Fortune: two-thirds of economists see a recession

With inflation currently the highest it’s been since 1981 in the U.S., and the Federal Reserve enacting tighter monetary policy to try and bring them down, experts and business leaders alike have been sounding the alarm that a recession could be on the horizon.  Two-thirds of macroeconomists recently surveyed by the Financial Times and the Initiative on Global Markets said they’re anticipating a recession, while more than three-quarters of global executives surveyed by business insights company Conference Board said they are as well.

~ Colin Lodewick, "Bed Bath & Beyond is firing its CEO because Americans are done spending with a recession in the distance," Fortune, June 29, 2022

Marc Benioff on optimism from Davos

It's an economic freight train.  Every CEO is bullish.  One of the things about Davos is that it tends to be a tremendous measurement of where things are.  You [interviewer Andrew Ross Sorkin] and I were both here in 2008, '09, '10 and you can see when everyone is walking around with their head down.  No one's walking around with their head down.  People are excited and they're feeling good about the world.

~ Marc Benioff, CEO, Salesforce.com, CNBC interview from Davos, 2018 World Economic Forum, January 23, 2018

William Norman Grigg: What will happen to the CEOs of Fannie and Freddie in the wake of a government takeover

Fannie CEO Daniel H. Mudd, and Freddie CEO Richard Syron engaged in fraudulent bookkeeping right up to the eve of the federal takeover by deliberately overstating their capital holdings and financial health. However, neither of them faces criminal or civil prosecution. In fact, strictly speaking they're not even being fired: They will both eventually "step down" from their current posts, but will be given sinecures of some kind.

Solicitude of this kind is routinely displayed toward those who had helped generate hundreds of billions of dollars in perfectly rotten mortgage loans as part of a corrupt scheme to boost executive compensation through dishonest accounting methods. Fannie and Freddie practiced Enron-onomics and Arthur Andersen-style accounting on steroids, in the serene confidence that the taxpayers would eventually have to absorb the costs and that nobody of any consequence in those agencies would suffer significant repercussions.

That confidence, as we can see, was entirely justified.

~ William Norman Grigg, "Washington's Kleptocratic State: 'More Communist Than China'," LewRockwell.com, September 9, 2008

Jim Cramer on Lloyd Blankfein

Lloyd Blankfein is money in the bank... He's the most underpaid CEO on Wall Street.

~ Jim Cramer, as appeared on CNBC, December 21, 2007

CEO of Dick's Sporting Goods expects business to weather tougher economy

Our business really travels in a narrower band than the economy as a whole. Based on keeping our business focused on that core athlete and outdoor enthusiast, we're not going to see the lows when the economy is a bit more difficult.

~ Ed Stack, CEO, Dick's Sporting Goods, "Dick's Buys California-Based Chick's, Hastening Its Spread West," Investor's Business Daily, December 10, 2007