Word: bailouts
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...auto industry bailout saga is working its way up and down the supply chain. Shortly before Christmas, the Federal Reserve Board quietly provided $200 million of support aimed specifically at auto dealers, who have had a difficult time financing their inventories - forcing some of them out of business. The support is being administered through the Fed's Term Asset Backed Securities Loan Facility or TALF, which was created this past autumn to encourage banks to start lending again. To further help the dealers, the Fed eased the eligibility requirements so that inventory financing (and there's plenty of inventory...
...Obama found himself in that uncomfortable position because of the unpopularity of the $700 billion Wall Street bailout that Congress passed last fall to help stabilize the nation's ailing banks. Half of that money has already been used up by the Bush Administration, and with little indication that such usage has helped ease the flow of lending to consumers and businesses, members of Congress are loath to hand over the rest of the money without guarantees of greater oversight and transparency. And so Senate Democratic leaders are struggling to prevent their members from passing a Resolution of Disapproval...
...veto. Such a situation might force Obama to expend some of his political capital on fixing the holdover problem, and it could drain support for what he prefers to be concentrating his time and energy on: a potentially trillion-dollar stimulus bill. That too, of course, is essentially another bailout, but it's directed at Main Street, so the President-elect can count on a little more gratitude from the American public. If he can't spend his entire inaugural week celebrating, that's the least he can expect in return for his efforts...
...form of the next bailout is not the critical issue. Banks will get the money they need to keep the global credit system from collapse. What is at stake is how the government will handle owning a majority stake in what used to be the pillars of the nation's financial system...
...that may force Geithner, 47, to do some self-evaluation. Along with Paulson and Bernanke, Geithner has been one of the key players overseeing the bailout of the banking industry. Some of the trio's decisions - like not rescuing Lehman Brothers in mid-September - have come under criticism on Wall Street and Capitol Hill for being hesitant and reactive. Associates say Geithner doesn't necessarily disagree with the charge that the government's response "has had an ad hoc, seat-of-the-pants quality to it," as a senior investment banker in the middle of things puts it. That...