morning call .... 04 24 2007

Goldman Sachs Group Inc., WallStreet's most profitable securities firm, raised $20 billion for its sixth leveraged-buyout fund, rivaling Blackstone Group LP'splan to create the largest pool of private-equity capital. $11 bil from institutional clients and wealthy clients, $9 bil from GS and its employees -risk tolerance: 12% asset is tied to less liquid holdings, such as real estate, private equity, up from 8% two years ago. Barclays and ABN Amro said they plan to return an estimated12 billion euros in excess capital to shareholders following thesale of LaSalle, mainly through a stock buyback. Buying LaSalle