1.The Gates Foundation buys shares in Goldman Sachs - and Monsanto
2.Goldman Sachs makes $1 billion profit on food price speculation
EXTRACT: The Seattle-based charity endowment, set up by Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) founder Bill Gates and his wife, bought a half a million shares in Goldman Sachs during the quarter ended June 30. (item 1)
NOTE: See the World Development Movement's report, 'The great hunger lottery: how banking speculation causes food crises', for how Goldman Sachs has not only exacerbated hunger but caused long term damage to the fight against global poverty:
http://www.wdm.org.uk/food-speculation/great-hunger-lottery-how-banking-speculation-causes-food-crises
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1.The Gates Foundation Buys Shares Of Goldman Sachs
Jeanette Borzo
Dow Jones, August 16 2010 [shortened]
http://www.nasdaq.com/aspx/stock-market-news-story.aspx?storyid=201008161826dowjonesdjonline000326&title=the-gates-foundation-buys-shares-of-goldman-sachs
SAN FRANCISCO - The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation took advantage of sagging stock prices in the second quarter to add Goldman Sachs Group Inc. ( GS), one of the most storied names in finance, to its portfolio, according to a 13F regulatory filing on Monday.
The Seattle-based charity endowment, set up by Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) founder Bill Gates and his wife, bought a half a million shares in Goldman Sachs during the quarter ended June 30. The investment bank's share price slid during the quarter after the Securities and Exchange Commission leveled civil fraud charges against it on April 16.
The value of the Gates Foundation's holdings dropped 6% to $11.9 billion over the quarter, down from $12.7 billion in the previous quarter.
The foundation, known for concentrating on vaccines and AIDS in its charitable work, also added Ecolab Inc. (ECL) and Monsanto Co. (MON) to its portfolio.
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2.Goldman Sachs makes $1 billion profit on food price speculation
The Ecologist, 19 July 2010
http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_round_up/542538/goldman_sachs_makes_1_billion_profit_on_food_price_speculation.html
'Risky and secretive' gambling on the price of coffee, cocoa and wheat is leading to unstable food prices and exacerbating poverty and malnutrition but creating billions of pounds for the banking sector
Banks such Goldman Sachs are making huge profits by gambling on the prices of key commodity crops such as coffee, cocoa and wheat, according to the campaign group the World Development Movement (WDM).
By creating funds to allow investors to speculate on the price of food, in the same way they would invest in the shares of a company, banks are able to bet on the price of food.
However this is leading to higher and more volatile prices which make it more difficult for farmers to plan and invest and also lead to damaging price rises - such as those witnessed in 2007/8 - which hit the poorest families in less industrialised countries hardest.
Only last month, says WDM, the price of coffee jumped by 20 per cent in three days, after a trader called the bluff of hedge funds that had made millions by selling coffee contracts and betting on the price to fall. This left hedge funds scrambling to buy actual coffee beans, and the price shot up from the extra demand.
'Nobody benefits from this kind of reckless gambling except a few City wheeler-dealers,' said WDM director Deborah Doane. 'British consumers suffer because it pushes up inflation, British companies suffer because of unpredictable oil and raw material prices, and the world's poorest people suffer because basic foods become unaffordable.'
Main perpetrators
The biggest banks involved in the trading are Bank of America, Citibank, Deutsche Bank, HSBC, Morgan Stanley and JP Morgan. Goldman Sachs alone is estimated to have made more than $1 billion from commodities trading in 2009.
WDM's new report, 'The great hunger lottery', calls for limits to be set on the amount that bankers can bet on food prices and for an end to secretive trading. The US has recently passed tougher regulation for the financial sector but WDM says similar reforms in the EU may not be agreed because of opposition from the City of London and UK Treasury, which still denies speculation played a significant role in the 2007/8 price spikes.
'Perhaps not coincidentally, London is host to the highest amount of commodity trading outside the United States. Recent opposition to EU regulation of hedge funds by the UK treasury shows that the UK government still gives a disproportionate voice to the financial sector at the expense of other sectors of the economy, and against the interests of citizens,' says the WDM report.