Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack Understands The Anger
Video: Bloomberg interviews Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack
The reporter caught Mack during a break in the FCIC hearings last month. Mack is measured and realistic. A few relevant facts from the clip and elsewhere:
1) Always remember, that Mack told Tim Geithner "to go f*ck himself" during the heat of the crisis in the Fall of 2008. Bonus points on top of bonus points.
2) Mack has not taken a bonus as CEO of Morgan Stanley for 3 consecutive years, including this year when Dimon took $17 million, Blankfein took $9 million and Bob Diamond of Barclays took more than $30 million.
3) Mack accepts and endorses limits on leverage for investment banks. Do not understate the elegant simplicity of this remedy. Just switch the rules back to pre-2005 levels (12X capital) and you will have eliminated substantial excessive risk-tasking.
4) Mack accepts and endorses a Wall Street TBTF tax.
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Video: FCIC Hearings recap with footage and quotes from all the Wall Street CEOs
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(Screenshot...video is above)
Feb 18, 2010 at 10:37 AM
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Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
LONDON (Dow Jones)--Dogged by deep public-sector deficits and dubious budget accounting, Greece must soon test bond market sentiment again in order to cover its funding needs.
The nation's next bond issue could come as early as next week and market watchers will be scrutinizing it closely to see how readily Greece can refinance its maturing debts with new borrowing.
Greece will need to borrow EUR20 billion to repay debts coming due in April and May, out of a total of more than EUR54 billion of debt it has to issue this year.
Euro-zone nations have pledged their support for Greece, but have so far failed to put any hard cash on the table. Greece has until March 16 to begin cutting its budget deficit, with the European Union threatening to intervene if Athens doesn't deliver.
"The EU want to show they are behind the peripheral [euro-zone countries] without having to put their money where their mouths are," Deutsche Bank's Jim Reid said Thursday.
"Such commitment seems to be enough to stabilize the situation in the short term but will it be enough to leave it at that by the time the next funding point comes around? We're concerned that it won't be," he added.
So far this year, Greece has raised EUR13.6 billion via the sale of Treasury bills and bond syndications, according to the Public Debt Management Agency. In addition, the nation now reportedly plans to sell as much EUR5 billion worth of 10-year bonds as soon as next week, people familiar with the situation told Dow Jones Newswires Thursday.
However, investment bankers say investors are likely to be cautious after Greece's previous five-year syndicated bond performed badly. The bonds lost as much as 2.5% of their value soon after the issue, partly because of the decision to increase the size of the deal to EUR8 billion from the initial EUR3 billion to EUR5 billion.
"Part of the reason the Greek bond didn't perform is that is it was too big," one senior European syndicate banker said this week. This suggests that Greece will stay within its stated size limits because buyers will want to be sure they aren't going to suffer a repeat performance this time around.
Such concerns are balanced by the fact that other embattled sovereign borrowers have proved it is still possible to tap markets for cash at the right price.
Portugal, which has also been in the spotlight recently due to its large debt pile, passed a key test of investor sentiment last week when it managed to sell EUR3 billion in 10-year bonds.
The Spanish government also got a much-needed boost Wednesday when its new EUR5 billion bond issue was well received by investors.
"Peripheral concerns will have been soothed somewhat by the carefully managed issuance of EUR5 billion of 15-year notes by the Kingdom of Spain," said Barclays Capital's Puneet Sharma. "With a significant amount of issuance expected in 2010, the calm market reaction to this deal could encourage further transactions to come to market."
Both Portuguese and Spanish issues priced with a premium of around 0.1 percentage points over existing bonds, much less than the 0.5 percentage points Greece paid to sell its January deal. Bankers said that in an effort to bring down its debt-servicing costs, Greece will be looking to be "more aggressive" on its next issue.
Indeed, Greece needs to cut costs wherever possible if it is to bring its budget deficit of nearly 13% of gross domestic product within the European Union's 3% limit.
Greece is due to present its first deficit-reduction plan by March 16 for scrutiny by the EU, which puts Greece's government firmly between the proverbial rock and the hard place.
Some elements of the Greek population have already judged the current plan--which includes slashing four percentage points off the deficit this year through freezing or cutting wages, increasing taxes and capturing tax evaders--as too aggressive.
Thousands of Finance Ministry workers and customs officials walked out in a recent protest over the cuts. At the same time, customs officials have also declared a three-day strike, while tax officials taxi drivers and fuel-truck drivers are also threatening to strike.
However, Brussels has so far expressed only tentative support for the plan, with some EU officials saying the cuts aren't big enough. If the country's euro-zone partners aren't convinced by the report, they could force Greece to take even more painful steps to reduce its deficit.
note, the first one that starts "RIP..."