Update: CIT Group files bankruptcy; No Government aid for CIT….Thursday Market Mover: Paulson on the Hill…
Update: 11/2/09: Bad, sad news, CIT Group went belly-up this weekend despite the 2B taxpayer infusion and the Carl Icahn offer. Bad news for small business. But it is an attempt to dump the debt and live on, so maybe it will live to fight another day.
CIT Group Inc. filed for bankruptcy protection Sunday, in a final attempt to restructure and keep the doors open at the century-old commercial lender.
Now, the lender to nearly a million small and midsize businesses must maintain its customer base as it tries to rehabilitate under Chapter 11 protection. Most financial firms sell off assets or liquidate in bankruptcy amid fears that customers will draw down credit lines and spark a run on the bank.
But CIT garnered support from about 90% of voting debt holders for a prepackaged reorganization plan that could allow the lender to speed through Chapter 11 and emerge with a new business model by year’s end. Under the plan, bondholders will exchange their debt for new debt that matures later, as well as nearly all the equity in a reorganized CIT.
The bankruptcy stay would eliminate some $10 billion in debt from the lender’s balance sheet, the company said. CIT has been weighed down by more than $30 billion in bond debt.
A $2.3 billion taxpayer bailout extended to CIT late last year under the Bush administration will be wiped out in the bankruptcy. Common shareholders will be wiped out, too.
The plan is among the first attempts to restructure a financial firm in bankruptcy court and have it emerge relatively intact. The board approved CIT’s decision to seek Chapter 11 protection in a meeting Sunday. “The board appreciated that this is a [historic] sort of filing,” said a person close to the lender. “It is clearly unprecedented.”…
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Charlie Gasparino is reporting on CNBC’s Kudlow that Sheila (Bair of FDIC) brought the hammer down and drew the line in the sand saying NO MORE BAILOUTS…shxt it would have to be on small business that the money train dried up eh?
Well, we love Sheila here at MiM (we wanted her or Jamie Dimon of JPMC for Treasury)and Timmeh was saying from Saudia Arabia that he was confident they would find a way to do the bailout, so we enjoy it when his toes are stepped on, bitter and petty that’s us today fer shure, BWAAAAHAAAA.
Hope Sheila’s foot met Timmeh’s axx on this one, FDIC should have the too big to fail wipeout authority IMO not the Fed and for Gawds sake not the Treasury….
CNBC on imminent CIT bankruptcy following FDIC and Treasury decision not to bailout…
… CIT Group, a major lender to small- and mid-sized U.S. businesses, said on Wednesday that talks with the government to bail out the company had ended, a development that could make bankruptcy likely.
…”Discussions with government agencies have ceased,” the New York-based company said in a statement. “There is no appreciable likelihood of additional government support being provided over the near term.”
The announcement came after last-ditch talks in which Treasury Department had been concerned about a worsening liquidity crunch at CIT over the last few days, and that government aid would not put the lender on a path to recovery….
Tomorrow BIG NEWS will be HANK PAULSON testifying on Capitol Hill about the Merrill BofA shenanigans, should be lots of fun. Hanks is the man who handed free market capitalism over to the government and then retired with hundreds of thousands of Golden Slacks shares…..Hank Hank Hank, when he sees whatis happening now how does he feel? He opened this door and TOTUS swagga’d through it….
Our MANY posts on Hank, Timmeh, AIG, Merrill, BofA, CITIBANK, Sheila, are too numerous to link…
Smashing Pumpins fan made video with footage of Tours in France, courtesy of buissonland
Moderate in the Middle 