Pimco eyes booming advisory growth
Pimco Advisory, the arm of bond giant Pacific Investment Management Co that found its calling
Pimco eyes booming advisory growth Pimco, the investment management company that made its name investing in bonds, has made huge gains in expanding its advisory business on complex investments, with that business now topping $1 trillion in assets, the head of Pimco Advisory told Reuters. Pimco Advisory, the arm of bond giant Pacific Investment Management Co that found its calling during the global financial crisis with the U.S. Treasury and the Federal Reserve as its first major clients, has both expanded its business with the Fed and won substantial private-sector business, its global head, Richard Weil, said in an interview. Pimco Advisory -- which advises clients on issues such as how to restructure loan portfolios, liquidate holdings and best time those sales, as well as offering structured credit services to both private and public institutions -- has gone from advising on $20 billion in assets at most before 2008 to more than $1 trillion in assets this year alone, said Weil. "That dwarfs by a huge magnitude what we were doing before. I think it is a long-term sustainable business," said Weil, who was named global head of Pimco Advisory when it was established as a separate business last May. In the wake of the global credit crisis, Weil, in his first extensive interview as Pimco Advisory's global head, said private and public sector entities will find it "hard to maintain the expertise that is required to deal with these very hard situations." Pimco Advisory's business is now split evenly between the public sector and private industry, he said. Pimco Advisory has served as the collateral manager for the Federal Reserve's Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility portfolio to revive securitization markets, won business as the adviser for the Fed's Commercial Paper Funding Facility, and become the adviser for the National Credit Union Administration. Last month Pimco beat out rivals including BlackRock Inc, the world's largest asset manager, to advise the National Association of Insurance Commissioners to help reassess the level of mortgage risks taken by insurance companies in a bid to improve on traditional bond ratings. The insurance industry's decision to pick Pimco comes in the wake of sharp criticism that rating agencies Standard & Poor's, Moody's Investors Service and Fitch Ratings mis-rated huge swaths of collateralized debt obligations and structured debt. "We are not strategically looking to replace the rating agencies, but we believe there is a role for people doing rating agency type work," Weil said. "The NAIC made a decision to seek an alternative approach." The advisory business represents a significant change for Pimco as it expands into areas such as equities outside its core strength in bonds. The firm manages more than $940 billion in assets, mostly in fixed income. Pimco Advisory is a separate business line housed in a separate building, with a staff that has gone from zero to 40. courtesy: http://www.reuters.com/ http://OxBridgeResearch.com
4th generation hydrogen generator
Lift Gas could provide a lift to your portfolio AlumiFuel Power (AFPW.OB) is displaying its 4th generation Hydrogen Generator which has been designed and developed from the feedback received from potential Military client(s). The PBIS-1000 could generate 264 Gallons of Hydrogen in just 20 Minutes! This is a 'Total Green' Technology with Civil and Defense applications. Potential customers include NASA, Department of Defense and the Weather Bureau. The unit will be on display at The American Meteorological Society conference in Atlanta. The company has partnered with world class Manufacturer APEX and the World's Largest weather balloon distributor, Kaymont Consolidated. 2010 could be a pivotal year for this diversified alternative energy company with multiple product lines.
GOOGLE Exits Communist China
Google says NO to Chinese Censorship - Democratic Forces Win
GOOGLE Exits Communist China
Democratic Forces Win
GOOG: GOOGLE
According to the SVP, Google, David Drummond
Google and more than twenty other U.S. companies had been the victims of a sophisticated cyber attack originating from China, and that during our investigation into these attacks we had uncovered evidence to suggest that the Gmail accounts of dozens of human rights activists connected with China were being routinely accessed by third parties, most likely via phishing scams or malware placed on their computers. We also made clear that these attacks and the surveillance they uncovered—combined with attempts over the last year to further limit free speech on the web in China including the persistent blocking of websites such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Google Docs and Blogger—had led us to conclude that we could no longer continue censoring our results on Google.cn.
So earlier today we stopped censoring our search services—Google Search, Google News, and Google Images—on Google.cn. Users visiting Google.cn are now being redirected to Google.com.hk, where we are offering uncensored search in simplified Chinese, specifically designed for users in mainland China and delivered via our servers in Hong Kong.
Figuring out how to make good on our promise to stop censoring search on Google.cn has been hard. We want as many people in the world as possible to have access to our services, including users in mainland China, yet the Chinese government has been crystal clear throughout our discussions that self-censorship is a non-negotiable legal requirement. We believe this new approach of providing uncensored search in simplified Chinese from Google.com.hk is a sensible solution to the challenges we've faced—it's entirely legal and will meaningfully increase access to information for people in China. We very much hope that the Chinese government respects our decision, though we are well aware that it could at any time block access to our services. We will therefore be carefully monitoring access issues, and have created this new web page, which we will update regularly each day, so that everyone can see which Google services are available in China.
In terms of Google's wider business operations, we intend to continue R&D work in China and also to maintain a sales presence there, though the size of the sales team will obviously be partially dependent on the ability of mainland Chinese users to access Google.com.hk. Finally, we would like to make clear that all these decisions have been driven and implemented by our executives in the United States, and that none of our employees in China can, or should, be held responsible for them. Despite all the uncertainty and difficulties they have faced since we made our announcement in January, they have continued to focus on serving our Chinese users and customers. We are immensely proud of them.
Posted by David Drummond, SVP, Corporate Development and Chief Legal Officer
Covered-Bonds Are Back
Better and Safer Bonds may ignite Mortgage Securitization
Covered-Bonds Are Back The Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce recently sold Covered-Bonds worth $2 Billion Dollars to the U.S. Investors. Covered Bonds could be the ticket to the return of U.S. Residential Mortgage securitzation. These Bonds are popular in Europe and might catch renewed interest from Investors and Bank Regulators. Unlike the exotic mortgage securities which created the huge mess, these bonds are relatively safe for two important reasons, first they are backed by specific pool of mortages and finally the issuing bank keeps on its books.
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