Sheila Blair, Chairman of the FDIC, gave a statement to the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission on January 14, 2010, which includes in my estimation the single best outline of all the true causes of the mortgage/financial crisis. Ms Blair’s comment were cogent, unbiased, and unflinching in their analysis of “the failure of market discipline and [...]

CIT Group Inc. (NYSE: CIT) won bank holding company status in December of 2008 so they could qualify for TARP money and then today announced their bankruptcy filing. CIT’s demise becomes the largest financial company failure since Lehman Brothers and the fifth largest bankruptcy in history. CIT Group and Mortgage Crisis CIT Group had a [...]

Tomorrow Tim Geithner, Treasury Secretary, is set to announce the results of the government’s bank stress tests on the country’s top 19 banks. Some of the “results” are leaking out today with speculation running rampant in business news channels on which companies will be required to raise capital and which won’t. Banking Stress Tests Revisited [...]

In a new twist, the FDIC when contemplating the take over of the failed Silverton Bank, a non-depositor institution, decided to create a bank themselves and become the receiver of the defunct bank’s assets and liabilities. FDIC Silverton “Bridge Bank” Makes Debut This newly dubbed “bridge bank” to facilitate the liquidation of Silverton Bank is [...]

OneWest Bank Group completed it’s purchase of the failed IndyMac Federal Bank today. OneWest Bank is the subsidiary of the newly created bank holding company, IMB HoldCo LLC. IMB HoldCo LLC was hand picked by the FDIC to take over when the failure was announced back in January. OneWest Bank’s Purchase Smells Funny When the [...]

As of January 30, 2009, the U.S. Treasury reached out to 42 more banks with TARP - CPP funds for the week. For the first time, Arizona and Nebraska banks are on the list showing the Treasury’s desire to strengthen rural banks or what they call Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs). Rural Banks (CDFIs) Get [...]

John Thain, former CEO of Merrill Lynch, who was “asked to resign” by BofA’s CEO, Ken Lewis last week for what I now want to call “serious greedy scumbag behavior”. Thain is believed to have booked trading losses right after the announcement of the BofA takeover, authorized huge end of year performance bonuses, and redecorated [...]

The U.S. Treasury Department announced today about $386 million of the bailout money went to 23 banks across the nation as part of its Capital Purchase Program (CPP). This press release announcing the funding of these little local banks is more of a PR ploy if you ask me. They want us all to think [...]

Here is this week’s list of banks getting TARP funds from the US Treasury Department as part of the banking bailout legislation passed late Summer of 2008. Banks Getting TARP Funds Week Ending 1/24/2009 The Treasury sends me emails of all sorts and I thought this would be one I’d simply repost each time I [...]