Wall $treet Folly

The perks keep getting eliminated at Goldman Sachs

First there were reports that bottled water and soft drinks were no longer free to Goldman Sachs employees.  Now we hear they're twisting the screws even further to slash costs.  You're gonna have to work longer to get that freebie meal and cab ride home, at least if you're in the UK. The Times of London reports:

A spokesman said: “When times get tough, any prudent company more aggressively manages expenses.”

In London, at the bank’s European headquarters on Fleet Street, Goldman circulated a memo entitled Policy Changes - Evening Meals and Taxis, in which it bemoaned the significant cost of providing free meals for staff who were still working in the office after 9pm. Goldman has made the service unavailable before 10pm, along with the free black cabs home.

Those little perks and freebies are squeezed by credit crunch - The Times of London

No more scoring a lap dance (or anything else) at Scores in NYC if the State Liquor Authority has anything to say about it

Business coming to a grinding halt: Even though many Wall Streeters aren't supposed to be going to strip clubs any longer, at least on the company's dime (most recently, Deutsche Bank),  of course, many still find their ways to such establishments (*wink* *wink*) .  So there may be more than a tear or two shed with the news that both Scores in NY City are likely to be closed down for good because their liquor licences are getting pulled (and what's a strip club with out spirits to loosen up the libido and wallet?).  It seems that at one of the two clubs -- Scores West --  hookers have been making themselves at home with the club owners turning a blind eye.

State Liquor Authority officials plan to   put out of business not only Scores West, but also Scores on the East Side, by   yanking the liquor licenses for the jiggle joints, officials said yesterday.
 
  It's a prospect that could chill the hearts of the mammary meccas' many famous   frolicking fans - who over the years have included Lindsay Lohan, Kate Moss,   Russell Crowe, Queen Latifah and Jim Carrey.
 
  The problem is that each club's liquor license carries the names of the same   two club honchos, Elliot Osher and Richard Goldring. Losing the Scores West   license - which was to be physically confiscated last night - makes both Osher   and Goldring "prohibited persons" under state Alcohol Beverage   Control laws.

Deutsche Bank clamps down on expenses in military style: No adult entertainment, brothel or strip club reimbursement, and you vill learn to enjoy that airport shower and shave. Ja wohl!

Wow. Times really are hard.  Deutsche Bank is really turning the screws on bankers' expenses.  According to the Times of London, hookers, strippers and the like are now verboten (they're no longer reimbursable expenses) even if they're for bonding outings with clients.  But there are even more indignities:

Second-class rail travel will be the norm in the United States, while in Britain first-class tickets may be bought only for journeys of more than two hours, and in Germany for trips longer than an hour. Taxi trips during a bus or Tube strike will be repaid only with the explicit approval of a banker’s line manager, and similar permission from on high is required if lunch with a client is going to cost more than €65 (£52) per person (the threshold may have to be raised a bit in London).

And if this sounds a world away from the banker’s archetypal business trip of penthouse suites and VIP lounges, it gets worse: Deutsche Bank employees arriving on an early flight are now barred from expensive early hotel check-ins and instead are expected to shower and shave at the airport.

Furthermore....

Fox Business: Office pools are just plain wrong!

All we have to say about this guy is: Pffffffft

Wall Street favorite retailer Charles Tyrwhitt going public

Charles Tyrwhitt, a Wall Street staple clothing retailer (we have a closet full) -- and one of our ad sponsors -- is set to go public on the AIM later this year.

Founder Nick Wheeler is seeking fresh capital to expand the company's stores from nine to a chain of 50 across the UK alone, having already opened two in Manhattan below the offices of Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns.

After previous managing director Ashley Potter, who joined from Ralph Lauren in January 2005, left the business Wheeler took operational control a year ago. He has refocused the business on clothing for work after attempts to diversify into womenswear and children's clothing left the company with unsold stock which had to be written off at a cost of about £3m. Wheeler, who owns 95 per cent of the shares in Charles Tyrwhitt, is expecting the business to turn over £50m this year and make a profit of £5m.

Hedge fund manager too busy to retrieve his $160K Maserati from the pound; even at £25 a day in fines, it's "not that expensive relative to the cost of parking in central London"

Too much money, too little time:  We just came across this and thought it was hilarious.   Bertrand Des Palliers, who runs recently opened $340 million hedge fund SPQR Capital, is a busy, busy guy.  Too busy and focused, it appears, to retrieve his impounded $160,000 Maserati Cambiocorsa when it was towed away from a square in Knightsbridge in May.  He owes about $10K in fines against the car, and officials were said to be completely baffled as to why Des Palliers didn't come forward to reclaim his expensive toy.  He didn't even really focus on it until the Evening Standard newspaper notified him that his car was about to be sold:

....he ignored all attempts by TfL to contact him and let the fines increase at the rate of £25 a day until the Evening Standard newspaper tracked him down and warned him the car was about to be auctioned.

Mr Des Pallieres, 39, who owns and runs the £170 million SPQR fund, left Deutsche Bank with two colleagues in April to set up his own firm, specialising in complex investments in the debt markets.

He said: "The truth is I was so busy I did not have time to deal with sorting the congestion charges, paying my road tax and getting my car out of the pound.

Bad Boss Contest 2.0

The Bad Boss Contest sponsored by Working America last year is back!  Share your stories and nominate your candidate(s) for the worst boss here.

Vanity Fair review / CNBC interview: Confessions of a Wall Street Shoeshine Boy

In early July we highlighted a Barron's review of  Doug Stumpf's new novel, Confessions of a Wall Street Shoeshine Boy.  It sounded like a fun read, and we're happy to say, after reading it, that it didn't disappoint. Earlier today, the author was interviewed on CNBC along with Michael Wolf of Vanity Fair.  Here's the video as well as Vanity Fair's recent review.

Book Review: Confessions of a Wall Street Shoeshine Boy sounds like a fun read

Barron's reviews the new novel Confessions of a Wall Street Shoeshine Boy as "complex with entertaining overtones":  Wall Street wizards...money grubbing wives...insider trading...mansions....models....sex orgies...How could you go wrong?

DOUG STUMPF'S RIBALD, FAST-MOVING first novel is light enough to toss into your beach bag. But it's also got an engrossing serious side. And it's for real: The details of character and plot are based mainly on testimony of an actual Brazilian shoe-shine boy who, with polish and brush, breached the inner sanctum of a big Manhattan financial firm -- where he inadvertently discovered its sometimes amusing, sometimes grimy, nooks and crannies.

The jigsaw-puzzle plot -- centering on piecing together the clues to insider-trading scams at the firm -- is thickened by a Cecil B. DeMille-sized cast of characters...

Jefferies' equity chief booted over Fidelity partying scandal

Jefferie's equtiy head Scott Jones didn't retire -- he got the boot according to the New York Post:

Jones' departure was just the latest echo from Jefferies' ill-fated attempt to win business from Fidelity by showering the money management giant's powerful stock trading desk with $2 million in gifts and travel.

Starting in 2002, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission order, Jefferies stock sales star Kevin Quinn wooed Fidelity traders with cases of wine and lavish trips to the Caribbean. The bank even helped finance a raucous bachelor party in Miami Beach for a trader that featured dwarf-tossing and strippers.

The SEC tagged Jones - a popular, 24-year veteran of Jefferies - for his failure to supervise Quinn, levying a $50,000 fine and a three-month supervisory suspension. The firm also was fined more than $15 million, and Quinn was barred from the industry for life.

Jefferies' 'Party' Boss Gets The Boot - New York Post