The mortgage settlement between the top five mortgage banks and state attorneys general may indeed be a net positive in the short term, as it offers more certainty about the myriad state inquiries and offers additional hope that more individual foreclosure cases can be resolved.
But there’s a reason why New York and California signed the accord: It does nothing to hold back their efforts to pursue banks for a wide range of mortgage-related claims.
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Virginia-based startup timeRAZOR has added $3.4 million in funding. The company has been in stealth mode since June 2011. The online startup’s mission is to bring “a sense of serendipity back to our highly-scheduled world.” The company’s board of advisors includes Linda Abraham, co-founder of comScore; Eddie Amos, former Microsoft executive; and Gene Riechers, former General Partner of Valhalla Partners.
Read more »TastemakerX has raised $1.8 million in funding. Investors include Guggenheim Partners, Baseline Ventures, True Ventures, AOL Ventures and Tekton Ventures. The company has also attracted Internet and music industry advisors John Battelle, Marc Geiger, Ian Rogers, Paul Bricault and Ted Rheingold and angel investors Andrew Anker, Mich Mathews, Michael Kassan and Mike McGinley. TastemakerX is a social gaming platform.
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Read more »When the New York attorney general sued three big consumer banks and MERS last week, it seemed like a thumb up the nose of the majority of other states who were on the verge of signing a deal to settle a host of mortgage crimes, such as robo-signing.
Read more »Morgan Stanley CEO James Gorman made news in February when he revealed that a critical goal for the bank was to boost bank's market share in fixed-income trading to roughly 8 percent, compared with the JP Morgan's market leading 15 percent share.
Read more »Morgan Stanley appears to have pulled off quite a coup.
Coming from way behind, it is on the verge of being named the lead underwriter for the Facebook IPO, if the WSJ is to be believed. Most people assumed that Goldman Sachs was in the driver’s seat but in the end, the botched effort to raise $1.5 billion from domestic clients of Goldman Sachs may have been a decisive factor. Or perhaps they just weren’t willing to compete on price. We may never know.
Read more »One legacy of the dotcom bust was the so-called global settlement that sought to reform sell-side stock research practices on Wall Street.
The deal called for a large fine and steps to erect something close to China walls between the research staff and the banking staff. At the time, it was hailed as a landmark settlement. That global settlement expired in 2009, and you’ve got to wonder if there’s been any slippage since then in the efforts of sell-side firms to maintain a wall between the two functions.
Read more »So how should private equity fees imposed on limited partners be calculated?
According to a new study prepared for the Financial Times by academics at Yale and Maastricht University, from 2001 to 2010, U.S. pension plans on average generated a 4.5 percent return annually, after fees.
“In that period, the pension funds paid an average 4 percent of invested capital each year in management fees. On top of those, private equity often collects a variety of other fees and a fifth of investment profits.”
Read more »One private equity industry executive tells Deal Book that, “I think it’s a pretty honorable industry, and I don’t know why people aren’t stepping up and defending the careers that define their lives. That’s a sad thing. What do they fear it will cost them?”
The race for the Republican presidential nomination has thrust the career of Mitt Romney, one of the co-founders of Bain Capital, into the spotlight. It's one that has proven harsh, as fellow Republicans have gone after him with a vengeance.
Read more »When will John Paulson return to his high-water mark in his top two funds? That’s a fair question in the wake of a disastrous year for the head fund honcho, who seemed unable to lose until this year.
His top two funds, his Advantage fund and the leveraged version, the Advantage Plus fund, were down roughly 36 percent and 51 percent in 2011. Several of his other funds were down as well. So how long until his funds get back to their high water mark, which would once again allow Paulson to take performance fees? It’s mostly likely going to be a long slog.
Read more »Is it all that shocking that the owners of BankUnited--which include the likes of Carlyle Group, Wilbur Ross and Blackstone Group--are seeking an early out?
Read more »Citigroup missed earnings projections for the fourth quarter, reporting profits of $1.16 billion, or $0.38 cents a share, compared with the average analyst recommendation of 50 cents a share. That’s cause for worry of course, but we shouldn’t let that obscure the big macro trend, which amounts to a troubling fall in revenue that may not improve anytime soon.
Read more »JPMorgan Chase kicked off the earnings period by reporting net income of $3.7 billion for the fourth quarter of 2011, compared with $4.8 billion for the fourth quarter of 2010.
Earnings per share were $0.90, compared with $1.12 a year ago. That essentially matched expectations. But as expected to a degree, the company also reported a debit valuation adjustment that resulted in a $567 million pre-tax loss, an accounting charge that the company does not consider indicative of operational results. So one could make the case that the bank actually beat earnings expectations.
Read more »Goldman Sachs has raised brows by throwing its support behind the Human Rights Campaign's effort to legalize same-sex marriages.
For the movement, this is a big deal, as the firm ranks as one of the most powerful businesses in the world. The Human Rights Campaign produced a video of CEO Lloyd Blankfein, who asks viewers to join a "majority of Americans who support marriage equality."
Read more »The Federal Reserve Board will likely decide the fate of the proposed Capital One deal for ING Direct when it convenes on Wednesday.
The $9 billion deal will create a bank with 1.5 percent of total U.S. deposits. As of now anyway, it does not own strong operations outside of core commercial banking, most of it at the retail level. The Fed has already held three hearings on the deal, which generated a surprising amount of opposition. Various consumer advocacy groups--notably the National Community Reinvestment Coalition--have opposed the deal largely on systemic risk concerns.
Read more »Conviva Inc., a maker of video quality optimization and analytics technology, has raised $15 million in a round led by Time Warner Investments. The company will use the funds to bolster its staff and for international growth, according to a press release. Names of other investors were not disclosed.
Read more »Xceleron, a company which accelerates drug development using ultra-sensitive bioanalytical analyses, has attracted existing investors Albion Ventures and Solon Ventures to invest $2.4MM to locate all of the company’s business in its custom-built facility in Germantown, MD. Xceleron was founded in 1997 in York, UK. In 2008, the company opened its US facility in Maryland.
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Read more »Orlando-based PlanSource Holdings Inc. has raised $12 million in new funding led by Lemhi Ventures. The company, which makes a cloud-based HR and healthcare software-as-a-service, will use the money for growth.
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A research firm has issued a new ranking the most valuable banking brands in the world, and there’s a new leader. HSBC has overtaken Bank of America and Wells Fargo to become the most valuable global bank brand. Bank of America fell from first to third, while Wells Fargo held steady in second place. Chase held steady in fifth place. Citi moved up to sixth from ninth. Not faring as well was Goldman Sachs, which feel to nineteenth from sixteenth. Article
Read more »Xagenic Inc., a molecular diagnostics company spun out of the University of Toronto, has raised $10 million in Series A financing co-led by CTI Life Sciences Fund and the Ontario Emerging Technologies Fund. QIAGEN N.V. also participated in the round. Toronto-based Xagenic will use the funds to continue development of its technology for decentralized, rapid diagnostic testing.
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