Banks possibly 'in more danger now'

I thought some of you might find this interesting. Good thing we saved all those banks by bankrupting our country! Maybe we could just sell our country to the Chinese. I hear they are doing well and looking to trade their U.S. dollars for hard assets.


WASHINGTON (CNN) – The banking system today may be in a more precarious position than it was a year ago, the man charged with overseeing a $700 billion bailout program said Wednesday.

Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general managing the Troubled Asset Relief Program, told CNN's Wolf Blitzer on Wednesday that the government's decision to support bank mergers over the past year may have put the U.S. economy more at risk.

"These banks that were too big to fail are now bigger," Barofsky said. "Government has sponsored and supported several mergers that made them larger and that guarantee, that implicit guarantee of moral hazard, the idea that the government is not going to let these banks fail, which was implicit a year ago, is now explicit, we've said it. So if anything, not only have there not been any meaningful regulatory reform to make it less likely, in a lot of ways, the government has made such problems more likely.

"Potentially we could be in more danger now than we were a year ago," he added.

Earlier in the day, Barofsky issued a scathing report criticizing the Treasury Department for not being transparent enough about how bailout money was being spent. He warned that this could have lasting effects.

"I think this cynicism, this anger, this distrust of government that's born in part from a lack of transparency could have far-reaching ramifications, whether there's a next crisis or when anytime the government is going to call on the American people, the taxpayer, to support necessary programs," Barofsky said.

politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com...

add another mouth to the growing list of mouths who say we are in for some extra hard times... thanks for trying to tell us barofsky.. thanks for doing your job even tho you were never suppose to in the first place..

reply to post by liveandletlive


Things are not that great in the UK either, have a read of this thread I created after spotting a few things going on if it interests you...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Any input would be appreciated.

Its going to be an interesting few weeks regardless of where you live to be honest.

Cheers.

[edit on 22-10-2009 by XXXN3O]

Americans always knew the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) was going to be expensive. But the program's special inspector general, Neil Barofsky, thinks the U.S. government has bitten off more than it bargained for: on July 20, his office released a report estimating the $700 billion effort to shore up the nation's wobbly banking system could end up costing taxpayers as much as $23.7 trillion, due to estimates for programs offered by the FDIC, federal money for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and other institutions on top of $7.4 trillion in TARP and other Treasury aid. A spokesperson for the Treasury Department quickly called the numbers flawed, making this the latest in the back and forth between Barofsky's oversight office — which currently has 35 ongoing criminal and civil investigations of suspected accounting, securities and mortgage fraud — and the Treasury Department over the handling of TARP disbursements.
www.time.com...

How much is that divided by the number of tax paying Americans?

reply to post by liveandletlive


Thanks for the great news. You want America to fail? You must want doom and gloom, which I detest. This is just fear-mongering. The sun will come out tomorrow, bet your bottom dollar, come what may.

Originally posted by XXXN3O
reply to post by liveandletlive

 

Things are not that great in the UK either, have a read of this thread I created after spotting a few things going on if it interests you...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Any input would be appreciated.

Its going to be an interesting few weeks regardless of where you live to be honest.

Cheers.

[edit on 22-10-2009 by XXXN3O]

Not to get off subject but whats with the "newly established Supreme Court that replaced the House of Lords this month as the highest court in the land"? Completely unaware of this.

What are the chances that the new court would rule against the banks?

Originally posted by pluckynoonez
reply to post by liveandletlive

 

Thanks for the great news. You want America to fail? You must want doom and gloom, which I detest. This is just fear-mongering. The sun will come out tomorrow, bet your bottom dollar, come what may.

I only want Denver to fail plucky and I know you love and crave the doom and gloom! I have another thread www.abovetopsecret.com... that Im sure you would detest as well.

reply to post by liveandletlive


Well the previous court ruled in favour of the public.

Theres more info in the thread.

I thought it would be worth mentioning because its not just the US that is facing difficulties right now.



[edit on 22-10-2009 by XXXN3O]

reply to post by liveandletlive

How much is that divided by the number of tax paying Americans?

23.7+11(current debt)+75(future debt e.g. SS)=109.7 Trillion/300 Million
I threw all of us in.

$365,000 at a 30 year rate of 5% monthly payments of $1960/month comes to $705,600 for every man women and child

think its overwhelming for the USTreasury now?!

just wait as the FED starts demanding repayments at Their loan-windows, & the troubled assets they redeemed at face value for their 1/2 Trillion$ stash of Treasury Notes & Bonds, swapped by the banks & investment firms that were too-big-to-fail...

The FED refuses to allow inspection of their 'balance-sheet',
which most of the economic/financial spokespersons say is in greater peril than the negative $9-12 Trillion that the USTreasury has.


One-Of-These-Days -Alice....KaPow! right-up-to-the-moon

Originally posted by pluckynoonez
reply to post by liveandletlive

 

Thanks for the great news. You want America to fail? You must want doom and gloom, which I detest. This is just fear-mongering. The sun will come out tomorrow, bet your bottom dollar, come what may.

I thought you liked fresh doom??

Topics I Like
fresh doom
Topics I Dislike
doom that is not fresh or projected in the future.

Thats pretty funny.

Originally posted by endisnighe
reply to post by liveandletlive

 

How much is that divided by the number of tax paying Americans?

23.7+11(current debt)+75(future debt e.g. SS)=109.7 Trillion/300 Million
I threw all of us in.

$365,000 at a 30 year rate of 5% monthly payments of $1960/month comes to $705,600 for every man women and child

Wow, so if I make the average hourly wage and work 24/7/365 how many years would that take for me to pay my share?

Originally posted by XXXN3O

Originally posted by pluckynoonez
reply to post by liveandletlive

 

Thanks for the great news. You want America to fail? You must want doom and gloom, which I detest. This is just fear-mongering. The sun will come out tomorrow, bet your bottom dollar, come what may.

I thought you liked fresh doom??

Topics I Like
fresh doom
Topics I Dislike
doom that is not fresh or projected in the future.

Thats pretty funny.

Her cat must have woke up on the wrong side of the bed!

reply to post by liveandletlive


I jest! You know me, I love fresh doom! Waking up and seeing fresh doom on ATS is like having Jessica Biel as an alarm clock...well, not as great but you get the idea.

reply to post by XXXN3O


Nice. Quoting me. Just a test to see if anyone was listening.

I hope the banks do fail. They are a bunch of stupids!


[edit on 22-10-2009 by pluckynoonez]

reply to post by liveandletlive

Wow, so if I make the average hourly wage and work 24/7/365 how many years would that take for me to pay my share?

Well since we all know banks will charge you if you pay off early.

$705,600
24 hours X $10/hour X ? days = $705,000 to 705,000/240= 2940 days or 8 years and 20 days of continual labor to pay off your cut of the debt

Originally posted by pluckynoonez
reply to post by liveandletlive

 

Waking up and seeing fresh doom on ATS is like having Jessica Biel as an alarm clock...well, not as great but you get the idea.

[edit on 22-10-2009 by pluckynoonez]

She's a little bit of heaven. The naughty thoughts I had, down right develish!

edit to clean up drool.

[edit on 22-10-2009 by liveandletlive]

Originally posted by endisnighe
reply to post by liveandletlive

 

Wow, so if I make the average hourly wage and work 24/7/365 how many years would that take for me to pay my share?

Well since we all know banks will charge you if you pay off early.

$705,600
24 hours X $10/hour X ? days = $705,000 to 705,000/240= 2940 days or 8 years and 20 days of continual labor to pay off your cut of the debt

Well, there goes any hope for a vacation any time soon! Of course you would have to subtract normal living expenses like food, shelter, clothing and transportation ect......unless of course someone was going to provide for all that. Maybe the government could build some camps, take over farming and retrofit some trains!

Of course they are in more trouble now. By receiving bailout funds, all they did was increase their debt (let's pretend they are really supposed to pay it back) and not change one single business practice.

When a company continues to operate in the same manner in which it almost went under, it's sure to go under again. And again.

I wouldn't get too worked up yet though. Things are going to totally bottom out in January.

Citibank is up to 29.99% APR. Bank of America is currently at 21.99%. And they just keep rising. Unfortunately, the people that were paying, will slowly no longer to be able to. Then the rates will go even higher.

Obama has certainly bought the banks enough time -- by announcing legislation intiatives to cap fees and rates but not actually doing anything -- to try and suck as much money out of people as possible. Whatever rates and fees are implemented prior to the legislation passing, will be "grandfathered" in.

I have a feeling that retail sales will be "better than expected" during the holidays. But come January, bankruptcies will be higher than expected as well since nobody will actually be able to afford what they bought in November and December.

I personally think people are getting antsy and waiting for something to make it OK to start spending money again -- the Holidays are the perfect reason to splurge.

You can not build back an economy on air -- which is exactly what is happening. Unemployment continues to rise -- 7,000+ people a day are LOSING their unemployment benefits. Which basically means 7,000 more people a day that have no money to pay back - or pay for - anything.

If you read about people collecting unemployment, they say they wipe out their savings account and then use credit cards to pay for their groceries, rent, phone, etc. They count on the fact that they can "right themselves" once they are employed again. The problem is -- that never happens.

That's yet another reason why you can't just keep throwing money at a problem to make it go away. Had unemployment remained low, the bailout could have possibly (stress possibly) worked. But with unemployment continuing to rise, businesses continuing to go under, foreclosures continuing to rise, etc -- there is sadly, no happy ending to this story.

Come January 2010, the government is faced with possibly defaulting on a loan received from China. I just can't wait to see what China is going to walk away with to make THAT debt disappear. My guess is that whatever the deal reached, more Americans will be out of work as a result.

Originally posted by lpowell0627
Come January 2010, the government is faced with possibly defaulting on a loan received from China. I just can't wait to see what China is going to walk away with to make THAT debt disappear. My guess is that whatever the deal reached, more Americans will be out of work as a result.

We could give them our land...... wait, no America's not for sale, oo oo I have an idea.... we could give them our children as slaves! No....No..people might be against that......hmmmm.......are you against that?............

reply to post by liveandletlive


Hey tis good old capitalism! China is just doing the right thing given the situation,they have been buying up assets for some time now though.In any case,i think China will be buying *hard* assets but i don't think they will dump the dollar.I think the dollar as a reserve currency will slowly dwindle and be replaced as top dog but not overnight,probably take quite a few years but it is bound to happen sooner or later.I would rather it was the yuan in all honesty but looks like it will be SDRs. Edward Griffin in his book basically nailed what has been happening with the bailouts and the *too big to fail* motto. The banks know they can get away with it. If you told people over here in the UK that we should have let the banks fail you would have been shunned and called crazy. Everyone thinks of the here and now, not understanding that the banks can keep leeching off their taxes by upping the fear factor and painting a gloomy picture.Five hundred billion please or we will collapse! rinse and repeat indefinetly until people are ready to let it all collapse,take the hit and rebuild.