This website has NOT been approved by Goldman Sachs. This website provides information about Goldman Sachs to demonstrate how destructive they are to our lives and the hopes and dreams of our children.

"When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty." - Thomas Jefferson

"When the people and the government fear Banksters like Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan, there is economic dictatorship that will destroy the very fabric of our existence as a civilized society." - Mike Morgan

"Let me control the money of a nation and I care not who makes its laws". - Meyer Rothschild, Creator of the Central Banking System

Certain Goldman Sachs Shareholders Still Don't Get It ...
By Bess Levin 
Goldman Sachs Cites Reputational Risk in Annual Report | BulletProof
By Sara Brown Meehan
AIG, Goldman Sachs,the Fed and Treasury, Shenanigans, Skullduggery and ...
OpEdNews
Goldman Sachs faces union plan lawsuit over executive pay
Pensions & Investments
Goldman Sued for Overpaying Executives
CBS News
Goldman Sachs sued by big pension fund over pay | Reuters
NEW YORK (Reuters) 
Goldman Sachs Sued By Union Fund For Overpaying Executives
By The Huffington Post News Editors
Business news in brief | Philadelphia Inquirer | 03/09/2010
Philadelphia Inquirer...AP Goldman Sachs Group Inc. was sued... 
Goldman Sachs (GS) Sued Over Compensation Practices – 24/7 Wall St.
By 247wallst 

Traders prepare for a drop in Goldman Sachs (GS)
ONN.tv
Pranking Goldman's Lucas Van Praag
Forbes (blog)
Goldman Paulson Sachs
American Spectator
Senate Said to Weigh $50 Billion Fund to Wind Down Failed Firms
BusinessWeek... Goldman Sachs Group Inc. ...

Goldman Sachs Group's hour of reckoning
GulfNews
Joe Stiglitz Slaps The Invisible Hand | Finance Blog
By Insurance... we request the attention of Christine Varney, and the entire anti-trust arm of the US government, in claiming that Goldman Sachs has to be dismantled forcefully 

Charlie Gasparino, FOX Business News, recently talked about the Fake Lucas van Praag Twitter page.  Lucas van Praag is Goldman Sachs (GS) Global Head of Corporate Communications who has not helped improve the GS image.  Yet his "Fake" Twitter page has garnered a lot of attention.  The comments are funny. 

Here is Charlie Gasparino's report: Who's Behind Lucas V. Praag's Tweets

...I will neither confirm nor deny” involvement in the tweets, which have become a sensation on Wall Street trading desks and financial bloggers.

Regardless of who started it, it is posted as "Fake Lucas van Praag" even though it does sport his picture in the upper left hand corner.(I assume it is van Praag's real likeness) and sends yet another clear message to GS as to the reputation they enjoy or actually, don't enjoy.

One thing for sure - it is evidencing - is that GS is not liked by many people including some in the media like Taibi of Rolling Stone.  The question is still why?  Why this continued daily outrage over Goldman Sachs?  Of course we know some of the reasons - bailout money they took, high bonuses and paythey take and banking status without really being a bank.  But most of all the suggestion that they have a large control over our government - hence the people - is, I believe, where most of the dislike/distrust comes from.  All in all, GS is their own worst enemy especiallyl when it comes to PR.  That being the case, then Lucas van Praag is "corporate enemy #1.  (I don't Twitter but I couldn't help taking a shot).

Some questions that need answers:

• Who are they?
• Are they one of the "secret" owners of The Federal Reserve?
• How much power do they really have?
• Are they part of "The New World Order" trying to control the economies of the world?
• How do they continue to get away with the way they operate without any repercussions?
• What are their true motives?

My personal belief is that if the truth is ever known, it would be the demise of GS along with others such as JPMorgan and more.  In short, it could spell the demise of our entire banking system as it is now.  Maybe not a bad thing to happen.  Perhaps a return to the old regional banking system with smaller, controllable banks is a much better system and could be the answer to many of our problems.

We shall all continue to seek out the truth no matter what the consequences.  If it is bad for the people then it is just plain bad. The people have a right to know the truth and to democratically correct what is wrong.

I want to thank Fox News Network for bringing Charlie's report to my attention.  While not a major story to impact our lives, it certainly contains an element of humor which we can all use some of.

Goldman Sachs is nearing a decision on whether to launch an all-out media blitz to combat a massive wave of negative publicity that some people inside the firm believe could soon result in lower profits as companies that once flocked to the financial powerhouse turn to less controversial firms for investment-banking advice, FBN has learned.

The full story...click here

Ethics Newsline® » News » In Annual Report, Goldman Sachs .
By Carl Hausman
Dealbreaker.com editor playing Goldman Sachs PR person on Twitter ...
By Chris Roush 
Goldman Sachs sued by big pension fund over pay
Reuters
Europe bars Wall Street banks from government bond sales
The Guardian
Is Wall Street bullish on America -- or is a Greek tragedy opening soon?
Seattle Times
So is it too wild to wonder how long before Goldman Sachs, the Wall Street boyz and the shadow banking crew start shorting the sovereign debt of the United ..
The Greedy Bastards Hall of Shame: Goldman Sachs to Dictate Health ...
By Mz.Many Name
Video: How Goldman Sachs runs the government! « Dprogram.net
By sakerfa (GSNote:   Video was recently posted here at GS666 but click here to view again)

Larry's Corner Lucas van Praag - The Goldman Sachs PR Chief 
Has His Own PR Problems

Lucas van Praag, the high level, high paid head of Goldman Sachs worldwide corporate communications has his own PR problems attempting to improve the bad PR of his company.

Earlier, Charlie Gasparino - formerly with CNBC now with FOX - reported on the Fake Lucas van Praag Twitter page and disclosed that he believes it was the work of DealBreaker blogger Bess Levin.   My related story appears in a previous post, Goldman Sachs Pr - The Good, The Bad, The Ugly along with the embedded video featuring Gasparino.(A related story by Charlie Gasparino can be found by clicking here)

As is the case almost every week, a new story concerning GS saturates the internet from major media to bloggers.  This weeks "breaking news" by Charlie - Lucas van Praag and the Fake Twitter page - will make it this weeks buzz.

But the story about van Praag has been brewing for some weeks.  I, in fact, had been contacted by a journalist who was working on a story about him a month ago..  But this Twitter thing has brought it to the forefront and I am sure will reintroduce older stories as I do here. 

David Weidner of the Wall Street Journal's MarketWatch wrote a column about van Praag  that was posted on February 23rd.  It is worthy of a revisit to it here in Larry's Corner.  You will learn what a "Chimera" is...it looks a little like van Praag.  (Editor's Note:  David Weidner is the journalist who published "The Top 10 Wall Street Blogs You Must Bookmark Now" in which he included this blog AND DealBreaker as otwo of the ten...click here for GS post and list of all ten). 

The Chimera at the gates of Goldman Sachs
Commentary: Goldman's PR chief is on message

By David Weidner, MarketWatch

"I'm sure there's a lot of pressure internally to fight back," said Steve Frankel, a partner specializing in financial services communication at Joele Frank, Brimmer Wilkinson Katcher. "Investment bankers read every word of every story that's written about the firm. "The (Goldman) PR strategy is to answer every criticism aggressively and in this situation and others, sometimes that approach makes it a bigger story." Some PR pros believe van Praag has, on occasion, been too aggressive and should have "dialed it back" but even critics refer to him as among" the best in the business." That is to say on that front that matters most, van Praag has held the line with panache. He's made the arguments of Goldman's traders and bankers very well . It's a trade-off and maybe not a bad one. Public criticism is going to be there whether van Praag issues a firm-wide mea culpa or not. What may not survive is the morale of the firm. If van Praag is seen admitting mistakes, how does that play in house? Given what we know about most Wall Street firms, the answer is not well. "During crisis, many corporate communications executives are in a 'no-win' position. Van Praag may be one of them," said Alan Towers, a corporate reputation consultant and head of TowersGroup Inc. "Reputation is built or broken by corporate culture, not communications. Even the top PR person usually has limited influence over culture, but is 'responsible' for reputation. I've seen these executives commit career suicide by pushing a defiant message management forces on them, then get fired when the company caves and needs a scapegoat." To take it a step further, van Praag seems to be betting that a firm built on loyalty will stay loyal to him. Probably a good bet at Goldman. Read the entire article...click here

As I search and read news and other blogs for information to post here, I often come across other blogs that point to stories about Goldman Sachs and others involved in the banking cartel leading our country  - no, our people - to economic servitude.  It has been the intent of this blog along with our sister publications, JPMorgan666.com and BarackObama666.com, to expose what is truly happening and how these Too Big To Fail corporations are changing this Republic, taking control and ruling without having to campaign or run in any government election.

The following post comes to us courtesy of a blog called, "Banking Horror Stories" who was forwareded the article called, JPMorgan Responsible for the Destruction of U.S. Financial System published in The Market Oracle, a UK financial publication.  It was the author of this post who I take the title of this blog from.


It is always interesting to see and hear from those overseas.  They have a totally different prospective, have access to more news that is not sanitized as are most stories in the U.S.   To see the passion and thoughts of those not having to live in this hell we are living in, is also interesting.  It is perhaps easier for someone outside to see more of the truth and reality

The piece is rather long but is worth the read..

The tag team of JPMorgan as the monster and Goldman Sachs as its harlot represent a powerful pair that is more responsible for destroying the entire US financial system than 95% of the American public has any awareness. The colossus of JPMorgan is a monster, a predator, nurtured by pond scum. It has gobbled up Chase Manhattan, Manufacturers Hanover, Chemical Bank, Bank One, and more over the past two decades. Their profound presence in keeping the USTreasury Bond yields down can never be understated. They do so by managing 85% of the credit derivatives on the planet. They distorted usury prices, as in price of borrowed money, thus aggravating the LIBOR (London InterBank Offered Rate) market in a very visible manner.

The oblong usury prices have contributed mightily to the destruction of the US Economy itself, created bubbles, killed jobs, and wrecked savings. The ugliest hidden activity for the JPMorgan monster is to manage the Bank of Baghdad, where they manipulate the crude oil price, where drug trafficking money is funneled from Afghan sales, under management by the US Military aegis (guys with no uniform stripes or markings). Maybe such illicit money offsets Credit Default Swap losses, making America strong for freedom and liberty. Goldman Sachs is clearly the investment banking agent for the USGovt, given the privilege of insider trading in unspeakable proportions.

.Read the full story...click here

You might also want to visit"Banking Horror Stories".  Also be sure to visit our sister site, JPMorgan666.comwww.JPMorgan666.com.  It is much more active now that we have a volunteer, who goes by the name - Nickle - who is posting frequently.  I welcome his participation, efforts and his writing.   

Now the links:
Financial Warfare Exposed: Soros, Goldman Sachs, Hedge Funds ...
By Rohl 
Could Goldman Sachs Do to California What It Did to Greece?
California Progress Report
The Glazers, Goldman and Man U
The Daily Deal

t r u t h o u t | Jim Hightower | Goldman Sachs Authors a Greek ...

Goldman Sachs, Chase, AmEx Make Top 50 'Most Admired ...(GS666 comment:  WOW!)

Never mind that they may be associated with the financial crisis, bailouts and credit card rate hikes...
JPMorgan bests Goldman Sachs in banking
FierceFinance  (GS666 Comment:  See JPMorgan666.com for more on JP.  Not much is published about them but they are a paternal twin of GS...another vampire squid whose tentacles do reach and affect the general population)
How the Monsters at Goldman Sachs Caused a Greek Tragedy | America ...
By ATS
Will Bad Press Affect Goldman Sachs's Fortunes?
DailyFinance
Goldman Sachs: The Reputation You Deserve : NO QUARTER
By Larry Doyle 
Larry's Corner
Goldman Sachs Facts with Humor... in video

Goldman Sucks

Response Vidio 2:  (1:43) GOLDMAN STING PART I (The Model)

Respnse Video 3: (2:46)  Goldman Sting II

How The Foxes Run the Henhouse (Or Why Goldman Sachs Hates Greece?)…
By econgirl 
Jim O'Neill faces red card from Goldman Sachs
The Guardian
Glazers May Cut Ties With Goldman Sachs Over Red Knights
SportsBusiness Daily (subscription)
EU parliament to stage hearing on Greek statistics
Reuters
Goldman Sachs: The Reputation You Deserve : NO QUARTER
By Larry Doyle 
Will Bad Press Affect Goldman Sachs's Fortunes?
DailyFinance
White House Offers Bill to Restrict Big Banks' Actions
New York Times (blog)
Does being a Goldman Sachs director warrant applause or catcalls ...
By Claudia Deutsch 


 

For those of you who haven't seen The Still Report on youtube, you should do yourself a favor and check it out (I admit I'm late getting to the game as well). At the 2 minute mark, Bill Still (the Producer of The Money Masters) points out how Goldman has 333 times the amount of derivatives bets than their assets. This may have changed somewhat since the video was produced in November '09 but the fact remains that our banking system is broken and needs major reform.



Check out the whole Still Report series on his channel at youtube and see if you agree with me that he's on the right track. Feel free to flame me in the comments if I'm wrong.

Goldman's Reputation Is Blankfein's Job No. 1: Jonathan Weil
BusinessWeek
Annals of Goldman Sachs client relations, Michael Lewis edition ...
Dick Bove Bashes Goldman Sachs For Getting Scared Out Of Market By ...
By John Carney 
Randall Blaum's Blog: Goldman Sachs Lists New Risk for Investors ...
By Randall Blaum
Man Utd's Glazers complain to Goldman Sachs boss about Jim O'Neill
Telegraph.co.uk
Many days of $100 million gains at Goldman Sachs
FierceFinance
Wall Street Had 'No Idea' What Subprime CDSs Were, Lewis Writes
Bloomberg
New Basel rules could hit synthetic CDOs – Goldman Sachs ...
By Randall Mikkelsen
Lucas van Praag: Goldman Sachs's cult PR man | Business and ...
By Andrew Clark 
FDIC's Bair blasts Wall Street's values on pay
Reuters
Goldman Sachs Objects to Sawgrass Resort's Plan to Spend Cash
BusinessWeek

Larry's Corner

The Squid Strikes Again

In the last link above, "GoldmanSachs Objects to Sawgrass Resort's Plan to Spend Cash" which appeared in BusinessWeek, one comment made by GS struck me hard.

The story is about the Sawgrass Marriott Resort in Ponte Vedra Beach in Northern Florida - which is also home to the TCP Sawgrass Golf Club, independently owned by a PGA Tour subsidiary - 


According to the BusinessWeek article, the Resort sufferred a loss of busniness in 2009 yet still operated at a profit.  What we do not know is if that reduced profit was suffiecient to continue to make mortgage payments.  One must assume that it was not or at least that the hotel's owners - RQB - stopped making payments for what ever reasons.  Nevertheless, a foreclosure cannot be initated unless there is a delinquency.  So suffice it to say there was a delinquency which would justify a foreclosure.  But why?  That is the question that remains unanswered.

RQB began negotiating a debt restructuring in March 2009 with Goldman Sachs, which is owed $193 million. But in October, Goldman Sachs informed the partners that it intended to foreclose on the resort instead, according to an RQB court filing.

Those negotiations evidently stopped but the reason given makes me wonder.  I have highlighted the comment in bold type below.

“When asked in early November why the restructuring was no longer an alternative, Goldman Sachs stated that its management had changed its mind and preferred to own the resort,” the filing said. (emphasis added by GS666)

While this article does not disclose all the pertinent information that led to the effort to renegotiate the loan from GS, it is apparent that GS was considering something when "it changed its' mind" because "it preferred to own the resort". 

Wanting to own the property through a costly foreclosure rather then renegotiating terms to the benefit of all involved seems odd to me.  It makes me wonder if this is just another  wealth transfer to the elite.  Just like the residential mortgage market has been a great transfer of wealth for the past few years so too now, is commercial real estate. The bankers would rather own the property then create a win win situation for many by modifying loans.  They simply do not want to do so.  In fact, foreclosures are occurring illegally in many instances at a record pace.  This, I consider to be the execution of the greatest transfer of wealth in the history of the world. 

What is odd about this - and becomes just another example of Goldman Sachs self inflicted negative PR - is how they explained it, "Goldman Sachs stated that its management had changed its mind and preferred to own the resort,"  Why did they change their mind?

It would have been more prudent to say something like, "our attempts to renegotiate this loan reached an impasse and proves not to be viable at this time leaving no other alternative then to proceed with foreclosure action".  This still would not have answered the question "why" but would have left less to imagination and posts like this. 

Now I am certainly not trying to clean up their PR act but it is often how someone makes a statement not what one says.  In this case, a slip of the tongue may just have told the truth and exposed their true intentions.  I take their statement to mean, "we could have renegotiated but our greed overcame us once again and we just want to outright own this beautiful, profitable property to add to our ever increasing portfolio of assets."  "We want to own this country."


Perhaps a harsh and exaggerated statement on my part but that is how I and possibly many others interprate it.

I just find unrealistic that a foreclosure is better then a workout if one is possible.  A workout makes it a win win for all involved.  If GS had securitized this loan - which it might possibly have - then it would be beneficial to the security bond holders.  If they have not securitized the loan and hold it in house, then it would be to the benefit of their corporate shareholders - the true owners of Goldman Sachs.

In my tenure in credit management for a large international corporation and my many years in finance which included restructuring loans, I always found the workout to be more beneficial then the alternative.  Often something is better then nothing and typically that something leads to a full long term solution whereby all are made whole.   This, not to mention the legal costs saved by all parties. 

In all fairness, not having all the details, I could be wrong.  This is just my opinion.  But the statement made and our knowledge of GS actions domestically and around the world lead me to believe that I am not too far off.  Just another example of the "Giant Vampire Squid" grabbing what it can, when it can, however it can with no consideration even to their own (the shareholders).  This is not even a moral issue, it is just simply what is fair and good for all.

The final comment made by GS was simply,

A Goldman Sachs spokesman said Tuesday he could not comment on the matter.

And they (GS) wonder why there is so much negative PR.   

About the Author:  For more than 30 years, I worked as an attorney. In addition to a clerkship and law firm experience, I worked for some of America’s biggest corporations. I have a background in both law and economics. Unfortunately, when one works for a big corporation, one often has to self-censor some of one’s more provocative thoughts.  But…it’s a living.

Despite all the management books postulating the opposite, corporations actually prefer employees who think in a linear way.  Employers are actually afraid of “outside the box”, unconventional ideas.  But if anything, the current financial crisis suggests we live in a non-linear world which requires more, not less, questioning of conventional ideas.

Goldman and the Winner Take All Society

Finally, Goldman Sachs has gone too far. In A Reputation as Good as Goldman? Part I, we discussed Goldman’s selling of mortgage backed securities, and its role in the current Greek budget crisis. These activities clearly contributed to its self-inflicted reputational damage.

Perhaps the hubris went further. Does Goldman believe that its status as a favored Federal Reserve “too big to fail” firm will insulate it from government investigation? Last week Ben Bernanke put a dent in Goldman’s Teflon shield:

Ben S. Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman, told Congress Thursday that the Fed was ‘looking into a number of questions relating to Goldman Sachs and other companies and their derivatives arrangements with Greece.’

Mr. Bernanke said the Securities and Exchange Commission was also concerned about how derivatives — financial instruments that are largely unregulated and do not trade on public exchanges — have contributed to Greece’s problems. ‘Obviously, using these instruments in a way that intentionally destabilizes a company or a country is counterproductive,’ he said. See In Greece’s Crisis, Fed Studies Wall St.’s Activities.

In Is Goldman Finally About to Be Leashed and Collared? Yves Smith observes and analyzes Goldman’s corporate culture. As a former employee, she reports on colleagues’ piggish and overly aggressive behavior. But in an otherwise excellent post, I believe she overlooks the role of current compensation systems.

Pay Practices and Reputation

In previously discussing the banking crisis, we pointed out a fundamental principal: you get what you incent.

Banks were interested in generating upfront fees. Incentives were predicated on “making the deal.” The best way to make a deal was to ignore the creditworthiness of the borrower. The banker who made the bad loan suffered no personal financial penalty. There was no “skin in the game.” Why not write as many loans to poor credits as possible? See Hard Truths from the Banking Crisis.

The Goldman culture incents a “winner take all” mentality. Since it is a public corporation rather than a partnership everyone is an employee. A highly mobile employee rather than an owner is far less concerned about the firm’s long term reputation. That employee wants to maximize current compensation; worrying about future consequences is for suckers. Drawing on this paradigm, we are not shocked by headlines excoriating the firm for trading against its clients’ interests, shorting the municipal bonds it helped underwrite, skirting EU rules, or tanking the housing market.

Goldman operates in a larger Wall Street and indeed general culture that encourages greed at the expense of overall civic good: (emphasis added by GS666)

* Successful hedge funds report individual earnings in the hundreds of million dollars per employee.
* Loyalty is dead. Employees change firms. Highly paid athletes change teams without a second thought.
* The media treats great wealth as reason for great celebrity.
* Compensation validates individual worth.
* Government backstops losses and allows gains to remain private.
* The zeitgeist promotes: “I better grab as much as I can now before the economy implodes.”

Does It Have To Be This Way?

Any alert Board of Directors should be asking some difficult questions. Why aren’t we concerned about the long-term firm reputation? What do we want the corporate culture to be? Just because we can legally do a transaction should we be doing it? How do we blend partnership-based personal accountability with a public corporation structure? How do we get employees to care about the long-term view? How do we meet the competitive threat of hedge funds and private equity without damaging corporate reputation? How does our compensation system comport with these concerns?

Yves Smith noted that it was as dangerous for anyone to get in the way of a Goldman employee and a profit making opportunity as it was to get between a predatory animal and its kill. Goldman has managed to get itself between a very worried Obama Administration and a very angry public. How ironic if the Goldman predatory lion becomes the Administration sacrificial lamb.
See the original post...click here

Crime & Federalism: Goldman Sachs is Crying
By Mike Heads, Wall Street wins; tails, Wall Street wins
Atlanta Journal Constitution (blog)
Banking on Big Fees From the AIG Deal
New York Times (blog)
Wall Street's financial aftershocks
Washington Post
Lucas van Praag: Goldman Sachs's cult PR man
The Guardian Near-Universal Hatred of Goldman Sachs May Cost Them Money ...
By Megan Carpentier
Goldman Sachs concedes it could be damaged by public outrage over pay
The Guardian

At Brown, Spotlight on the President's Role at a Bank New York Times (blog

Editor's comments:
As I post these daily links and sifst through the many stories, I am often compelled to offer my comments and commentary.  I guess you have noticed.  Since I take up a little "corner" of the daily links (sometimes not so little) I began to think of it as "Larry's Corner".  I would like to make this an ongoing feature here at GS666.  If you will allow me to indulge myself, I will begin calling this feature simply, "Larry's Corner".