Skip to main content

Features of the week

The financials seem to be the prevailing theme in this Friday's, "Features of the week". But Lehman, BKX, and Ambac aren't the only items we have in store for you; there's lots more to see and hear.

Read on!

1. Lehman Brothers may raise $5 billion in capital in an effort to de-lever the balance sheet. The bank had been seen as a sale target earlier in the week.

For more, see: "Making sense of David Einhorn vs. Lehman Brothers", and, Jim Cramer's Blogging Stocks piece, "Einhorn gutted Lehman, and that's OK".

2. US unemployment rises at fastest rate since 1986.

3. Morgan Stanley, Merrill, Lehman ratings cut by S&P.

4. Some were taking this week's breakdown in the bank index (BKX) as an ominous sign; will there be an upcoming bounce for the banking sector?

5. MBIA and Ambac lose their S&P AAA ratings, affecting over $1 trillion in debt securities guaranteed by the companies.

6. IEA says world needs $45,000bn energy revolution.

7. It's not so easy being less rich - (New York Times).

8. Jim Rogers talks to Bloomberg about commodities, oil, and financials.

9. Ben Bernanke: Soaking them at Harvard.

10. Market wisdom from Bernard Baruch.

11. Stephen Schwarzman joins FT "View from the Top" to discuss the credit crunch, Lehman Brothers, Blackstone's IPO, and deleveraging in the banking sector.

12. "Dr. J", Julius Erving talks to Bloomberg about life after sports and says the Celtics vs. Lakers final is a "dream matchup".

Thank you for visiting Finance Trends Matter. If you enjoyed this post, please pass the link on to a friend!

Enjoy your weekend.

Popular posts from this blog

Clean Money - John Rubino: Book review

Clean Money by John Rubino 274 pages. Hoboken, New Jersey John Wiley & Sons. 2009. 1st Edition. The bouyant stock market environment of the past several years is gone, and the financial wreckage of 2008 is still sharp in our minds as a new year starts to unfold. Given the recent across-the-board-declines in global stock markets (and most asset classes) that have left many investors shell-shocked, you might wonder if there is any good reason to consider the merits of a hot new investment theme, such as clean energy. However, we shouldn't be too hasty to write off all future stock investments. After all, the market declines of 2008 may continue into 2009, but they may also leave interesting investment opportunities in their wake. Which brings us to the subject of this review. John Rubino, author and editor of GreenStockInvesting.com , recently released a new book on renewable energy and clean-tech investing entitled, Clean Money: Picking Winners in the Green Tech Boom . In Clean ...

Slate profiles Victor Niederhoffer

Slate's recent profile of writer/speculator, Vic Niederhoffer has been getting some attention from traders and finance types in recent days. I thought we'd take a look at it here too, to offer up some possible educational value from Vic's experiences with trading and loss. Here's an excerpt from Slate's profile of Victor Niederhoffer : " I've enjoyed getting your e-mails. It sounds like you've thought a lot about being wrong. Well, the reason you contacted me, to call a spade a spade, is that I'm sort of infamous for having made a big, notorious, terrible error not once but twice in my market career. Let's talk about those errors. The first was your investment in the Thai baht, which pretty much wiped you out when the Thai stock market crashed in 1997. I made so many errors there it's pathetic. I made one of my favorite errors: "The mouse with one hole is quickly cornered." That is key. There are certain decisions you make in li...

Seth Klarman: Margin of Safety (pdf)

Welcome, readers! Signup for free email updates at the Finance Trends Newsletter . Update: PDF links removed due to DMCA notice. Please see our extensive Klarman book notes below. New visitors, please check the Finance Trends home page for all new posts. Here's something for anyone who has been trying to get a look at Seth Klarman's now famous, and out of print, 1991 investment book, Margin of Safety .  My knowledge of value investing is pretty much limited to what I've read in Ben Graham's The Intelligent Investor (the book which originally popularized the investment concept of a "Margin of Safety"), so check out the wisdom from Seth Klarman and other investing greats in our related posts below. You can also go straight to Ronald Redfield's Margin of Safety book notes .    Related posts: 1. Seth Klarman interviews and Margin of Safety notes     2. Seth Klarman: Lessons from 2008 3. Investing Lessons from Sir John Templeton 4. ...