Good news!! IMF chief says worst of financial crisis is over

IMF chief says worst of financial crisis is over

IMF chief says worst of financial crisis is over
Posted: 15 May 2008 2237 hrs
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Dominique Strauss-Kahn

BRUSSELS: The worst of the financial sector crisis is over although the impact on the broader economy will likely drag on in coming months, IMF managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said on Thursday.

"There are good reasons to believe that the largest part of disclosure in financial institutions has been done, especially in the United States ... so that the worst news is behind us," he told a panel at the European Parliament.

"The main problem is the linkages between the financial crisis and the real economy and this is not behind us," he said, estimating that the financial turmoil would weigh on economic activity for another "several quarters."

Growth has slowed in most major economies in the wake of a slump in the US housing market, which has triggered extreme financial market volatility and reluctance among banks to make all but the safest loans.

However, Strauss-Kahn acknowledged later at a conference on the euro that it was impossible to know exactly whether the worst of the financial crisis was over or not because there were good reasons to argue that it is not.

"We don't know exactly where we are," he said, adding that there was a sound argument that because "the housing market in the United States still has prices going down ... the source of the problem is still there."

After months of nerve-wracking swings in financial markets, optimism has begun to emerge among market participants that the worst of the storm has blown over since the collapse of the US investment bank Bear Stearns in mid-March.

While past financial crises tended to be triggered by problems in developing countries, often with current account problems, Strauss-Kahn warned that in the long-term, the recent turmoil would likely be "a taste of the new kind of crisis that we are going to face."

With big developed economies such as the United States and Europe slowing following the turmoil, Strauss-Kahn said emerging countries would be the biggest motors behind world growth this year.

Nevertheless, he insisted that such fast growing economies would also eventually feel the impact of the slowdown in rich countries, although perhaps with "some delay."

"In no way is there some sort decoupling" between economic growth trends in developed countries and emerging economies, he said, weighing into one of the hottest debates currently in economics.

Strauss-Kahn said the coming months would reveal just how well the European economy can hold up.

"The resilience of the European economy is at stake," he said. "The slowdown of 2001 is not very assuring - it took a lot of time to recover.

"The coming six months, or maybe nine months, are certainly a very interesting stress test for the European economy.

The eurozone economy rebounded with unexpected growth of 0.7 percent in the first quarter this year, according to initial official estimates issued on Thursday.

The growth in the 15 countries sharing the euro beat both economists' predictions and the 0.4-percent growth recorded in the last quarter of 2007, thanks largely to bumper 1.5 percent expansion in Germany, the data showed. - AFP/de

IMF is already history.It is obsolete.What can it do talk talk like us in this forum.:banghead:

"Stealth Layoffs" Sweep across Wall Street
By Louise Story and Eric Dash The New York Times | 16 May 2008 | 05:14 AM ET

People on Wall Street seem to be vanishing overnight.

Thousands are losing their jobs as hard-pressed banks cut deep. But while layoffs are nothing new in the financial industry (they come with almost every downturn), this round seems different: it is eerily quiet.

So quiet, in fact, that people refer to these cuts as stealth layoffs. Some bosses hardly say a word after people are fired. At Citigroup, Goldman Sachs Goldman Sachs Group and Morgan Stanley for example, the first clue that someone is gone can be e-mail messages that are returned to senders from a former colleague’s inactivated corporate address.

While the financial markets have found a bit of a footing lately, banks are pushing ahead with plans for some of the deepest job reductions in years. Since last summer, banks worldwide have announced plans to cut 65,000 employees.

But exactly how many jobs have been or will be eliminated is unclear. In the past, banks typically made sharp reductions all at once. After the 1987 stock market crash, for example, employees were herded into conference rooms and dismissed en masse.

This time, companies are making many small cuts over the course of weeks or even months. Some people who have lost jobs, and many more struggling to hold them, say banks are keeping employees in the dark about the size and timing of layoffs.

Citigroup, for example, said last year that it would eliminate 17,000 jobs, or about 5 percent of its work force. Then in January, Citi said it would dismiss 4,200 more people. In April, it said an additional 8,700 would go.

By contrast, after the financial upheaval of 1998, when many Wall Street banks pared payrolls, Citigroup eliminated 10,600 jobs, or about 6 percent of its work force at the time.

The idea that banks will slowly wield the knife again and again unnerves many employees. People know the cuts are coming — they just don’t know when or where.

“Nobody knows who is coming in; nobody knows who is going out,” said JoAnne Kennedy, who was laid off by JPMorgan Chase this year. “They want to keep it all as quiet as possible.”

To some bank workers, one round of layoffs seems to blur into the next. At Goldman Sachs, low performers were dismissed from January through March. A few weeks later, the bank quietly began letting more people go. All told, Goldman is axing about 8 percent of its work force, although incoming employees this summer will make up for some of that loss.

At Merrill Lynch 1,100 people were laid off early this year, mostly in mortgage-related businesses. But in April, the firm announced 2,900 more cuts.

JPMorgan Chase said last fall that it would lay off 100 people in its fixed-income division and then followed up with several smaller rounds of cuts in other parts of the bank. The casualties will keep mounting as JPMorgan melds with Bear Stearns, the troubled investment bank it is buying.

Starting at the top, JPMorgan executives are eliminating jobs at their own bank, redeploying some people to other divisions and replacing others with Bear Stearns workers. As many as 5,500 Bear Stearns employees and 4,000 JPMorgan workers could lose their jobs before it is over.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 彭博

要扩展亚洲业务 美林将多聘请几百名员工
彭博电
新加坡
2008-05-16

美林（Merrill Lynch）计划扩展在亚洲的私人银行服务业务，因而将多聘请几百名员工。

根据美林和凯捷顾问公司（Capgemini）去年发布的一项报告，亚太区高净值人士的财富预料在2011年增加8.5％至12万7000亿美元，涨幅仅次于财富增长最快速的中东。摩根士丹利同样看准该市场，准备多聘请员工。

美林已在去年8月在印度开设财富管理中心。

除了财富管理，公司也将加强在亚洲的企业财务和销售与交易业务。

上个月宣布裁退多3000名员工的美林表示在亚洲的裁员行动已近尾声，受影响员工大多来自其日本的商业房地产抵押业务。

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OMG! Why so many hiring?

Citi is hiring in Singapore. UBS is hiring in Singapore.
Now Merill Lynch needs a few hundred more.

Where to find so many bankers in Singapore?