Morning Reading

Happy Friday. I just have one item to suggest this morning because it’ll take a few minutes to watch. I think it’s worth it.

Exploring the inner workings of Goldman Sachs (PBS NewsHour) Paul Solman has the first of a two-part series on unraveling the profit puzzle at Goldman Sachs. Here’s an excerpt from part 1, with the video piece below it.

PAUL SOLMAN: David Stockman, President Reagan’s budget director, went to Wall Street in the mid-’80s.

DAVID STOCKMAN: Take their results that just came out. In 2009, they had $45 billion of revenue, of which $35 billion was from equity and fixed-income trading and commodities and currencies. Now, that’s 75 percent of their revenue was basically from trading.

PAUL SOLMAN: So, when a Republican friend of mine who used to be in the Treasury Department says that Goldman Sachs is a hedge fund masquerading as a bank, that’s true?

DAVID STOCKMAN: Absolutely true.

Part 2 airs tonight. Solman looks at whether Goldman has been making money on the backs of taxpayers.