We recently presented a look at some of the most notorious financial felons of contemporary times.

Since then, news has included the indictment of Mark Cuban for insider trading in a case that is somewhat reminiscent of Martha Stewart's case. According to the SEC, the billionaire entrepreneur asked his broker to sell all his shares of Mamma.com after the company's CEO confidentially told him of an impending stock offering that would dilute the value of all existing shares. By selling before the information became public, Cuban is said to have sidestepped losses of more than $750,000. Cuban insists, though, that no agreement existed to keep the information confidential.

And then there was the indictment in Texas of Vice President Dick Cheney, along with former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and others. There seems to be a conflict of interest between the vice president's influence on the federal agency that oversees federal immigration detention centers and his substantial holdings in Vanguard Group, which invests in private prison companies. But does the lame-duck county district attorney, who was a no-show in court, have the authority to bring charges against federal officials with regard to federally run institutions?

Continue reading Financial Felons: Where are they now and is there a next generation coming?

Financial Felons: Where are they now and is there a next generation coming? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Tue, 25 Nov 2008 14:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

This post is part of a feature on companies and products that our bloggers think are in need of a makeover. See all 26.

Remember Dick Cheney? He hasn't emerged from his spider hole since shooting his buddy in the face at a quail hunt. But last time I was in Washington, I was walking along the street near George Washington University Hospital and suddenly all the cars disappeared and an armada of police cars and black suburbans whizzed by. I was later told that it was Cheney getting his stent checked up.

Prior to his stint in the administration of the 43rd president, It turns out that Cheney's heart beat for Halliburton (NYSE: HAL). In 2004, for example, taxpayers provided Halliburton's KBR subsidiary with $7 billion to provide services in Iraq while it took hundreds of millions of dollars in improper charges. With its 2% profit over costs, the more taxpayer money Halliburton spent, the higher its profits. Fortunately, Halliburton spun off that pesky KBR subsidiary in April 2007.

But it has other problems. The SEC is investigating Halliburton for paying bribes in Nigeria; its KBR subsidiary did a lousy job replacing bolts on an undersea pipeline that will cost Halliburton up to $220 million; the SEC investigated Halliburton for bogus contract revenue accounting; it settled asbestos litigation; a competitor of Hallburton accuses it of antitrust violations; and it received a $108 million judgment for dumping hazardous waste.

Continue reading Makeover needed: Halliburton

Makeover needed: Halliburton originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 24 Oct 2008 14:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

The clock has an interesting history. The now-deceased Manhattan real estate developer, Seymour Durst, built this sign in 1989 because he thought that the then $2.7 trillion debt was too high. The debt kept growing after he put up the sign but by the end of Bill Clinton's second term, it was down to around $5 trillion. Since January 2001, the national debt has grown to $11.3 trillion thanks to the $850 billion bailout bill.

The good news is that the clock, which currently counts the deficit by substituting a 1 for the $ sign that was there before, will be fixed next year -- adding two digits. Too bad fixing the clock won't make the U.S. economy any less perilous. At 81% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), our national debt is way above the 60% that the IMF considers to be a risky borrower.

Peter Cohan is President of Peter S. Cohan & Associates. He also teaches management at Babson College and edits The Cohan Letter.

National debt breaks clock originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 09 Oct 2008 11:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Dick Cheney testified to SEC on Halliburton (HAL) accounting issues originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 03 Oct 2007 16:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Michael Jackson shopping for East Coast vacation home originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 05 Jul 2007 18:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Dick Cheney is certainly no stranger to criticism. In recent months, the Bush administration has come under sharp attack from foreign leaders, Congress, and Democratic presidential candidates, not to mention Barbra Streisand. But last week, Cheney drew criticism from an unlikely source: His investment manager, Jeremy Grantham.

Some choice quotes from his report, "While America Slept, 1986-2002: A Rant on Oil Dependency, Global Warming, and a Love of Feel-Good Data:"

"Successive U.S. administrations have taken little interest in either oil substitution or climate change, and the current one has even seemed to have a vested interest in the idea that the science of climate change is uncertain."

"The U.S. is the only country in which environmental data is steadily attacked in a well-funded campaign of disinformation (funded mainly by one large oil company)."

According to TheStreet.com: "Grantham is, like most fund managers, prudent, conservative and inclined to favor the free market and smaller government. He has even said he supported Bush-Cheney in 2000. That doesn't make him particularly political. He also manages a portion of the Heinz-Kerry fortune, as well as those of many other wealthy types. "

The growing realization that global warming is a real problem that presents a "grave and growing threat" is having negative ramifcations for the Bush administration, which was recently accused of censoring climate change scientists. With global warming science now solidly part of the mainstream, investors may want to take note. For information and links about how you can profit from global warming, read my post about it here. For information about Peter Lynch's top solar power picks, read Gary Sattler's excellent piece.

Cheney's fund manager attacks energy policy originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 05 Feb 2007 15:05:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.