Occupy Wall Street: a Frenzy That Fizzled

The following is an excerpt from an article in:


The New York Times
Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Occupy Wall Street: a Frenzy That Fizzled

By ANDREW ROSS SORKIN

It will be an asterisk in the history books, if it gets a mention at all.

A year ago this week, the Occupy Wall Street movement got under way in Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan. The loose group of protesters, frustrated by the economic downturn, sought to blame Wall Street and corporate America for many of the nation's ills.

While the movement's first days did not receive much news coverage, it soon turned into a media frenzy, with some columnists comparing its importance to that of the Arab Spring, which led to the overthrow of leaders in several Middle Eastern and African countries, spurred by social media. Images of the Wall Street protesters getting arrested were looped on news channels and featured on the covers of newspapers. Big banks - and the famous Charging Bull statue that is an icon of Wall Street - were fortified with barricades. By the end of the year, Time magazine had named the protester its Person of the Year, perhaps rightly given the revolutions taking place around the world, but the magazine also lumped Occupy Wall Street in among the many meaningful movements taking place.

But now, 12 months later, it can and should be said that Occupy Wall Street was - perhaps this is going to sound indelicate - a fad.

For more, visit www.nytimes.com.

For Deal Makers, Incubator Offers an Alternative to Wall St.

The following is an excerpt from an article in 

The New York Times
Tuesday, August 14, 2012

For Deal Makers, Incubator Offers an Alternative to Wall St.

By ADRIANA GARDELLA

Incubators have long existed for technology start-ups. But the needs of investment bankers are not quite the same as those of tech entrepreneurs who started a business in a garage and spent all night programming code.

Jolyne Caruso, experienced on Wall Street, took a page from the tech playbook to help seasoned financiers run their own firms. In 2010, she created the Alberleen Group, an incubator for investment bankers who have experience in their sectors and entrepreneurial attitudes but lack capital, investor contacts or support in areas like regulatory compliance.

As the economy remains lackluster and Wall Street keeps shedding jobs, Ms. Caruso is offering an alternative to the large firms and the more prominent boutique investment banks.

Just as Wall Street has learned from the tech industry to be more nimble, the Alberleen Group's team members say they set themselves apart from other banks by providing more creative, customized services. In addition, the incubator has been able to attract clients who are often disenchanted with the higher fees, diminished service and potential for conflicts of interest at the big banks, she said.

"The big investment banks continue to be tough places to work - between regulations, the lack of capital to fund deals and the broken compensation model," Ms. Caruso said, adding that the "misery factor" remains high even four years after the financial crisis.

Though some Wall Street bankers have started boutique investment banks, not everyone has the investment capital or backing to do so. But because of the support of the Alberleen Group, which is affiliated with a registered broker-dealer, its banking teams can offer clients the gamut of investment banking services including bond financing, and advice on mergers and acquisitions or initial public offerings.

Ms. Caruso's connections, cultivated during 30 years on Wall Street, provide an entree for the bankers, who focus on energy, real estate and middle-market deals. The Alberleen Group's advisory board members, who include E. Stanley O'Neal, the former chief executive of Merrill Lynch, are all investors in the company, giving them a stake in the success of its banking teams.

For more, visit www.nytimes.com.

Many Sites Chart a New Course as Google Expands Fees

Excerpt from an article in

The New York Times

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Many Sites Chart a New Course as Google Expands Fees

By QUENTIN HARDY

SAN FRANCISCO — When it comes to offering online maps to their users, some companies have been leaving Google Maps and setting out for less familiar territory.

In the seven years since it was introduced, Google’s offering of street maps, satellite photos and street-level views has become the dominant player in the world of online mapping, displacing earlier entrants like AOL’s MapQuest. According to comScore, 71 percent of the 91.7 million people in the United States who looked at maps online in February used Google Maps.

There are signs, however, that Google’s dominance is under assault — and the company’s own moves may have something to do with this.

Many sites incorporate Google Maps into their own pages, whether to pinpoint real estate listings or pothole problems. Google was already charging the biggest users of the service fees that could run into six figures a year. But last October it announced that it would start charging smaller Web sites when their users started generating an average of 25,000 map views a day over a quarter. Many independent Web developers, upon whom Google relies to make its products popular, rebelled at the change.

“If you are a site just looking to put a pizzeria on a map, it’s no big deal, but if you are trying to put a brand around your mapping, it’s a big deal,” said James Fee, chief evangelist at WeoGeo, which provides location data. “Google says it will affect a very small number of users, but I have heard it will touch 30 or 40 percent of people who really depend on maps for their business. It could cost you tens of thousands of dollars a month.”

In late February, Foursquare, the social media location service, said that on its Web site it would move from Google Maps to data from OpenStreetMap, a user-contributed map service that is created and managed much like Wikipedia. In a blog post, Foursquare said Google’s price increases had prompted the change.

Apple’s new version of its iPhoto application for the iPhone and the iPad also uses data from OpenStreetMap, though Apple uses many mapping sources, particularly Google, in its other products. Nestoria, a real estate search engine, also said it was leaving Google for OpenStreetMap because of the prices.

According to comScore, OpenStreetMap itself still has a minuscule amount of Web traffic. Google Maps had 65 million users in February, a 16 percent increase from a year earlier. MapQuest had 35 million, a 13 percent drop. Microsoft’s Bing Maps came in third with nine million users, an 18 percent gain.

Wall Street Brain Drain

CNBC's Jane Wells reports on who the next generation of capitalists look up to now.  Click the link for video.

http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?video=3000073245

Wall Street vs. Silicon Valley Talent Hunt

CNBC reports that thanks to a new crop of overnight billionaires in tech, keeping Wall Street's top talent has become more difficult.  Click the link below for video.

http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?video=3000073215