Word: bankes
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...English language is rough on those who are determined to hold on to their money. If your style is to limit your bank withdrawals, get ready to be labeled parsimonious, penny-pinching, miserly, niggardly or cheap: in short, a skinflint. In recent decades, though, there have been fewer and fewer people in those categories. Americans have been more likely to reach for their credit cards, or to scramble to sign new mortgages...
...expect a healthy dose of political posturing before, during and after the President's meeting with top bankers Monday. "It's a p.r. stunt," says an executive at one of the banks that will be getting a dressing-down at the White House meeting. Executives from Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Wells Fargo are expected to be among those in attendance. (See 25 people to blame for the financial crisis...
...Obama's bank-bashing is about more than politics. The President has real problems only the banks can help him solve. On jobs, housing and the strength of the economy, he needs bankers to change their behavior, and there's only so much he can do to force them. So when he sits down with the financial industry élite on Monday, he may talk tough, but he'll also be asking for their help...
...Obama will also criticize the banks for trying to derail financial-regulation reform, which passed the House last week but faces multiple battles after Christmas in the Senate. And he'll scold them for continuing to distribute high bonuses, especially when they reward excessive risk-taking. The senior bank executive at one of the banks meeting with the President Monday describes the process as a "public spanking" and says other than the public humiliation the Administration has little leverage. (See the top 10 crooked CEOs...
...Obama and Geithner have a long list of penalties they can impose if the banks don't do a better job of lending to small businesses or modifying home loans. And Obama's pay czar, Kenneth Feinberg, could target the bank's bonuses with what the senior bank executive calls a "crazy" pay restriction like the one Britain passed last week. But the banks are expert at staying just on the right side of the Administration's guidelines for lending, and they have many friends on the Hill who can help defuse a movement to punish the banks. Which...