White

Crisis Dashboard: LIBOR, VIX, TED Spread, Dow

2009-07-02T17:30:00Z

CRISIS DASHBOARD
Figures are calculated according to the latest stock data available at approximately 1:30 pm ET
July 2, 2009
Benchmark	Spread	Change from previous day	1 week ago	1 month ago	1 year ago
LIBOR 1-MONTH	0.30	-0.002	0.31	0.32	2.46
LIBOR 3-MONTH	0.58	-0.010	0.60	0.65	2.79
TED	0.41	-0.003	0.42	0.51	0.87
Exchange	Average	Change from previous day	1 week ago	1 month ago	1 year ago
VIX	28.36	+2.14 (+8.16%)	26.36	29.63	25.92
DOW	8,335.38	-168.68 (-1.98%)	8,472.40	8,740.87	11,215.51
T-bond	Current Price/Yield		Price/Yield change
3-Year	101-04+ / 1.47		0-06+ / -.072
5-Year	101-00 / 2.41		0-14+ / -.097
10-Year	97-04.5 / 3.47		0-17.5 / -.067
Sources: Bloomberg.com, CNBC.com

The Dow plummeted Thursday. Some factors affecting the market, according to CNBC, are:

Employers cut 467,000 jobs in June, bringing the unemployment rate to 9.5%.
Factory orders jumped 1.2%.
The Treasury Department is expected to name nine fund managers to operate the long-awaited Public-Private Investment Program.

LIBOR rates eased lower again, and the Ted Spread contracted. Both three-month LIBOR and the TED Spread remain near their lowest levels in over 12 months. Interbank lending rates are well below where they were even a month ago, but there remains a lack of confidence among banks in lending to each other. Additionally government bailouts have increasingly made LIBOR less useful a measure of the health of credit markets, according to Ze ro Hedge.

The VIX increased Thursday after dropping to its lowest levels this week since last September, when Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. collapsed. The VIX has been continuing to bob between a low of 26 and a high of 32 over the past two weeks and hit a low of 25.08 Wednesday. The VIX holding above 40 indicates a bottom hasn't hit yet, as the VIX in the range of 25 to 30 signals a recovering economy. In May 2008 the VIX was below 20 and typically volatility rises in July and August so the dip in VIX is temporary, according to Marketbeat.

U.S. Treasury bond prices rose Thursday as investors grow more concerned over unemployment reports and further U.S. debt auctions. The Treasury will hold four auctions next week. "Investors will be able to bid on $8 billion of 10-year Treasury Inflation Protected Securities on July 6, $35 billion of 3-year notes on July 7, $19 billion of 10-year notes on July 8 and $11 billion of 30-year bonds on July 9," according to Bloomberg. - Maria Woehr and George White

Troubled Wall Street Prices at approximately 1:30 pm ET
Name	Price at open	Price at 1:30 pm	Change	Market cap
J.P. Morgan Chase & Co.	33.36	32.85	-0.92	123479.02
Goldman Sachs Group Inc.	145.86	144.53	-2.79	72759.43
Morgan Stanley	27.88	27.24	-1.12	29469.39
Citigroup Inc.	2.94	2.90	-0.07	15987.26
Fannie Mae	0.57	0.58	-0.01	643.29
Freddie Mac	0.61	0.64	0.00	412.46
Bank of America Corp.	12.79	12.76	-0.29	81701.85
Wells Fargo & Co.	23.73	23.52	-0.62	100286.00
American International Group Inc.	17.86	18.79	+0.71	126.45
Fifth Third Bancorp	6.97	6.95	-0.21	4009.71
Capital One Financial Corp.	21.46	21.40	-0.47	8471.32
SunTrust Banks Inc.	16.17	16.17	-0.16	5771.31
U.S. Bancorp	17.48	17.37	-0.21	30549.71
Regions Financial Corp.	3.91	3.85	-0.12	2675.87
KeyCorp	5.07	5.13	-0.03	2577.72
PNC Financial Services	37.94	37.06	-1.25	16502.03
BB&T Corp.	21.53	21.17	-0.52	11866.56
Bank of New York Mellon Corp.	28.59	28.31	-0.38	32654.16
State Street Corp.	46.83	47.22	-0.13	20529.94
Source: The Deal

Auction for AIG investments unit stalls

2009-07-02T16:54:56Z

Efforts to sell American International Group Inc.'s (NYSE:AIG) asset management business have stalled after another week of negotiating. Now, the price of AIG Investments has fallen, according to The Wall Street Journal.

AIG has been in talks to finalize the deal with Franklin Templeton Investments Inc. since May and the price has fallen from $800 million to between $350 million and $450 million. Apparently, one of the key factors is the management, according to the report.

Complicating matters are questions about who would fill management jobs. If current AIG Investments executives remain in their positions and buyers assume certain employee-benefit costs, that could result in a lower price being paid for the business, people familiar with the talks said.

The Franklin-led group is being advised by Charles E. "Chuck" Johnson, a former Franklin Templeton executive and deal maker for the firm who now runs a small California private-equity firm. Another partner is Crestview Partners LP, a New York private-equity firm. Potential backers include Richard Li, the prominent Hong Kong businessman who runs Pacific Century Group and is the son of Li Ka-shing, one of Asia's wealthiest people.

If the auction opens again, there are other potential buyers for the unit including Macquarie Group Ltd. and Religare Enterprises Ltd. Similarly, Bank of America Corp. (NYSE:BAC) is having trouble selling its investment management unit and could wind up breaking up the unit and selling it in pieces if it means selling it for more cash. Could AIG wind up doing something similar? We shall see.

This isn't the only auction that is running into trouble. There's some question over how successful AIG's International Lease Finance auction will be due to recent plane crashes. Concerns over the AIG Advisor Group auction also loom since there could be a mass exodus from the unit. Some wonder if these worries could cause the valuations on these auctions to plummet. If so, that's a huge problem for the insurer, which is currently trying to auction off assets to raise back its $180 billion loan from the government. So far, the insurer is a long way from its goal, raising only about $6.7 billion from asset sales, according to Bloomberg. - Maria Woehr

For more details about AIG's auctions also see:
AIG chooses i-banks for AIA IPO
Buyout shops join auction for AIG's Nan Shan
At AIG meeting all is secure except future

SEC exec: Whistleblowers should be rewarded

2009-07-02T15:45:12Z

The Securities and Exchange Commission's inspector general says the regulator should pay whistleblowers for information about fraud, and hedge funds should be forced to use independent custodians and certify that they have conducted proper due diligence.

David Kotz, the SEC's inspector general, made the suggestions in a letter to Rep. Paul Kanjorski, D-Pa., chairman of the House of Representatives subcommittee on capital markets.

Kanjorski has been pressing Kotz for information on how the SEC missed the immense fraud orchestrated by Bernard Madoff before Congress takes up President Obama's new regulatory reform package.

According to Kotz, the SEC's oversight of the financial industry would be improved if a custodial rule -- similar to one already in place for mutual funds -- was in place for hedge funds.

"This custodian requirement essentially removes the ability of an investment adviser to fraudulently use the proceeds invested by new investors to make payments to old investors," Kotz wrote to Kanjorski.

In another suggestion based on a rule already in place, Kotz said hedge fund and investment advisers should have to sign a pledge -- under penalty of law -- that they have conducted due diligence, much like CEOs are required to certify their companies' financial statements under the 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley Act.

Kotz also backed putting in place "bounty" programs that would provide "necessary incentives" for individuals to bring complaints about possible illegal activity.

"Although the bounty system has been in place at the SEC for more than 20 years, there have been relatively few awards made," he said. The current system applied only to insider trading cases, and criteria for judging awards were "vague."

The inspector general also want to empower the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board to audit reports prepared by accounting firms.

In his letter Kotz reiterated that the agency has not completed its investigation into the Madoff fraud but is proceeding "in an expeditious manner."

The results of the Madoff investigation are expected to be published by the end of August, Kotz said. Two other reports that will provide specific recommendations on improving the SEC's various divisions are expected on Sept. 30. - Donna Block

Crabtree & Evelyn begins bankruptcy process

2009-07-02T15:23:16Z

Crabtree & Evelyn Ltd., a bath and body products retailer, has filed for bankruptcy protection and will begin restructuring, joining a string of other U.S.-based retailers such as Eddie Bauer Holdings Inc., Lenox Group Inc. and Filene's Basement Inc. (see Retailers and bankruptcy).

Crabtree plans to use a $40 million debtor-in-possession loan from its parent, Malaysia's Kuala Lumpur Kepong Berhad to begin its reorganization. Crabtree will use the DIP to pay off the roughly $21.73 million KLKB is due and use the rest for working capital. (The Deal Pipeline subscribers can see the full story here.)

Crabtree's plan isn't all to different from Eddie Bauer's, which went into Chapter 11 with a prepack. In the meantime, Eddie Bauer will auction its assets July 16. Stalking-horse bidder CCMP Capital Advisors LLC is kicking off the the bidding with $202.3 million. (The Deal Pipeline subscribers can see the full story here.)

But a prepack doesn't guarantee the retailer will go to the the stalking-horse bidder. Filene's Basement Inc.'s assets were won by Syms Corp. and Vornado Realty Trust (NYSE:VNO) in a second auction. In a preliminary auction, stalking-horse bidder Crown FB LLC was outbid by Men's Wearhouse Inc. (The Deal Pipeline subscribers can see the full story here.). A prepack also doesn't mean that the retailer will be able to restructure successfully. Both Eddie Bauer and Filene's Basement filed for Chapter 11 twice. Other retailers such as Fortunoff Inc. have had to liquidate after filing for bankruptcy a second time. - Maria Woehr

FDIC data shows no CRA, failure correlation

2009-07-02T14:46:46Z

Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. data shows that over the last decade most banks have complied with the controversial Community Reinvestment Act with no corresponding rise in bank failures.

The debate over the 1977 law that forbids discriminatory lending practices by commercial banks received attention during the presidential campaign last year as Republicans blamed it for the credit crisis. Although the election is over, the debate has continued amongst financial and economics bloggers -- most notably Clusterstock's John Carney.

For what its worth, the FDIC every month reviews a selection of member banks to see how they are complying with the law and gives them a grade. July's crop mostly received satisfactory ratings -- only four weren't in compliance with one of them receiving the lowest rating of significantly not in compliance.

Additionally, the FDIC offers a search tool that provides data on compliance dating back to 1990. Interestingly, a quick search discovers most banks seem to have little difficulty complying with the law. In fact, last year only 22 banks failed to comply with the law, which seems to be the case for much of the last decade. Additionally, there is a clear improvement in CRA compliance during the Clinton years as the number of scofflaw banks dropped from about 100 a year to the current levels.

If CRA really was a factor in the credit crisis, shouldn't bank failures have increased with CRA compliance? Why would it take over a decade of improved CRA compliance before the recent rash of bank failures? - Matthew Wurtzel

See the FDIC's CRA compliance database

Intermediate Capital raising $576M

2009-07-02T14:39:22Z

The stock of publicly traded private equity firms has gotten roughed up since the credit crisis began back in July 2007, but Intermediate Capital Group plc is hoping its shareholders will forgive and forget its announcement of a new $576 million rights offering.

The London-listed investment firm's plan gives investors a bargain basement price for participating. The firm plans to issue 302 million shares at 121 pence, a 74% discount to Wednesday's closing price and gives them seven new shares for every two they already own, according to a statement on its Web site.

The firm's managing director Tom Attwood said, "The extraordinary state of the credit markets, the absence of liquidity in the banking sector and changes in the competitive landscape have provided ICG with significant opportunities to invest."

While Intermediate says its portfolio is in good shape, the firm plans to use the money to extend loans, refinance portfolio companies and buy debt from other investors, according to Bloomberg. Investors will vote on the plan on July 20.

Shares of U.S. traded LBO firms like American Capital Group Ltd. (NYSE:ACAS) and the Blackstone Group LP (NYSE:BX) have been under pressure for the last 18 months as a dearth of leveraged financing crimps their ability to do more deals, while the recession takes a toll on the fortunes of their portfolio companies. - George White

Finance Layoffs: 467K jobs lost

2009-07-02T13:41:14Z

The Labor Department's results are out. Employers cut 467,000 jobs in June, and the unemployment rate rose to 9.5%. That means the number of people on unemployment is around 6.8 million, according to CNBC. Many of those that are unemployed worked in the finance industry. Rumors and reports of layoffs at GE Capital, Lloyds Banking Group plc (NYSE:LYG) and Wells Fargo & Co. (NYSE:WFC) swamped reports earlier this week (see links below). A small bank in Florida is also reporting layoffs. Oculina Bank has laid off four employees in the past couple of weeks, according to TCPalm.

It's a tough employment market for financial professionals, but there are jobs as companies are hiring. In fact, Royal Bank of Canada (NYSE:RY) is hiring in Europe, according to Hedgeweek. Jefferies Group has also been aggressively hiring. Here's our pick of the day from The Deal's Career Channel:

Managing Director - Principal Transaction at Macquarie in N.J.

For a roundup of all the announced layoffs to date, check out The Deal's Pink slips on Wall Street Dealwatch or any of the links below. Also, feel free to leave us any layoff or hiring rumors you are hearing. - Maria Woehr

follow me on twitter @newsgirlmw

Also see:

Finance Layoffs: Wells Fargo and more

Finance Layoffs: Lloyds, GE Capital and more

Finance Layoffs: HSBC, LSE and more

Buyout shops start looking at IPO exits again

2009-07-02T13:21:48Z

Venture capital firms aren't the only ones eying the IPO market to start providing exits from their portfolio companies.

While VCs have racked up six IPO exits this year, the only PE-backed company able to make that jump has been language software firm Rosetta Stone Inc. (NYSE:RST).

However, with some signs of life in the IPO market, LBO firms are taking notice and "cautiously looking" at equity offering again, according to a Reuters story.

Bankers and lawyers report a rise in the number of portfolio companies in their IPO pipelines and a increased level of talks with private-equity firms. "There's a slow snowball picking up," said Richard Truesdell, co-head of the global Capital Markets Group at law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell in New York. "We are miles away from the frenetic activity of 2007 but we are also hopefully miles away from the complete absence of IPOs that we had."

While both private equity and venture investors would surely love to see the IPO become a reliable exit strategy once again, buyout shops do face some higher hurdles to making going public profitable. Unlike the typically leverage-free VC portfolio companies, PE-backed companies will often see any new money raised go toward paying down the huge debt loads most carry.

Further complicating the race to profitability are the high valuations, LBO shops paid during the heyday of cheap debt. However, a resurgent IPO market may be the best bet for buyout firms to break even or profit on the 2005-2007 crop of companies as tight debt markets and reduced buyer appetite makes a profitable M&A exit a long shot. - George White

Goldman Sachs vs. Rolling Stone

2009-07-02T12:35:11Z

It's the talk of the town: Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (NYSE:GS) versus Rolling Stone's contributing editor Matt Taibbi.

Since earlier this week -- when our editor in chief Robert Teitelman reacted to Taibbi's article -- the discussion online has erupted into somewhat of a word-slinging wrestling match that has been debated in many mediums, ranging from magazines to blogs to newspapers to e-mails, as well as, interestingly enough, Twitter, as Felix Salmon points out.

The debate is all based on a conspiracy theory that Goldman is successful in both good times and bad because it manipulates the markets and therefore is effectually ruining American society. Taibbi writes, "The world's most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity." Though Taibbi is entertaining and his argument is actually intriguing with its better points, he discredits himself through editorializing to the point that the online conversation seemed to quickly devolve from Goldman conspiracy to balanced reporting.

Lucas Van Praag, a spokesman at Goldman, told the New York Post via e-mail, the piece was:

"an hysterical compilation of conspiracy theories. ... Notable ones missing are Goldman Sachs as the third shooter [in John F. Kennedy's assassination] and faking the first lunar landing. We reject the assertion that we are inflators of bubbles and profiteers in busts, and we are painfully conscious of the importance in being a force for good."

Taibbi, who apparently did try to get in touch with Goldman prior to publishing the article, reacted to Goldman's statements on his blog:

Given this, I tried to make that first list of questions as basic as possible. I asked if Goldman would have turned a profit in Q1 2009 if it hadn't orphaned the month of December 2008. Then I asked if Goldman had made changes to its underwriting standards during the internet boom years...

you'd have to be absolutely crazy ... not to accept the notion that Goldman shouldered a significant portion of the blame for the internet mess. They were, after all, the leading underwriter of internet IPOs during the internet boom years.

So while they maybe weren't the biggest player, they were still a major player, and one can easily make the case that they were the most obnoxious player, given that they dove into this muck with their eyes wide open, unlike so many other idiots on Wall Street.

As the Post points out and Heidi Moore twitters, several other banks on Wall Street take the same approach that Goldman does. The Post writes, "Indeed, sources point out that Lehman and Bear both used the same strategy, despite the ultimate collapse, and others continue to do so today, including Morgan Stanley."

Goldman is just good at it. As The Deal's Teitelman points out, the bigger picture is how to reform the financial system:

For Taibbi to make his case for Goldman's Oz-like power would be to suggest that the firm, which did achieve preeminence on Wall Street in the '90s, has been manipulating American geopolitical power relations since Roosevelt, through Nixon and Reagan and into the Bush years. That's clearly absurd, which is not to say Goldman (or any firm) was free of all responsibility. But the larger question that all these pieces raise is what exactly is the relationship between macroeconomics and microeconomics when it comes to cause -- and how should that affect reforms that are currently being debated.

Truth is, it's easy to sling mud at Goldman, but at this point slinging mud at Goldman or any investment bank on Wall Street is cliche. The real story behind Taibbi's article seems to be that he wants to jump on the Wall-Street-bankers-are-villains bandwagon, which is easy to do and frankly at this point, passe:

My feeling is that companies like Goldman Sachs have a virtual monopoly on mainstream-news public relations; for every one reporter like me, or like far more knowledgeable critics like Tyler Durden, there are a thousand hacks out there willing to pimp Goldman's viewpoint on things in the front pages and ledes of the major news organizations. And there are probably another thousand poor working stiffs who are nudged into pushing the Goldman party line by their editors and superiors (how many political reporters with no experience reporting on financial issues have swallowed whole the news cliche about Goldman being the "smart guys" on Wall Street? A lot, for sure).

Granted, sometimes responses from PR flaks can grab any reporter's goat, but Goldman is highly successful at what it does, and that has stirred up conspiracy theories about the bank for years. That is why, in fact, so many prominent dealmakers come from Goldman and are now in government positions to help restructure the financial system into one that will work for everyone -- not because there is some greedy martini-drinking brotherhood fraternity that is plotting to take over Wall Street or the world. Durden, over at Zero Hedge, has a bunch of theories concerning Goldman's strategies that are interesting and worth checking out. He sticks to the facts and doesn't claim that firms like Goldman are ruining the world with their existence. - Maria Woehr

See Taibi's story about Goldman from Rolling Stone

Roll Call: No One Coming In To Work At Citi Today

2009-07-02T11:00:54Z

Here are some links to kick off your Thursday.

Slate asks If Paul Krugman Were a Woman

Breakingviews on Sachs, Drugs and Rock and Roll

PeHUB on how PCG Pays $2 Million To Escape New York Probe

DealBook : In Praises of Law Firm Layoffs

24/7 Wall Street on Car Sales: Ford (F) Rules June

Dealbreaker says No One Coming In To Work At Citi Today

Fortune highlights the Dumbest moments in business for 2009

International Power sells Czech units

2009-07-01T22:30:25Z

Energy group International Power plc of London agreed Wednesday to sell its Czech operations to central European buyout shop J&T Finance Group AS for £738 million ($1.2 billion).

The acquisition is the second in quick succession in the energy sector for J&T, which in February bought German mining and power business Mibrag BV for €404 million through its Czech power group joint venture, CEZ.

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856 articles related to the Czech Republic
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