About the 'no stock broker left behind' bill

[melchar]

Let me get this straight - the Senate has added 150 BILLION more to the 700 billion 'Wall Street Welfare' bailout bill. Bwah?

So they added PORK and did NOT add re-regulation [they should do this FIRST] - so they're doing NOTHING to stop this from happening again;

They should BAN collateral debt obligations and adjustable rate mortgages. Plus they are explicitly going to allow FOREIGN interests to get bailed out, too. Anyone else feel sold down the river?

Comments

[nobarking.livejournal.com]

I was surprised the initial bill was ONLY for 700 billion, as all the reports were quoting at least 850 billion.

My dad is sitting here staring at his red, red, red screen on Etrade (nothing is buying, everything is selling and dropping) going "Well on the one hand we're fucked, on the other wouldn't it be cool if they just up it to a Trillion dollars? I mean we've never used that number before in real economic terms. I want a Trillion Dollar Bailout Bill."

He'll probably get his wish.

Please note that adjustable rate mortgages are illegal in Canada and always have been -- we have such a small economy we can't afford to mess with it.

Foreign interests getting bailed out is strictly a cover-their-ass strategy -- every major economy is tanking right now because the US is (Canada is looking on with a D: expression because the US is our major trade partner), but those economies will also bounce back because in a lot of cases they didn't have anything to do with this -- or were sold batches of the bad mortgages and were told they were A+ no-risk, and now their money is gone. They were lied to, plain and simple.

It's all just ugly.

I don't understand why they're not adding re-regulation, boggle. Not that anyone will be stupid enough to do this in the next 20 years, but after that?

[howeird]

Buy low.
'nuff said

[nobarking.livejournal.com]

Eh we liquidated our US stocks when the first bank was bailed out a few months ago -- that was the warning sign my dad was waiting for. But ugh. Canada's stock market is going "Aaaaaaaaugh!".

[gil-liant.livejournal.com]

Buy American!
Senators and Congressmen,
On Sale! Duty Free!

[howeird]

'no stock broker left behind
ROFL

I just bought a chunk of Freddie Mac and some Fanny Mae as part of my "no mortgage banker left behind" program. I just hope I live long enough to see the price go up again.

[gil-liant.livejournal.com]

I am failing to understand the entire approach to this bailout. As clearly as I can express it, they want us to buy a bunch of bad paper and acquire an equity interest in a lot of failing companies in order to solve a lack of supply in the liquid credit marketplace.

Why don't we take the $850+ billion and buy a bunch of good paper and acquire an equity interest in successful companies to solve a lack of supply in the liquid credit marketplace?

AIG is going bankrupt? Okay, let them. But put $50 billion into other insurance companies with tolerable balance sheets. Instead of bailing out Wachovia, give some commercial banks an extra $200 billion to loan, in exchange for an equity stake in their success. Tired of bailing out GM? How much would Toyota cost the U.S. government on the open market? Pass the 'bailout' directly to main street by putting the money in the hands of those who have shown they can use it responsibly and create new jobs for all the dispossessed 'worker bees', while allowing the negligent upper management of the unsuccessful companies to drown in the fiscal liabilities they created for themselves -- and rue the additional restrictions they, themselves, placed on personal bankruptcies not-so-long ago.

Of course, the government would ruin this too, because we have generally seen that public takeovers of successful private firms generally leads to spectacular failures due to micro-mismanagement and partisan politics. But, if we know they would ruin a healthy investment, how can anyone think that investing in an unhealthy enterprise will be anything but an inflationary disaster?

[maestrodog.livejournal.com]

I can only sigh and shake my head. And to let the market correct itself for a couple months after the bill passes, and at that time, shift my retirement accounts into safer investments.

[daytime-moon.livejournal.com]

w.h.a.t? holy shite. I'm soo confused, and yet, it all makes sense, and doesn't at the same time. I did appreciate the insight by your various commenters, so that helped. I think. :)

[melchar.livejournal.com]

I listen to too much news radio and thus I have learned that the big problem came from the mortgage defaults. The banks financed a lot of mortgages for nothing down, negligible interest - and when these mortgages were failing as housing prices dropped, the banks BUNDLED them together so these bits of fail were moved from the 'failed loan status' [on their own] into an 'asset' because they were bundled [WTF?] and then these bundled toxic loans were SOLD to the financial markets.

So there are piles of these loans [still less than 100 billion, by all reports] that began causing financial houses to totter. So the REST of this huge mess was money to pay the financial house - and also to pay for a new government bureaucracy - and a lot of extra pork just thrown into the bill to get the votes it needed to pass!