Goldman's Viniar Says Fear Rules in Credit Markets (Update1)
By Christine Harper
Feb. 6 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. credit markets are trading as if the economy is in a recession because investors' ``fear has overwhelmed greed,'' Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Chief Financial Officer David Viniar said today.
``Credit markets are trading like we're in the middle of the worst recession we've seen in a very, very long time,'' Viniar said at an investor conference in Naples, Florida, sponsored by Credit Suisse Group.
Viniar, 52, also said he expects to see a plan devised that will help the monoline bond insurers, which are facing potential rating downgrades. Insurers including MBIA Inc., Ambac Financial Group Inc. and Financial Guaranty Insurance Co. are at risk of losing their AAA ratings because mortgage-backed securities they've insured have declined in value.
New York State Insurance Superintendent Eric Dinallo told a meeting of Wall Street banks and brokerages that they ``created this mess,'' making necessary a plan to rescue bond insurers, the Wall Street Journal reported today, citing people familiar with the matter.
`More Complicated'
``It is likely that you will see some solutions to what's going on with the monolines,'' Viniar said. ``You have a number of companies who are involved in a lot of different things, so I think it's going to be more complicated'' than the industry bailout of hedge fund Long-Term Capital Management LP in 1998, he said.
Conditions in the leveraged-lending market are similar to August and September, when liquidity all but disappeared, Viniar said. Still, Goldman is ``pretty bullish'' on the private-equity business and the longer-term outlook, and is ``very happy'' with most of its own investments, he said.