FUN FOR THE DAY

Another CROOK on the dock

Stanford in court in massive fraud case

RICHMOND, Virginia (Reuters) - Texas billionaire Allen Stanford will
appear in federal court in Virginia on Friday to answer allegations
he orchestrated a massive fraud through his Antigua bank that bilked
investors out of millions of dollars.

BROKER CALL Lloyds remains key European pick at UBS
19 June, 2009

Broker remains buyer of Lloyds Banking Group with a target price of 107p, with the stock remaining a key European pick.

"Lloyds strong capitalisaton and participation in the UK Govt APS ensures that the group is able to withstand a greater degee of credit stress than peers. Moreover, APS participation will ensure that Lloyds impairment charges are more likely to be 'V' shaped than elsewher and that rising impairment at Lloyds is an issue that should not ultimately concern the market."

After moving to under 70p at one point, late this afternoon has gone into a spike that move it into 71.50 / 71.60p ( new Intraday high ), at this point it had difficulties on moving higher as it went side ways for a couple minutes and then lower again now 71.20p

Lloyds ADR ( on the US ) currently up 2%

big......big buy going in at the end of the day at 70p.....196 mill

watcher

US fund managers eye Lloyds' Insight arm -sources

Reuters, Friday June 19 2009

US fund firms consider bids for Insight
* Bids for the unit due imminently
* First round bidders pre-selected
By Victoria Howley and Simon Meads

LONDON, June 19 (Reuters) - U.S. investment managers are circling Lloyds Banking Group's third-party asset management arm, after rival BlackRock scooped up Barclays Global Investor, people familiar with the situation said on Friday.
Bids for Insight Investment's third party business are due imminently from a small group of pre-selected bidders, two people familiar with the process told Reuters on Friday.
"The pre-selected parties are mainly trade bidders. The process will be opened up more widely if the offers are too low," one of the people said.
Lloyds and Insight Investment declined to comment.
Offers for Insight are likely to be in the range of 150 million to 300 million pounds ($245 million to $491 million), the sources said.
As at March 31, Insight had total assets under management of 116.6 billion pounds ($190.7 billion), including 70 billion pounds managed on behalf of third parties.
Bank of New York Mellon Corp, which was bidding against BlackRock for BGI, was likely to make an offer, the sources said. State Street Corp and privately held Fidelity Investments were also potential suitors.
Bank of New York Mellon and Fidelity declined to comment. State Street could not be reached for comment.
Advent International together with Hellman and Friedman, owner of UK asset manager Gartmore and a bidder for Barclays iShares, are also expected to submit bids, the people said, but it is unclear whether they are in the group of first bidders.
Both firms declined to comment.
Part-nationalised UK lender Lloyds said earlier this year that it would keep Insight separate from its other funds arm, Scottish Widows Investment Partnership.
The move was interpreted by analysts as paving the way for a sale of one or both businesses.
Abdallah Nauphal, recently appointed to head SWIP in addition to his role as managing director and chief investment officer at Insight, has been mulling a management buyout of Insight's third party business, according to reports.
"There is no question there are both private equity and strategic (buyers) in the process so it is by no means a slam dunk MBO at all. I think strategics have a good chance here," said another person close to the process.
More private equity firms are likely to enter the process if first round bids do not meet the vendor's expectations, the sources said.

The dividend payment should be back next year, and LLOY will be more structured and the most powerful bank in Britain.
Well at least is what I think

Further good news maybe on the way

Lloyds to Receive Bids for $122 Billion of Assets (Correct)
By Sarah Jones

June 20 (Bloomberg) -- Lloyds Banking Group Plc may receive formal offers for 74 billion pounds ($122 billion) worth of assets managed by Insight Investments, the London-based Times reported, without citing anyone.

Insight Chief Executive Officer Abdallah Nauphal is assembling a management buyout proposal and several backers have expressed interest, the newspaper said.

A Lloyds spokesperson declined to comment when contacted by Bloomberg News.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=ayDaBn0YuPxc

There is signs of Fund Managers building atakes as the economy is recovering

Buying Lloyds
By Dylan Lobo 21 June 2009

Fund managers are starting to see value in Lloyds on hopes the economic green shoots in the UK economy will turn into small shrubs.

Henderson New Stars Stephen Peak is among those who have bought into Lloyds recently. The move was part of his gentle shift into cyclical stocks where performance is generally linked to economic health.

Peak has invested 1.5% of his 158 million New Star UK Alpha fund, which he inherited from Tim Steer following Henderson purchase of New Star earlier this year, in the UK lender. I have been sceptical about banks for some time. But while Lloyds is still a risky situation and still has significant exposure to bad loans, a good part of this is factored into its share price, he said.

The intriguing thing about the banks is to work out where they will be. There is in argument that banks have never had it so good as they can charge attractive margins to the people they lend to. 'The more difficult bit is to work out the historical legacy of the problems but I feel that a degree of fear is already factored into some bank share prices.

While Peak is more optimistic on the economy, he warned investors to expect a bumpy ride between now and the end of the year. I think there will be further lurches of enthusiasm and despair. I expect the market to be higher by the end of the year but not significantly and it wont go up in a straight line.

Lloyds Halifax web site still shows the Gov,s share holding 22nd June 2009

Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY)
Sector:Banks
Add to watchlist ShareBuilder ShareDealing ISA SIPP Share Price
70.00p
Change Today
0.70p
Market Cap
19,013m
Summary Prices Charts Trades News Financials Director Deals Broker Views Profile Overview Latest Deals Largest Deals Latest Deals
Traded Action Notifier Price Amount Value
08-Jun-09 Placing Helen A Weir 38.40p 69,913 26,846.59
08-Jun-09 Placing Anthony Watson 38.40p 869 333.70
08-Jun-09 Placing Anthony Watson 38.40p 7,541 2,895.74
08-Jun-09 Placing Tim Tookey 38.40p 16,162 6,206.21
08-Jun-09 Placing Truett Tate 38.40p 86,665 33,279.36

More Lloyds Banking Group director deals
Largest Deals (28 days)
Traded Action Notifier Price Amount Value
08-Jun-09 Placing J Eric Daniels 38.40p 419,592 161,123.33
08-Jun-09 Placing Victor Blank 38.40p 275,190 105,672.96
08-Jun-09 Placing Archibald G Kane 38.40p 188,738 72,475.39
08-Jun-09 Placing Wolfgang C G Berndt 38.40p 155,319 59,642.50
08-Jun-09 Placing Truett Tate 38.40p 86,665 33,279.36

More Lloyds Banking Group director deals
Director Shareholdings
Notifier Holding Value*
J Eric Daniels 441,829 309,280
Victor Blank 290,625 203,438
Archibald G Kane 211,188 147,832
Wolfgang C G Berndt 163,504 114,453
Truett Tate 91,399 63,979
Helen A Weir 73,772 51,640
Tim Tookey 44,403 31,082
Timothy Ryan 12,426 8,698
Martin Scicluna 9,681 6,777
Sandy Leitch 9,148 6,404

Major Shareholders
Notifier** Holding Value*
The Commissioners of Her Majesty's Treasury 11,798,531,471 8,258,972,030

The shares are very strong today, though they have spend most of the morning on the RED, but by 11am they managed to be on the UP to 71.40 +1.40p.

That is a good performance considering the FTSE is well down by 50 points

        LUNCH TIME FUN

The GREEDY - FAT CATS - are still around .................

RBS boss set for 9.6 million pay deal

The new chief executive of Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) could be paid as much as 9.6 million under the terms of a deal expected to be unveiled later this week by the bank.

It is understood that Stephen Hester, who took over the 70% taxpayer owned bank late last year, will receive a basic salary of 1.2 million, a 2 million annual non-cash bonus, and up to 6.4 million of long-term share and stock-options.

The stock options are dependent on meeting various targets including share-holder return and share price performance.

It is understood that Hester will only receive the maximum payout if RBS's shares rise above 70p - effectively doubling from Friday's close of 37.2p.

A rise to such a level would also take them above the level at which the government bought its stake last year for around 50p.

Lloyds chief executive, Eric Daniels, is on around 1 million annually, with a further maximum 2 million as part of a long-term incentive scheme.

Hester's payout - which should be confirmed this week - was approved at a meeting last week by UK Financial Investments (UKFI), the state-body which controls 70% of RBS, as well as by other leading shareholders.

While the payout will no doubt be seen as excessive for what is a taxpayer funded bank, the decision to align Hester's remuneration to the share price performance will effectively tie the interests of the chief executive to shareholders.

RBS courted controversy over the weekend over its continued funding of corporate hospitality at Wimbledon.

According to reports, the bank has spent 300,000 on packages which include Centre Court tickets, 75-a-head lunches and vintage champagne.

The package, which the bank said had been contracted in and was part of a long-term deal, comes following announcements from the group that it is to shed 15,000 jobs in total as part of a restructuring.

Last week former RBS boss Sir Fred Goodwin agreed to reduce his pension payout by 210,000 a year following a surge of anger at the scale of the deal which eventually led to an attack on the ex-chief executive's home.

Goodwin said he would reduce his pension payout from 555,000 to 342,500 a year.

Is action being taken on time?

LLOYDS BANKING GROUP (LLOY.L) The bank has acted in anticipation of a sharp rise in the number of struggling companies
on its loan book by more than trebling the size of its corporate restructuring division, the Mail on Sunday said.

Looking good since the Intraday low of 60p two weeks ago

......... But that UPTREND line of two weeks, is now broken with yesterday's close down and more today it seems,
now 66.40p -1.45p, still up over 10% from that low.

The rest of the banks are week also, as the market has not got a proper direction today, a bit of up and down so far.

Wealth managers back banks as 'buy'
By David Campbell -- 23 June 2009

More than a third of wealth managers say UK banks are a definite buy with only pharmaceutical stocks and oil and gas rated higher, an industry survey has shown.

Research for the Association of Private Client Investment Managers and Stockbrokers (Apcims) showed that 35% of money managers believe that the sector is now undervalued.

Almost three quarters (72%) said they believed there would be at least one further strong rally in the next year and the same number believed the current rally would last six months.

More than half (58%) said that they were now taking reallocating cash and 28% said that they believed that their exposure to corporate bonds would continue to rise.

Mike Lenhoff, chief strategist at Brewin Dolphin and chair of the Apcims asset allocation committee, said: Bond and equity markets are reflecting a growing conviction that policy makers the world over will be successful with their efforts to reflate the global economy.

Indeed, we may be going through the trough of the recession right now. That said, the prospect of recovery does not mean plain sailing ahead.

Inevitably there will be set backs along the way and so it makes sense to maintain an appropriate degree of balance between bonds and equities in portfolios.

The results came despite a distinct lack of conviction about the economic health of the UK. Just 28% said they expected the economy to improve versus 35% who said they expected no change and 37% said they expected it to deteriorate.

Alongside financials oil and gas was also highly rated as a buy opportunity by 47% of respondents while pharmaceuticals were rated by 42%.

Trading central forecast for LLOY........

61.25 is our pivot point.

Our preference: short term rebound towards 87.25.

Alternative scenario: the downside breakout of 61.25 would call
for 52.75 and 47.5.

Comment: the RSI is below 50.
The MACD is above its signal line and negative.

The configuration is mixed. Moreover, the share stands above its 20 day MA
(66.9) but below its 50 day MA (70.08).

Supports and resistances:

92.5 *

87.25 **

82

67.85 last

64.5

61.25 **

52.75 *

(c) TRADING Central 23-06-09

And the reason for today's poor performance ..........

Lloyds Banking Group (LON:LLOY) is down this morning courtesy of a ratings downgrade by Moody's to its key operating units.

Moody's Investors Service lowered the Bank Financial Strength Rating (BFSR) of Lloyds Banking Group component Lloyds TSB from C+ to C.

Moody's also said the outlook was negative.

"The lowering of Lloyds TSB's BFSR by one notch to C incorporates the significant challenges lying ahead for the bank's management to continue the integration of HBOS and its subsidiaries, as well as the residual risk remaining in those assets that will not be covered under the Asset Protection Scheme" said Elisabeth Rudman, Vice President - Senior Credit Officer at Moody's and lead analyst for Lloyds.

Tell us what does a Moody's credit analyst know about rationalising Lloydstsb and HBOS? Don't you get sick of these so called experts that have never run a business in their lives. It is time these mindless pen pushers were questioned and their motives exposed.

Should see these fly tomorrow !! why ???? because i got out today - usually makes a share soar :-)

        CLOSING MARKET REPORT

Investors reacted negatively to the furore over RBS Chief Hester's remuneration deal with the shares edging down 0.77p at 35.19p,
while others in the sector also weakened. Barclays was a major casualty, down 4.95p at 259.05p, while Lloyds fell 2.85p at 65p
and Standard Chartered slid 40p at 1,135p.