To late if he is looking they are doomed. Unbelieveable! We are seeing equivalent of a financial black hole sucking in all of Wall Street.
If a vacum forms in a market somebody else expands to fill it. So derivative xposure aside, no big deal if a few I-Banks go down, the survivors wll expand to take their place.
What's wrong with the Chinese buying and running a US investment bank? American firms send their own people to China to run subsidiaries. The Chinese have every right to do the same. Remember, it was American-style 'thinking' that got the banking industry into the trouble it is in today, while the Chinese were out there building a sustainable economy and bringing their people out of poverty. Its widely acepted that people in debt lose control over their destiny. I think you could apply the same logic to an entire country. The future of America belongs to China, and its going to be a difficult time for people who do not embrace Chinese ideas such as hard work and sound money.
No way that MS should merge with WB. Definitely not a good combination. WB called MS.... definitely WB is in dire straits.
Hard work and sound money are not exactly chinese ideas. Yes they played their cards right, mostly profiting from other's greed. But cheap labor and manipulated currency is more like it.
If you had ever worked for Chinese you would not be asking. What I am saying is that MS rainmakers are not going to answer to people who have to know about and control the minutia of everything. They are going to walk. As for the Chinese miracle I suggest you look at a chart of US housing stocks and the Shanghai index and ask yourself why they are tracking. Hint, no one in China believes in decoupling or growth from domestic expansion is going to replace Joe Sixpack taking out the equity in "his" house and blowing it on crap made in China. Their claim to fame as to be the current cheapest labour. Thailand was a miracle economy when it was them - they too were going to take over the world.
And that's a problem, why?? If they 'walk', then they won't have to be paid severance. "MS rainmakers", what the f*ck are you talking about? Or wait, are you one of those wall-streeters who thinks his/her job is one-of-a-kind, and irreplaceable? The people who leave will be replaced, in case you haven't noticed, theres tens of thousands of very capable people on Wall Street unemployed right now, and more to come as more banks go under. And colleges keep churning out business grads faster than milk goes sour in Mexican sun. That's just the stock market, which often doesn't reflect the physical market in goods and services, or even the prevailing discount rate. Remember that the 'stock market' was giving dotcoms without earnings insane valuations just a few years ago. The "stock market" less than 52 weeks ago valued AIG at $72, now its worth $2. Even the US completely falling off the map won't be much more than a temporary blip in China. And by acquiring a US investment bank, the Chinese have an excellent opportunity to become much 'closer' to their investments than they previously were.