Honest dollar goldman sachs

David Solomon - A + A NEW YORK (May 18): Goldman Sachs Group Inc Chief Executive Officer David Solomon said clients are preparing for slowing growth and a decline in asset prices — all as “extremely punitive” inflation creates a tax on the economy. “There’s a chance of recession,” he said in a telephone interview. While he added that he’s not overly concerned about that risk, Solomon cited at least a 30% chance of such an event in the next 12 to 24 months as calculated by his firm’s economists, led by Jan Hatzius. He’s watching closely for whether credit spreads begin to widen out more materially. Solomon’s comments come months after his top deputy, John Waldron, told a large investment client that the Federal Reserve hadn’t been acting swiftly enough to control inflation. This week, former Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein expressed similar unease about soaring prices. “We have to get rid of inflation,” Solomon said Tuesday on the phone call. “Inflation is … [Read more...] about Goldman CEO sees recession risk, ‘extremely punitive’ inflation

- A + A HONG KONG (May 18): Analysts at Goldman Sachs said on Wednesday they were lowering their China 2022 gross domestic product growth forecast to 4% from 4.5% as a result of Covid-19-related damage to the economy in the second quarter of this year. It was more likely China's economy would undershoot than overshoot their target, they added. "Even this lower growth projection embeds the assumption that Covid is mostly under control going forward, the property market improves from here, and the government provides substantial policy offset through infrastructure spending in coming months," they wrote. China's retail and factory activity fell sharply in April as widespread Covid-19 lockdowns confined workers and consumers to their homes and severely disrupted supply chains. China's uncompromising strategy to fight Covid-19 has placed hundreds of millions of people in dozens of cities under restrictions of some kind, and has disrupted a global rebound in … [Read more...] about Goldman cuts China 2022 growth forecast to 4%

- A + A HONG KONG (May 18): Smarting from HSBC Holdings Plc’s move to scrap its dividend during the height of the pandemic, the bank’s largely silent mass of retail shareholders in Hong Kong is warming up to the idea of a breakup. Splitting up Europe’s biggest bank to separate out its Asian operations is being pushed by its largest investor, Ping An Insurance Group Co, based just across the border in Shenzhen. The call is winning support in Hong Kong’s retail base, which owns about a third of the bank, with some seeing it as a surefire way of preventing the steady stream of payouts from being cut off again. Their loyalty has been tested as numerous pivots in strategy fail to impress the market, leaving dividends at half of what they were in 2018 and the stock down more than 40%. The former British colony is the beating heart of the bank’s global operations, accounting for about 30% of the group’s 2021 adjusted profits. Yet decisions such as the halting of dividends … [Read more...] about HSBC’s mass of Hong Kong retail investors warms to breakup

Reuters filepix for illustration purpose only - A + A NEW YORK (May 18): The US is forcing Wall Street banks to embark on a systematic search through more than 100 personal mobile phones carried by top traders and dealmakers in the largest-ever probe into clandestine messaging on platforms such as WhatsApp. The Securities and Exchange Commission has been sending firms lists of key positions — in some cases pointing to around 30 people including heads of certain investment banking teams or trading desks — that are subject to the review, according to people with direct knowledge of the requests. Personnel in those roles are being ordered to hand over phones so devices can be examined by lawyers. The aim is to gauge how pervasively Wall Street professionals use unauthorized messaging platforms to chat with each other or clients as regulators decide which firms to punish, and how hard, for failing to preserve business-related messages sent via unapproved platforms. … [Read more...] about US pries into over 100 trader and banker phones in texting probe

- A + A NEW YORK (May 18): In public, Elon Musk’s erratic tweets have sent Twitter Inc’s shares flailing, as traders bet that the billionaire is preparing to walk away from or re-negotiate his US$44 billion takeover of the social-media company. Behind the scenes, it’s more like business as usual, as advisers on both sides plug away at the day-to-day work of closing a megadeal. One potential sign that the deal is still on track: the 139-page filing that hit early Tuesday, detailing how the offer came together and Twitter’s rationale for accepting it. That document was the result of weeks of coordinated work by both Musk and Twitter’s teams, according to people familiar with the matter. Musk himself signed off on the final version — complete with a deal price of US$54.20 a share — before it was filed, the people said. The situation is similar at the banks that promised to finance the transaction, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the details are … [Read more...] about As Musk tweets, advisers plug away to keep Twitter deal on track

Shares of Citigroup ( C ) jumped 7% after Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway reported a nearly $3 billion stake in the bank. Berkshire revealed the investment along with others in its quarterly 13F filing . Citigroup’s shares were down 16% this year, trailing other big banks. The bank is in the middle of a turnaround led by new CEO Jane Fraser, who took over in March of last year following years of missed financial targets and regulatory controls. Citigroup announced plans to close its consumer banking operations in 13 markets including Australia, China, and Russia. Then in March, the bank unveiled a multi-year turnaround strategy that included financial targets and a 6% increase in expenses as the bank seeks to improve its internal controls. Berkshire unloaded the rest of its stake in Wells Fargo, and sold its stakes in JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs in 2020. It still owns about $41 billion of Bank of America ( BAC ) shares, which is Berkshire’s second-largest holding … [Read more...] about Buffett’s Big Bet on Citigroup

New Hertz CEO Stephen Scherr has publicly admitted for the first time that some customers have been arrested for driving cars they rented . "It's not acceptable to Hertz to have any customer, a single customer, sort of, caught up in some of what's happened," Scherr told CNBC on Monday, about a month after starting his new job. The admission is a huge change for Hertz, to say the least. For more than a decade, the company has fought these claims in various courts, arguing that any customer arrests are the customers' own fault. " The vast majority of these cases involve renters who were many weeks or even months overdue returning vehicles and who stopped communicating with us well beyond the scheduled due date," a Hertz representative told Inc.com late last year. "Situations where vehicles are reported to the authorities are very rare and happen only after exhaustive attempts to reach the customer." The representative went on to disparage the reputation of the attorneys … [Read more...] about New Hertz CEO Says Customer False Arrests Are ‘Not Acceptable’