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’[Something for the weekend] Don’t offer this man a Rakoff
Jed Rakoff is quite the hero. A New York District judge, he has done what the rest of us would love to do, and busted a cosy deal between bankers and their regulators. In early 2007, just when everything was starting to slide,
When footballers become collateral
Can someone please stop the world? We want to get off.
Things are seemingly moving quickly from the ridiculous to the absurd, in sovereign debt crises.
Gary Jenkins, head of fixed income over at Evolution Securities,
Mervyn Maradona
The Bank of England governor is a rule-breaker, just like Argentinian football star Diego Maradona.
So says Malcolm Barr over at JPMorgan:
One of Mervyn King’s most memorable analogies in explaining the conduct of monetary policy was his reference to Diego Maradona’s two goals against England in the semi final of 1986 World Cup.
(Under) Perform Group takes the plunge
And the latest company to brave the treacherous waters of London’s IPO market gets off to a less than auspicious start.
The price action in Perform Group, the progressive sports media company, on Friday morning.
[South Africa 2010] Higher GDP makes footballers more attractive
Some August fun below.
A new paper from the University of Toronto’s Feng Chi and Nathan Yang seeks to determine whether there’s a link between social status and wealth. In particular, it tries to examine a possible connection via the perceived social status of 2010 World Cup football players and their country’s GDP per capita.
Spurs 1 – Autonomy 0
The curse of the Premier League strikes again.
Just weeks after signing a deal to have its name emblazoned on the shirts of Tottenham Hotspur, shares in FTSE 100 software company Autonomy have dropped following the publication of half year results:
[South Africa 2010] Paul the octopus, conqueror of quants
Spain won.
Paul the Octopus was right.
And FT Alphaville, for one, welcomes our new cephalopod overlords.
Because from our reading of the results of the World Cup forecasting contest run by the data predictor chaps at Kaggle,
[South Africa 2010] The World Cup effect
Courtesy of Standard Chartered:
Asset markets have gradually drifted higher over the last fortnight, as mixed signals on both the fundamental and technical fronts kept market participants looking for clues to future market direction.
[South Africa 2010] Take on the World Cup quants
Data prediction site, Kaggle, has, er, borrowed FT Alphaville’s prize collection of World Cup notes.
But, being the light-hearted new media types that we are, we won’t hold that against them.
No,
[South Africa 2010] Two very different quant models say Brazil will win World Cup
Continuing our recent theme of financial analysts-turned-football-experts, we bring you a Friday edition of 2010 World Cup predictions. This time the conjectures come from two different financial outfits,
[South Africa 2010] England sponsor confident England will lose
Not really (probably).
However, England-squad sponsor Nationwide are offering four-year ‘football bonds’ with a bonus, should the team win the 2010 World Cup:
(Will the JP Morgan quants be investing?)
Odds at most British bookmakers for England to triumph in the Cup are currently 6/1.
[South Africa 2010] England to win World Cup, says JPM quant model
And we all know those are never wrong, right?
With the 2010 World Cup a mere three weeks away, the trickle of investment bank World Cup research continues apace. Yes, suddenly all the analysts have become football experts going on bookies.
[South Africa 2010] UBS on which stocks – and teams – will win the 2010 World Cup
Expect to see more of these in the coming weeks — the World Cup is, after all, less than a month away.
The analysts at UBS have taken a break from the sovereign debt crisis to make some World Cup “just for kicks”
[South Africa 2010] World Cup beer goggles = 180bps
A World Cup without beer is like cricket without Pimm’s.
Or a night out in Essex without an alcopop.
But how much does hosting a World Cup football tournament actually boost local beer sales?
According to Sanford Bernstein analysts Trevor Stirling,
Chart du jour, European soccernomics edition
From our cousins at the Economist, a nifty graphic of Europe’s most valuable football fans:
As the weekly newspaper noted (links ours):
Europe’s most sucessful football club off the pitch, measured by revenues for the 2008-09 season,
[Modern Football Finance] PIKing apart the Man Utd refinancing
You have to look hard to find it, but it’s there in the notes on page 30 of the (printed) prospectus — what appears to be a key reason for Manchester United’s £500m senior notes offering and refinancing.
[Modern Football Finance] Debt double-Glazering
On sale today:
Issuer: MU Finance plc.
Sec Type: Senior Secured Notes Distribution: 144A and RegS (no Reg Rights)
Amount: £500,000,000 equiv.
[South Africa 2010] World Cups good for tourism, bad for industrial production, BofAML says
The 2010 World Cup will add at least 0.5 percentage points to South Africa’s GDP growth, analysts at Bank of America Merrill Lynch said in a note on Monday.
But while the sporting event will boost retail sales and other consumption spending as well as tourism,
Saudis come to Merseyside
How much is a leading Premier League club worth in these straightened times?
We could be about to find out.
RTRS-SAUDI FIRM F6 IS IN “DIRECT TALKS WITH GEORGE GILLETT” TO BUY BETWEEN 25 AND 50 PCT OF LIVERPOOL FC- COMPANY OFFICIAL .
How do you say “we are the Blues” in Chinese?
China’s resource-grab has made headlines here before, but now it seems to be after resources of a different sort.
Relegation-fodder football players.
Hong Kong businessman Carson Yeung has made a £81.5m offer for Birmingham City FC,
Mervyn’s FA-style
We can’t remember the last time Mervyn King, governor of the Bank of England did an interview with a leading UK newspaper, wire or broadcaster — outside of official conferences that is.
But he does talk.
Football hyperinflation
Is this for Real?
2003
Ronaldo became Manchester United’s first-ever Portuguese player when he signed for £12.24 million after the 2002–03 season.
2009
Manchester United said on Thursday they have received a world record 80 million pound ($131.2 million) bid for forward Cristiano Ronaldo from Real Madrid.
Forever blowing bubbles
Rather tragically appropriate in a new and different light: the Hammer’s anthem.
Reports the Guardian:
West Ham United will be taken over by a consortium of international banks in the coming weeks.