As the Nasdaq goes higher, market-making business goes higher, implying that the fundamentals of Nasdaq companies are doing better. |
Generally I'm pleased from a shareholder perspective with what's going on. They've made a significant restructuring, which will result in significant cost savings, much of which will fall to the bottom line. This breaks them out from being a very inefficient, large brokerage house. |
I think (the European investments are) something they need to do, but we haven't seen the benefits from their investment yet. I've seen better progress at other firms. |
I'm not terribly excited about the company ... but it was a good quarter. |
Lehman is the winner so far this quarter. Lehman has a bigger fixed income business proportional to the size of the company. |
No one won in the past market environment. A lot of people will be changing chairs. |
Such fees help to get rid of non-profitable accounts or turn them into profitable ones. |
They can just wait until the weaker players go out of business and those customers will go to one of the dominant players. |