Results tagged “profits”

Goldman Sachs, which repaid a $10 billion TARP loan to the U.S. government, announced second quarter profits of $3.44 billion, which beat analysts' expectations. The NY Times says, "The results continue a robust turnaround for the firm since it rode out the final tumultuous months of last year with the aid of a federal rescue... [The bank] said in the first six months of 2009 it had set aside $11.4 billion for compensation and benefits. Analysts said this was up 33 percent from a year earlier and was enough to pay each employee $386,429 for the first half of this year." Bloomberg News notes that the firm is "reverting to a business model analysts deemed irretrievably broken after a crisis of confidence in Wall Street raised borrowing costs and led to the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. While rivals have pared risks, Goldman Sachs has increased them."

As expected, actor Jeremy Piven's abrupt departure from the Broadway revival of David Mamet's Speed-the-Plow is costing the show's investors a mint; they had expected to finally break even just when Piven quit due to "mercury poisoning." The box office take dropped 33% in the wake of his withdrawal, and the money guys are livid. One producer tells the Post, "We were so close to recouping, and then this jerk screwed it up." Even Piven's former cast mate Raul Esparza is lashing out, telling the audience during curtain call last Sunday: "Today was the first time I really enjoyed playing this show. I hope you weren't expecting a big TV star." Meanwhile, actor Fisher Stevens has surfaced to defend Piven, testifying that he suffered from mercury poisoning earlier this year while eating fish four or five times a week during production of documentary The Cove, about the slaughter of mercury-loaded dolphins.