SECOND TEAM David Zion Credit Suisse
Credit Suisse’s David Zion, who lands in second place for a third year running, “tells you what topics and accounting principles are most important and quantifies their impact on a company-specific basis,” observes one money manager. Zion wowed clients with an exhaustive report in April, “Parking Earnings Overseas,” in which he analyzed the past ten years’ earnings cached overseas — totaling some $1.3 trillion — for each company listed in the Standard & Poor’s 500 index. “Yes,” he admits, “that’s 5,000 10-Ks!” Investors shouldn’t make liquidity assumptions based on the offshore booty, however. “Even as cash continues to pile up on corporate balance sheets, companies may not have as much flexibility or liquidity as it appears,” he concluded. “To get their hands on it, companies face a tax hit of $360 billion in off-balance-sheet liability.”