[Abacus] Goldman’s shares hit 52-week low
On a day when the S&P 500 index closed 3 per cent higher, Goldman Sachs’ shares touched a 52-week low of $131.30, a level not seen since May 14 2009.
And as the YTD chart below (via Google Finance) illustrates,
[Abacus] Goldman faces new CDO case
Add this one to the many legal risks of Goldman Sachs.
It looks like the bank’s bid to reach a settlement with the Australian hedge fund Basis Yield Alpha over the so-called Timberwolf CDO hasn’t worked — as was indicated.
[Abacus] The many legal risks of Goldman
Here’s an interesting tidbit, or two, or three (or four) from the ‘Legal Proceedings’ part of Goldman Sachs’ filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission, published on Monday:
We are involved in a number of judicial,
[Abacus] Goldman TV
What PR pill did Lloyd Blankfein pop so soon after escaping Carl Levin’s chamber on Capitol Hill?
Here’s the Goldman chairman/ceo on Charlie Rose. It’s a polished performance – and one in which Blankfein acknowledges he doesn’t know whether his bank would have survived without government support and where he says that the American public’s anger is “understandable and even justified…”
[Abacus] Understated Research Headline of the Year, Part II
Hello criminal probe, goodbye hard-earned reputation — and, er, about seven per cent off Goldman Sachs’ stock, as at pixel time.
This note from a Merrill Lynch analyst says it all:
We are lowering our rating on GS to Neutral from Buy and our price objective to $160 from $220.
[Abacus] Call the cops
If you thought the media was starting to lose interest in that Goldman Sachs fraud case, think again.
The Wall Street Journal:
Federal prosecutors are conducting a criminal investigation into whether Goldman Sachs Group Inc.
[Abacus] Goldman in DC: A blogger round-up
US Senators spent a full ten hours grilling Goldman executives on Tuesday over their role in mortgage markets.
Thankfully, bloggers had a much snappier take on proceedings. Here are the best.
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A quick recap
First,
[Abacus] Live, from Room 106
The FT’s Alan Rappeport is live blogging proceedings at the Senate subcommittee on investigations on Tuesday.
Should be fun.
The hearing’s running order – here.
Rappeport, meanwhile, is here — refresh for the latest updates.
[Abacus] ‘My name is Fabrice Tourre’
Just in case you can’t wait for the live testimony before a Senate sub-committee later on Tuesday…
We present the prepared remarks of Fabrice Tourre, the Goldman trader accused of subprime fraud in the SEC’s complaint against his bank.
[Abacus] The running order in Room 106
We’ll have to wait a bit for the headline act. The business of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations gets underway at 10am – in Room 106 in the Dirksen Senate office building.
Lloyd Blankfein,
[Abacus] Tail risk in the Rhineland
IKB, the bailed-out German bank, has been thrust ignominiously into headlines once again.
IKB was one of the investors in Goldman Sachs’ now-infamous Abacus CDO, which lies at the heart of an SEC law suit against the American bank.
[Abacus] More Goldman voyeurism
It is, as the Guardian noted on Monday morning, a topsy-turvy world when Goldman Sachs takes to bragging about its losses at the height of the mortgage crisis.
But we are, where we are, and over the weekend Goldman released another batch of emails in response to a selection published by the Senate Permanent Subcommittee.
[Abacus] In defence of Goldman Sachs
First we had a screaming WSJ headline on Tuesday:
SEC Split on Party Lines Over Goldman Case
Then someone on CNBC was shouting earlier on Wednesday about how the SEC had received testimony that…
APPEARS TO CONTRADICT THE GOVERNMENT’S CASE!
And then we had,
[Abacus] Appearing soon in the Senate – fabulous Fab (updated)
This is either genius or madness.
Fabrice Tourre is going to appear (along with his boss Lloyd Blankfein) at the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations on April 27, according to Bloomberg.
And obviously he is going to tell everyone he did nothing wrong:
[Abacus] Dear Paulson investor…
On Monday night, Paulson & Co held a conference call with around 100 investors in the wake of the SEC lawsuit against Goldman Sachs.
(Obviously) we weren’t on the conference call, but we have obtained a copy of the letter Paulson sent to investors (reproduced in full below).
[Abacus] The exemplary Magnetar CDOs
What’s the proper way to disclose that someone going short on a CDO is also selecting its assets?
The SEC seems to have had some idea.
In Part II of its defence documents, Goldman talks of the following suggestion made by SEC staff at a September 2009 meeting — before the regulator filed its CDO fraud suit against the bank:
[Abacus] Fabrice Tourre goes underground
Want to check in on Fabrice Tourre’s Linked-in profile?
You can’t.
It looks like the Goldman Sachs man, who’s been accused of CDO fraud by the SEC and was de-registered from the FSA on Tuesday, has been busy removing his digital footprint.
[Abacus] The experience of Laura Schwartz
Laura Schwartz is a name that appears in Goldman Sachs’ defence documents — the bank’s counter-arguments against the SEC’s allegations of civil fraud in its Abacus CDO — and the pitch-book for the deal.
[Abacus] Is this the sound of a bandwagon?
This, from the UK’s Financial Services Authority, landed in FT Alphaville’s inbox on Tuesday morning:
FSA statement on Goldman Sachs International
Following preliminary investigations the Financial Services Authority (FSA) has decided to commence a formal enforcement investigation into Goldman Sachs International in relation to recent SEC allegations.
[Abacus] Der Abakus
Alternate title: How Mitteleuropa led to the creation of the Abacus CDOs.
The German bank IKB, together with ACA, was one of the investors in Abacus 2007-ACI, the subprime-referencing synthetic CDO at the heart of the SEC’s civil fraud suit against Goldman Sachs.
[Abacus] Fabrice Tourre scores an indefinite paid holiday
Fabrice “Fabulous Fab” Tourre, the Goldman Sachs employee at the epicentre of the SEC’s allegations against the former investment bank, has gone on holiday. Indefinitely.
From the WSJ on Monday:
Goldman spokesman Lucas van Praag confirmed in an email that Mr.
[Abacus] The Goldman defence documents
A big hat tip to the FT’s Francesco Guerrera here.
Presenting Goldman Sachs’ detailed defence of Abacus 2007-AC1 CDO — Part I and Part II
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There’s so much here worthy of discussion,
[Abacus] Fisking Goldman’s latest rebuttal
Goldman doth protest too much, we think, in the statement it issued on Sunday on the SEC’s complaint against it and its trader Fabrice Tourre. We note that Goldman is already on its third rebuttal since Friday.
[Abacus] A CDO litigation risk league table
Interesting table from Dan Davies at Credit Suisse, who checked the Dealogic database to see who acted as lead underwriter on deals similar to Goldman’s Abacus 2007-AC1.
Here’s the ranking for the key boom years,
[Abacus] A Goldman blogger round-up
The weekend produced a veritable Eyjafjallajökull ash cloud of blogging and bloviating on the SEC’s filing on Friday against Goldman Sachs and its structured products trader Fabrice Tourre. Here’s the best we’ve read.
[Abacus] The analysts react
The SEC’s complaint against Goldman Sachs, alleging the bank misled investors on a 2007 subprime synthetic CDO deal, caused a 12 per cent drop in the company’s share price on Friday.
So, has the bank’s
[Abacus] ACA’s rather disastrous CDO forays
In addition to being your run-of-the-mill (disastrous) monoline insurer and at the heart of the SEC complaint against Goldman Sachs’ alleged fraud — ACA was something else: a very unsuccessful CDO manager.