SOOOO Not Amused

I am freaking exhausted.  Every day I come into work it's the same story: (and Linka, I know you can appreciate this) there are anywhere from 20 to 120 calls waiting.  It lasts all day long, and to each one  I have to bear the same bad news, "No, we can't give you your money until we get it back from Reserve."  And not just the on the fund that broke the buck, but ALL of their funds are on lockdown, no money in, no money out.  Can you imagine??  Telling one caller after another that they or their client can't have their cash.  Holy shit.  I think I've been torn about 50 new assholes, I'm like a hunk of fuckin' swiss cheese over here, EASE UP.  

Though much to my surprise, many advisors are showing some level of compassion and have been cooperative on all the new transactional restrictions.  And some are even expressing some misplaced sense of camaraderie due to relying on us so heavily during this surrealist financial circus and have been throwing all propriety out the window.  They call up and speak to me in very familiar terms... if this were football they'd be calling me by my last name and slapping me on the ass... instead they're calling me "babe" and "hon."  Fuckin' odd.  And it's not just advisors, I had Dustin from the bond desk this morning say "I love you!" to me instead of "Have a nice day," or "Thanks for calling."  I guess desperate times call for desperate endearments.  Or something.

For the first few days in hell, good ol' Jim was feeding us free lunch, but that gravy train has screeched to a halt as of Tuesday.  Which, I guess, is fine with me seeing as how I've gained back 8 of the pounds I worked my ass off to lose and God knows I don't need any more freakin' pizza or Jimmy John's.  Mmmmmmm.... Jiiimmmmmyyyy Johhhhhhnnnnn's....  Clearly I'm not one of those people who lose weight when they're stressed!  If I was, I'd look like Nicole Richie.  I'd rather have chocolate, bottom line people.

Good lord, I just want this week to be over... Just ONE more workday... I think I can, I think I can, I think I can... Someone pass the cake frosting, I'll just eat it with a spoon.

Mortgage Hangover

The marketplace chaos is made up of a million little shitstorms. I've had the worst week ever at my job and it's all Lehman Bros' fault. One of the money market products my brokerage firm used was Reserve Funds, who were invested with bad Lehman debt securities to the tune of $785M and on Wednesday some of their funds broke the buck.

Which for clients of the firm means that if they had $1000 sitting in cash on Tuesday, when they woke up on Wednesday they had $970. And on Thursday they had $950. CASH. How do you lose cash?  Who knew that a money market could tank? I guess we all do now.

What exacerbated the issue was some apparent insider trading, so our company is suing the Reserve Funds. They were gonna break the buck anyway, but leaking it ahead of time really killed it.

Since Wednesday I've been fielding calls from anxious advisors about what in the hell they are supposed to tell their clients. Well, it's going to have to be the truth Guy, they lost cash. It's gone. Sure there might be a settlement, but we started doling out checks last week on an SEC ruling that was handed down in 2005. Three and a half years passed before people had their accounts restored in that case. So long, in fact, that they now have no idea what these checks are for. This money market situation is likely to be much the same. So, Guy, your client did effectively overbuy mutual funds by $31,500. Yes, really. Sure, I know the money was there when you placed all their trades, but on settlement day the money just wasn't there anymore. Sorry....

Over the past few months I've seen people scrambling for the relative safety of CDs, but even those aren't granting absolute sanctuary. Indymac being a perfect example. Good thing they were FDIC insured. If they didn't learn any time in the past they know now to go straight for the FDIC insured cash.

Economists, bloggers, and people on the bus are predicting that we're on the verge of another Great Depression.  The only things missing are the breadlines and orphanages filled to the brim with abandoned children.  Unless, of course, you look at Nebraska's current situation with their Safe Haven law which has encouraged several parents to abondon a total of 14 children at hospitals, and of course the $700 billion breadline that every financial firm in the country has queued up for.  Hmm, do I smell financial ruin?