Sunday, 5 July 2009

Goldman Sachs and Bubbles

Goldman Sachs Tower.


Goldman Sachs was founded in 1869 by German Jewish immigrant Marcus Goldman.[2]

In 1882, Goldman's son-in-law Samuel Sachs joined the firm.[3]

On 4 December 1928, Goldman sachs launched the Goldman Sachs Trading Corp. a closed-end fund with characteristics similar to that of a Ponzi scheme.

The fund failed as a result of the Stock Market Crash of 1929.

On 2 July 2009, Matt Taibbi, at Rollingstone.com, told us how how 'Goldman Sachs has engineered every major market manipulation since the Great Depression.'

Matt Taibbi: How GoldmanSachs Seized Washington

Among the points made:

1. Goldman Sachs is the world's most powerful investment bank.

2. 'Goldman Sachs has engineered every major market manipulation since the Great Depression.'

3. There is a two-tiered investment system - one for the insiders, and the other for the ordinary investor who is tricked into to buying investments at soaring prices which the banks know are too high.

4. Think of the profits to be made from selling houses to people who cannot afford them.

5. Think of the money to be made from huge rises in oil prices.

Goldman persuaded pension funds and other large institutional investors to invest in oil futures.

6. Henry Paulson was CEO of Goldman.

Henry Paulson was George Bush's last Treasury secretary.

Henry Paulson was the architect of the bailout, a plan to give trillions of Dollars to a handful of old friends on Wall Street.

Robert Rubin worked for Goldman for 26 years.

Robert Rubin became Bill Clinton's Treasury secretary.

People who worked for Goldman include:

The heads of the Canadian and Italian national banks,

the head of the World Bank,

the head of the New York Stock Exchange,

and the last two heads of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

It was Robert Rubin who believed that the American economy and the financial markets were over-regulated and needed to be set free.

7. Former Treasury secretary Paulson decided to let Lehman Brothers — one of Goldman's last real competitors — collapse without intervention.

8. Barack Obama's leading private campaign donor was Goldman Sachs.

Obama's Treasury chief of staff Mark Patterson and CFTC chief Gary Gensler both worked for Goldman.

9. The next bubble is in carbon credits.

The new carbon-credit market is 'a virtual repeat of the commodities-market casino that's been kind to Goldman'.

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