Quote:
Businessweek
July 30, 2008, 6:41PM EST
But when officials tried to withdraw money in May, the bank told them the funds were frozen. "We believe at the time the Church made the…investments, the purchases were suitable," a UBS lawyer told First Lutheran in a June 20 letter. "However, as a result of unprecedented instability in the…markets, there recently have been numerous…auction failures."
Court documents suggest, however, that UBS may have known about problems with the securities months, and even years, before the market disintegrated. [b]UBS, Citigroup (C), Merrill Lynch (MER),[/b] and others, which collected huge fees for running the auctions, habitually intervened: When enough buyers didn't show up, firms bought the leftovers to keep the auctions going. From January 2006 through February 2008, UBS bought securities at 88% of the 30,000 auctions it ran for towns and student loan authorities. In 2006, the Securities & Exchange Commission fined 15 other brokerages, including Citi and Merrill, $13 million for failing to disclose that they sometimes supported the auctions. Citi and Merrill declined to comment. http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/08_32/b4095000912782.htm
Unquote
This article cites by name, 3 banks, UBS (now under investigation for fraud) Citi and Merrill.
Temasek/GIC is heavily invested in two out of the three of them. Governments should govern and stay out of investing or it would be easy for people to suspect that it might not be a case of stupidity but that there is something more sinister going on.
Will people like Dr Chee Soon Juan be sued for defamation and end up in jail again if he brings up this issue into the open, go on the streets to protest? It is hard to live under a dishonorable regime.
If the government cannot make wise investment decisions, they should have enlisted the help of people like Warren Buffett.
Can a plumber make wise investment decisions?
Worse of all is that they are losing billions to foreigners and depriving local companies of precious resources to become world class MNCs, yup, we
can conclude the despots want the majority of silliporeans to remain coolies all their lives (and work into their old age) while they cash in with
massive amounts of public money.
Originally posted by maurizio13:
If the government cannot make wise investment decisions, they should have enlisted the help of people like Warren Buffett.
Can a plumber make wise investment decisions?
Cannot make good investment is one thing but pouring billions into companies that are charged with FRAUD???!!!!
Actually it's quite sad, because most of the funds in Singapore belongs to the government (public sector), therefore depriving the private sectors a source of funds for investments. Instead these funds are used for frivolous overseas acquisitions that resulted in losses for most of their overseas investments.
There should be a clear distinction between people in charge and people handling the funds. A clear segregation of duties prevents fraud and other maladies.
Would you trust your CEO, to be CFO, CIO and COO too?
A command of all the different departments would make fraud perpetuation easier and difficult to discover.
Yes, no Sonys Samsungs Disney Hollywood Studios (private companies) and only coolies at the back and call of despots too old to die as long as people refrain from supporting martyrs like Dr Chee Soon Juan.
Originally posted by maurizio13:
Actually it's quite sad, because most of the funds in Singapore belongs to the government (public sector), therefore depriving the private sectors a source of funds for investments. Instead these funds are used for frivolous overseas acquisitions that resulted in losses for most of their overseas investments.
There should be a clear distinction between people in charge and people handling the funds. A clear segregation of duties prevents fraud and other maladies.
Would you trust your CEO, to be CFO, CIO and COO too?
A command of all the different departments would make fraud perpetuation easier and difficult to discover.
Not just "CEO, to be CFO, CIO and COO too?" but would you trust the people that happens to be the judge, jury, police, prosecutor, thief, fraudster, all from the same gang!!!
The despots of Singapore loaned tens of billions bailing out UBS for a possible stake using silliporeans hard earned money and the US government take over AIG, owns AIG, simply lending the company tens of billions....
DAMNED ASSPOTS