Article: Turkey fines firms over short selling irregularities

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Turkey fines firms over short selling irregularities

Reuters, 01 April 2021

Turkey fined 10 securities firms for up to 7.8 million lira ($1 million) in relation to irregularities in short-selling transactions, the country’s Capital Markets Board said in its weekly bulletin on Thursday.

Fines of various amounts were imposed on firms including Merrill Lynch International, JP Morgan Securities, Goldman Sachs International, Credit Suisse Securities Europe and Barclays Capital Securities, the statement said.

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Article: In Archegos fire sale, Credit Suisse, Nomura burned by slow exit

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In Archegos fire sale, Credit Suisse, Nomura burned by slow exit

Matt Scuffham, Elizabeth Dilts Marshall, Brenna Hughes Neghaiwi, 31 March 2021

NEW YORK/ZURICH (Reuters) -While banks including Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Deutsche Bank were able to exit their trades with Archegos Capital relatively unscathed, Credit Suisse and Nomura have been burned in the fire sale.

The blowup of the Archegos fund, a family office run by former Tiger Asia manager Bill Hwang, is still reverberating across the financial system, with global banks so far standing to lose more than $6 billion.

Switzerland’s Credit Suisse and Japan’s Nomura are expected to bear the brunt of that. Continue reading “Article: In Archegos fire sale, Credit Suisse, Nomura burned by slow exit”

Article:SEC Opens Probe Into Archegos Chaos, Deutsche Bank Confirms ‘Quick Sale’ To Avoid All Losses

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SEC Opens Probe Into Archegos Chaos, Deutsche Bank Confirms ‘Quick Sale’ To Avoid All Losses

TYLER DURDEN, 31 March 2021

As more details from the now infamous debacle surrounding Tiger cub Archegos, whose massive derivative-based exposures spilled out into the open and transformed into the biggest and most painful rolling margin call to hit Wall Street since Lehman, we now know that at least six Prime Brokers scrambled to unwind the biggest hedge fund blowup since LTCM without hammering the overall market.

To “make a living in this business… be first, be smarter, or cheat…”

We previously noted that Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs were the “first” to break ranks and rejected the efforts of Credit Suisse’s emissaries who tried to create consensus to unwind the positions without sparking a panic.

As we now also know, Nomura and Credit Suisse which dithered and were unsure what to do, seeing their stock crushed and their counterparty risk hedge premia explode higher.. Continue reading “Article:SEC Opens Probe Into Archegos Chaos, Deutsche Bank Confirms ‘Quick Sale’ To Avoid All Losses”

Article: Report: SEC Opens Preliminary Investigation Into Archegos’ Bill Hwang After $30 Billion Stock Liquidation

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Report: SEC Opens Preliminary Investigation Into Archegos’ Bill Hwang After $30 Billion Stock Liquidation

Sarah Hansen, 31 March 2021

TOPLINE The Securities and Exchange Commission has opened a preliminary investigation into Sung Kook “Bill Hwang,” whose Archegos Capital Management roiled markets by defaulting on risky margin calls last week and prompted $30 billion in losses, Bloomberg reported Wednesday.

Archegos defaulted on highly leveraged margin calls last Friday, triggering a fire sale of some $30 billion in stocks including ViacomCBS, Baidu, Tencent Music Entertainment and Discovery Communications as banks rushed to unwind their positions. Credit Suisse and Nomura—two of the firm’s brokers—warned this week of “significant losses.” Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley were also forced to liquidate the positions they held for Archegos, but did so more quickly than other banks and as a result saw smaller losses, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday. Continue reading “Article: Report: SEC Opens Preliminary Investigation Into Archegos’ Bill Hwang After $30 Billion Stock Liquidation”

Article: One of World’s Greatest Hidden Fortunes Is Wiped Out in Days

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One of World’s Greatest Hidden Fortunes Is Wiped Out in Days

Katherine Burton and Tom Maloney,  30 March 2021

From his perch high above Midtown Manhattan, just across from Carnegie Hall, Bill Hwang was quietly building one of the world’s greatest fortunes.

Even on Wall Street, few ever noticed him — until suddenly, everyone did.

Hwang and his private investment firm, Archegos Capital Management, are now at the center of one of the biggest margin calls of all time — a multibillion-dollar fiasco involving secretive market bets that were dangerously leveraged and unwound in a blink. Continue reading “Article: One of World’s Greatest Hidden Fortunes Is Wiped Out in Days”

Article: Wall Street Giants Beat Treasury Auction Rigging MDL

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Wall Street Giants Beat Treasury Auction Rigging MDL

Dean Seal, 30 March 2021

A New York federal judge ruled Wednesday that he has yet to see any direct evidence that Wall Street banks including Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse conspired to manipulate the $14 trillion market for securities issued by the U.S. Treasury Department.

U.S. District Judge Paul G. Gardephe dismissed long-running multidistrict litigation accusing a group of banks that also included JPMorgan Chase and Morgan Stanley of rigging auctions for Treasury Department bonds and other securities, on top of reducing competition in a secondary market for those securities. Continue reading “Article: Wall Street Giants Beat Treasury Auction Rigging MDL”

Article: A “Very Surprised” JPMorgan Calculates The Damage From The Archegos Collapse

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A “Very Surprised” JPMorgan Calculates The Damage From The Archegos Collapse

TYLER DURDEN,  30 March 2021

Unlike the devastating London Whale debacle in 2012, which was all JPMorgan eventually drawn and quartered quite theatrically before Congress (and was a clear explanation of how banks used Fed reserves to manipulate markets, something most market participants had no idea was possible), this time JPMorgan was nowhere to be found in the aftermath of the historic margin call that destroyed hedge fund Archegos. Which is may explain why JPMorgan bank analyst Kian Abouhossein admits he is quite “puzzled” by the recent fallout from the Archegos implosion (or maybe JPM simply was not a Prime Broker of the notorious Tiger cub), which however does not prevent him from trying to calculate the capital at risk from the Archegos collapse. Continue reading “Article: A “Very Surprised” JPMorgan Calculates The Damage From The Archegos Collapse”

Article: Financial Capitalism: The Endgame

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Financial Capitalism: The Endgame

TYLER DURDEN,  30 March 2021


In 2008, we had the opportunity, collectively, to reboot a broken financial system so it became fit for purpose.

But instead of reconfiguring finance to serve the real economy politicians and central bankers used quantitative easing to buy time which lulled the mainstream media into reporting that everything was back on track. Some people haven’t bought that story.

Marc Friederich and Matthias Weik are two economists who didn’t succumb to groupthink after the 2008 crash and now see financial capitalism’s end game.

Friedrich explained to Renegade Inc. that the authors’ intention is to help translate the complexity of a financial system by inverting it into a language that everybody understands. Having studied economics, and as children of the dot com bubble, the authors of four best-selling books in Germany, stress the important role sarcasm and dark humour play in their work in respect to making seemingly complex matters accessible to the wider public. Continue reading “Article: Financial Capitalism: The Endgame”

Article: Banking Stocks Credit Suisse, Nomura Reeling From Archegos Hedge Fund Fire Sale

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Banking Stocks Credit Suisse, Nomura Reeling From Archegos Hedge Fund Fire Sale

ADELIA CELLINI LINECKER,  29 March 2021

Investment banks Nomura (NMR), Credit Suisse (CS) and possibly others are on the hook for billions of dollars in losses as Archegos Capital Management hedge fund was forced to dump more shares Monday to meet liquidity minimums. Nomura and Credit Suisse stocks plunged more than 10%.

Among the companies affected by the fire sale that started last week are ViacomCBS (VIAC) and Discovery Communications (DISCA). Their shares sank more than 25% on Friday.

Archegos has sold nearly $30 billion in shares so far to meet a margin call. A broker makes a margin call to require a client to add funds to its account if the value of it drops below a certain level. The client, in this case Archegos, has to liquidate investments to meet that requirement. Continue reading “Article: Banking Stocks Credit Suisse, Nomura Reeling From Archegos Hedge Fund Fire Sale”

Article: How Goldman And Other Wall Street Giants Loaned Billions To Someone Who Traded Like A Meme Stock Gambler

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How Goldman And Other Wall Street Giants Loaned Billions To Someone Who Traded Like A Meme Stock Gambler

Kevin Dowd,  29 March 2021

Imagine if Goldman Sachs GS -0.5% lent a billion dollars to RoaringKitty.

News about margin calls is once again roiling markets. Except this time, instead of industry outsiders like Robinhood and RoaringKitty, a leading GameStop bull on WallStreetBets subreddit, the drama centers on traditional giants of the financial establishment. Continue reading “Article: How Goldman And Other Wall Street Giants Loaned Billions To Someone Who Traded Like A Meme Stock Gambler”

Article: The Firm Behind The $30 Billion Firesale Shaking Financial Markets Disclosed Almost Nothing

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The Firm Behind The $30 Billion Firesale Shaking Financial Markets Disclosed Almost Nothing

Antoine Gara,  28 March 2021

Up until recently, the website of Archegos Capital Management, the firm behind a reported $30 billion financial firesale that is battering stocks worldwide, contained a giant image of Central Park. The vista displayed on Archegos’ webpage was a fitting homage to the views of its offices atop a Manhattan skyscraper on 57th street, until the site was taken down as the firm gets liquidated.

Archegos was a giant in U.S. financial markets, apparently holding tens of billions of dollars in securities, including massive exposures to companies like ViacomCBS, Discovery Communications and Baidu. It traded with Wall Street’s largest brokerages, and was headquartered at an expensive address housing many powerhouse investment firms. But when it came to routine financial disclosures, Archegos was virtually non-existent.

Forbes searched for a trace of Archegos on the Securities and Exchange Commission’s repository for securities filings, called EDGAR, short for Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis, and Retrieval. Amazingly, almost nothing came up. Continue reading “Article: The Firm Behind The $30 Billion Firesale Shaking Financial Markets Disclosed Almost Nothing”

Article: Supreme Court to decide whether Goldman Sachs shareholders can bring suit in major fraud case

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Supreme Court to decide whether Goldman Sachs shareholders can bring suit in major fraud case

Tucker Higgins, 28 March 2021

The Supreme Court is set to hear arguments from Goldman Sachs in a long-running case that could have major implications for shareholders seeking to bring securities-fraud lawsuits.

Arguments are scheduled to begin at 10 a.m. ET Monday and will be streamed live as the court continues to meet remotely as a precaution against Covid-19.

The case, which dates to the Great Recession, concerns statements that the investment bank made while it was marketing “Abacus,” an investment known as a synthetic collateralized debt obligation. Continue reading “Article: Supreme Court to decide whether Goldman Sachs shareholders can bring suit in major fraud case”

Article: Archegos Fallout Begins: Nomura Crashes 15% After Reporting Record $2BN Loss From “Transactions With US Client”

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Archegos Fallout Begins: Nomura Crashes 15% After Reporting Record $2BN Loss From “Transactions With US Client”

TYLER DURDEN,  28 March 2021

(Bloomberg) — Back in May 2016, Japanese mega-bank Nomura, announced that it had suffered its biggest-ever loss in history (of a rather tame by Western standards $40 million) from a single client, and which it then quickly blamed on an “incompetent” bond trader. Fast forward to today, when Nomura just suffered a far, far greater loss from a single client, this one is anything but boring.

Early on Monday local time, Nomura Holdings said it may have incurred a “significant loss” arising from transactions with a U.S. client.

The estimated amount of the claim against the client is about $2 billion based on market prices as of March 26, the Japanese brokerage said in a statement. The estimate is “subject to change depending on unwinding of the transactions and fluctuations in market prices.” Continue reading “Article: Archegos Fallout Begins: Nomura Crashes 15% After Reporting Record $2BN Loss From “Transactions With US Client””

Article: Goldman Sold $10.5 Billion of Stocks in Block-Trade Spree

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Goldman Sold $10.5 Billion of Stocks in Block-Trade Spree

Bei Hu, Gillian Tan and Drew Singer,  27 March 2021

(Bloomberg) — Goldman Sachs Group Inc. liquidated $10.5 billion worth of stocks in block trades on Friday, part of an extraordinary spree of selling that erased $35 billion from the values of bellwether stocks ranging from Chinese technology giants to U.S. media conglomerates.

The Wall Street bank sold $6.6 billion worth of shares of Baidu Inc., Tencent Music Entertainment Group and Vipshop Holdings Ltd. before the market opened in the U.S, according to an email to clients seen by Bloomberg News.

That move was followed by the sale of $3.9 billion of shares in ViacomCBS Inc., Discovery Inc., Farfetch Ltd., iQiyi Inc. and GSX Techedu Inc., the email said.

More of the unregistered stock offerings were said to be managed by Morgan Stanley, according to people familiar with the matter, on behalf of one or more undisclosed shareholders. Some of the trades exceeded $1 billion in individual companies, calculations based on Bloomberg data show. Continue reading “Article: Goldman Sold $10.5 Billion of Stocks in Block-Trade Spree”

Article: In Cramer We Trust

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In Cramer We Trust

HARRISON R. T. WARD,  24 March 2021

Without trust, markets break down. The U.S. dollar is a fiat currency, which means that its value is derived from the trust we ascribe to our government; as that trust wanes, Americans turn away from traditional financial institutions. During the 2008 financial crisis, many everyday Americans, unsure of who to trust, took their money out of banks en masse. Large commercial banks began to fail; by 2012, almost 450 banks had collapsed. Today, deep into a historic pandemic and recession marked by political division, Americans’ trust is waning again.

On Jan. 27, a group of amateur traders helped push the stock of struggling video game retailer Gamestop to a price of $347 per share. Alarmed, financial experts took to the air to warn against what Alan Greenspan, former chair of the Federal Reserve, calls “irrational exuberance” — an unreasonable, optimistic view that the market will keep rising. Jim J. Cramer ’77, host of CNBC’s finance show “Mad Money,” was of those exasperated experts — “People begin to think, ‘Are prices real?’” he exclaimed on the air. Continue reading “Article: In Cramer We Trust”

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