From my latest MSN Strategy Lab Journal:

Market manipulators  won’t go down without a fight against President Obama’s reform plans for Wall Street.

It appears that we could be heading for a showdown. In one corner: the Masters of Disasters, the Thrashers of Crashers, a.k.a. the Lending Loonies (theatrical pause) . . . Bank CEOs and Financial Company CEOs and Upper Management! In the other corner, the Cool of Rule, the Pope of Hope, the Arranger and Changer President Barak Obama. (crowd roars).

It is no joke. The likes of Goldman Sachs (GS) Morgan Stanley (MS) and JP Morgan (JPM) have a lot to worry about. No one argues that there is a new sheriff in town and he is aiming to clean up the street. So far, he has not given the “you are out of this town by high noon tomorrow” speech, but who knows how far you can push a man on a mission.

For too long, the markets have been run and even at times manipulated by those that will do anything to make a buck. Just this summer, we were astonished to learn that a little known legal loophole was left open after the Enron debacle. Now known as the Enron Loophole, it was one of the main reasons that the price of oil was headed to $200 per barrel. Only until the Commodity Futures Trading Commission intervened and ultimately changed the definition of who was considered a speculator did the price of oil begin to fall.

Yet, all the time, Goldman Sachs analyst “Arjun “where is he now?” Murti was projecting that we should see oil at $150-$200 within a year. Here is something to think about: What firms made a killing trading oil during 2007-2008?

Read the entire journal entry HERE