Update: Paulson to Lewis on BofA Merrill Merger, An Offer He Couldn’t Refuse?
Update: In Depth View via Bloomberg:
Vodpod videos no longer available.
Our previous posts on the Clash of these Bank, Trading and Finance Titans here
Disclaimer: MiM are Merrill/BofA shareholders, our view is pretty damn biased as a result..
Was Timmeh in the room and in the loop? He was head of NY Fed then, betcha he was in the loop…..
Andrew Cuomo has his teeth in and he has that bulldog lockjaw thing happenin’ as he gets ready to run in 2010, Cuomo v Giuliani would be sweet!
Ken Lewis is SOL, shareholders are rightfully pixxed as all get out if he let Hank bully him into waiving withdrawing form the merger under MAC provisions. Material Adverse Change, which is what the MER losses were at that point according to Lewis’ testimony to Cuomo
…BUT even if he stood up to Hank and pushed ahead and went to court in DE, Hank is right in what he told Lewis anyway, DE is a tough fight on MAC, and it would have likely turned out BofA could NOT withdraw under MAC as with proper DUE DILIGENCE they should have KNOWN these losses were coming…either way Lewis is Fired CEO Walking…
More Horror YARM: Sorority Row….
Good Grief, not again. And the thing the cast thinks makes it more original than the original is that it is like OTHER CLASSICS like Scream! Jeebus Crispies….
The original film trailer reimagined by HorrorTrailerGuy:
Audrina Patridge, who co-stars in the horror remake of Sorority Row, told a group of reporters that the film is more like the horror films she grew up with than the 1983 original.
Patridge plays sorority girl Megan, one of six sisters pursued by a mysterious killer after they cover up an accidental death caused by one of their pranks.
“It kind of almost reminds me of I Know What You Did Last Summer and Scream,” Patridge said in a group interview on Tuesday in Hollywood, where she was promoting her TV show The Hills. “It’s very suspenseful and makes you jump. It’s very gory. No one knows who the killer is. Six hot girls, it’s a great movie.”
If it’s very gory, in the modern horror flick sense, then it isn’t like Summer and Scream, the point there was the suspense…is this SAW meets Prom Night, cause that is what it sounds like so far….being a horror flick fan I will have to go see it and find out…..
Patridge found out about the original after she was cast. Then she compared it to her film. “When I first read the script, that’s what they told me, so I went and actually got the movie, the original one, House on Sorority Row from 1983, and I watched it. It was scary. This one, the new Sorority Row, is actually modernized. It’s kind of different. It’s almost the same storyline, a prank goes wrong, but they’ve changed it a little bit. It’s not exactly like the original in 1983.”…
How about some of the original?
Courtesy of jobthepossum
Courtesy of HorrorFest1987
Video Update: Housing: Existing Home Sales Drop 3% in March….
Update: We STILL have a 9.5 month supply of homes, I do NOT agree this is a bottom, as UE goes up, and the foreclosure moratoriums end, the supply continues to grow. But to be fair here is the other side, second clip below, also if you need to refi or modify, check out the website here: http://makinghomeaffordable.gov/index.html/ NAR clip number 3, recall the NAR is in business to increase home sales, LOL, talk about a rosy view…
Breaking CNBC Chryon..
This comes after a bump up in sales in February, which some had hoped signalled a bottom and a resurgence in Spring Home sales…
March existing home sales fall 3% to an annual rate of 4.57 million…..
Video Updates: Market Mover Thursday: UPS misses and forecasts rougher 2Q, Credit Card honchos to the WH as TOTUS and the Critters take on a problem ALREADY SOLVED BY THE FED!…
Watch these pols rant for something the FED ALREADY DID, unreal…here we have Austan NAFTA Doublespeak Goolsbee….
…The world’s largest package delivery company reported net income of $401 million, or 40 cents a share, compared with $906 million, or 87 cents a share, a year earlier.
Excluding an impairment charge for the early retirement of the company’s fleet of DC-8 jets, UPS earned 52 cents per share in the quarter. Analysts on average had expected earnings of 56 cents a share, according to Reuters Estimates.
“The results are miserable, but we expected misery,” said Edward Jones analyst Dan Ortwerth. “And all bets are off as to when that misery will end.”…
…The U.S. economic bellwether also gave a second-quarter outlook below analysts’ expectations and warned that while economic recovery may begin in late 2009, it is more likely to come in 2010.
Credit Cards -everyone hates them- what a nice target for Team Obama. Meredith Whitney warned us these were the next shoe to drop on writeoffs of bad debts, now that TOTUS has them as a target I don’t see how these firms can hope to make any money going forward……:
President Barack Obama and senior White House aides plan to meet with credit card industry executives Thursday and will urge the companies to end practices regarding interest rates and fees that critics say have added to financial distress faced by U.S. consumers.
The House Financial Services Committee Wednesday approved legislation aimed at reigning in credit card company practices that have surprised consumers with interest rate hikes and charges.
HILLARIOUS! B/C the FEDERAL RESERVE ALREADY DID THIS AND IT GOES INTO EFFECT SUMMER 2010!!!
Here is the Federal Reserve Press Release from December 2008:
Release Date: December 18, 2008
For immediate release
The Federal Reserve Board on Thursday approved final rules that would better protect credit card users by prohibiting certain unfair acts or practices and improving the disclosures consumers receive in connection with credit card accounts and other revolving credit plans.
The final rules prohibiting certain credit card practices were adopted under the Federal Trade Commission Act, and are being issued concurrently with substantially similar final rules by the Office of Thrift Supervision and the National Credit Union Administration. Among other things, the rules will:
- Protect consumers from unexpected interest charges, including increases in the rate during the first year after account opening and increases in the rate charged on pre-existing credit card balances.
- Forbid banks from imposing interest charges using the “two-cycle” billing method.
- Require that consumers receive a reasonable amount of time to make their credit card payments.
- Prohibit the use of payment allocation methods that unfairly maximize interest charges.
- Address subprime credit cards by limiting the fees that reduce the amount of available credit.
In finalizing the rules on unfair credit card practices, the Board carefully considered information obtained through consumer testing and more than 60,000 comment letters received during the comment period.
“The revised rules represent the most comprehensive and sweeping reforms ever adopted by the Board for credit card accounts,” said Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke. “These protections will allow consumers to access credit on terms that are fair and more easily understood.”
The Board is also adopting final rules to revise the disclosures consumers receive in connection with credit card accounts and other revolving credit plans to ensure that information is provided in a timely manner and in a form that is readily understandable. These rules amend Regulation Z (Truth in Lending) and conclude a comprehensive review of the open-end credit rules. The final rules under Regulation Z require changes to the format, timing, and content requirements for credit card applications and solicitations and for the disclosures that consumers receive throughout the life of an open-end account. Many of the changes reflect the result of consumer testing conducted on behalf of the Board during its review.
“Our intent is to increase transparency and fairness in how credit card and deposit accounts operate, thereby enhancing competition and empowering consumers to better manage their accounts and avoid unnecessary costs,” said Federal Reserve Governor Randall S. Kroszner. “The rules represent a significant step forward in consumer protection. By ensuring fairness and making credit terms easier to understand, these safeguards should allow more consumers to benefit from using credit.”
Both of the final rules addressing credit card accounts take effect on July 1, 2010.
The Board is separately proposing rules to protect consumers that use overdraft services offered by their bank. The rule solicits public comment on proposed amendments to Regulation E (Electronic Fund Transfers) intended to provide consumers a choice regarding their institution’s payment of overdrafts for automated teller machine withdrawals and one-time debit card transactions. The Board is proposing two alternative approaches to providing consumer choice, including a proposed requirement that would require institutions to obtain consumers’ affirmative consent (or opt-in) before any overdraft fees or charges may be imposed on consumers’ accounts. The comment period for the Regulation E proposal ends 60 days after publication in the Federal Register.
In a related move, the Board is adopting final amendments to Regulation DD (Truth in Savings) to address depository institutions’ disclosure practices related to overdraft services. The effective date for the final rules adopted under Regulation DD is January 1, 2010.
All four Federal Register notices are attached. Publication of each of the rules is expected shortly.
Highlights of Rules Regarding Credit Card Accounts and Overdraft Services (30 KB PDF)
Statement by Chairman Ben S. Bernanke
Statement by Governor Randall S. Kroszner
Federal Register notice, Regulation AA: 466 KB PDF | HTMLFederal Register notice, Regulation DD: 93 KB PDF | HTML
B-10 (69 KB PDF) Aggregate fee model
Federal Register notice, Regulation E: 499 KB PDF | HTML
Model forms and samples:
- A-9 (28 KB PDF) Model consent form for overdraft services
- A-9 (A) (28 KB PDF) Model opt-out form for account opening
- A-9 (B) (11 KB PDF) Model opt-out form for periodic statements
Review and Testing of Overdraft Notices (1.94 MB PDF)
Federal Register notice, Regulation Z: 3.36 MB PDF | HTML
Model forms and samples:
- G-10 (A) (77 KB PDF) Applications and solicitations model form (credit cards)
- G-10 (B) (72 KB PDF) Applications and solicitations sample (credit cards)
- G-10 (C) (59 KB PDF) Applications and solicitations sample (credit cards)
- G-10 (D) (28 KB PDF) Applications and solicitations model form (charge cards)
- G-10 (E) (22 KB PDF) Applications and solicitations sample (charge cards)
- G-17 (A) (58 KB PDF) Account-opening model form
- G-17 (B) (62 KB PDF) Account-opening sample
- G-17 (C) (64 KB PDF) Account-opening sample
- G-17 (D) (48 KB PDF) Account-opening sample (line of credit)
- G-18 (A) (460 KB PDF) Periodic statement transactions: interest charges; fees sample
- G-18 (D-E) (27 KB PDF) Periodic statement new balance, due date, late payment, and minimum payment sample (credit cards) and periodic statement new balance, due date, and late payment sample (open-end plans (non-credit-card accounts))
- G-18 (F) (162 KB PDF) Periodic statement form
- G-18 (G) (926 KB PDF) Periodic statement form
- G-19 (14 KB PDF) Checks accessing a credit card sample
- G-20 (23 KB PDF) Change-in-terms sample
- G-21 (50 KB PDF) Penalty rate increase sample
Moderate in the Middle 