Post by docfung on Nov 3, 2007 10:24:39 GMT -6
Top US analyst hits back after death threats over Citigroup downgradeTom Bawden in New York
Meredith Whitney: The $360bn analyst | Citigroup fears send Wall Street reeling | Citigroup chief is about to quit amid mounting woes | Wall St braced for $10bn more credit crunch hits
business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/markets/article2796774.ece
Meredith Whitney, the analyst who prompted a $369 billion (£177 billion) plunge in the value of US shares on Thursday by issuing a negative note on Citigroup, hit out at Wall Street’s culture of intimidation yesterday after receiving several death threats from investors in the bank.
Ms Whitney, a CIBC analyst who is married to the former World Wrestling Entertainment champion Death Mask, prompted a near 7 per cent drop in Citigroup’s shares on Thursday, after suggesting that the bank needed to raise more than $30 billion to restore its capital cushion.
She also downgraded her recommendation on Citigroup’s shares to “market underperform” in the note that set off America’s biggest stock market decline since August.
Ms Whitney, Forbes’s second-highest ranked stock picker for 2007, told The Times: “People are scared to be negative, especially when a company has such a wide holding. Clients are not pleased with my call and I have had several death threats.
“But it was the most straightforward call I’ve made in my career and I am surprised my peer analysts have been resistant. It’s so straightforward, it’s indisputable.”
Ms Whitney, whose marriage to John Charles Layfield, the wrestler, 2½ years ago was detailed in The New York Times, said that she has never felt any pressure from the Wall Street firms themselves to be positive. But she said investors could be “nasty and belligerent” if they felt you had lost them a lot of money by influencing the price of their shares.
“No one had the moxie to put in print what I put in print,” she said.
Ms Whitney’s note came two weeks after Citigroup reported a 57 per cent drop in its third-quarter profits, following a $6.5 billion writedown, much of which related to the credit crunch.
That writedown intensified recurring calls for Chuck Prince, Citigroup’s head, to stand down, although he remains at the helm of the world’s biggest bank.
But in a move that will fuel speculation about his position, Mr Prince yesterday cancelled a speech he had been due to give tomorrow at the US Japan Business Conference. A Citigroup spokesman said he had cancelled the appearance to prepare for the company’s new listing on the Tokyo Stock Exchange on Monday.
Ms Whitney, 37, met Mr Layfield in 2003 when they were panelists on Bulls & Bears, a programme on Fox News.
Mr Layfield credits Ms Whitney with helping to make him more sophisticated. The New York Times reported him saying at their wedding: “She took a country boy like me and kind of refined me. I know what fork to use now at the dinner table, and I drink my beer from a glass.”
Have your say
Hey! If you're wise you'll note this woman's name and listen to her future market opinions, be they upgrades or downgrades as in this case. You could have made a lot of money if you knew beforehand she has so much power! You make money not only by buying shares [termed "going long"]; you can equally make money by selling [termed "going short"] even without owning. You could have made piles of cash from going short on Citigroup shares as soon as she issued her downgrade. Look up "short selling" on investopedia.com. This woman is powerful!
Charles, Bristol, UK
What's wrong with pro-wrestlers? Better than blood-sucking, avaricious men working in the 'city'!
Peter K Day, Doncaster, UK/ Yorkshire
Completely, totally irrelevant : Any part of this story that mentions wrestling, wrestlers, or marriage.
Completely, totally relevant : "Ms Whitney, Forbes’s second-highest ranked stock picker for 2007..."
R, Topeka, KS
What good's the news if you can't include a little juicy gossip?
P, Oakland, CA,
Naturally the investors want to kill the messengers...
They just can't take the truth. They shuld have been able to forsee
and manage their portfolios for themselves, but maybe it is
easier to go after the messenger.
That Ms Whitney married a wrestler... she is NOT AFRAID of ANYTHING ! ! !
Go Girl!
jezzika, Beverly Hills, California, USA
Well I am not a pro pro wrestler, but I do like the kind of woman he married.
So I like it that a woman can see a man for what he is, and love him.
As to her article, I think she has tapped into the maklet psychology, and I think I need to put my 401k $$ in something real safe, and then get back into the futures markets.
Valk, Chicago,
hey, guys, money is not every thing, you are sure touchy, relax. you'll live longer to make more money.. it's simple she married for love. that being your case, yould live longer because you are happier and you would make more money...ti's obvious Mr. Muscles is mentioned to discourage death threats
buster, Edgewood, Tx. 75117, USA TEXAS
Why is this woman's marriage to a former pro wrestler or anyone else for that matter even remotely relevant to this article? Did you throw that in just for fun?
Stick to the money matters.
bobble, CO,
I wonder why the auther of this article spends so much print to undermine Ms. Whitney by discussing her marriage, when it has no material connection at all to her career or her stock ratings which is supposed to be the crux of the story? How about some discussion instead about her prior accuracy is such predictions, which would be germaine?
Robert Johnston, Nrothridge, CA
I am fine with her downgrade, but what kind of idiot marries a pro-wrestler? Not the kind you want to take financial advice from.
C, San Francisco , CA
I applaud her courage and diligence. She was doing here job very well, and spoke the truth as she saw it. I've been investing in the stock market for many years, and it used to be if a stock you owned got beat up by an analyst then that was just the way it was, and you took the beating and went on. Nowadays, there seem to be newer folks in market who think their stocks should always go up, never get in trouble, and that's really naive. These are very unstable times and anyone who can't handle market risk ought to get into something less stressful, like "bowling for dollars."
Joe Davies, Springfield, Missouri, USA
Meredith Whitney: The $360bn analyst | Citigroup fears send Wall Street reeling | Citigroup chief is about to quit amid mounting woes | Wall St braced for $10bn more credit crunch hits
business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/markets/article2796774.ece
Meredith Whitney, the analyst who prompted a $369 billion (£177 billion) plunge in the value of US shares on Thursday by issuing a negative note on Citigroup, hit out at Wall Street’s culture of intimidation yesterday after receiving several death threats from investors in the bank.
Ms Whitney, a CIBC analyst who is married to the former World Wrestling Entertainment champion Death Mask, prompted a near 7 per cent drop in Citigroup’s shares on Thursday, after suggesting that the bank needed to raise more than $30 billion to restore its capital cushion.
She also downgraded her recommendation on Citigroup’s shares to “market underperform” in the note that set off America’s biggest stock market decline since August.
Ms Whitney, Forbes’s second-highest ranked stock picker for 2007, told The Times: “People are scared to be negative, especially when a company has such a wide holding. Clients are not pleased with my call and I have had several death threats.
“But it was the most straightforward call I’ve made in my career and I am surprised my peer analysts have been resistant. It’s so straightforward, it’s indisputable.”
Ms Whitney, whose marriage to John Charles Layfield, the wrestler, 2½ years ago was detailed in The New York Times, said that she has never felt any pressure from the Wall Street firms themselves to be positive. But she said investors could be “nasty and belligerent” if they felt you had lost them a lot of money by influencing the price of their shares.
“No one had the moxie to put in print what I put in print,” she said.
Ms Whitney’s note came two weeks after Citigroup reported a 57 per cent drop in its third-quarter profits, following a $6.5 billion writedown, much of which related to the credit crunch.
That writedown intensified recurring calls for Chuck Prince, Citigroup’s head, to stand down, although he remains at the helm of the world’s biggest bank.
But in a move that will fuel speculation about his position, Mr Prince yesterday cancelled a speech he had been due to give tomorrow at the US Japan Business Conference. A Citigroup spokesman said he had cancelled the appearance to prepare for the company’s new listing on the Tokyo Stock Exchange on Monday.
Ms Whitney, 37, met Mr Layfield in 2003 when they were panelists on Bulls & Bears, a programme on Fox News.
Mr Layfield credits Ms Whitney with helping to make him more sophisticated. The New York Times reported him saying at their wedding: “She took a country boy like me and kind of refined me. I know what fork to use now at the dinner table, and I drink my beer from a glass.”
Have your say
Hey! If you're wise you'll note this woman's name and listen to her future market opinions, be they upgrades or downgrades as in this case. You could have made a lot of money if you knew beforehand she has so much power! You make money not only by buying shares [termed "going long"]; you can equally make money by selling [termed "going short"] even without owning. You could have made piles of cash from going short on Citigroup shares as soon as she issued her downgrade. Look up "short selling" on investopedia.com. This woman is powerful!
Charles, Bristol, UK
What's wrong with pro-wrestlers? Better than blood-sucking, avaricious men working in the 'city'!
Peter K Day, Doncaster, UK/ Yorkshire
Completely, totally irrelevant : Any part of this story that mentions wrestling, wrestlers, or marriage.
Completely, totally relevant : "Ms Whitney, Forbes’s second-highest ranked stock picker for 2007..."
R, Topeka, KS
What good's the news if you can't include a little juicy gossip?
P, Oakland, CA,
Naturally the investors want to kill the messengers...
They just can't take the truth. They shuld have been able to forsee
and manage their portfolios for themselves, but maybe it is
easier to go after the messenger.
That Ms Whitney married a wrestler... she is NOT AFRAID of ANYTHING ! ! !
Go Girl!
jezzika, Beverly Hills, California, USA
Well I am not a pro pro wrestler, but I do like the kind of woman he married.
So I like it that a woman can see a man for what he is, and love him.
As to her article, I think she has tapped into the maklet psychology, and I think I need to put my 401k $$ in something real safe, and then get back into the futures markets.
Valk, Chicago,
hey, guys, money is not every thing, you are sure touchy, relax. you'll live longer to make more money.. it's simple she married for love. that being your case, yould live longer because you are happier and you would make more money...ti's obvious Mr. Muscles is mentioned to discourage death threats
buster, Edgewood, Tx. 75117, USA TEXAS
Why is this woman's marriage to a former pro wrestler or anyone else for that matter even remotely relevant to this article? Did you throw that in just for fun?
Stick to the money matters.
bobble, CO,
I wonder why the auther of this article spends so much print to undermine Ms. Whitney by discussing her marriage, when it has no material connection at all to her career or her stock ratings which is supposed to be the crux of the story? How about some discussion instead about her prior accuracy is such predictions, which would be germaine?
Robert Johnston, Nrothridge, CA
I am fine with her downgrade, but what kind of idiot marries a pro-wrestler? Not the kind you want to take financial advice from.
C, San Francisco , CA
I applaud her courage and diligence. She was doing here job very well, and spoke the truth as she saw it. I've been investing in the stock market for many years, and it used to be if a stock you owned got beat up by an analyst then that was just the way it was, and you took the beating and went on. Nowadays, there seem to be newer folks in market who think their stocks should always go up, never get in trouble, and that's really naive. These are very unstable times and anyone who can't handle market risk ought to get into something less stressful, like "bowling for dollars."
Joe Davies, Springfield, Missouri, USA