Goldman Sachs Response to New York Times Article on Europe and CDS

The New York Times published a story this morning which makes reference to a report (see below) produced by a trading strategy group in our Securities Division in August 2009. The group produces reports from time to time which outline general trading ideas and are distributed to institutional clients.

The report discussed in the New York Times’ story was neither confidential nor did it contain novel views. Although the story suggests that one of the trading ideas was to buy CDS protection on Greek sovereign debt, the report doesn’t mention any country by name.

Secondly, the New York Times attempts to make a link between a note sent to clients last year called, “CDS 101,” (see below) and investor concerns about Greece’s fiscal position. It will be quite clear to anybody reading this report that it is nothing more than an educational primer on the CDS market.

>> State of the Market [PDF, 1.7 MB]