Sunday, March 22, 2009

A poor man's access to profitable Wall Street corruption

I recently suggested Goldman Sachs as a "buy" given its revolving door policy with the US government. As an alternative to owning Goldman Sachs common stock, which can be volatile, you can buy a trust preferred security offered by Goldman Sachs. They are commonly described as a hybrid between a bond and a preferred share. In any case, one offering from Goldman Sachs which I would like to highlight is
Corporate Asset Backed Corp., CABCO Series 2004-1 Trust (Goldman Sachs Capital I), 6.00% Class A-1 Callable Certificates
It trades like a stock on the New York Stock Exchange with the ticker symbol GYA.

Click here for IPO prospectus.

There are of course a lot of technical details associated with this security. I think the following is all you need to know. Assuming Goldman Sachs will never go bankrupt, this security will always be "in the money" and you stand to collect an annual dividend of $1.50 per year and have each share redeemed at $25 if you wait for its maturity on 2/15/2034. With the shares trading around $15 now, you stand to collect a 10% dividend yield on what I consider to be a safe bet. This is much higher than any interest rate you can earn in any bank or investment account. With this security, you also have the potential for capital gains. If Goldman Sachs goes bankrupt, the worst case scenario is you lose the value of your then-investment. In the event of bankruptcy liquidation, you stand to collect residual proceeds before the common shareholders. This makes these shares "safer" than owning common stock.

I doubt Goldman Sachs would ever go bankrupt given their prowess and profitability. So here's a safer alternative to participating in Goldman Sach's corrupt profits without having to actually work for them.

1 comment: