Yeah,we'd sure be doing good taking these chumps advise .Wonder if they were shorting POG?.Kinda like stock picking based on who's riding the "Big Dipper" at Disneyland.. Profits to all.BMD
INVESTMENT BANKING AUGUST 26, 2009, 4:38 AM Natixis Gets $50 Billion Guarantee on Toxic Assets BY Dealbook The French investment bank Natixis said on Wednesday that its partially state-owned parent company would guarantee about 35 billion euros in toxic assets on its books, in what amounts to a government-engineered reinforcement of its troubled finances, The New York Times’s David Jolly and Chris Nicholson reported.
B.P.C.E., which holds 70 percent of Natixis, will guarantee the loans, equivalent to $50 billion, in exchange for fees of 48 million euros a year, the companies said. The parent will take on the risk for 85 percent of the assets, with Natixis holding the remaining 15 percent.
Shares of Natixis, which were suspended Tuesday pending the announcement, soared 33 percent in Paris trading Wednesday afternoon.
B.P.C.E. was formed this year through the merger of Groupe Banque Populaire and Groupe Caisse d’Épargne, two French savings banks. François Pérol, a close ally of President Nicolas Sarkozy, was installed as its chief executive, as well as chairman of the Natixis board.
The government also invested 3 billion euros in B.P.C.E.’s preferred non-voting stock, giving it a 20 percent stake.
Groupe Banque Populaire and Groupe Caisse d’Épargne had already received a bailout from the French government, including more than 2 billion euros last October.
Natixis on Wednesday reported a second-quarter loss of 883 million euros. While that was down from a loss of more than €1 billion for the same period last year, it marked the fifth straight losing quarter for Natixis, which continues to write down its monoline bond insurance portfolio, asset-backed securities and collateralized debt obligations underpinned by subprime mortgages.
“I don’t think it’s the end of Natixis’s problems,” Alain Tchibozo, a banking analyst at ING Financial Markets in London, said. “But the risk of the company going bankrupt is now behind us.”
“It will be 10 years before we know the final cost,” he added.
Natixis was created in 2006 when Groupe Banque Populaire and Groupe Caisse d’Épargne combined their investment banking and asset management operations. But lacking the market strength of better-established rivals, Natixis ended up pursuing riskier, sometimes marginal business.
The company was badly hurt by the subprime crisis, and Mr. Pérol was brought in to arrange a shotgun wedding of its parent companies. He said later that the problems at Natixis had posed “a systemic risk,” justifying the government’s decision to forego a routine vetting of his candidacy by a parliamentary ethics panel.
The merger allowed Natixis to streamline its management and restructure along core business lines.
Laurent Mignon, Natixis’s chief executive, said in a conference call that Natixis hoped to be profitable in the third quarter.
