![Warren to nab powerful committee seat? According to several Senate sources, Senator-elect and populist hero Elizabeth Warren has a good chance of getting a seat on the powerful Senate Banking Committee. This is a logical fit for Warren, architect of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and would give her great power in her efforts to curb deceptive and unscrupulous practices on the part of financial institutions. “[G]iven her prominent work on those issues, she would certainly have a very good shot” at getting a spot on the committee, an aide tells Reuters. Having Warren on Banking is essentially the Republicans’ worst nightmare, but it’s worth noting that it’s a nightmare entirely of their own short-sited construction. source](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_md8mpzSxGQ1qas8z9o1_500.jpg)
Warren to nab powerful committee seat? According to several Senate sources, Senator-elect and populist hero Elizabeth Warren has a good chance of getting a seat on the powerful Senate Banking Committee. This is a logical fit for Warren, architect of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and would give her great power in her efforts to curb deceptive and unscrupulous practices on the part of financial institutions. “[G]iven her prominent work on those issues, she would certainly have a very good shot” at getting a spot on the committee, an aide tells Reuters. Having Warren on Banking is essentially the Republicans’ worst nightmare, but it’s worth noting that it’s a nightmare entirely of their own short-sited construction. source
I keep hearing the president say he’s responsible for keeping the country out of a Great Depression. No, no, no, that was President George W. Bush and Hank Paulson.Mitt Romney • At a town hall meeting today. We’re no political strategists, but we’re wondering how helpful it is for a presidential candidate to make a statement now, in 2012, that’s both pro-George W. Bush and pro-bailout. TARP, for instance, is currently sitting with a net -13 approval rating. Not exactly a winning issue. source (via • follow)
Mitt Romney, when pushed, refused to out and out denounce the TARP bailout, which while politically toxic for a GOP candidate, he says is based on his experience in the private sector. He insisted they were necessary to keep the whole system from collapsing, though he stressed he has no interest in any further bailouts. Also, he’d try to play a bigger role in the European debt crises, particularly Greece’s.
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Papandreou’s office says “next week is particularly crucial” to the country’s next bailout. The debt crisis is also so bad that a guy lit himself on fire yesterday because he couldn’t renegotiate his loan.
» This is both the largest consumer protection fine ever levied by the Fed and the first time the institution has punished a bank for nudging customers into subprime loans. There’s more to come, too; in addition to the fine, the order also “requires that Wells Fargo compensate affected borrowers,” although it’s unclear how this will work. It’s better than nothing, but $85 million just seems a bit low; as a point of comparison, the bank made $2.5 billion in the first three months of 2010 alone.
» The American companies include: Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, and Freddie Mac. Two of the top three companies on the list are Chinese. On the upside, the Treasury has as much money as Google, so that’s kind of a nice consolation prize.
» Not all is rosy in Bailoutville: One of the biggest issues we still face are the dual sinkholes of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which have reportedly cost taxpayers $150 billion and we like to think of as dual sinkholes. And some legislators feel that the effect has set us up for having to bail out unsuccessful companies in the future.
So assuming that the banking sector doesn’t suffer another crisis in the next two years, taxpayers might be okay after all. Indeed, even if there is some loss on these guarantees, the assets would have to be pretty rotten to eat up the government’s entire $12 billion profit on the equity sale.The Atlantic associate editor Daniel Indiviglio • Offering some more context on the Citi bailout numbers. While the U.S. no longer owns any shares in Citi, we do have other stakes in the company – most notably, we’re still backing a lot of their debt right now due to a program called the “Temporary Liquidity Guarantee Program,” which isn’t as easy to acronym as TARP. But by the end of 2012 at the latest, we’ll be off the hook for that. Still, though, the fact that we might make any money off of TARP is impressive. “Citi was viewed by many as the big bank with the most serious problems,” Indiviglio notes, suggesting that the profit would prove that their bailout in 2008 was warranted by panic and general FUD, not “too big to fail”-type concerns. source (via • follow)
Watch: PCB gets a visual shout out on GMA’s Yahoo/Tumblr...
Wrote a thing.
Hat tip to this headline writer.
Congrats Tumblr!
Don’t screw this up Yahoo.
In 2007, I was...
I started tumblr when I was at one of the lowest points of...
» Whoa! Did your heart just stop? Ours did too. It actually created a short delay in posting this. *whew* Now that we’ve caught our breath, let us explain. After Bear Stearns went under in early 2008, a special plan was put in place to offer emergency, quickly-paid-back loans to banks during the financial crisis to ensure they continued to run smoothly. All loans required collateral, all were low-interest, and all have already been paid back. The program also ended in May of last year, so no worries about any residual effects. But yeah. Have you ever seen $9 trillion? It would probably require dozens of Scrooge McDuck’s money vaults.
We’ve seen this song and dance before. First in Greece, then Belgium, then France, then in Britain, but it’s still not any more frustrating to watch – especially in Ireland’s case. The Irish had a solid decade of economic growth, only to see the economy go into freefall and be forced to take upon tons of bailout money in the span of about two years. So that’s why these people are protesting in Dublin today. They’re angry because of the insane cuts they’ll be forced to swallow – the worst of any European nation so far. (Photo by Marcus Swan) source
Hey, yo, Ireland. ShortFormBlog here. We just wanted to commend you for coming to your senses and deciding to take a loan from the European Union. But there’s still a problem – you’re remaining way too timid about accepting help. You guys don’t want to end up like Greece or Iceland, do you? While we don’t know how much you’ll be willing to take (all you’re on the record for is saying €100 billion would be “too much”), but with that crappy housing market and contracting economy of yours, you might be wise to work on improving your economic stability with a bailout, not trying to figure out how little you can get. Again, if you don’t want the bailout money, we’ll take if off your hands. source
I don’t know where the market is going to be a year or two down the road, so I can’t make such a bold statement. Sure, I’m hopeful, and I’m not saying it can’t happen. I think the company is well positioned … so things look good for General Motors.GM CEO Dan Akerson • Not committing to a full repayment of the taxpayers’ money from the bailout. It sounds like a hedging of the bets, honestly. If he says it now and the stock goes south, he’s on the record offering a promise he can’t keep. For what it’s worth, though, GM’s stock is doing boffo so far in its first day of trading, already up six percent in early-morning trading. source (via • follow)
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