Goldman May Become Proper Investment Bank Again
And The Financial Times reports that the sale of BGI will mean that investment banking arm Barclays Capital will get an even higher profile within Barclays Group, as the UK bank strives to beef up profits without one of its crown jewels.
Not everyone is convinced, however, that Barclays will have it easy. The newspaper quotes Sandy Chen, an analyst over at Panmure Gordon, who said in a note to clients: 'Our concerns are longer-term, and relate to sustainability of the remaining group's earnings.....the remaining group will be highly exposed to the risks of increased dependency on the volatile earnings stream from BarCap, and rising impairments on the lending businesses'.
The Financial Times reports that Morgan Stanley and Citi may have to wait up to 2 years to get the most out of their $14bn brokerage joint venture, as it is likely to take that long for the firms to integrate their IT systems.
The newspaper also reports that Bank of America is to launch a $10m print and online advertising campaign this week, which will extol the virtues of Merrill Lynch. Merrill staff will no doubt be miffed - that's another $10m that could have gone in their bonus pot!
And The Daily Telegraph reports that ICAP CEO Michael Spencer saw his compensation fall $3.93 in the firm's last financial year, even though ICAP managed to marginally increase its profitability. Spencer, however, still managed to bag $11m (including long-term incentive awards).
Finally, The Independent reports that City Minister Lord Myners is determined to fight the EU to ensure that tighter hedge fund regulation won't simply mean that the industry ups sticks and quits London. Heaven forbid we lose the tax revenues!