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November 06, 2007
Merrill Lynch's bad week.
Make that a tough month for Merrill Lynch, the U.S. brokerage founded in 1914. First, record losses and stock plunge, and CEO replacement. Now the SEC investigation on off-balance-sheet deals to obscure risky mortage debt (AP), the forced exit of the chief of ML's consulting services arm (Jacksonville Business Journal), and the exit of a municipal pension fund from the ML portfolio (Global Pensions).
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Citigroup: Rescue by Rubin
Business Week: Former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin is tasked with finding a new Citigroup CEO.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
The Environment: The Universal Waste Rule
You can expect to hear more from industry and government in the next few years on the issues of responses to global warming, nuclear energy, energy security, non-fossil alternative fuels, waste disposal, and the environment generally. We'll see more federal environmental law enforcement, which waned under both Ds and Rs in the past fifteen years. Remember Jimmy Carter? Remember the "cradle-to-grave" waste management scheme of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976 ("RCRA")? Okay, well then, how about the
Universal Waste Rule (original) issued in 1995? Under federal UWR, which is being amended further still, certain hazardous wastes generated by a wide variety of businesses--companies which generally generated no other hazardous wastes--were given a uniform but relaxed treatment: light bulbs (e.g., fluorescent, mercury vapor, sodium vapor, neon); batteries such as nickel cadmium, silver oxide, and lithium; mercury-containing devices (thermostats, barometers, thermometers, switches); and expired, collected or recalled pesticides. For a good primer on the Universal Waste Rule, see in the recent issue of Environmental Protection magazine "Universal Waste: Bulbs, Batteries, Bugs and Barometers" by Mike King of Excal Visual LLP.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 02:52 PM | Comments (0)
CNN's Nancy Grace gives birth.
A Truly Blessed Event. Twins--a boy and a girl, according to AP. Forty-nine year old mother and babies are doing fine, CNN rep says. Which is of course good. But this is very, very suspicious to WAC? How could this happen? Who saw it? Why weren't we briefed about this earlier? Who drove to the hospital? Who was at the scene first? Did someone secure the area? Sounds like the old run-around to us.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:46 AM | Comments (0)