Here's David Gaffen trying to convey just how putrid some of this structured crap is.
(he invokes Yosemite Sam)
The WSJ's Energy Roundup tips us to this story from Financial News (powered by Dow Jones):
*New York Times on Mr. D's 1992 resignation from his eponymous firm:...Celent predicts increased interest from retail investors could tip the market towards the €40bn level by 2012.
The Kyoto protocol agreements, which help reduce emissions by introducing carbon-emission allowances and credits, has given rise to a growing carbon-emission derivatives market.
Future and forwards contracts are the most actively traded products, accounting for 90% of the transactions on the carbon-emission market this year, according to Celent.
Abyd Karmali, global head of carbon emissions at Merrill Lynch, said: “There has been a robust forward-contract market for EU allowances this year, as well as key developments in carbon-emission structured products. The maturity in the options market has catalyzed the developments in carbon-emission structured products.”
Investment banks are also teaming up with large traditional exchanges, as well as the specialist carbon-emission exchanges, to expand the range of carbon-emission structured products and derivatives.
Merrill Lynch, one of the many banks developing products, has provided a level of principal protection to its emission structured products using a combination of options and positions on the underlying asset, as well as arbitrage swaps and inter-market spread contracts.
Some of the world’s largest traditional exchanges, investment banks and broker-dealers are keen to tap into this market.
Barclays Capital has bought a stake in Enhance Energy, a Canadian company that reduces greenhouse-gas emissions, while the Chicago Climate Futures Exchange, the US environmental derivatives market, increased access to its products in anticipation of greater volumes.
...Mr. Della Femina, 56 years old, is the creator of the name Meow Mix; wrote "From Those Wonderful Folks Who Brought You Pearl Harbor," with Charles Sopkin, and created the advertising for WABC-TV's Eyewitness News that highlighted a report on the Willowbrook hospital for the mentally ill.Here's his five paragraph auto-bio. in New York Magazine.
Mr. Della Femina also created Joe Isuzu, the smarmy character who made it into both Democratic and Republican rhetoric....
