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There were the executives who won big and the shareholders who lost out — and none of them did it quietly. Our business commentator hands out his annual awards for 2012 …

The disaster unfolding at Fortescue, and the desperate attempt by billionaire Andrew “Twiggy” Forrest to cling on to his fortune prove again that when Jim Chanos says something, it’s worth listening.

Why the shares in probably the safest of the sectors in the market had to be sold yesterday in their millions, and were then bought back in the afternoon, will be the biggest mystery of yesterday’s outing by the lemmings of Australian finance.

A Macquarie Bank subsidiary entered into a secret side contract with the SBS, under which an “incentive payment” of $3.85 million was paid without being declared to the market or the ABC.

When does a Millionaire Factory stop being a Millionaire Factory? Not when it makes an annual profit of $956 million, pays its top 12 executives $59 million and has 15,325 staff earning an average $254,486 in the austere post-GFC environment of the past 12 months.

Many commentators erroneously point to the so-called heroic role played by Australian banks in steering Australia through the GFC, when it was the Australian taxpayer that saved the banks.

Macquarie Group raided its profitable Macquarie Airports piggy bank to dress up its 2010 interim result and hold the reported fall in after-tax profit to a more comfortable level.

There is nothing intrinsically wrong with Macquarie, except that it is now just another investment bank that has run out of bright ideas, swimming at the back of a pack of larger, hungrier sharks.

Macquarie’s worsening performance and lacklustre return on equity is the inevitable result of a business that has lost its primary competitive advantage.

The big question mark over the new Macquarie model is whether its failure to gain traction and generate respectable performance is due only to the peculiar market circumstances or whether the model itself is incapable of generating the kinds of returns Macquarie investors and staff have become accustomed to.

The Sydney Morning Herald has overstepped the mark with today’s attack on Macquarie Bank, which is just another shot in the war between Michael West and Macquarie.

It appears that Macquarie Bank directors have short memories — barely a year since the credit crunch caused turmoil in financial markets, money again is being spread around the executive suite at Martin Place with gay abandon.

China property prices hit record highs … Greece is in worse shape than most thought … Plane sailing for Macquarie … A bonus for the hard-working South Korea … An embarrassing time for Morgan Stanley … Fluctuating fortunes of the gold market …

Mike Rann is attending a function at the Adelaide Intercontinental Hotel tonight at 7pm. Has Michelle Chantelois been tipped off, and will she make an appearance? Plus, rotten news for Macquarie Bank’s staff in the Big Apple.

Former US Treasury Secretary and Goldman Sachs CEO Henry Paulson on Tuesday undertook a strident defence of his management of the US economy during the height of the financial crisis.

While the China bubble could continue for months or years to come — a planned economy not known for human rights and continuing to defy gravity would also need to defy history, writes Adam Schwab.

News that private equity has pulled another attempt to take the money and run from a poorly performing retailer again causes us to ask, just where is the added value from private equity?

KPMG’s approval of Macquarie Airports’ $345 million bounty is kind of like saying a thief who steals your wallet was being fair and reasonable because they didn’t shoot you afterwards.