The most striking part about this particular development is how totally unstriking it is anymore:
Some banks are prodding the government to let them use public money to help buy troubled assets from the banks themselves.
Banking trade groups are lobbying the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. for permission to bid on the same assets that the banks would put up for sale as part of the government’s Public Private Investment Program.
[...]
The lobbying push is aimed at the Legacy Loans Program, which will use about half of the government’s overall PPIP infusion to facilitate the sale of whole loans such as residential and commercial mortgages.
In some circumstances, recursive patterns are considered elegant and deft. Signs of some fundamental harmony in nature or the universe. Finance is just not one of those disciplines. This is going to (start, endure and) end in tears.
This is priceless doublespeak:
Allowing banks to have it both ways would give them added incentive to sell assets at low prices, even at a loss, the banks contend. They claim it also would free up capital by moving the assets off balance sheets, spurring more lending.
Handing them billions of dollars with no expectation of repayment would accomplish the same goals.
Banks Aiming to Play Both Sides of Coin [The Wall Street Journal]
I inherited this mess from the previous administration
Maybe Erin Burnett would like to have drinks with me this Friday at Cucina Dell Arte in Palm Beach. Still too chilly in the Hamptons
Sinceley,
Guy who did not allocate funds to Madoff
@1- hmm, I get that you were trying to make fun of Obama but not sure how, since…that’s exactly what happened.
@3
je m’appelle bag le douce
@3, I forgot who came up with the brilliant PPIP idea. Can you tell me who that was?
Circular References are the stuff that Finance is made of!
Also, yes, because moving more crap off balance sheet to spur more lending worked out so famously the 1st time around, gee, what could possibly go wrong?
Bodine- we all know your name is douchebag, no need to reiterate.
if I wanted to start a ponzi scheme and cover my tracks, I do something just like this. hey, the gov’t gave ME money…I can’t be bad, right?
@7
i would hope that a metro from amsterdam ave and 80th with the richness of experience that comes from stalking online would more often than not make better decisions regarding when to post than a white male with no sensitivity towards gender, race, and competence norming in gov’t policy
Well played, Seaman Bodine II……!!!!
@bodine- i’ve come to the conlusion you’re a douchebag based on your comments. no need (or desire) to stalk you.
what’s a metro? Metrosexual? Since when do they live at 80/Amsterdam (Barney Greengrass? Popover Cafe? – both suck; Mermain Inn – now we’re talking)
“would give them added incentive to sell assets at low prices, even at a loss”
Would someone walk me through a scenario where giving a bank 1) a non-recourse loan and 2) matching equity, would encourage a bank to buy an asset from itself at a low price.
Anal_yst has it right.
Did I hurt someone’s feelings with the Obamarama post?