Viewpoint: Geoff Colvin
From Fortune: “Wall Street has to change in painful ways. The major firms, gloriously profitable just a few years ago, are not earning their cost of capital. They’re failing...
“Wall Street has to change in painful ways. The major firms, gloriously profitable just a few years ago, are not earning their cost of capital. They’re failing, and everyone seems to agree on their near-term future: lower returns and lower profits. The firms have to get smaller, cut expenses, live less large, pay people less. The glory days are over. But hold on. Wall Street’s glory days are over every 10 years, like clockwork. They were over at the end of the ’70s, after a decade of market stagnation; again at the end of the ’80s, when takeovers and leveraged buyouts faded; at the end of the ’90s, with the dot-com bust; and now with the subprime disaster. Every time, Wall Street comes back in new ways that no one imagined. That pattern is hopeful for the firms. For Barney Frank and the legions of new regulators he helped to create, it’s worrisome.”
Geoff Colvin in Fortune
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Trump uses tariffs to upend Brazil's domestic politics
IN THE SPOTLIGHT By slapping a 50% tariff on Brazil for its criminal investigation into Bolsonaro, the Trump administration is brazenly putting its fingers on the scales of a key foreign election
-
3 questions to ask when deciding whether to repair or replace your broken appliance
the explainer There may be merit to fixing what you already have, but sometimes buying new is even more cost-effective
-
'Trump's authoritarian manipulation of language'
Instant Opinion Vienna has become a 'convenient target for populists' | Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
-
Issue of the week: Do high-speed traders rig the market?
feature Wall Street is abuzz over high-frequency trading.
-
Issue of the week: How Yellen spooked the markets
feature At her first press conference, the new Federal Reserve chair made the mistake of indicating when the Fed would raise interest rates.
-
Stop calling women ‘bossy’
feature Let’s ban “She’s bossy.” Instead, let’s try, “She has executive leadership skills.”
-
Issue of the week: GM’s recall disaster
feature Mary Barra is facing “her first big test” since she took over as GM’s new CEO in January: a recall of more than 1.6 million vehicles.
-
Issue of the week: Who gets Fannie’s and Freddie’s profits?
feature Fannie Mae’s and Freddie Mac’s shareholders want their money back.
-
Issue of the week: Comcast buying Time Warner Cable
feature Has Comcast won the cable wars?
-
Issue of the week: AOL’s million-dollar babies
feature AOL’s “gaffe-prone” CEO, Tim Armstrong, “got in some hot water” last week.
-
Issue of the week: Why Google unloaded Motorola
feature Three years after shelling out $12.5 billion for Motorola, Google announced its sale to Lenovo Group for $2.9 billion.