City trader runs up potential losses of more than £7bn

2»

Comments

  • clarkey cat
    clarkey cat Posts: 3,641
    Rick Chasey wrote:

    Banks offer a service, rather like hairdressers. Only their services are related to investment and finance.

    I've worked in banking and finance for 10 years and the kind of service a bank offers is nothing like that of a hairdressers.

    Its more like the kind of service you get when you're in Eastern Europe and you get enticed into a nightclub with sexy dancers but when you're in, some massive bouncers intimidate you into handing over hundreds of pounds before you are allowed to leave. Its more like that kind of service.
    Dolan Mythos
  • nathancom
    nathancom Posts: 1,567
    clarkey cat wrote:
    Rick Chasey wrote:

    Banks offer a service, rather like hairdressers. Only their services are related to investment and finance.

    I've worked in banking and finance for 10 years and the kind of service a bank offers is nothing like that of a hairdressers.

    Its more like the kind of service you get when you're in Eastern Europe and you get enticed into a nightclub with sexy dancers but when you're in, some massive bouncers intimidate you into handing over hundreds of pounds before you are allowed to leave. Its more like that kind of service.

    Well by hairdressers I think he means you come out with less than you went in.
  • rick_chasey
    rick_chasey Posts: 75,661
    clarkey cat wrote:
    Rick Chasey wrote:

    Banks offer a service, rather like hairdressers. Only their services are related to investment and finance.

    I've worked in banking and finance for 10 years and the kind of service a bank offers is nothing like that of a hairdressers.

    Its more like the kind of service you get when you're in Eastern Europe and you get enticed into a nightclub with sexy dancers but when you're in, some massive bouncers intimidate you into handing over hundreds of pounds before you are allowed to leave. Its more like that kind of service.

    You've never really worked on capital markets side of things ;).
    _
  • pinno
    pinno Posts: 52,094
    Rick Chasey wrote:
    clarkey cat wrote:
    Rick Chasey wrote:

    You've never really worked on capital markets side of things ;).

    You seem to be repeating that comment as if because no-one here has worked in 'Capital markets', we are naieve or somehow not understanding the complexities of those 'wealth creating' financial systems.

    So explain the sub-prime mortgage fiasco ? Explain why councils up and down the country who invested in hedge funds and investement funds in Iceland which went POP just like everything else and left them in a huge financial mess. Explain the fixing of night rates by Barclays et al.
    Explain why the global recession has driven 10, 000 businesses a week in the Uk alone to go bust.
    You may sit behind a veil of "I know' and you don't" but the culture of the bankers is plain to see and there is scandal after scandal and in the meanwhile they try to justify their enormous and immoral salaries and executive postions - based on what ? You see, the top 3rd of earners in this mess are not suffering. The top 3rd do not have to scrape by each week. It has not affected them.
    Ultimately, there is a deep recession and the financial markets (in whatever form) are directly responsible for it but we are having to pick up the tab. Explain why the current banking systems and personel supposedly running them should not be taken out the back and shot ?
    seanoconn - gruagach craic!
  • rick_chasey
    rick_chasey Posts: 75,661
    Look. I'm not arguing the toss of the crash. It's pretty easy to portion blame at all four corners of those involved. Those lending, those borrowing, those investors who don't understand what they're investing in and those regulating.

    Let me put it like this. Any bank wants to make money. Right? They'll do that however they can, and they'll pay smart people to play the game as well as they can to make as much as they can.

    To think that that's different to what any other free-market private firm would do is ridiculous.

    It's not a big conspiracy to f*ck everyone. It's just a very mature, developed financial services market.

    I don't buy the 'wealth' creation argument. People need financial services, and banks and other financial institutions, offer those. That service has an intrinsic value to an economy. Like any other service. There's a demand for it, and they offer it.

    Now, I can see the argument regarding top-heavy derivative markets - where derivative markets can be up to 10 time bigger than the value of the underlying. That doesn't make sense and when you get at that level, the value can indeed be illusionary.

    For sure, '07/08 shows we need more financial regulation. No-one's disputing that. But making out professional services, because they happen to be financial, add no value is clearly b*llocks.
    _
  • nathancom
    nathancom Posts: 1,567
    Rick Chasey wrote:
    Look. I'm not arguing the toss of the crash. It's pretty easy to portion blame at all four corners of those involved. Those lending, those borrowing, those investors who don't understand what they're investing in and those regulating.

    Let me put it like this. Any bank wants to make money. Right? They'll do that however they can, and they'll pay smart people to play the game as well as they can to make as much as they can.

    To think that that's different to what any other free-market private firm would do is ridiculous.

    It's not a big conspiracy to f*ck everyone. It's just a very mature, developed financial services market.

    I don't buy the 'wealth' creation argument. People need financial services, and banks and other financial institutions, offer those. That service has an intrinsic value to an economy. Like any other service. There's a demand for it, and they offer it.

    Now, I can see the argument regarding top-heavy derivative markets - where derivative markets can be up to 10 time bigger than the value of the underlying. That doesn't make sense and when you get at that level, the value can indeed be illusionary.

    For sure, '07/08 shows we need more financial regulation. No-one's disputing that. But making out professional services, because they happen to be financial, add no value is clearly b*llocks.
    They provide value as long as they enable the real economy to function. Their withdrawal of credit forced the real economy into an overnight slump and at that point the financial sector had no value and a lot of drag on the real economy. Financial products have no extrinsic value such as you suggest since in the end all financial products are an attempt by the original lender to mitigate risk on the initial investment. That they manage to market them as something else shouldn't disguise the nature of what they peddle.

    The financial sector is socially neither benign nor neutral and to explain it all away as good ol'healthy profit making is fundamentally disingenuous considering the behaviour of banks and bankers who were willing to treat elected politicians with disdain up until the point when they needed to be bailed out. I don't think we have even got 50% through the economic reset that is in progress. ;)

Categories