Monday, March 17, 2008
Who's next?
Just four days after Bear Stearns Chief Executive Alan Schwartz assured Wall Street that his company was not in trouble, he was forced on Sunday to sell the investment bank to JPMorgan Chase for a price of $2 a share, or $236 million.
Here a list of sub-prime related losses from banks so far...
Merrill Lynch - $24.5 billion
Citigroup - $22.4 billion
UBS - $18.4 billion
HSBC - $12.4 billion
Morgan Stanley - $9.4 billion
IKB Deutsche - $8.9 billion
Bank of America - $7.9 billion
Credit Agricole - $6.4 billion
Washington Mutual - $5.8 billion
Credit Suisse - $4.9 billion
Bear Stears - $2.6 billion
Monday, January 07, 2008
Obama honored by OWNAA...
A day before the New Hampshire primary, Obama took time out from his 10-point lead over Hillary Clinton to be honored by the One Word Name Association of America (OWNAA) in a private ceremony hosted by Bono. Obama will soon join the ranks of other one name greats as Cher, Elvis, Madonna, Ophra, Prince, Sinbad and Liberace. Obama is the first presidential candidate to be honored by the association.
Saturday, December 22, 2007
Memorable exchanges between Arthur Branch and Jack McCoy…
Arthur
“Now Jack, if you’re going to be as contrarian as a civil war buff on Veterans day in Vancouver, you might as well hang your hat out to dry 'cause no jury in the world's going to convict when you throw the chicken out with the bathwater.”
Jack
“Come again?”
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Ingmar Bergman - (1918-2007)
"They dance away from the dawn and its a solemn dance toward the dark lands, while the rain washes their faces and cleans the salt of the tears from their cheeks." - IB
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Subway story #7...
A musician's rare 20th-century violin went missing after he fell asleep in a hot subway station is pleading for its return.Juilliard School graduate Tom Chiu said his $80,000 Scarampella violin and his backpack were stolen June 27th, 2007 after a gig in Brooklyn.
Chiu said it was raining and he went into the subway station and fell asleep. When he awoke his bags were gone.
He said the violin has been his heart and soul for the last 13 years and it is irreplaceable. He said he'd be forever grateful if it's returned to him.
The violin was last seen at the Clark Street Subway Station in Brookyln.
Anyone with information on the rare violin can call the NYPD Crime Stoppers Tipline at 1-800-577-TIPS.
Monday, May 21, 2007
Out of things to buy, Private Equity Firms buy other Private Equity Firms…
Private equity firm Blackstone Partners announced today it would begin buying other Private Equity Firms as a part of a long term strategy of owning all the assets on planet Earth. The news came on the heels of last week's announcement that Manny's Quick Mart on 174th Street in Spanish Harlem would be acquired by Private Equity Firm, TPG Capital, for $1.9 billion dollars. The take over bid was 5,375 times what the neighborhood store cost Manny in 1994. With the sale of Manny's (pending regulatory approval expected to pass next week) all assets in the continental United States will owned by Private Equity Firms.
Fund Analyst, Rob Lowenbrau, said on the recent announcement, "some thought the anti-Christ would be a person. I'm here to tell you in fact it's a private equity fund."
The Blackstone Group could not be reached for comment.
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
and down the stretch...
Photo finish of a greyhound race in Tampa, Florida on February 9, 1939.
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
It's all I have to bring today...
It's all I have to bring today—
This, and my heart beside—
This, and my heart, and all the fields—
And all the meadows wide—
Be sure you count—should I forget—
Some one the sum could tell—
This, and my heart, and all the Bees
Which in the Clover dwell.
This, and my heart beside—
This, and my heart, and all the fields—
And all the meadows wide—
Be sure you count—should I forget—
Some one the sum could tell—
This, and my heart, and all the Bees
Which in the Clover dwell.
-Emily Dickinson
Friday, March 02, 2007
And the nominees are...
Stocks had their worst day of trading since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks Tuesday, hurtling the Dow Jones industrials down more than 400 points on a worldwide tide of concern that the U.S. and Chinese economies are stumbling and that share prices have become overinflated. What does this mean for the economy?
Absolutely nothing!
Regardless, here are the top 5 nominees for best distressed trader from Tuesday's debacle.
Nominee #1:
"Head down. Eyes covered... Works every time"
Nominee #2 
Nominee #4
Nominee #5 
Absolutely nothing!
Regardless, here are the top 5 nominees for best distressed trader from Tuesday's debacle.
Nominee #1:
"Head down. Eyes covered... Works every time"
Nominee #2 "Gettin' on the horn"
Nominee #3
"Migraine while commodities fall in undetermined third world country"
Nominee #4"If I look up at the screen long enough people will think I'm actually doing work..."
Nominee #5 "Smoking and talking on a phone while markets plummet"
Saturday, February 24, 2007
Essential and Employed...
EssentialShe just wants to keep her essential
sorrow. Everyone wants her to
be happy all the time, but she doesn't
want that for them. There is value in
the thread of sadness in each person.
The sobbing child on an airplane, the
unhappy woman waiting by the phone,
a man staring out the window past his
wife. A violin plays through all of them,
one long note held at the beginning and
the end.
Employed
She just wants to be employed
for eight hours a day. She is not
interested in a career; she wants a job
with a paycheck and free parking. She
does not want to carry a briefcase filled
with important papers to read after
dinner; she does not want to return
phone calls. When she gets home, she
wants to kick off her shoes and waltz
around her kitchen singing, "I am a piece
of work."
Poems: "Essential" and "Employed" by Beverly Rollwagen, from She Just Wants. © Nodin Press.
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Thanks, Robert Frost
Do you have hope for the future?
someone asked Robert Frost, toward the end.
Yes, and even for the past, he replied,
that it will turn out to have been all right
for what it was, something we can accept,
mistakes made by the selves we had to be,
not able to be, perhaps, what we wished,
or what looking back half the time it seems
we could so easily have been, or ought...
The future, yes, and even for the past,
that it will become something we can bear.
And I too, and my children, so I hope,
will recall as not too heavy the tug
of those albatrosses I sadly placed
upon their tender necks. Hope for the past,
yes, old Frost, your words provide that courage,
and it brings strange peace that itself passes
into past, easier to bear because
you said it, rather casually, as snow
went on falling in Vermont years ago.
David Ray, © The Backwaters Press.
Monday, January 29, 2007
Barbaro
(April 29, 2003 – January 29, 2007)
Sire: Dynaformer
Dam: La Ville Rouge
Damsire: Carson City
Sex: Stallion
Foaled: 2003
Country: United States
Colour: Bay
Breeder: Lael Stables
Owner: Roy and Gretchen Jackson
Trainer: Michael Matz
Record: 7:6-0-0
Earnings: $2,302,200
Major Racing Wins: Laurel Futurity (2005), Florida Derby (2006), Kentucky Derby (2006)
Kentucky Derby Highlights:
Undefeated going into the race, Barbaro was sent off as the second choice of the betting public, at odds of 6:1, in a full field of 20 horses. Barbaro charged ahead during the last turn and straightaway of the race to win by 7 lengths. Barbaro's lead in the final furlong expanded even as jockey Edgar Prado did not ask for his top speed. This margin of victory at the Kentucky Derby was the largest since 1946, when Triple Crown winner Assault took the Run for the Roses by eight lengths. Barbaro's win made him only the sixth undefeated horse to win the Kentucky Derby.[1] During the gallop-out after the wire, Barbaro's lead extended to 20 lengths, which is rare during post-race gallop-outs. The manner of his Derby victory led to speculation that Barbaro might be a "superhorse," the likes of which had not been seen since Affirmed and perhaps even Secretariat, arguably the greatest American thoroughbred of all time. Barbaro is also one of the few horses to have won the "Run for the Roses" after more than a 5-week lay-off.
Sire: Dynaformer
Dam: La Ville Rouge
Damsire: Carson City
Sex: Stallion
Foaled: 2003
Country: United States
Colour: Bay
Breeder: Lael Stables
Owner: Roy and Gretchen Jackson
Trainer: Michael Matz
Record: 7:6-0-0
Earnings: $2,302,200
Major Racing Wins: Laurel Futurity (2005), Florida Derby (2006), Kentucky Derby (2006)
Kentucky Derby Highlights:
Undefeated going into the race, Barbaro was sent off as the second choice of the betting public, at odds of 6:1, in a full field of 20 horses. Barbaro charged ahead during the last turn and straightaway of the race to win by 7 lengths. Barbaro's lead in the final furlong expanded even as jockey Edgar Prado did not ask for his top speed. This margin of victory at the Kentucky Derby was the largest since 1946, when Triple Crown winner Assault took the Run for the Roses by eight lengths. Barbaro's win made him only the sixth undefeated horse to win the Kentucky Derby.[1] During the gallop-out after the wire, Barbaro's lead extended to 20 lengths, which is rare during post-race gallop-outs. The manner of his Derby victory led to speculation that Barbaro might be a "superhorse," the likes of which had not been seen since Affirmed and perhaps even Secretariat, arguably the greatest American thoroughbred of all time. Barbaro is also one of the few horses to have won the "Run for the Roses" after more than a 5-week lay-off.
Sunday, January 21, 2007
"No matter how much I insist, don't let me keep painting…."
When German painter Paul Klee lived at the Henry Hudson Hotel on 59th & 9th Avenue he hired Fritz Lownbrau to physically remove him from his studio each night. Klee feared he'd over-paint and kill the art if someone did not stop him.
Lowenbrau's contract was to arrive every night at 9PM (Klee tended to start painting around noon) with a bottle of whiskey and an itinerary that usually involved going to Harlem for any number of distractions.
"Paul usually put down the brushes after two drinks," said Lownenbrau. "But he was a son of a bitch to budge if Dali was in town..."
Thursday, January 18, 2007
A Color of the Sky
Windy today and I feel less than brilliant,
driving over the hills from work.
There are the dark parts on the road
when you pass through clumps of wood
and the bright spots where you have a view of the ocean,
but that doesn't make the road an allegory.
I should call Marie and apologize
for being so boring at dinner last night,
but can I really promise not to be that way again?
And anyway, I'd rather watch the trees, tossing
in what certainly looks like sexual arousal.
Otherwise it's spring, and everything looks frail;
the sky is baby blue, and the just-unfurling leaves
are full of infant chlorophyll,
the very tint of inexperience.
Last summer's song is making a comeback on the radio,
and on the highway overpass,
the only metaphysical vandal in America has written
MEMORY LOVES TIME
in big black spraypaint letters,
which makes us wonder if Time loves Memory back.
Last night I dreamed of X again.
She's like a stain on my subconscious sheets.
Years ago she penetrated me
but though I scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed,
I never got her out,
but now I'm glad.
What I thought was an end turned out to be a middle.
What I thought was a brick wall turned out to be a tunnel.
What I thought was an injustice
turned out to be a color of the sky.
Outside the youth center, between the liquor store
and the police station,
a little dogwood tree is losing its mind;
overflowing with blossomfoam,
like a sudsy mug of beer;
like a bride ripping off her clothes,
dropping snow white petals to the ground in clouds,
so Nature's wastefulness seems quietly obscene.
It's been doing that all week:
making beauty,
and throwing it away,
and making more.
Tony Hoagland, from What Narcissism Means to Me. © Graywolf Pr
Saturday, December 30, 2006
Hedge Fund Manager still on the loose....
Hedge Fund manager Johnny McManus is still on the loose after committing armed robbery at a Brooklyn bodega yesterday. McManus was last seen by neighbors leaving his South Hampton home at 4AM for Manhattan on what many experts predicted would be the heaviest trading day of the year. Familiar patrons report seeing McManus sitting alone at Le Cirquec two hours after the opening bell, three martinis deep into lunch grumbling how the market was being controlled by Argentinean mobsters. Half way through martini number 4, La Cirquec maitre de Jean Debois assisted a disheveled McManus into a downtown taxi. Several witnesses outside the Madison Avenue restaurant said McManus was shouting to no one in particular how he had to "get back in the game" before the market closed.
Minutes following the closing bell, the 76th Brooklyn Police Precinct of Redhook was called to investigate a robbery on Atlantic Avenue. A man fitting the description of McManus stormed the convenient store dressed in Brooks Brothers tweed clutching a FAO Schwarz bag and 9mm Glock 17. Witnesses to the robbery report that McManus demanded a bottle of scotch, all the twenties in the register and a diet coke with lemon.
Fund manager and wife of the suspect, Jennifer McManus, was in London at the time of the robbery and advised reporters to direct all questions to either her lawyer or her nanny. Neither could be located for comment.
Friday, December 29, 2006
A horse by any other name...
Kate Winslet, stakes winner in both France and the United States, is apparently in trouble. The 6-1 odds high-strung 4-year-old ran her best race ever in the Yaddo Stakes at Historic Saratoga Racetrack back in August of 2005. Since that time the Philly has been living it up at all hours in public with the likes of Giacomo, Funny Cide and Smarty Jones at questionable haunts near Hollywood Park. Sources close to the Philly say she's recently dropped a noticeable amount of weight and is developing a reputation for excessive partying. While both Keith Urban and Mel Gibson have extended open invitations for the horse to spend New Year's Eve at Betty Ford, Kate Winslet's trainer has not commented where exactly the Philly will be ringing in the New Year.
Friday, December 22, 2006
Going home...
"Soon after, I returned home to my family, with a determination to bring them as soon as possible to live in Kentucky, which I esteemed a second paradise, at the risk of my life and fortune..."
-Daniel Boone
Monday, December 18, 2006
Inanition...
"...it comes on me from time to time. I also detest it in others. A judge will never forgive a criminal for a crime he is capable of committing himself."
-Norman Mailer-
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
First they came for the Palm Trees and I did not speak...
After a third consecutive 14-hour day, Cash came home to his junk-mail stuffed "pillar box" recently purchased from Travel Mall magazine. Taped to the handle of the mailbox was a business card of one Louie Lowenbrau - Director of Tree Inspection. Hand written on Lowenbrau's card in red were the words, "PALM TREE WILL BE REMOVED"
Monday, December 11, 2006
Great Cathedrals...
Before a date, my college roommate
Used to drive his candy-apple red Camaro
Down to the car wash and spend the afternoon
Washing, waxing, vacuuming it,
Detailing the chrome strips, buffing the fenders,
Spraying the big expensive tires
With their raised white lettering
That said something like Intruder
Or Marauder, with a silicone spray
Until they were slick and dark as sex.
He polished that car as if each caress,
Each pass of the chamois, each loving
Stroke of the terry cloth would increase,
By measurable degrees,
The likelihood that in the immaculate
Front seat, with its film of freshly applied
Vinyl cleaner, at the end of a cul-de-sac
Somewhere above the campus,
She would consent to be rubbed
And buffed just as lovingly.
We do what we can,
And if God is no more impressed
By the cathedral at Chartres
Than by a righteously clean and cherry
Camaro, at least He can't say
We haven't tried
With all our might to conceal our fear
That we have little else to offer
Than stained glass or polished chrome,
The elbow grease of our good intentions.
So I'm happy to see
That in the Christmas card photo he sent
Mark stands, balding now,
With a dignified gut, a pretty wife,
And a couple of nice-looking kids, in front
Of the great cathedral
Like the sweet vision of a future
He'd been vouchsafed one day
Long ago, through Turtle Wax
On a gleaming hubcap.
by George Bilgere, from The Good Kiss. © The University of Akron Press.
Saturday, December 02, 2006
In consumer news...
"One week back in the United States, and I've heard the word Stocking Stuffer 153 times..."
Cash Frock
Thursday, November 30, 2006
This week in the news...
On Tuesday, building management in Fern Creek, Kentucky were busy escorting a flailing man out of an office building shouting, "I did nothing wrong!"
Reports indicate real estate executive, Tad Lowenbrau, was asked to vacate the premises after attempting to tote a Victoria Secret's bag into the office complex where he works.
"I don't get it," said Tad. "The secretaries all carry their crap in Victoria's Secret bags every freakin' day. My wife gave me the only bag we had left in the house to carry my lunch in, and this happens."
Building management had not comment.
Lowenbrau's lawyers stated a lawsuit was pending and were not able to comment on when or if Lowenbrau would be allowed to return to work.
"I assumed I'd get funny looks, but never did I think they'd bar me from going to work. I mean, the bags really are durable. Not like those cheap Macy bags. "
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
Couldn't help but think of ole' Sammy Swope...
"Some of the owner men were kind because they hated what they had to do, and some of them were angry because they hated to be cruel, and some of them were cold because they had long ago found that one could not be an owner unless one were cold."
-John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath.
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
It's all cyclical....
Winnie Swope's dream was to be a small town New England college professor of Lacanian theory on semi-permanent sabbatical; all the while hammering out publisher-hungry novellas that put Virginia Woolf to shame.
Instead, Winnie choose the less ambitious route, as head of a mezzanine global finance group at Morgan Stanley. This route was reaffirmed when Random House sent a letter indicating that 120 pages about a color blind North Dakota man growing up without any arms or legs was not hitting the publisher's optimal demographic.
Soon after, Winnie phoned in her resignation to Morgan Stanley and moved to Culver City, California in hopes of writing the next great American novel staring Will Ferrell.
Monday, November 13, 2006
The race is on...
A new kind of colonialism has come into vogue as Hollywood celebrities compete to adopt babies from every country on the planet. Odds-maker Stevie Lowenbrau (seen here on piano) list the top 10 celebrities most likely to be the first to adopt a baby from Darfor, Sudan:
1) Oprah (5-1)
2) Madonna (4-1)
3) Jennifer Aniston (7-1)
4) Jolie (3-1)
5) Penelope Cruz(6-1)
6) Katie Couric (2-1)
7) Katie Holmes (5-1)
8) Brittany Spears (3-1)
9) Gwen Stephanie (9-1)
10)Mia Farrow (10-1)
Saturday, November 11, 2006
Somewhere near Paramus...
Mildred,
I'm positive there are far worse fates than traveling up and down the New Jersey turnpike for three days with your boss. But as I sit crammed in this mid-sized rent-a-car outside Paramus while he's inside haggling over the lunch bill with a limping gray-haired waitress named Lu-Lu, I just can't think of one.
Cash
Saturday, November 04, 2006
November...
Friday, October 06, 2006
Cash runs into unexpected company in Culver city...
Yesterday afternoon at a bar in Culver City, I struck up a conversation with this heavily tattooed and disheveled ex-military guy. He was in pretty bad shape. Unshaved and up for days (probably hitting the meth from what I could tell), he kept talking about how he used to be somebody. Said his girlfriend just left him. Said that looking back on the whole thing he was relieved, because she was anorexic and had issues. I wasn't going to argue with the guy. When he got around to telling me his name was Popeye, I was shocked. I mean the guy was barely recognizable. Turns out, after the Ecoli scare, Warner Brothers let him go. He's been living out of a hotel in San Bernardino ever since. He said, unemployment runs out in November. I told him I'd keep my fingers crossed.
Saturday, September 30, 2006
New economic data out of Wall, New Jersey....
The definition of disposal income = the purchase of a Cannondale Tandem Bicyle.
Thursday, September 21, 2006
Only in the 60's...
The Dodgers' salvo of four consecutive home runs in the ninth inning Monday night can only be matched three times in baseball history:
June 8th, 1961 -Crosley Field, Cincinnati
The Red's Jim Maloney, with a 10-2 lead in the seventh, gave up home runs to Eddie Mathews and Hank Aaron. Marshal Bridges relieved Maloney and gave up home runs to Joe Adcock and Frank Thomas on his first two pitches. The Reds held on for a 10-8 victory.
July 31, 1963 at Cleveland Stadium
Already trailing, 4-1, in the sixth, Angels pitcher Paul Foytack gave up consecutive home runs to Woodie Held, Pedro Ramo, Tito Francona and Larry Brown, all on 0-2 counts. The Indians won, 9-1
May 2, 1964 at Municipal Stadium, Kansas City, MO
Tony Olivia led off the 11th inning against Kansas City A's pitcher Dan Pfister with his second home run of the game, and Bob Allison and Jimmie Hall followed, suit, all on the first pitch. Vern Handrahan relieved Pfister and Harmon Killebrew hit his second home run, also on the first pitch. The Twins won, 7-3
