The Weinswig Affair: Is Citigroup Making An End-run On Employee Free Choice?

“If you’re an analyst, you need to show that your analysis is independent, and that you’re not beholden in anyone,” he said.  “Is that a valid assessment?..........
“Her reputation on the line,” he said. ~~~~~~~~~~Stein,Huff Po

Note: Was Ms.Weinswig a devotee of Jim Cramer,by any chance?
To wit:

... Jim Cramer Shorting Stocks, Manipulating Markets, Saying The SEC Doesn’t Understand
Huffington Post | Julie Satow | March 11, 2009

In light of the current economic crisis, and with the hullabaloo ignited recently by Jon Stewart over the accuracy of CNBC’s reporting, we thought it might be useful to revisit this shocking 2006 interview Jim Cramer gave to TheStreet.com’s Aaron Task.

In it, the host of Mad Money says he regularly manipulated the market when he ran his hedge fund. He calls it “a fun game, and it’s a lucrative game.” He suggests all hedge fund managers do the same. “No one else in the world would ever admit that, but I could care. I am not going to say it on TV,” he quips in the video.

He also calls Wall Street Journal reporters “bozos” and says behaving illegally is okay because the SEC doesn’t understand it anyway.

Here are some gems:

-On manipulating the market: “A lot of times when I was short at my hedge fund, and I was positioned short, meaning I needed it down, I would create a level of activity before hand that could drive the futures,”

-On falsely creating the impression a stock is down (what he calls “fomenting"): “You can’t foment. That’s a violation… But you do it anyway because the SEC doesn’t understand it.” He adds, “When you have six days and your company may be in doubt because you are down, I think it is really important to foment.”

-On the truth: “What’s important when you are in that hedge fund mode is to not be doing anything that is remotely truthful, because the truth is so against your view - it is important to create a new truth to develop a fiction,” Cramer advises. “You can’t take any chances."~~~~~~~~[Excerpt}

I completely Agree ddrb.
If the current administation really wants to rebuild America’s economy. Then they have to let the banker’s get paid. I know what the base salaries are and without bonuses, We’d have monkey’s running the banks… Which to many of you reading this might seem like a good thing. Incentives are good and as American as Apple Pie. As long as people are not getting paid by US tax dollars to sell America down the River. There is oportunity here and I hope the politicians take note. Invest in America! And if you don’t then don’t be upset when you get mugged.

We’d have monkey’s running the banks…

And just what do you think we have now? Greedy, dishonest monkeys, but monkeys all the same.

Incidentally, the vast majority of actual banks are not in trouble. It’s all these non-regulated, hazy ‘financial institutions’ that should be paid in bananas.

Wanting to ‘retain’ the mob that engineered this fiasco in the first place is ridiculous.

I don’t think someone getting a good deal on toilet paper at Walmart is, through their purchase, endorsing Walmart’s business practices. ~ Greg Spotts

“it is important to create a new truth to develop a fiction”

Isn’t that what Ken V. means when he says Perception (a new truth), is more important than Reality?  Wouldn’t Perception be considered developing a new fiction?

“I know what the base salaries are and without bonuses, We’d have monkey’s running the banks… Which to many of you reading this might seem like a good thing.”

How would this be, fire all the bank executives and replace them with Wal-Mart cart pushers and shelf stockers or maybe the banks janitor!!  After all, aren’t these the people who made the companies successful and not management?  I’m sure people like Ken V., ddrb, SDV and Screwedby, would be happy having having a Wal-Mart ‘Greeter’ handling their money as a bank CEO!!

“Then they have to let the banker’s get paid.”

You would think that people who BACK the unions, would know what a CONTRACT is!!  Those bonuses were in the contract between the bank and their employees!!  Just ask the UAW, they had to re-negotiate their contract, to CHANGE it, GM couldn’t just break it!!

Isn’t that what Ken V. means when he says Perception (a new truth), is more important than Reality?

Ummm… no, it’s not.

What’s good for Wal-Mart is BAD for America!

I would venture Jim Cramer knows a heck of lot more about money matters than someone who can’t make an original post, in her own words (ddrb).

You connect the Bankers that created the financial meltdown and the Media that prevented the story being told and you will find that they are one and the same organization.

http://www.deepcapture.com/what-we-should-learn-from-ji… /

March 12th, 2009 by Patrick Byrne

What should we learn from the fact that “The Daily Show’s” Jon Stewart has in four evenings (1 2 3 and 4) exposed Jim Cramer in a way that, in any sane world, he would have been exposed a decade ago? ~~~~~~~~~DU

Ken V,

“Ummm… no, it’s not.”

Then, exactly what do you mean, when you say Perception is more important than reality?  If Reality is the REAL truth, what is Perception, if NOT a new (invention of the)truth?

bbrd,

Did you see where SEN. Chuck Schumer - Dem., said that the taxpayer doesn’t MIND paying for ‘pork barrel projects’?  He must have been talking about people like ddrb!!

Speaking of pork barrel....how about those AIG bonuses?
A second helping at the trough,evidently.

To wit:

Why aren’t AIG’s counterparties taking haircuts on their exposure?

“For the answer to this question, we need to go back to the very first decision to bail out AIG, made, we are told, by then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, then-New York Fed official Timothy Geithner, Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein, and Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke last fall.

Post-Lehman’s collapse, they feared a systemic failure could be triggered by AIG’s inability to pay the counterparties to all the sophisticated instruments AIG had sold.

And who were AIG’s trading partners? No shock here: Goldman, Bank of America, Merrill Lynch, UBS, JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, Deutsche Bank, Barclays, and on it goes.

So now we know for sure what we already surmised: The AIG bailout has been a way to HIDE an enormous SECOND ROUND of cash to the SAME group that had received TARP money already."~~~~~~~~~~ [Excerpt] Clusterstock

Note: Merrill Lynch is the investment firm involved in the ERISA lawsuit against WalMart by W/M retirees,incidentally-Braden vs. WalMart.

The thread with the photo of W/M Treasurer Holley has details of the alleged “deal” between WalMart and Merril Lynch on the overpriced investment instruments,resulting in devaluation of retiree accounts.

re: Goldman Sachs and WalMart,from two years ago--ONE BILLION DOLLARS

Hyatt Sells $1 Billion Stake
by Portfolio Staff Aug 30 2007
The deal puts the Pritzkers and the Waltons in same boardroom.

The Pritzker family sold a $1 billion stake in Global Hyatt, the hotel company it controls, to Goldman Sachs and Madrone Capital Partners.

The deal was reached as the Pritzkers attempt to divide their assets among 11 adult children, as required under a 2001 agreement that was made in an attempt to quell intense family feuding.

The sale also brings a new family into to the mix, as Madrone Capital Partners is the investment firm affiliated with S. Robert Walton, the chairman of Wal-Mart. Madrone and Goldman Sachs will each gain a seat on the Hyatt board.

The Pritzkers have been “trying to build Global Hyatt into a worldwide, world-class player in the hospitality industry,” Hyatt chairman Thomas Pritzker told the Wall Street Journal. “And we’re also trying to restructure the family entity. This transaction supports both of those goals at the same time.”~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Then, exactly what do you mean...(?)

To begin with I don’t recall the word ‘important’ being part of my discussion of perception vs. reality. I find it incredible that a dabbler in the market such as yourself would be ignorant of the power of perception.

Short sellers make fortunes manipulating the perception of stocks. Are market ‘expectations’ real or merely perception?

Behind a fence topped with razor wire just off U.S. Highway 71 is a bunker of a building that Wal-Mart considers so secret that it won’t even let the county assessor inside without a nondisclosure agreement.

Ken V,

“Short sellers make fortunes manipulating the perception of stocks. Are market ‘expectations’ real or merely perception?”

Short sellers can make perception become reality, that’s how they make those fortunes!!

What should we learn from the fact that “The Daily Show’s” Jon Stewart has in four evenings (1 2 3 and 4) exposed Jim Cramer in a way that, in any sane world, he would have been exposed a decade ago? ~~~~~~~~~DU

That Jon Stewart passing himself off as a newsman has about as much credibility as a WMW posting about Rev. Billy.

Did you see where SEN. Chuck Schumer - Dem., said that the taxpayer doesn’t MIND paying for ‘pork barrel projects’?  He must have been talking about people like ddrb!!

I’ll keep my “pig” comments to myself, RDS :o)

Yes!  You have to, have worked at WAL-MART Store #2615 in Valdosta, Georgia to OVERSTAND the sick working environment employees must face each and every day--without any real voice. 

It is my belief.  That every worker at Wal-Mart Stores Inc., should have an equal chance to advance up the ladder on an equal footing, which is not presently being done in many departments according to workers. 

Today it was brought to my attention that workers are still being coached, and given a D-Days without merit in order to justify terminations. 

Moreover, if you become sick and use your sick time you may not have a job when you return.  (Workers name withheld, but available).

Wal-Mart Managers must understand that workers are adults, American Citizens, and should be treated with respect.  It is Un-American to treat WORKERS as if they were in China or in some other third world nation. 

Moreover as a Retired United States Armed Forces Military Veteran of the Vietnam Era.  I received training in people skills, supervisory, leadership and management.  And I am very much capable of recognizing a disgraceful working environment when I see one, and Wal-Mart Store #2615 is definitely such an environment. 

In addition, workers cannot speak up for themselves because they are fearful of terminations----as so many other outstanding workers. 

Why do I use the term workers instead of associates?  Because Wal-Mart WORKERS are NOT presently being treated as ASSOCIATES, as defined in Webster’s Dictionary. 

Even more sickening is why CUSTOMERS, and former WORKERS continue supporting the ill treatment of American Workers in the State of Georgia in the 21st Century at Wal-Mart Store #2615.

It seems that Wal-Mart Store #2615 and the State of Georgia EMPLOYEES need a union ASAP.  And as a person of conscious, my heart grieves when Wal-Mart WORKERS consistently tell me about Wal-Mart’s “OPEN DOOR POLICY.”

This is a door that LOOKS like, TASTE like, FEELS like, SOUNDS like, SMELLS like the real thing, (An OPEN DOOR).  But when workers try walking through this open door.  They find themselves getting UP, off the floor after running into---invisible Plexiglas.  Then out the door they go.  How Sad? 

But then again who cares? Surely, not Georgia Elected Officials who seem to have sold Georgia Workers down the drain, under Georgia’s unfair “At Will Employment Law.”

A law wherein workers can be fired “for cause, or for no cause at all,” and employers are NOT even required to inform workers why they were fired. 

This law also applies to returning United States Military Veterans from the Iraq and Afghanistan War.  Yet Georgia politicians continue to tell the American Citizens, that they support our troops.  How sad?

It is up to the VOTERS to remove politicians from office, that keep Georgia’s sick “At Will Employment Law” alive in our nation, and in the State of Georgia. 

So please spread the word by writing letters, e-mails, and inform all Americans to educate themselves concerning the “At Will Employment Law.”

Together we stand-----and divided they win, again, and again, and again!  G.B.R.

GBR
Retired Military Veteran
A concerned citizen and brother of all humanity