Credit Agricole, Goldman, Henderson, Lehman, Natixis, RBS
The New York Times reports that Goldman Sachs still has the 'Teflon' factor. Despite the news Wednesday that the New York state Attorney General's Office was looking into the firm's underwriting of auction-rate securities sold by Fidelity Investments, and that analysts at Morgan Stanley and Atlantic Securities have slashed their earnings estimates for the firm by almost 50%, Goldman's stock barely moved - closing just 0.3% down on the day.
Reuters reports that fund management group Henderson posted $93.4m in first-half earnings Thursday, down from $110.8m in the same period last year.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Lehman Brothers has apologized for plagiarizing two Sandford C. Bernstein research reports. Lehman confirmed that several pages of text and graphics of a March 2008 report 'closely resembled' Bernstein research issued last year. Lehman has apologised to Bernstein, and the matter is now closed.
Bloomberg reports that French bank Natixis has posted a $1.5bn net loss in its second-quarter, after $2.2bn in writedowns and loan provisions. The bank is currently raising some $5.5bn in new capital to beef up its balance sheet.
Finally, the news that Stephen Hester, the CEO of British Land, is to join the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) board in October has fuelled rumors that he is being lined up as a possible successor to under fire bank boss Sir Fred Goodwin. Despite its problems, however, RBS is still on the lookout for key hires in strategic areas. Reuters reports that US debt arm, RBS Greenwich Capital, has just landed 16 bankers for its mortgage-backed securities team, 15 of them from Bear Stearns.
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