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Reuters - Goldman Sachs could post its first ever quarterly loss as a public company in December, as market turmoil weighs on revenue for investment banking businesses and forces asset writedowns.
One Wall Street analyst, Glenn Schorr at UBS, predicted a loss for the bank on Friday. The potential for a quarterly loss, combined with the generally weaker environment for financial institutions, has some investors wondering if Goldman Sachs really deserves to trade at a higher valuation than Morgan Stanley, the other major independent investment bank that is now a commercial bank.
Goldman’s shares trade at about 1.1 times their tangible book value, while Morgan Stanley’s shares trade at less than half their tangible book value. A spokesman for Goldman declined to comment.
Goldman Sachs is legendary for its risk management expertise. In early 2007, it saw the storm clouds gathering above the subprime mortgage market and positioned itself to profit from the expected home loan downturn.
Bloomberg - Nippon Life Insurance Co., Japan’s biggest life insurer, said it will boost hedge fund investments and may target distressed assets to take advantage of volatility caused by the collapse of the U.S. subprime mortgage market.
Nippon Life, with about 100 billion yen ($920 million) in hedge funds, increased its allocation to this asset class by about 30 billion yen during the past two years in a trend it intends to continue, Hideya Sadanaga, deputy general manager of the firm’s Credit & Alternative Investment Department, said in an interview in Tokyo.
The global credit crisis that’s caused more than $500 billion of losses and writedowns at financial firms has increased volatility in debt markets and led to a 20 percent decline in the value of the 1,737 companies on the MSCI World Index this year.
“There will be investment opportunities in the credit and distressed asset class eventually, given this market environment,” said Hiroshi Aikawa, head of alternative investment at office at Nippon Life’s Nissay Asset Management Corp., in the same interview on Sept. 5. “Investments that profit from trading volatility also look attractive.”
Bloomberg.com: Asia - Nippon Life Insurance Co., Japan’s biggest life insurer, said it will boost hedge fund investments and may target distressed assets to take advantage of volatility caused by the collapse of the U.S. subprime mortgage market.
Nippon Life, with about 100 billion yen ($920 million) in hedge funds, increased its allocation to this asset class by about 30 billion yen during the past two years in a trend it intends to continue, Hideya Sadanaga, deputy general manager of the firm’s Credit & Alternative Investment Department, said in an interview in Tokyo.
The global credit crisis that’s caused more than $500 billion of losses and writedowns at financial firms has increased volatility in debt markets and led to a 20 percent decline in the value of the 1,737 companies on the MSCI World Index this year.
Bloomberg- Asian hedge funds are increasing their use of multiple prime brokers after the U.S. subprime mortgage market collapse heightened the risk of relying on a single investment bank for brokerage services, an AsiaHedge survey found.
Hedge funds that are managed in Asia or invest primarily in the region awarded 326 shared mandates to prime brokers, 36 percent more than last year, according to Bloomberg calculations based on information in AsiaHedge’s 2007 and 2008 Asian prime brokerage surveys. The pace of growth exceeded the less than 20 percent increase in sole mandates to 778 in the past year.
Rising delinquencies in the subprime market that led to the near collapse of Bear Stearns Cos., once among the top three Wall Street prime brokers, have forced the world’s largest banks and securities firms to post more than $400 billion of asset writedowns and credit losses since the beginning of last year.
Bloomberg- Asia’s expanding hedge fund industry will probably create tens of thousands of jobs in the next five years, even as investment bank recruitment dries up after the U.S. subprime mortgage market collapse, said Sheridan Mather, a managing director of recruitment firm Pinnacle International Ltd.
“We’re seeing some streamlining at the moment. We’re seeing some of the not so well-performing funds closing down,” London- based Mather said in an interview with Bloomberg TV today. “But we’re seeing massive growth of the established guys.”
The world’s biggest banks and securities firms cut 83,000 jobs in the 10 months to May as U.S. subprime mortgage delinquencies seized up the global credit market, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Independant- European Union Financial Services Commissioner Charlie McCreevy has defended hedge funds in relation to the fallout from the US subprime mortgage market collapse.
The move comes in tandem with a report commissioned by French President Nicolas Sarkozy which states that France should join a German initiative asking the European Union’s executive arm to propose measures boosting hedge fund transparency.
Berlin has been pushing for the creation of a code of conduct for hedge funds within the group of Eight club of industrialised nations, even though regulators show little appetite for imposing tougher rules on the industry. Mr McCreevy is considered a general critic of regulation in financial markets.
Bloomberg- Wall Street is losing its top oil analysts as securities firms suffer record losses and hedge funds offer the promise of higher pay.
Morgan Stanley’s Douglas Terreson and Citigroup Inc.’s Doug Leggate, ranked first and second by Institutional Investor on coverage of the biggest oil companies, left their positions, the banks said. Geoff Kieburtz, the No. 3 analyst for oilfield contractors, is leaving Citigroup. Robert Morris, the top-ranked analyst for independent oil companies such as Anadarko Petroleum Corp., left Bank of America earlier this year.
Exxon Mobil Corp., Anadarko and other oil stocks rose to all-time highs this year as crude futures surged 46 percent to a record $139.89 a barrel and natural gas jumped 73 percent. The exits also came as banks and securities firms cut more than 83,000 jobs after the collapse of the subprime mortgage market led to $390 billion in writedowns and losses.