"I remember going into the Fed for meetings on the LTCM rescue plan. At one end of the table there was Jimmy Cayne, at the other Dick Fuld. Now the table is a lot smaller and the faces are not so familiar"
One Wall Street banker attending the bail-out meetings in September shows that if a week is a long time in finance today, then 10 years feels like before the beginning of time
"I don’t know what everyone is bitching about. I, for one, am thrilled I no longer receive junk mail from companies offering me credit cards"
A banker in the subway overheard commenting on the credit crunch’s effect on consumers
"May I suggest the XXX across the road? Either that or we can go somewhere a bit more casual – the main thing is just that they serve alcohol"
"Let’s just meet at the restaurant. I will be the guy lying in the back corner nursing a half-empty bottle of Jack Daniels..."
Contacts responding to lunch invitations from Euromoney in the days following Lehman’s collapse
"The SEC had jurisdiction over five investment banks that all went down in ignominy. Their response? Ask for more powers to regulate the CDS market. You didn’t exactly cover yourselves in glory there, guys, so stick to regulating securities"
Many in the CDS market echo this investor’s views on the SEC’s calls for further regulation
"What TARP really stands for is Taxpayer Assisted Re-election Plan"
One commentator tells it how it is
