"Problems of this sort are rarely confined to one institution; the dotcom era shows us that in the wake of a crisis, business practices which were considered normal at the time can look very much worse with the benefit of hindsight and in a legal setting"
A Credit Suisse analyst report shows why every investment bank, and not just Goldman Sachs, should be worried about the Abacus case
(see Regulation: Banks fear widening SEC investigation)
"Let’s all just not call it a bank fee and call it what it is, which is a punitive bank tax"
Jamie Dimon, chief executive of JPMorgan, cuts to the chase on what the Obama plan means for banks
"No one else has what we have on our scale in cashflows, capital and market size. If we can’t win from this position, then no one can win"
Brian Moynihan, chief executive of Bank of America Merrill Lynch, outlines the scale of his ambitions
(see Too big to succeed? The scale of Brian Moynihan’s ambitions at Bank of America)
"I held up the iPhone to the audience and said: ‘Look guys, Nokia was in the mobile phone business for God knows how long before Apple showed up and yet Apple overtook everyone’"
Anil Prasad, global head of foreign exchange at Citi, explains how technology keeps banks on their toes in FX
(see Euromoney FX survey 2010: The chasing pack narrows the gap)
"I did not mislead IKB or ACA, two of the most sophisticated institutional investors in these products anywhere in the world"
So says Fabrice Tourre, the Goldman exec who put the Abacus trade together. Given what has happened to IKB and ACA, it does not say much for the sophistication of the investor base in structured credit