Is ING dying ? they cut their CEO today and are up shit creek, Whadabout the NY Marathon sponsorship ?

Jeez, them too? I actually have money with them, and one reason I did that was because of their support of running.

The Dutch gov't bailed them out and they layed off a mass of people.

I only know one guy who worked at ING. He was very recently laid off.

New York Marathon has become a bargain for potential sponsors. They have done such a great job that they don't need ING. ING helps a great deal, but someone else would be happy to step in.

I wouldn't have thought the Dutch would be having problems.

Slim chance or none of anyone replacing ING for at least two years until this economic depression is over.

From NY Times, Nov. 1, 2008:

Wittenberg said she was not surprised when she heard of the financial rescue.

“We’d been in close contact with ING,” she said. “We had a very good sense throughout the crisis that ING was on solid footing, as we understood it. ING is quite significant in the Netherlands, so we thought the bailout would likely be coming.”

ING is not cutting its commitment to the marathon, which goes through 2010.

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The replacement ING CEO has stated that for the restructuring all cards are on the table. The NYCM will likely go as it is unnecessary overhead.

All that ass kissin by Mary and staff and now the guy is out of work. I wonder if you can still return those knee pads?

I believe that ING has concluded its sponsorship of the Amsterdam marathon. What is more shocking to me, is that UNICEF has picked up the sponsorship!

What ever happened to the good ol'days when we used to despise CEO's. I gotta tell you, I'm still there. A CEO like that losing his job is music to my ears. Those guys wipe their asses with money, sneeze into money, and jerk off into money. I'm not sad one of them lost his job.

[quote]ING dying ? wrote:

Is ING dying ? they cut their CEO today and are up shit creek, Whadabout the NY Marathon sponsorship ?[/quote

Don't worry about sponsorship for the NYC Marathon. The government will bail them out, if necessary. It will be called the "U.S. Treasury NYC Marathon." Gotta love Obama - taxing us into prosperity.

As for me, I'm just keeping on the crete.

The Concrete Runner wrote:

[quote]ING dying ? wrote:

Is ING dying ? they cut their CEO today and are up shit creek, Whadabout the NY Marathon sponsorship ?[/quote

Don't worry about sponsorship for the NYC Marathon. The government will bail them out, if necessary. It will be called the "U.S. Treasury NYC Marathon." Gotta love Obama - taxing us into prosperity.

As for me, I'm just keeping on the crete.

The US Government didn't bail them out, it's the Dutch government... founders of NYC when it was called New-Amsterdam. 15 million tax-payers of a tiny country in Europe save ING (a Dutch Company!) because of stupid Americans who live on credit and can't afford anything at all.

Stanhope - no one forced ING to invest in Collateralized Debt Obligations.

ING like most everyone else in the financial services industry arrogantly thought their quant models could ensure success in the CDO market just as they had been breezily succeeding with their models in, let's say, the currency exchange market (where assumptions are fewer and time horizons far shorter). And the banks were given a great push by Great Society politicians (both Republican and Democrat) who somehow thought that giving people access to easy long term credit even though they don't have the life skills or job to service 30 year commitments was a good idea.

The killer is that there where risk managers at virtually every one of these institutions that knew that the risks in the housing markets were substantial. Of course, if those risk managers kicked and screamed then, they would have been out of a job, because in a boom everyone wants in, share prices need to keep up with the competition, and increasing those mortgage numbers made the Barney Frank's of the world happy and it was easier to lobby against that next tranche of consumer protection in a bankruptcy or regulatory bill.

So I am not sure the culprit is the American consumer - who in many cases remain financially illiterate. I have trouble blaming busts on stupid people. They can't often help themselves. Smart people can. If customers were that stupid, why did these institutions enter into multi-hundreds of thousand dollar transactions with them without really caring about whether they could afford them? Good bankers know their customers - which is why if we ever turn this around the local model of lending will return, even if it makes certain groups unable to obtain easy credit. And the quants with their fancy Ivy League or Grande Ecole type educations are going to learn the hard way there is no substitute for real judgment and common sense. And they are going to have to learn to live on salaries like the rest of us, if they even have jobs. Not sure I have many tears here as all players long deviated from the rock hard principle in finance that you only take truly known risks, and hedge the rest.

ing direct wrote:

I wouldn't have thought the Dutch would be having problems.

Actually most of the world is doing as badly or worse than the US. Our unemployment is just now reaching a level that is considered normal in France and Germany. Iceland's government dissolved yesterday because of its economic disaster. As bad as things may be here, be glad you're in America because you could be much worse off.

My tax dollars paid for your crete.

Have you ever heard of the Tulip Bulb Mania?