Update: Bernanke gets his Joe Cassano on…
Update: 4/17/11~ Question Asked, Question Answered~ (emphasis from original)
…Stunningly, today we learn that to keep long rates low, the Fed may have resorted to nothing short of the same suicidal trade that destroyed AIG FP and brought the entire system to its knees. Namely, Ben Bernanke is now quite possibly the second coming of Joe Cassano, since in order to keep rates low, Bernanke is forced to a last resort action of selling billions upon billions of Treasury puts to “pin” rates low contrary to natural supply-demand mechanics…
What do you do for $:Fed reveals partial data on emergency lending facilities, still mum on discount window
Update: Well, it would appear absolutely EVERYONE got a bailout except the middle class. And I do mean everyone.
Zero Hedge breaks down the 35 foreign banks that the Fed bailed out here.
…$1.27 trillion in agency MBS was traded by foreign banks…
led by the $410 billion by German-based Deutsche Bank ..
…the $382 billion by the Switzerland-based Credit Suisse.
Other highlights of the disclosure include that GE among other commercial endeavors got $ from the Fed, and that the Fed has essentially been taking all the polluted assets from everyone with a pulse (again, except for the US middle class consumer/homeowner who has been lectured about ‘moral hazard’ and whose house has been foreclosed upon):
.the Federal Reserve purchased $1.25 trillion in agency MBS from all participating banks.
Goldman Sachs borrowed 84 times from Fed’s dealer facility (PDCF) from Sept. 15 to 11/26/08 for amounts ranging from $100m to $8b
Bank of America borrowed 118 times from the PDCF from Sept 18 2008 to May 2009, in amount ranging from $375 million to $11 billion.
And even CA Pension funds got in on the bail out action, per ZeroHedge:
Looking at the TALF data, we see that the biggest borrower by subscription is Calpers, with a total of about $5.4 billion
Federal Reserve data breakdown and press release here. More from WSJ here
…The data released Wednesday include short-term liquidity moves for financial institutions and companies made as part of the Fed’s traditional role as lender of last resort, liquidity injections directly to borrowers and investors in key credit markets and financial support for Bear Stearns Cos. and American International Group Inc. (See all the data from the Fed)
Fed officials reported details on more than 21,000 transactions from December 2007 to July 2010. The emergency programs caused the size of the Fed’s balance sheet to swell. (See a history of the Fed’s lending)…
Update: Rand Paul’s Most Excellent Speech…
Update: Full Speech! yay!
Courtesy of sunrise1834
Look someone proudly embracing capitalism and American exceptionalism! Take note D.C.: We Americans Love America. Get a clue.
Financial collapse and housing: WaMu execs testify before Senate
Update: CSPAN3 livestreaming the hearing here
The Senate seems to have quite a bit of evidence suggesting the WaMu team deliberately securitized bad bad bad loans as ‘great!’ loans..
WSJ live blogging it here
“The worst managed business I had seen in my career.” That is how Washington Mutual’s former president described his company’s home loan division.
The mortgage lending practices at the Seattle thrift take center stage at a Senate hearing this morning.
The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations says WaMu did little to stop the loan fraud and generally risky and highly defective securitization practices in its mortgage businessWaMu’s defense? Former CEO Kerry Killinger says he reigned in his company’s mortgage business and blames his thrift’s collapse on unfair and biased regulators who were willing to save Wall Street firms, but not his own
- 7:11 am
- by Michael Corkery
- Add a Comment
Levin: Killinger made $11 million to $20 million a year, from 2003 to 2007. He was paid $25 million when he stepped down in 2008, as his thrift was going down the tubes. Killinger may have complained about not being part of the Wall Street club (see earlier Deal Journal post). But he sure was paid like one of club.
Update: Lynch (D-MA) unloads on Geithner; Market Mover Wednesday: Geithner, Paulson AIG testimony on the Hill…
Gee Lynch in Massachusetts seems a little edgy wonder why?!
CNBC will carry the hearings on livestream here (10:00am EST) . WSJ covers the emails here. Lots of previous posts on the AIG bailout. FD-We are former employees/shareholders…
WOW! Must See TV: Congressional JEC panel ripping Geithner apart: Rep Brady (R-TX) first to ask him to resign: MiM starts Obama economic team “shake-up” watch…
Vodpod videos no longer available.
If you look at UE Tim, the US is substantially WORSE off than it was when Obama took office to answer Timmehs whine….In fact someone should tell Tim, taking him at his word that he believes all measures, any measure of economic activity shows things are better since January, the measure of foreclosures and delinquencies has also more than doubled since Obama ‘took charge’:
Update: 12:10pm EST: uh oh. Kudlow says and Steve Liesman confirms, that Geithner is the most fiscally conservative member of Obamas economic advisers. No wonder we are in a world of hurt! CNBC just ran the Brady Timmeh back n forth so it should come up in a video post shortly. will get it up right away.
Vodpod videos no longer available.
Update: 11:!5am OMG OMG Geithner just threw Seniors unda da bus!! He acknowledges to Brownback that yes the CBO score only works if Congress actually DOES the Medicare cuts and he insists they must and should and will DO THE CUTS. He says the costs have to be reduced, Brownback is saying but why cant we save Medicare? Good grief Geithner is a disaster, you aren’t supposed to tell Seniors they are getting thrown under there Timmeh, Obama will be displeased. Good ad for the GOP though!
WOW!! Excellent!!!! Live feed from CNBC here
I am starting Geithner Fired/Resigns Watch now, there will fer shure be some sort of ‘ Obama economic team shake-up’ to placate the rumblings as they get ready to ask for MORE STIMULUS…They can’t get away with it under Geithner IMO, looks like he is marked as sacrificial lamb, but the Progressives will be no happier with Larry Summers, lol….
By dequalss
Typos abound, getting ready while I do this- TImmeh is red and ranting and blaming Bush and Rep Brady made him acknowledge yes he was head of NY Fed when this collapse happened, and they are cross talking, Brady says the public has lost all confidence in Geithner and he reflects badly on his President, he says at some point Geithner has to take responsibility…ohhh excellent!!
Update: 11:04am EST: Rep. Burgess (R-TX) just said “I don;t think you should quit, you shouldn’t have been hired”. Is that a bus engine I hear idling??? This the Joint Economic Committee and is made up of both Senators and House members, double the fun!! Now Sen Brownback is going off about the health care plan and the Yuan peg…
(FD-MiM is a former AIG employee and shareholder and we have followed Geithner’s handling of the crisis as NY Fed-head closely for two years now, our posts on Geithner, Hank Paulson and AIG are legion. Our previous posts on Geithner and the troubled CITI bailout here and here and here and here and here and even here ….)
Recall Sens DeMint and Isakson called on Geithner to resign last March. As did several members of the House.
This is in keeping with the report in TheHill this morning:
A Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC) member said there’s “growing consensus” among liberals that Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner should step down.
Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) said Wednesday that he and other liberal House members are becoming increasingly tired of Obama administration economic policies that they say are too focused on maintaining the stability of Wall Street firms and largely ignore “Main Street.”“A growing consensus in the caucus [believe that Geithner should be removed],” DeFazio said on MSNBC this evening, adding that some lawmakers are “considering questions regarding him and other economic advisers.”
DeFazio said that lawmakers have not yet drafted a plan to remove Geithner. The lawmaker also took aim at top Obama economic adviser Larry Summers for furthering many of the same policies favored by Geithner.
“We need a new economic team,” said DeFazio…..
Hey man, live by the populist pitchforks, die by the populist pitchforks. Hard to put that class war genie back into the bottle and it was a HUGE mistake to embolden the populist rhetoric flame throwers in the House…
This drum beat is getting louder. Dodd thinks Geithner is a drag on his polling, lol, and Simmons, Dodd’s GOP opponent called for Geithner’s resignation already:
A former House Republican running for the Senate in Connecticut is calling for Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner to be replaced over his handling of AIG’s bailout.
GOP candidate Rob Simmons reacted to a report by Neil Barofsky, the inspector general of the $700 billion bailout program, known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).
Barofsky’s report criticized the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which Geithner led during the bailout, for a series of missteps that Barofsky said ended up requiring the government to provide additional support to AIG.
“The report issued yesterday by the inspector general for the TARP program is a deeply troubling account of Secretary Geithner’s failed management of the AIG bailout in which he cost taxpayers $13 billion in unnecessary new debt,” said Simmons, who appears to be the only candidate or office-holder to call for Geithner’s replacement in response to the report.The federal government committed more than $180 billion to AIG, which was crippled by poor investments and trades in credit default swaps, a financial derivative.
Simmons also attacked his opponent, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), in the statement calling on Geithner to be replaced.
“The cozy relationships between the bailed-out financial companies and powerful politicians like Tim Geithner and Chris Dodd are exactly why Americans have lost trust in Washington, D.C., and why we need new leadership with the skills and integrity to clean up their mess and get our economy back on track.”…
More great housing news:
US mortgage delinquency rates and the percentage of loans that entered the foreclosure process jumped in the third quarter, with both reaching record highs, the Mortgage Bankers Association said on Thursday.
The percentage of loans on which foreclosure actions were started rose to 1.42 percent in the third quarter, an all-time high, up from 1.36 percent in the second quarter and 1.07 percent in the third quarter of 2008.
…The delinquency rate for mortgage loans on one-to-four-unit residential properties rose to a seasonally adjusted rate of 9.64 percent of all loans outstanding as of the end of the third quarter of 2009, up 40 basis points from 9.24 percent in the second quarter and up 265 basis points from 6.99 percent one year ago, the MBA said in its National Delinquency Survey. The delinquency rate broke the record set last quarter. The records are based on MBA data dating back to 1972.
…The percentage of loans in the foreclosure process at the end of the third quarter was 4.47 percent, an increase of 17 basis points from 4.30 percent the second quarter of 2009 and 150 basis points from 2.97 percent one year ago.
The combined percentage of loans in foreclosure and at least one payment past due was 14.41 percent on a non-seasonally adjusted basis, the highest ever recorded in the MBA delinquency survey….
Update: Anyone? Bueller? Market Mover Monday: Smoot-Hawley rises from the grave and TOTUS to ‘admonish’ and ‘push’ for his regulatory scheme today…
Update 2: BWAAAHAA!!! Bob Pisani of CNBC says the traders have been passing around the Ben Stein Smoot Hawley Tariff scene from Ferris Bueller on the floor this morning!! lol..
Update: OMG in his opening remarks TOTUS recognizes Barney Frank D-MA as the man who will be instrumental in leading our financial policies and regulatory reforms. OH NOES! The guy who gave FAN FRED a pass?
He mentions Paul Volcker (who seems to serve primarily as TOTUS’ figurative crucifix against the vampires of reality who note TOTUS is fumbling the economy and implementing disastrous policies) Why does Volcker let himself be used this way? Sad. TOTUS is touting him as the CHIEF of his council of something or other, and we all KNOW Volcker is being ignored..Our previous posts on Volcker here. And here is one of interest concerning his speech in February wherein he said ‘MOST aspects of capitalism will survive’.
Apparently no one ever told TOTUS you don’t start a land war with Asia and you don’t start a trade war with your banker..
TOTUS’ decision to put a tariff on Chinese Tire imports is well..untimely…to say the least. Timmeh Geithner just got back from another round of promising China we would restrain our deficit (AS IF!) and now here is TOTUS starting a trade war. At whose behest?? LABOR OF COURSE!!! Good grief! Our previous post on Smoot Hawley here
…China indicated Sunday it would restrict U.S. imports of chicken and auto products after Washington’s move to slap punitive sanctions on Chinese tire imports, raising tensions in a trade dispute ahead of two planned meetings between the countries’ leaders.
Citing a jump in Chinese imports, the Obama administration said Friday it would impose stiff tariffs on Chinese-made tires for the next three years, invoking a section of trade law that China agreed to as a condition for its joining the World Trade Organization in 2001. The move essentially would cut off the source of nearly 17% of all tires sold in the U.S. last year and hit cost-conscious consumers particularly hard, as retailers will have to find alternative sources for the lower-end tires that make up much of what China sends to the U.S….
And just to follow up, TOTUS will come on down to Wall St to give another lecture and remind everyone that they are bad bad people. Despite Sheila Bair’s resistance, TOTUS is leaning HARD on FDIC and SEC to give Treasury and the Fed expanded powers..
President Barack Obama, speaking on Wall Street Monday on the first anniversary of the crescendo of the financial crisis, will discuss the administration’s plans “to wind down government involvement in the financial sector,” will push for “immediate action” on regulatory changes need to prevent future crises and admonish Wall Street to avoid the practices that led to the crisis, an administration official said. The president’s remarks, follow similar comments from the Treasury and Federal Reserve aimed at blunting criticism that they lack an “exit strategy” for withdrawing their support for the financial system with speeches and documents timed for the first anniversary of the worst moments of the crisis.
More after the break:
Moderate in the Middle 