America's Economic Future – A Discussion By Ted Kavadas
I found the Opening Statement at the Full Committee Hearing on ‘Too-Big-to-Fail’ Post- Dodd-Frank, made yesterday (June 26) by The Committee On Financial Services’ Chairman Hensarling, to be notable. While I don’t necessarily agree with everything said in this Opening Statement – or with all aspects of the following excerpts – here are the excerpts I found …
Today’s Barron’s has an interview with Joseph Stiglitz. I found his answer to the following question to be an interesting perspective: Before we talk about all that, what are the most surprising developments since you won your Nobel Prize? Surprising to whom? The bubble episode surprised so much of the world—Greenspan and Bernanke believed that …
On Thursday, Larry Kudlow interviewed Rep. Spencer Bachus on CNBC. I found one comment Kudlow made, starting at the 6:17 mark, to be especially notable: “Many people believe that the top 5,6,8 banks are in fact too big to fail and constitute government sponsored enterprises in effect. That is an unfair advantage in the credit …
I found some interesting comments in the SIGTARP January 30 2010 Report to Congress: http://www.sigtarp.gov/reports/congress/2010/January2010_Quarterly_Report_to_Congress.pdf From the Executive Summary, which begins on Page 5: “Many of TARP’s stated goals, however, have simply not been met. Despite the fact that the explicit goal of the Capital Purchase Program (“CPP”) was to increase financing to U.S. businesses and consumers, …
The term “Too Big To Fail” is heard frequently. However, for all of the talk regarding its danger, very little if anything has been done to rectify the condition. As seen in The Wall Street Journal of December 16, p C18, “The top four banks have combined assets of $7.4 trillion, or 56% of the U.S. …
Here is a link to an October 20 speech given by Mervyn King. The speech speaks of the concept of Moral Hazard: http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/speeches/2009/speech406.pdf Although there are various notable passages, I found this line perhaps most interesting: “The massive support extended to the banking sector around the world, while necessary to avert economic disaster, has created possibly the …
I’d like to make a brief comment about the “bank bonus” story that came out a few days ago. Here is one article on it, titled “Bank Bonus Tab: $33 Billion” from The Wall Street Journal on 7-31-09: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124896891815094085.html#articleTabs%3Darticle Needless to say, it seems outrageous that such bonuses, in said amounts, were paid out so …
To date, I haven’t written or otherwise commented about the issue of Moral Hazard. Perhaps the main reason is that I am afraid if I start writing about it, I may never stop… Needless to say, the issue of Moral Hazard and its implications are massive, and just seems to grow with time. It seems …