WallStreetOasis.com - ...where monkeys come to play

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Mon, 11 Apr 2005 23:50:38 -0400

Stuck in your cube on Wall Street? You are not alone.
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Best Trading Desk for Hedge Funds

MMBinNC — Thu, 15 May 2008 19:27:26 -0400

Hey what trading desk would be best for a hedge fund specifically equity long/short or merger arbitrage?

Icahn launches Yahoo! proxy fight

WallStreetOasis.com — Thu, 15 May 2008 10:50:14 -0400

Signaling that he wants to invest up to $2.5 billion, activist investor Carl Icahn on Thursday launched a proxy contest at Yahoo! Inc., nominating 10 directors in the hopes of negotiating a successful merger with Microsoft Corp.

In a letter addressed to Yahoo! chairman Roy Bostock, Icahn said: "It is clear to me that the board of directors of Yahoo has acted irrationally and lost the faith of shareholders and Microsoft."

He called the $33 per share offer price a "superior alternative" to the company's standalone prospects and pointed out that it represented a 72% premium over Yahoo's closing price of $19.18 ahead of the offer. Microsoft originally put forth a $31 per share offer and withdrew its $47.5 billion bid May 3 after it was repeatedly rebuffed.

What is Gained from Sourcing / Cold Calling Experience?

prospectivemonkey1 — Wed, 14 May 2008 18:40:11 -0400

I have never posted here before, but was unable to find an answer to this question so I decided to ask it.

From the sounds of it, sourcing/cold calling seems to be a miserable experience. I understand that few people could actually enjoy the experience of constantly calling CEO's only to be hung up on. That being said, what are the exit opportunities from an internship or job that mostly entails cold calling? Could someone use their sourcing experience in private equity to land a job in sales? Would there be any chance to get a banking job after a sourcing internship?
I have no experience in either, so I will take what I can get. I am hoping cold calling would not be miserable AND a waste of time.

Thanks.

WallStreetOasis.com: Spring 2008 Newsletter

WallStreetOasis.com — Mon, 12 May 2008 08:39:15 -0400

Dear Fellow Primates,

ATTENTION: Click here to register/login and gain access to the NEW 2008 Compensation Database for Finance Professionals! (preview image below)

The database is available free for any registered members once you log in. Once you are registered (takes less than 1 minute), you can find the database here: www.wallstreetoasis.com/compdb-2008 ...enjoy!

This version is much more extensive than the last compensation database. Along with Investment Banking salary and bonus figures, we also have Private Equity, Sales & Trading and Consulting compensation data. Each industry is broken down by average base and bonus and by position (where there was a sufficient sample size). Please help us grow the WallStreetOasis community by spreading the word and forwarding this newsletter on to your friends and colleagues.

VC to Hedge Fund?

MikeMikeMike — Sat, 10 May 2008 20:32:55 -0400

I've always been extremely interested in hedge funds, but when I had the opportunity to do an internship at a VC firm starting this summer, I took it. Is it likely/possible to go from VC to HF after an analyst stint at a VC firm or are the skills completely separate? Also, is VC looked upon highly by HFs?

Thanks

Dark Pools

hodeez — Fri, 09 May 2008 09:08:21 -0400

Shares Bought in the Dark
By Aaron Lucchetti

A Supreme Court jurist once wrote that sunlight is the best disinfectant. Wall Street, though, is increasingly finding it more profitable to work in the dark.

In the past few years, large brokerage firms, trading boutiques and even stock exchanges have launched or announced plans to start almost 40 trading networks known as "dark pools," named because they attempt to put buyers and sellers together anonymously without exposing their clients' orders first to the public, as happens on traditional stock markets like the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq Stock Market.

The pools have proliferated as big institutional investors respond

The Debut of FROs

WallStreetOasis.com — Fri, 09 May 2008 05:20:05 -0400

Faisal Laljee submits: I got an email yesterday from the American Stock Exchange that I wanted to pass along:

AMERICAN STOCK EXCHANGE ANNOUNCES LAUNCH OF FIXED RETURN OPTIONS (FROs) ON THURSDAY MAY 8, 2008