Stavros and the banker

Does the situation in Greece mark the beginning of the second bite from the financial crisis? It would appear that the same bankers responsible for the last crisis have a very big hand in present developments.

Excerpts from an article in today's Independent
full article-http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/goldman-sachs-the-greek-connection-1899527.html


Goldman Sachs: the Greek connection

Goldman Sachs, the giant investment bank, is today at the centre of the row over the Greek government's finances, amid recriminations over complex financial deals that allowed the eurozone nation to skirt its debt limits......

....The euro membership rules place strict caps on the size of government deficits relative to a national economy, but Goldman Sachs and other banks helped Greece raise cash earlier in the decade in ways that did not appear in the official statistics...

.....In one deal, Goldman channelled $1bn of funding to the government in 2002, in a transaction called a cross-currency swap.....
Goldman Sachs, the world's most powerful investment bank, is already under intense scrutiny in the ongoing controversy over banking practices, pay and profits. President Barack Obama last month launched an assault on Wall Street, proposing to cap the size of the biggest US banks and clamp down on their trading activities. On the same day, Goldman began distributing nearly £10bn in pay and bonuses to its staff for their 2009 performance, just a year after the financial system was bailed out by governments. Reflecting the importance of the Greek government as a client, and the scale of the fees to be generated from derivatives deals, Goldman sent Gary Cohn, who as chief operating officer is second-in-command of the global group, to Athens last November to pitch for new business with the debt management office....