Mon Dieu! French Fraud Costs Bank $7 BillionFINANCE
• Chase CEO Jamie Dimon has some big plans at Davos this year: “Number one on my list is world peace.” [MarketBeat/WSJ, DealBook/NYT]
• Looks like Steve Schwarzman is green only with greed — his newest moneymaking scheme hinges on building huge coal plants in pristine locales in the American West. [Fortune]
• Société Générale, the second biggest bank in France, found that one of its “plain vanilla” traders had taken “massive fraudulent directional positions…far beyond his limited authority” that would ultimately end up costing the bank $7 billion. It is, according to the Times, “an exceptional fraud.” Seriously! Quelle balls! [NYT]
early and often
It’s Final: Clinton Is UnelectableSometime last week, the narrative of Clinton’s candidacy changed from the inevitability of her nomination to, as today’s Daily News lede helpfully summarizes, “Where did Hillary Clinton’s mojo go?” We dare propose it went right up the widening gyre of the news cycle: At this point, the media continue an enthusiastic pileup — while lamenting that pileup’s largely imaginary toll. (“Clinton remains way ahead in national polls,” the News admits in the story’s tenth graph, “Though some have shown a slip.”) Not to worry: The next, equally specious, chapter will probably be about how the victimized Hillary is racking up sympathy votes. With any luck, we can go through five or six more of these twists before Iowa, basing each one on a 3 percent shift in a poll with a 4 percent error margin. In the meantime, the latest outrages.
gossipmonger
Padma: When in Doubt, Suck Face With SalmanA prankster made lewd comments to Ann Curry and Matt Lauer during a media conference call between TV writers and the Today anchors. Banker Rafael Follieri, boyfriend of Anne Hathaway, flew commercial from Atlanta to New York despite supposedly owning a private jet. Padma Lakshmi was overheard telling someone she still was “still trying to work the secret to a great relationship out” hours before she made out with Salman Rushdie at Bungalow 8. (Rushdie also almost fell asleep during a play at the Guggenheim on Saturday.) Ivanka Trump couldn’t get into East Village dive Black and White because she didn’t have an I.D. The smoking hot ex–First Lady of France, Cecilia Sarkozy, is coming to visit New York with her kid.
show and talk
Fashion Studio: Narciso Rodriguez
Designer Narciso Rodriguez partnered with Liz Claiborne last month, and New York fashion director Harriet Mays Powell visited his studio recently to discuss the new venture. Rodriguez, who has maintained a minimalist aesthetic for over a decade, first became averse to trends while working in Paris. “There was so much creativity on the runway, but no clothing,” Rodriguez recalls. “When you can dress people, then you’ve done your job.”
Fashion Studio: Narciso Rodriguez [NYM]
basel blog
As Art Fair Ends, It Becomes Clear: Girls Ruled
Amid the dense and hedonistic five-day spree of partying at Art Basel Miami Beach, it’s easy to forget that millions of dollars of art changed hands, too. And when the rhinestones had settled, the surprises went far beyond the no-shirt dress code (for men, at least) at the Visionaire party Saturday. Art dealers at the fair, which drew a record 40,000 attendees, had braced for Russian buyers, hedge-fund spending, and buzzy interest in the new new things. Instead, Latin Americans went on a binge, artists from the seventies outdrew emerging stars, and there was furious — even competitive — buying by a suite of New York–based real-estate developers.
So who bought what?