Busting the Banksters!

[JackLuis]

Robert Reich: Bernie Sanders’ threat to break up the banks is a threat to the Democratic Party establishment

The recent kerfluffle about Bernie Sanders purportedly not knowing how to bust up the big banks says far more about the threat Sanders poses to the Democratic establishment and its Wall Street wing than it does about the candidate himself.

Of course Sanders knows how to bust up the big banks. He’s already introduced legislation to do just that. And even without new legislation a president has the power under the Dodd-Frank reform act to initiate such a breakup.

But Sanders threatens the Democratic establishment and Wall Street, not least because he’s intent on doing exactly what he says he’ll do: breaking up the biggest banks.

The biggest are far larger today than they were in 2008 when they were deemed “too big to fail.” Then, the five largest held around 30 percent of all U.S. banking assets. Today they have 44 percent.

For example, Dodd-Frank instructed the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to reduce certain risks, but the Street has sabotaged the process.

In its first major rule under Dodd-Frank, the CFTC considered 1,500 comments, largely generated by and from the Street. After several years the commission issued a proposed rule, including some of the loopholes and exceptions the Street sought.

Wall Street still wasn’t satisfied. So the CFTC agreed to delay enforcement of the rule, allowing the Street more time to voice its objections. Even this wasn’t enough for the big banks, whose lawyers then filed a lawsuit in the federal courts, arguing that the commission’s cost-benefit analysis wasn’t adequate.

As of now, only 155 of the 398 regulations required by Dodd-Frank have been finalized. And those final versions are shot through with loopholes big enough for Wall Street’s top brass to drive their Ferrari’s through.

 

[Hard_Rom]

Bad move. What the US needs is bigger banks. Not all these tiny ones that go bankrupt or are too susceptible to market fluctuations. One of Canada's economic strengths is our banking system with our big banks. In fact our banks are admired world wide. During the last recession our banks got 'bailout' money but not to bail themselves out of trouble. They used the money to buy up bankrupt US and European banks and become even stronger.

Canada is roughly equivalent to California in economics. We have five huge banks in Canada. How many does California have. A lot more than five.

You need just enough banks to ensure competitiveness. You want to watch a country go to hell fast. Watch it's banking system collapse. Commodities prices go up and down, recessions come and go but if you have a string banking system you will get through it.

4 of Canada's banks rank in the top 10 in the world. And yet in economics and population we do not or barely rank in the top 10. One of Canada's stereotypical traits is our stability. Based on strong banks and a strong central government.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/4-canadian-banks-on-top-10-list-of-world-s-strongest-1.1318217

Nothing wrong with big banks and a strong federal government.

Peace, order and good government.

 

[JackLuis]

Bad move. What the US needs is bigger banks. -

Nothing wrong with big banks and a strong federal government.

Peace, order and good government.

So if one of your big banks breaks the law, does the CEO go to jail?

 

[Hard_Rom]

So if one of your big banks breaks the law, does the CEO go to jail?

Try find an example of one of the big five breaking the law. Too heavily regulated. They don't get the opportunities that US bankers do. Plus why endanger HUGE profits for personal gain. Different atmosphere up here in the banking world. They are huge and powerful but kept inline by heavy regulation. The broken and divided "small' US government does not have the laws and regulations to properly regulate US banks.

The same regulations ensure they have a lock on banking business. Government and big banks working hand in hand. It can work.

Most you get up here are individual investment advisors or bank employees committing crimes.

 

[BotanyBoy]

Bad move. What the US needs is bigger banks.

LMFAO!! Yea because so big you can crash the country, then demand the government pay you a cool trillion bucks and get it on the spot isn't big enough.

More power is exactly what an industry who has the government by the balls needs!!


I can't tell if he's fucking retarded or just hates the US that much.

 

[JackLuis]

Hillary Clinton blames absence of Wall Street prosecutions on a lack of ‘sufficient laws’

Throughout his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, Sen. Bernie Sanders has decried the U.S. Justice Department's failure to prosecute any of the key figures involved in the events leading up to the financial crisis. But when the New York Daily News editorial board asked Hillary Clinton about Wall Street's apparent impunity, she sounded a more cautious note.

Clinton attributed the dearth of prosecutions to a lack of "sufficient laws [and] sufficient prosecutorial resources," according to a transcript of the discussion released Monday. But neither Clinton nor the Daily News editorial board mentioned last month's disclosure that a bipartisan panel had called for a Justice Department investigation into President Bill Clinton's onetime treasury secretary.

In 2010 the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, which Congress had charged with examining the root causes of the Wall Street collapse, recommended an investigation into potential lawbreaking on the part of former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin. The Justice Department apparently disregarded that recommendation, or at least left behind no evidence to suggest otherwise, multiple news outlets reported last month.

The Commission argued that Rubin — who, along with the rest of President Clinton's financial policy team, presided over a deregulatory spree in the 1990s — may have illegally deceived Citigroup investors in 2007 while serving as chairman of the Citigroup board's executive committee. The Commission said Citigroup claimed its exposure to subprime bonds was significantly lower than Rubin knew to be the case.

Perhaps it wouldn't have happened if Slick Willy and Rubin hadn't killed Glass-Segal?