Wall Street bonuses to rise by 40 percent

[Hannah Bell]

The authors of the biggest financial catastrophe in world history—executives and traders at US investment and commercial banks—will see their year-end bonuses rise by an average of 40 percent compared to last year, according to a report issued Wednesday by Johnson Associates, a Wall Street-based compensation consulting firm.

Traders in stocks, bonds and derivatives are likely to significantly exceed even that lofty average, with projected bonuses 60 percent higher than in 2008, the company said. Wall Street is making the bulk of its profits this year from such financial speculation, not from more traditional lending to finance business activities in industry and commerce...

In a considerable understatement, the bonus survey said that the banks were “outpacing recovery of broader economy.” In 2008, Wall Street firms awarded more than $20 billion in bonuses in the midst of the greatest financial crash since 1929. This year, according to the published estimate, the bonus pool could reach $28 billion.

The Wall Street Journal, in its article on the survey, reported, “A typical senior fixed-income trader can expect a total pay package of about $930,000 in cash and stock, compared with a package last year of about $695,000.”

The bonuses for executives at the leading investment houses are in seven and eight figures—Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein, for instance, made over $50 million last year—while hedge fund operators have raked in as much as $1 billion compensation for a single year of “work...”

Just what Wall Street traders actually do for a living was underscored by the announcement Wednesday by J.P. Morgan Securities that it will forfeit $722 million in fees and penalties stemming from the bribing of government officials in Jefferson County, Alabama (Birmingham), to buy derivatives from Morgan and sell county bonds through it.



http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/nov2009/bonu-n06.shtml

[tabatha]

1. Disgusting!

They nearly brought the world financial system to a halt.

[dana_b]

2. what's new...

not a damn thing

[Egnever]

3. Good !

That ought to just about seal their fate when it comes time for Financial regulation.

[Hannah Bell]

4. how do you figure? the gov't continues to shovel them money & free passes.

doesn't look like there's much will to regulate.

[Egnever]

8. Regulation is next on the agenda after health care

should be pretty good timing actually, right about when these bonuses start to be paid off. The public outrage will hopefully help make the regulation stronger.

[Hannah Bell]

10. keep dreaming your hopeful dream. if i knew you, i'd bet you $100 no

meaningful regulation will emerge.

the "good timing" for regulation was in the wake of the crash, when they were handing out government largesse.

[Egnever]

18. Well color me shocked that you would bet against regulation happening

I mean thats pretty much your schtick isnt it? Betting against this administration?

[Hannah Bell]

22. right, & i'm a puma, i want a pony, i don't understand chess, besides which, i'm a

lousy trot.

take your pick of lies, mr. ad hom.

sure, the reason obama's cabinet is full of wall streeters, the reason the first thing he did is bail out the moneymen -- it's all because he plans to regulate the street once he wraps this health care thing up.

just like the fact that his big campaign funders are all simultaneously funding charter school initiatives & his ed head ran chicago's charter effort shows his support for public ed.

delusional.

nixon was the last president who tried to make policy outside his sponsors' agenda.

[Egnever]

26. Obama doesnt write the laws

did you forget that part?

[Hannah Bell]

30. did i say he did somewhere? please point it out.

contrary to your apparent assumptions, it's not all about obama.

[Egnever]

35. You are the one going on about the administration

When we are talking about regulation that is to follow health care reform. Why do you keep going on about them if you arent trying to imply they bare the ones driving the legislation ?

[IDFbunny]

5. Have they no shame?

[Hannah Bell]

6. interesting thing about psychopaths. things you & i might feel ashamed of, they think proves their

superiority.

in their eyes, getting away with it means *you're* the boob.

[IDFbunny]

7. Most of feel a twinge of shane when we take the last piece of cake

when there isn't enough to go around. As in taking very limited flu shots.

Marie Antoinette comes to mind.

[Divine Discontent]

13. have we no gov't to protect us?

[Autumn]

42. No, they are very busy protecting

"them." No time for us, well maybe later.

[wroberts189]

19. No ..actually they feel quite above us all and more deserving....

Their motto..

"Greed is good"

[SammyWinstonJack]

38. NONE! And worse, they believe they are ENTITLED too!

:puke:

[chill_wind]

9. "$930,000 in cash and stock, compared with a package last year of about $695,000.”

Think about that.


Still waiting for the average American to have one collectively final, ultimate WTF!!! moment.

Still...waiting.

[Hannah Bell]

11. million-dollar bonuses for the fuckers who took down the world economy.

meanwhile, employed US workers lose 1.5% of their compensation, not to mention the 10% unemployed.

not to mention the more severe losses elsewhere in the world.

[chill_wind]

14. Well .."Thank Gawd it passed!" And thank gawd for Timmy

and Summers and the big crackdown and all.

All hail!

[Divine Discontent]

12. Seriously, why don't they just tie us all down and suck the blood from our bodies???

[wroberts189]

17. It must not be profitable. nt

[Divine Discontent]

21. true... since we have no $ to buy it back, what's the use. How they get away with literally

raping the country as a whole, is beyond me. So many people are made to suffer because they jack up profits on products, and pay as little as possible. The few union jobs that are left are at risk, as many union jobs have been lost to, whaddayaknow - overseas outsourcing.

[wroberts189]

25. And the funny thing is eventually they will cause their own demise.

Rome.. French revolution ..etc etc etc etc.

On edit ...you would think they would think long term. You do not clear cut the forest ...you selectively cut.

Maybe they know the planet is basically doomed.

[Hannah Bell]

20. now you see where the rumors about "lizard people" come from.

there may be something to it.

[Divine Discontent]

24. ah... true true...

[wroberts189]

28. Ya know.. as crazy as it is what else can explain these idiots?..

Whatever they are they could care less about us, the future, or the planet.

[Hannah Bell]

31. lol. ever since i saw that movie, "they live," i think of the ruling class

& their shills like that, & wish i had some of those glasses.

they're inbred little shits, you know. possibly there is some lizard in the mix.

[wroberts189]

33. "They Live" ...That was an excellent movie...

I loved it. A cult classic.

[blindpig]

40. or something...

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41130XPQ1QL._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-sticker-arrow-click,TopRight,35,-76_AA240_SH20_OU01_.jpg

Newitz tracks the monsters spawned by capitalism through b movies, Hollywood blockbusters, pulp fiction, and American literary classics, looking at their manifestations in works such as Norman Mailer’s “true life novel” The Executioner’s Song; the short stories of Isaac Asimov and H. P. Lovecraft; the cyberpunk novels of William Gibson and Marge Piercy; true-crime books about the serial killers Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer; and movies including Modern Times (1936), Donovan’s Brain (1953), Night of the Living Dead (1968), RoboCop (1987), The Silence of the Lambs (1991), and Artificial Intelligence: AI (2001). Newitz shows that as literature and film tell it, the story of American capitalism since the late nineteenth century is a tale of body-mangling, soul-crushing horror.

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41130XPQ1QL._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-sticker-arrow-click,TopRight,35,-76_AA240_SH20_OU01_.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.amazon.com/Pretend-Were-Dead-Capitalist-Monsters/dp/0822337452&usg=__59Sr84jbO_iuIbKR6yD67zbJSMo=&h=240&w=240&sz=13&hl=en&start=1&tbnid=xIx6e6XjeJNihM:&tbnh=110&tbnw=110&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dcapitalist%2Bmonsters%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Den

[jtrockville]

32. Blood doesn't satisfy greed. I'm waiting for them to seize our PAYCHECKS

Oh wait. They already have.

[earth mom]

15. Ill gotten gains on the taxpayers dime! Fuckers!

:puke:

[wroberts189]

16. Anyone have an old tv I can smash on the ground ? knr/nt

[Divine Discontent]

23. actually ---- YES! My friend just drove away with one I gave her that she really doesn't need for

too long! so, yes, I do! come in get it, I wanna watch you drop it, first for anger release, and second, so we can send the video into Letterman, maybe he'll go drop some stuff from a building for us like he used to...

[wroberts189]

27. Ok ..get a video camera...

First I am going to manually smash it against concrete.

Then I will smash what is left with a rock pick.

Then I will stomp on it. And scream.

It will be a good show.


Err.. then I will clean it all up :)

[Divine Discontent]

29. what fun!!! we'll sell tickets. might as well get some green in our pockets finally! hehe

[wroberts189]

34. Tell you what .. I will scream Glen Becks name as I smash the tv to oblivion....

We will become a Youtube sensation...!

Seriously... if I had the money and time I would buy a damn tv to smash and pay for it all.

I got the private concrete pavement.

I just got a thought "someday Jennifer someday" ...."Back to the future" movie ..Marty is wanting a truck.. great movie.

If I had billions I would be a serious thorn in their side.

Just millions and I could mess up things for these jerks ...I could fund candidates now. Hire Detectives ..reporters.. ..even the pubs (they will do anything for money).

Still waiting on that powerball ticket...

[Divine Discontent]

44. hehehe. just think of how batshit crazy we could have you be on the vid, sadly the frustration

would be realistic, but screaming Glenn Beck over & over would be comedy GOLD, Jerry! (Seinfeld scene)

Yeah, these most disgusting people who vote against our causes, um, rich Dems can't hire a couple private eyes to dig into their doings? You need to win that powerball!

[Octafish]

36. Something's very much wrong with America.

Is this even America anymore?

Battling Wall Street : The Kennedy Presidency

"Money trumps peace. Eh-uh, sometimes." -- George W Bush

[ljm2002]

37. Because they *deserve* it...

...don't you see? They should reap big rewards because they took a lot of *risk* (with other people's money...). They work 80-hour weeks! They're virtuous (not like those lazy factory workers who deserved to have their pensions taken away...)

Oh I could go on and on but we all know how it goes these days.

Let them eat mud cakes.

[Xenotime]

39. Time for complete government regulation and control of the stock market..

Those profits could go towards welfare or healthcare. Not the pockets of rich fucks.

[Kansas Wyatt]

41. Okay.... What changed again, when we voted for change?

When can we expect our 'hope' to kick in?

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

43. Corporate welfare is now chic and PC on DU because it's our guys caving to the bankers. K&R