by ilene - July 23rd, 2010 4:48 pm
Courtesy of Jr. Deputy Accountant
So let me make sure I have this right because Lord knows I’ve been drinking more than usual lately. Feinberg spent months putting together this report only to discover 17 firms had paid out $1.8 billion in questionable bonuses but then comes out and says he’s not going to do anything about it.
What the f*ck are we paying this guy for then?
WSJ:
U.S. "pay czar" Kenneth Feinberg on Friday declined to request 17 financial firms that doled out $1.6 billion in "ill advised" executive compensation to return the excessive payouts, saying to do so would be unfair to the companies and could trigger private lawsuits and additional Congressional investigation.
Mr. Feinberg released a report that found 17 firms—including Goldman Sachs Group Inc., J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup Inc.—made the bonus-like payouts to top executives in late 2008 and early 2009 even as the companies were receiving taxpayer assistance.
Mr. Feinberg, the Obama administration’s special master for compensation, said he deemed these payments as "ill advised" both for the sheer amount—some individual payouts exceed $10 million, he said—and the lack of reasonable rationale for their payment.
Other firms Mr. Feinberg criticized for poor judgment included: American Express Co., American International Group Inc., Bank of America Corp., Boston Private Financial Holdings Inc., Capital One Financial Corp., CIT Group Inc., M&T Bank Corp., Regions Financial Corp., Sun Trust Banks Inc., Bank of New York Mellon Corp., Morgan Stanley, PNC Financial Services Group Inc., U.S. Bancorp and Wells Fargo & Co.
"Lack of reasonable rationale" hahahahaha. Maybe we should charge Obama with that for giving this guy a fake job patrolling payouts in the first place.
Tags: BofA, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, Kenneth Feinberg, Obama, Pay Czar, poor judgment
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by ilene - October 25th, 2009 2:31 am
Courtesy of Robert Reich of Robert Reich’s Blog
At a conference in London, a Goldman Sachs international adviser, Brian Griffiths, praised inequality. As his company was putting aside $16.7 billion for compensation and benefits in the first nine months of 2009, up 46 percent from a year earlier, Griffiths told us not to worry. “We have to tolerate the inequality as a way to achieve greater prosperity and opportunity for all,” he said.
Eight months ago it looked as if Wall Street was in store for strong financial regulation — oversight of derivative trading, pay linked to long-term performance, much higher capital requirements, an end to conflicts of interest (i.e. credit rating agencies being paid by the very companies whose securities they’re rating), and even resurrection of the Glass-Steagall Act separating commercial from investment banking.
Today, Congress is struggling to produce the tiniest shards of regulation that would at least give the appearance of doing something to rein in the Street.
What happened in the intervening months? Two things. First, America’s attention wandered. We’re now focusing on health care, Letterman’s frolics, and little boys who hide in attics rather than balloons. And, hey, the Dow is up again. The politicians who put off Wall Street regulation for ten months knew that the public would probably lose interest by now.
Second, the banks keep paying off Congress. The big guns on Wall Street increased their political donations last month after increasing their lobbying muscle. Morgan Stanley’s Political Action Committee donated $110,000 in September, for example, of which Democrats got $43,000.
Official Wall Street PAC donations are piddling compared to the tens of millions of dollars that Wall Street executives dole out to candidates on their own (or with a gentle nudge from their firms). Remember — the Street is where the money is. Executives and traders on the Street have become the single biggest sources of money for Democrats as well as Republicans. And with mid-term elections looming next year, you can bet every member of Congress has a glint in his or her eye directed at the Street.
That’s why the President went to Wall Street to raise money Tuesday night, gleaning about $2 million for the effort. He politely asked the crowd to cooperate with reform — “If there are members of…
Tags: Brian Griffiths, campaign contributions, Financial Regulation, Goldman Sachs, Ken Feinberg, lobbyists, Pay Czar, Politics, Robert Reich, Wall Street
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by ilene - September 26th, 2009 10:36 am
Courtesy of Lawrence Delevingne at Clusterstock
Relax TARP execs, the mobs aren’t coming for you.
Reuters: President Barack Obama’s "pay czar" said on Friday he will not cap compensation for the top employees at bailed-out companies, and will not reveal names, when he releases the first wave of decisions within a few weeks.
"We don’t want specific names next to dollars," said Kenneth Feinberg, who was appointed in June to decide compensation packages for the highest-paid personnel at companies that received U.S. government bailouts.
So Kenneth Feinberg has probably taken the first step towards making his office irrelevent, though theoretically he still has the power to intervene when a pay package is somehow excessive or likely to induce risk. In reality, he probably won’t do much of anything.
Folks, the pay issue is fading, even if the G20 promises a "coordinated effort ."
At least until Michael Moore’s "Capitalism" drops in October…
See Also:
Citi Is Pissed Off About The Pay Czar’s Comp Restrictions (C)
Obama’s Pay Czar Ready To Crack Heads On Wall Street
Pandit Says He’s Embarrassed By Andrew Hall’s $100 Million Bonus (C)
Tags: AIG, Bailout, Bonus, bonuses, capitalism, compensation, Financial Crisis, Michael Moore, Pay Czar, Payment Plan, regulation, TARP, Wall Street
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by ilene - June 10th, 2009 2:28 pm
[Sign up for free membership and PSW Reports - click here, no credit card, instant access to articles. - Ilene]
Another twilight zone episode, courtesy of Mish. Maybe we’ll have a marathon.
The Obama administration on Wednesday will name a ‘pay czar’ with power to reject compensation plans at companies receiving "exceptional" government aid, an administration official said on Wednesday.
The administration will also call for "say-on-pay" legislation that would give the Securities and Exchange Commission authority to require public companies to hold nonbinding shareholder votes each year on executive pay, the official said.
The pay czar, or "special master," will review compensation structures for the top 100 salaried employees of firms receiving exceptional assistance, the official said.
Obama Tells American Businesses to Drop Dead
Kevin Hassett at Bloomberg writes Obama Tells American Businesses to Drop Dead.
I’ve finally figured out the Obama economic strategy. President Barack Obama and his team have been having so much fun wielding dictatorial power while rescuing “failed” firms, that they have developed a scheme to gain the same power over every business. The plan is to enact policies that are so anticompetitive that every firm needs a bailout.
Once that happens, their new pay czar Kenneth Feinberg can set the wage for everybody and Rahm Emanuel can stack the boards of all of our companies with his political cronies.
Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer came to Washington to announce what Microsoft would do if Obama’s multinational tax policy is enacted.
“It makes U.S. jobs more expensive,” Ballmer said, “We’re better off taking lots of people and moving them out of the U.S.” If Microsoft, perhaps our most competitive company, has to abandon the U.S. in order to continue to thrive, who exactly is going to stay?
Hassett is talking about Obama’s proposal to end the deferral of multinational taxation.
I have a simple suggestion. Instead of taxing American businesses to death in the United States, why don’t we eliminate corporate income taxes in the US altogether? That way, businesses would not have an incentive to hide profits, waste money inventing schemes to defer profits,
…
Tags: auto industry, FDIC, Federal Reserve, GM, Obama, Pay Czar
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Will the Obama administration’s meddling in the affairs of business ever end? That’s what I am asking as I read 
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