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Recently dismissed U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Preet Bharara, is suddenly being celebrated as an aggressive warrior in the fight against Wall Street corruption. Really? You could’ve fooled me. Perhaps I was in a coma when a string of big bank executives were arrested and sent to prison. No, what actually happened is one of the most powerful attorneys in the nation came up with a mealy-mouthed, cowardly rationale for why he let these financial thieves off the hook. Crain’s reports: Bharara was nowhere to be found when it came to charging the top executives whose...

Video Link -- Catherine Herridge on Fox reporting that Clinton leaked classified intel to Canadian bankers in one of her speeches.

Politics Election 2016 Several GOP Business Leaders Are Backing Clinton Democratic presidential candidate to get backing from executives, some of whom cite unease with Trump’s candidacy By Laura Meckler June 23, 2016 12:09 a.m. ET More than 50 business executives, including several longtime Republicans, endorsed Hillary Clinton for president on Thursday as her campaign seeks to capitalize on discomfort with Republican Donald Trump. They include Jim Cicconi, senior executive vice president at AT&T Services Inc., and Dan Akerson, who held top positions at General Motors Co. and Nextel Communications Inc. A Clinton campaign aide provided the list. The endorsements reflect...

April 6, 2016 Ivanka Trump Scarves Recalled Because Of "Burn Risk" Scarves made in China and sold as part of Ivanka Trump's fashion line are being recalled because they are too flammable and pose a "burn risk" to consumers. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission said Wednesday that no injuries have been reported. The recall involves about 20,000 rayon scarves, sold from October 2014 through January 2016 in department stores and online. They range in cost from $12 to $68. A representative for the Ivanka Trump brand, which includes clothing, accessories and fragrances, said that it is disappointed for the...

Saudis, Russia Agree to Freeze Oil Output; Iran Still Resists by Reuters Feb 16 2016, 9:34 am ET Top oil exporters Russia and Saudi Arabia agreed on Tuesday to freeze output levels but said the deal was contingent on other producers joining in - a major sticking point with Iran absent from the talks and determined to raise production. The Saudi, Russian, Qatari and Venezuelan oil ministers announced the proposal after a previously undisclosed meeting in Doha. It could become the first joint OPEC and non-OPEC deal in 15 years, aimed at tackling a growing oversupply of crude and helping...

Everybody hates bankers and Wall Street, and so politicians hate them too. Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) has made much of Hillary Clinton's Wall Street connections. "I don't know any progressive who has a super PAC and takes $15 million from Wall Street," Sanders has said. Hillary accuses Bernie of "innuendo." But they both want you to believe that "greedy bankers" rather than stupid government policy cause the Crash of 2008. So we need Dodd-Frank to keep the bankers tame and obedient. My thinking on greedy bankers diverged from the conventional wisdom many years ago when I read an article about...

When it comes to selling copy, it’s a good bet that sex trumps multilateral finance. That’s an axiom of human nature. It would be asking too much to expect that the media, or its customers, would be as fascinated by the in-house diplomacy of the International Monetary Fund as all concerned have been by the scandal surrounding the recently handcuffed and dethroned IMF managing director, Dominique Strauss-Kahn. Most eyes are now on the prosecutor’s cratering case, the curious past of the maid who alleged the sexual assault, and the media now analyzing its own coverage of these sordid events. But...

“Sure,” Cruz responded. “There is a lot of confusion and, unfortunately, a lot of misinformation you can get on the Internet that people are confused, so let’s explain what each of those three are.” Cruz, by saying that, was essentially making the exact same claim—blaming the Internet for what he argues is “misinformation”—as House Ways and Means Committee chairman Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI)...From there, Cruz aimed to separate TPA and TPP—but he didn’t mention the other, even more secretive trade agreements like T-TIP or TiSA, which would also be fast-tracked under TPA. TPP’s text is available for members of Congress...

NEW YORK – American Express said president Ed Gilligan died suddenly Friday after falling ill while flying on a corporate plane to New York. The credit card company said the 55-year-old executive was coming back from a business trip. The plane made an emergency landing in the U.S., an American Express spokeswoman said, but she declined to say where Gilligan had been.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, her Chief of Staff Cheryl Mills, and Sen. Bob Menendez (D., N.J.) supported a visa waiver for the daughter of a fugitive Ecuadorian banker in exchange for significant campaign contributions to the Democratic Party. On Tuesday, NBC 4 New York reported that Menendez, with express written support from Clinton, intervened on behalf of Estefania Isaías, who was banned from traveling to the U.S. due to accusations of visa fraud. Isaías is the daughter of Roberto Isaias, who lives in Miami and is currently fighting extradition to Ecuador for banking crimes and under investigation for...

There was a time when it was possible to ‘retire’ from investment banking in your 30s. That time has passed. As the the trajectory of banking careers changes, 30 has instead become the age at which you must be positioned at a firm that will see you through to your 40s and beyond. Swapping banks when you’re aged 30+ is increasingly challenging. Headhunters working across business areas bemoan the lack of recruitment beyond vice president (VP) level. “Banks have become incredibly cost-conscious,” says a partner at an M&A search boutique. “They’re not making a 25% return on equity any more...

Having already proven that their institutions are above the law in the aftermath of the financial crisis, executives at the “Too Big to Fail and Jail” banks have decided it’s time to teach Senate Democrats a lesson. Not being content with trillions in taxpayer backed bailouts to protect and further consolidate virtually all wealth within their oligarch fiefdoms, these bankers are irate at the notion that a commoner would dare criticize their unassailable crony privilege. However, the worst part of this story, is that while Warren is harsher than most of her completely bought and paid for colleagues, she is...

According to the initial investigations of the NTSB, which include witnesses at the scene, the driver exited the vehicle on the tracks to inspect it being hit by a crossing gate: Reports so far show that 49-year-old Ellen Brody crossed onto the tracks, when the crossing gate slammed down on the back of her vehicle. Instead of pulling through the intersection though, she got out to inspect the back of her car. It was when she got back in her car and started to pull forward that she was struck by the passing train – going 58mph. The crash led...

Janet Yellen, Obama, and Bernanke For sixty four years, the world enjoyed some degree of stability, perhaps greater than at any previous period in history, with the United States performing the expensive, but indispensable role of “stabilizer.”  There had been regional wars, and provincial atrocities often localized to sectarian disputes, but most of the world went about its business, criss-crossing oceans and borders to grow trade, or travelling to distant vacations.  9/11 changed behaviors, nevertheless, we continued on our paths, but did so with a little more caution on our air-travels.  Then, with the power of wealthy and powerful senior...

Following the deaths of 36 bankers last year, 2015 has got off to an inauspicious start with the reported suicide of Chris Van Eeghen - the 4th ABN Amro banker suicide in the last few years. As Quotenet reports, the death of Van Eghen  - the head of ABN's corporate finance and capital markets -"startled" friends and colleagues as the 42-year-old "had a great reputation" at work, came from an "illustrious family," and enjoyed national fame briefly as the boyfriend of a famous actress/model. As one colleague noted, "he was always cheerful, good mood, and apparently he had everything...

Amrish Mahajan, former president of failed Mutual Bank of Harvey and a major fundraiser for imprisoned former Gov. Rod Blagojevich, has been barred from future participation in the banking industry under a newly released regulatory order. Mr. Mahajan consented, without admitting or denying unsafe or unsound banking practices, to a May 1 order by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. prohibiting him from participating “in any manner” in the conduct of the affairs of any federally insured institution. ... Mr. Mahajan was known for his political connections, particularly to Mr. Blagojevich. Mutual Bank briefly entered the realm of national politics after...

A popular bike path became the scene of a gruesome murder late Thursday when a life insurance executive was killed while running near her Connecticut home. Melissa Millan, 54, a triathlete and mother of two, was found stabbed at about 8 p.m. in the Hartford suburb of Simsbury, Conn. Police have stepped up patrols of the bike path and scoured the area on Saturday, but no suspect has been named and the murder weapon has not been recovered, WFSB reported. Millan, a senior vice president who had been with MassMutual Financial Group since 2001, was transported to an area hospital,...

here was no knife recovered at the scene, leading officials to suspect the death was not a suicide, and they were trying to determine who had access to his apartment. One-bedroom apartments at the building are listed at more than $1 million.

PRESS RELEASE NOVEMBER 14, 2014 ROBBER BARON BANKERS: Scam $1.3 Quadrillion/yr November 14, 2014 – Reuters reported yesterday: “Regulators fined six major banks including Citigroup (C.N) and UBS (UBSN.VX) a total of $4.3 billion for failing to stop traders from trying to manipulate the foreign exchange market, following a year-long global investigation. HSBC (HSBA.L), Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS.L), JP Morgan (JPM.N) and Bank of America (BAC.N) also face penalties resulting from the inquiry that has put the largely unregulated $5 trillion-a-day market on a tighter leash, accelerated the push to automate trading and ensnared the Bank of England.” See:...

Tyler Durden 11/11/2014 A funny thing happened on the way to the ‘end’ of the multi-trillion dollar bond buying program known as QE - the Fed chronicles. Aside from the shift to a globalization of QE via the European Central Bank (ECB) and Bank of Japan (BOJ) as I wrote about earlier, what lingers in the air of “post-taper” time is an absence of absence. For QE is not over. Instead, in the United States, the process has simply morphed from being predominantly executed by the Federal Reserve (Fed) to being executed by its major private bank members. Fed Chair,...