Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Attention new employees: News you can use
Are you just starting out in the world, working in finance, accounting, corporate law, or general corporate toolhood, or maybe in business or law school? Well, if you are, check out this searchable online glossary of financial, legal, and business "jargon" from the great global law firm of Latham & Watkins. I've already found it quite useful.
9 Comments:
By 
, at
Wed Apr 15, 12:10:00 PM:
A lot of corporate lawyers at Latham have a time on their hands.
Link
By 
Viking Kaj, at
Wed Apr 15, 01:42:00 PM:
I just printed out my tax return, which thanks to all the bungling by the federal government and the impending failure of print media is now bigger than what is left of the Yellow Pages. Not only did I loose my job last year but I had to take cash in my portfolio to avoid the train wreck that is the deficit funded "let's all load up on debt, we all under leveraged" federal government. The only positive thing is that I will be able to get rid of a lot of my soon-to-be-worthless 42 cent stamps mailing the pile in. These guys are talking about taking over GM when they couldn't run a lemonade stand in the Mojave.
So here are a few of my special definitions for April 15:
Income Tax = armed robbery.
Government = organized conspiracy to defraud across state lines with legal immunity.
Government (alt.) = our only growth industry
Private Industry = endangered species not protected by any government, see eg. Passenger Pigeon.
Indian Casinos = treasury plan to reinflate the economy.
Barack Obama = Sam Giancana
Tim Geitner = Meyer Lansky
Joe Biden = Foghorn Leghorn
Portugese Water Dawg = gangbanger slang for pulling a fast one
Home = a highly speculative asset
Brazil = where we will all be living when the Indian Casino goes bust
By , at
Wed Apr 15, 02:49:00 PM:
Happy April 15 from Link:
I was just on Main Street in my little Westchester NY town and noticed how many stores are now vacant. Every empty store has its own story, but there's a common theme to most of the new businesses in our town. They're almost all Korean-owned.
Koreans run a good number of the NYC-area delis, nail salons and dry cleaners. It's a successful model: 1) get start-up equity from a relative with a blood oath to pay it back; 2) use relatives as employees whenever possible ... off the books -- to avoid payroll and other taxes; 3) go into cash businesses where you can under-report revenue.
Rinse and repeat.
Lest you think this is a racial slur, I doubt many Irish-run bars fully report their revenue either.
Chuck Feeney -- the Billionaire Who Wasn't -- amassed a huge fortune as founder of Duty Free Shopping and other ventures. He's been quietly giving away billions of dolalrs for years. If it wasn't for a business dispute, his philanthropy would have been a total secret -- he literally would send anonymous checks to beneficiaries. Part of his business success was putting everything in the name of his French-born wife ... with that and other tax gimmicks -- he's avoided almost all personal US taxes.
By Viking Kaj, at
Wed Apr 15, 03:34:00 PM:
$ 100 = price of a pack of Wrigley's spearmint
By Viking Kaj, at
Wed Apr 15, 04:28:00 PM:
The White House
Washington DC
Dear President Obama,
I was just forced to write a check for many thousands of dollars to a government that I no longer have confidence in.
This includes both Republicans and Democrats. You are all idiots. Government is not the solution, it is the problem.
I'm considering getting it over by shooting myself in the head and leaving all my money to the government, since you are going to get it all anyway in the end and if I don't hurry up you will take away my gun.
Yours truly,
The fleeced
By Escort81, at
Wed Apr 15, 04:39:00 PM:
Link - Mr. Feeney may well have had excellent tax planning, but don't underestimate the quality of his business model, that Miller and Feeney executed it well, given the hunger of travellers to look for "a good deal," and the fact that LVMH stepped up in the 1990s and overpaid for his equity, as LVMH did with a number of other businesses (one, fortunately, partly owned by an acquaintance of mine). Feeney's philanthropy is wonderful, and it is admirable that he tried to be anonymous about it.
Your larger point about the potential impact of the non-criminal underground or off-the-books cash economy is an interesting one (then there's the criminal underground economy as well), and when I was in B-school, I tried to develop a model with one of my profs to roughly estimate the size of it, both in the U.S. and internationally. We thought it had to be at least 10% of National GDP here, and I believed it was higher worldwide (and this was 20 years ago, right before the fall of the USSR, which must have opened up huge segments of the underground economy). Lord knows what it is now, but I don't think the number is trending downward.
But anyway, the L&W glossary is a nice resource.
By Escort81, at
Wed Apr 15, 04:45:00 PM:
VK - don't shoot -- we'll miss you.
Anyway, I think currently the first $3.5 mil. is exempt from Federal estate taxes, and the Obama platform last year suggested freezing it at that level (as compared to the status quo of phaseout altogether, strangely followed by the sunset of the phaseout). So, that's something.
By , at
Wed Apr 15, 05:46:00 PM:
Link, again
I agree, L&W glossary is a nice resource.
Sorry to clutter this item, but it is April 15 and I need to rant somewhere. My main point was that small and/or growing businesses can suffer from too high taxes. Big oligopolies can often adjust and just pass tax costs on. Politicians love small business in theory, but unless it's a business that kicks back to them, they don't really care.
As I look on my own little Main Street, the only new businesses are "cash only" and shade into the underground economy. I wonder if we'll see growth in barter. What would happen if craigslist.org-like websites developed to facilitate this? When all-in marginal rates start going over 50%, there's plenty of incentive.
***
Bo is cute, but I thought Obama was going for a mutt from the pound. I know ... he didn't break a campaign promise, he just couldn't turn down Ted Kennedy's generosity. It's Obama's world ... we just live in it. Obama probably actually got a chuckle over Bo and how he pulled another con. Seriously, Obama is a "lying sack of shit", as my mother would say. I'm usualy not down on politicians personally, but Obama is dangerous. Am I crazy?
By Viking Kaj, at
Wed Apr 15, 08:26:00 PM:
Nope, you're not crazy. Tea, anyone?
As per Jon Stewart "Don't forget you need to file your tax return by midnight tonight, unless you are nominated for a position in the Obama administration..."
What, Obama? Broke a campaign promise? To animal rights activists? I'm shocked.
You know I heard those Kennedy dogs are trained to walk around the Palm Beach compound with small flasks of Jamesons around their neck in case someone looks like they might go into withdrawal...
