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TGIF: The Poetic Beauty of Palin's Tweets
July 31, 2009 @ 09:24 AM | By Greg MacSweeney

Love her or hate her (I don't think there is a middle ground, is there?), Sarah Palin's Twitter tweets can be poetic, but only when read by The Captain, William Shatner. The Tonight Show's Conan O'Brien brings in Captain Kirk, aka Denny Crane, to read Palin's tweets verbatim. The result is a strange free verse that Shatner takes to a new level. Enjoy on this rainy Friday. TGIF!

Also, Shatner recites Palin's final speech. Palin's final speech was a thing of poetic beauty...And who does poetry better than Shatner?

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Michael Lewis "Defends" Goldman; Spinal Tap Performs
July 31, 2009 @ 07:13 AM | By Penny Crosman

Michael Lewis speaks for all of Goldman Sachs when he says, "America stands at a crossroads, and Goldman Sachs now owns both of them." And Spinal Tap makes an appearance on the Daily Show

Michael Lewis Clears Up Misconceptions About Goldman

In a Bloomberg article, Bashing Goldman Sachs Is Simply a Game for Fools, Liar's Poker author Michael Lewis, adopting the persona of a Goldman employee, explains the firm's perspective on recent unflattering press reports. For instance, he debunks the rumor that Goldman Sachs owns the U.S. government: "Every time we hear the phrase 'the United States of Goldman Sachs' we shake our heads in wonder. Every ninth-grader knows that the U.S. government consists of three branches. Goldman owns just one of these outright; the second we simply rent, and the third we have no interest in at all. (Note there isn’t a single former Goldman employee on the Supreme Court.)"

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The End Of Wall Street: Why It Happened
July 24, 2009 @ 10:07 AM | By Greg MacSweeney

Here is another well produced and interesting video from the Wall Street Journal about the credit crisis. I don't think there is fresh information here, or breaking news, but the video is easy to watch. Chapter two of this WSJ series takes a look at what was going through the minds of CEOs, corporate boards, fund managers and mortgage lenders as they created hard-to-understand derivatives Warren Buffett once called "weapons of financial mass destruction."

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TGIF: China Celebrates Status As World’s Number One Air Polluter
July 24, 2009 @ 07:08 AM | By Penny Crosman

Proud that its industries are growing fast and producing more greenhouse gases along the way, China partied today. Festivities included the 100 Widow Smog Dance, The Onion reports.

China Celebrates Its Status As World’s Number One Air Polluter

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Iron Fist With Brass Knuckles Ruled Lehman Brothers
July 23, 2009 @ 11:42 AM | By Greg MacSweeney

Lawrence G. McDonald, the author of "A Colossal Failure of Common Sense: The Inside Story of the Collapse of Lehman Brothers," speaks to WSJ's Dennis Berman about what went wrong at the top of the firm. McDonald says that Lehman just wasn’t ruled with an iron fist, “it was ruled with brass knuckles,” and that some of the “best and the brightest” who tried to bring attention to the subprime risks were immediately silenced by leaders at Lehman.

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Brokerage Statement Leaders & Best Practices
July 21, 2009 @ 11:19 AM | By Michael Ellison

Monthly statements are often the primary form of communication between a firm and its clients, allowing brokerages to show each customer – clearly and simply – what they own and what they’ve done with their account recently. Given the challenging market environment, now more than ever it is essential for brokerage firms to provide a clear and complete account review to their clients via the account statement. Every year, Corporate Insight reviews the statements we receive through our client accounts by running them through our rigorous benchmarking audit criteria. Our analysis focuses on a number of different categories including design, content, customization and “green” issues such as e-delivery.

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Brokerage Statement Leaders & Best Practices
July 21, 2009 @ 11:19 AM | By Michael Ellison

Monthly statements are often the primary form of communication between a firm and its clients, allowing brokerages to show each customer - clearly and simply - what they own and what they've done with their account recently. Given the challenging market environment, now more than ever it is essential for brokerage firms to provide a clear and complete account review to their clients via the account statement. Every year, Corporate Insight reviews the statements we receive through our client accounts by running them through our rigorous benchmarking audit criteria. Our analysis focuses on a number of different categories including design, content, customization and "green" issues such as e-delivery.

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TGIF: How to Grow Grass in Someone's Keyboard
July 16, 2009 @ 06:15 PM | By Penny Crosman

It's a nice way to welcome a co-worker back from vacation.

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Are Speculators Driving Up Oil Prices?
July 09, 2009 @ 11:35 AM | By Greg MacSweeney

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) certainly suspects that oil speculators are behind the wild swings in oil prices. Bart Chilton, commissioner of the CFTC, says “it’s not our job to set prices in government, but it is our job to make sure there is no fraud, abuse or manipulation.” For the first time, the CFTC is considering setting limits on speculators in the oil futures markets with the hope of increasing transparency. Commodities traders, naturally, don’t like the proposed regulations, with some analysts even calling it a “witch hunt,” in this CBS News video.

Watch CBS Videos Online

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Goldman Sachs Is A Vampire Squid, Rolling Stone Says
July 02, 2009 @ 10:48 AM | By Penny Crosman

In a riveting article in its July 9-23 issue, "Goldman Sachs: The Great American Bubble Machine," Rolling Stone describes the investment bank as a "great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money."

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Is Wall Street’s Day of Reckoning Still to Come?
July 02, 2009 @ 10:12 AM | By Greg MacSweeney

“Liar’s Poker” author Michael Lewis hasn’t been a popular guy on Wall Street since he wrote the book 25 years ago. Since then, he has written about finance many times and he is working on a new book about the current financial crisis. Although the banks have been scared and many have been shaken to their foundations, Lewis contends that there may be more upheavals to come. He is also shocked that the Treasury, the SEC and other agencies haven’t really begun to investigate what happened in the subprime mess. He says that when he has interviewed numerous executives from financial institutions, such as AIG’s Financial Products division, they tell him that no one from a regulator has come to try to find out exactly what happened. That fact alone, is simply astonishing.

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