Free Republic

In Europe, even Mickey Mouse is getting a bailout. The Disney resort on the outskirts of Paris is getting a financial lifeline from owner The Walt Disney Company to handle rising debt and a decline in visitors at a time of economic uncertainty in Europe. The €1 billion ($1.3 billion) lifeline will see the park’s California masters take control of Euro Disney, which runs Disneyland Paris and Walt Disney Studios Park. Until now, the U.S. company owned only 40 percent of the theme park operator, alongside Saudi prince Al-Waleed Bin Talal and a host of small European investors who originally...

To oversee this process, Dodd-Frank created the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC), made up of the heads of the financial services regulatory agencies. The council claims very broad power to designate certain activities (like asset management) or companies and products (including mutual funds) as systemically important and subject them to Federal Reserve bank-style regulation, including leverage and capital requirements. And the council is doing just that – first with banks, then insurance companies and now, potentially, mutual funds. President Obama’s “independent” insurance expert on the council issued a blistering dissent when it designated Prudential – the nation’s second-largest life insurer...

It didn't get much attention outside Capitol Hill, but late last week House Republican leaders scuttled a vote to repeal an ObamaCare bailout plan for major heath insurance companies if they lose money on new Affordable Care Act policies. Taxpayers could be on the hook for billions of dollars of payouts for ACA insurance policies that incur losses that exceed premiums collected. Despite pleas from conservatives to hold a vote to repeal the sham subsidy program to the biggest insurers — like Aetna (NYSE:AET), Cigna (NYSE:CI) and Humana (NYSE:HUM) — our sources tell us the House leadership reportedly said that...

A special inspector general report on compensation for executives at General Motors and Ally Financial blasts the Treasury Department for allowing excessive pay at the companies as taxpayers lost billions of dollars on the auto bailouts. The watchdog group issuing the report monitors the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), which was set up to save financial corporations deemed "too big to fail" due to systemic risk to America's financial system. The program was expanded to allow for the bailing out of the auto industry, despite the questionable use of funds specifically designated for financial institutions. A NY Times piece...

Report Criticizes Treasury for Allowing Pay Packages Worth at Least $1 Million a YearWASHINGTON—The Treasury Department allowed General Motors Co. GM +0.69% and Ally Financial Corp. ALLY +0.43% to give big pay raises to top executives while the firms struggled to exit their federal bailouts, a federal watchdog said Wednesday. The report criticized the Treasury for allowing Ally and GM to pay compensation packages worth at least $1 million in 2013 for all 25 top executives at each company. The companies paid those executives an average of $3 million annually, an increase of 28% from 2009, the report found. The...

It's official. Chrysler has now wholly-merged with Italian auto maker, Fiat. It had taken a bit over five years for Fiat to gain total control of the bailed out, once-American Chrysler Corporation. Back in June of 2009, President Obama gifted (payment was made in the form of "technology") an initial 20% stake in Chrysler to Fiat as part of his orchestrated auto bailout process. Fiat parlayed that into full ownership and is now showing its gratitude to the American taxpayers who helped fund the deal by relocating Chrysler's headquarters to London ; a move which will lessen the company's...

The Mega Debt and Sustainable Capitalism Economics / Credit Crisis Bailouts Tom Naysburn writes: Accepted thought acknowledges the financial crisis of 2008 was a near apocalyptic event which needed the citizens of the Anglo American dominated financial world to bailout the banking system to the conservative tune of $10 trillion in the US, and at least £1 trillion by UK taxpayers. For perspective, the entire cumulative national government debt in the UK stood at £350bn at the turn of the century. Why then was a bailout required? Would we have woken and the sky had fallen? No. The answer given...

Government leaders are expected to agree in November that the world's top banks must issue special bonds to increase the amount of capital which can be tapped in a crisis instead of calling on taxpayers to come to the rescue, industry and G20 officials said. The bonds, known as "gone concern loss absorption capacity" or GLAC, are seen by regulators as essential to stopping the world's 29 biggest lenders from being "too big to fail". The plans are being drafted by the Financial Stability Board, the regulatory task force of the Group of 20 economies which declined to comment ahead...

It has been two years since General Motors admitted that there was little demand for the Chevy Volt (as reported here)due to there being "no plug-in market." Their answer was to "create market" to drive sales for the politically popular but economically-nonviable Volt. GM manipulated sales for the Volt through the use of subsidized leases at a time when President Obama's favorite, green wonder-car was being criticized for low sales as it failed to live up to the early hype. GM was able to use taxpayer money in the form of electric vehicle tax credits to help drive down...

Newly released emails show a key White House adviser intervened on behalf of the health insurance industry after an executive repeatedly warned that massive premium hikes were coming unless the administration expanded an ObamaCare program that Republicans call an industry "bailout." The insurance industry ultimately got a more "generous" offer from the administration -- one that Republicans warn could transfer potentially billions of taxpayer dollars into the Affordable Care Act to bail out insurance companies. The documents were included as part of a report by Republicans on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Republicans allege that White House adviser...

General Motors Co (GM.N) on Wednesday announced six recalls covering 717,950 vehicles in the United States for varying reasons. None of the recalls were related to the ignition switch issues that have caused nearly 15 million recalls of GM vehicles worldwide this year. The new set of recalls brings GM's recalls worldwide this year to nearly 30 million. The largest recall is for a potentially loose bolt in power adjustable front seats for several cars from model years 2010 and 2012.

The pensions of retired salaried workers at Delphi have been in limbo since they were assumed by the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation. This week, U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and three more Democratic lawmakers from Ohio sent a letter to Labor Secretary Thomas Perez, urging him to intervene on behalf of Delphi retirees. “The 20,000 members of the salaried plan have been waiting for almost five years for a final benefit determination from the PBGC. Recent comments from the PBGC have suggested that the agency has yet to take basic initial steps towards making such a determination,” wrote the Ohio...

This is an article that was written and sent to me by Alessandra Nucci, an Italian journalist and friend. It describes what the European Union has done to Italy. Since it's a very long article, I've broken it down in 4 parts. Here is the first part. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ How would you feel if for years you had been picking up shipwrecked penniless migrants from Africa, dumped by criminal agents all over the Mediterranean, ferrying them to your shores and taking them in by the thousands, only to see yourself made the butt of sarcasm, reproaches and even pecuniary fines...

For ordinary consumers, the answer varies. A lot of Americans who never had insurance before have indeed been able to find health coverage AND health care, (they're two different things, after all). But a lot of Americas have lost their previous plans, and now they're having trouble finding actual doctors to treat them even under their more expensive coverage. Whether the ACA has actually helped more citizens than it's hurt has turned into a partisan war of statistics. That war will be waged for years to come. While I believe the new law will ultimately hurt more people than it...

Senate lawmakers on Wednesday approved a $10 million financial bailout for Delaware’s three gambling casinos. The Senate voted 14-5 to pass legislation to help the casinos, which say they are struggling with increased competition from neighboring states and have to share too much of their gambling revenue with the state. [...] The change would take effect in July 2015, at an estimated cost to the state of about $10 million annually. To help the casinos until then, lawmakers cobbled together a similar amount of taxpayer money, mostly from unspent funds that are supposed to be used for economic development projects....

“All of the investment banks, up in New York and D.C., they should have gone to jail.”That isn’t a quote from an Occupy Wall Street protester or Senator Elizabeth Warren. That’s a common campaign slogan repeated by Dave Brat, the Virginia college professor who scored one of the biggest political upsets in over a century by defeating Majority Leader Eric Cantor in the Republican primary last night.The national media is buzzing about Brat’s victory, but for all of the wrong reasons.Did the Tea Party swoop in and help Brat, as many in the Democratic Party are suggesting? Actually, the Wall Street...

The nation’s $1.2 trillion — and growing — student debt is reshaping Americans’ economic lives in far-reaching ways, from slowing rates of homeownership to retirement security to choice of specialty for medical students. The consequences of that financial burden on both borrowers and the U.S. economy were the focus of a Senate Budget Committee hearing Wednesday chaired by Sen. Patty Murray. In her opening statement, Murray noted that nearly one-third of young households now carry student debts. Each college graduate owes an average of $30,000. Such a “crushing” load, Murray said, could dog students through their entire financial lives. “A...

The recalls are multiplying, and the bailout stigma remains. You may have noticed that General Motors recalled a lot of vehicles lately. You may not have noticed just how many separate recalls the company announced, 30 since January 1, or just how many vehicles are being recalled — 13.79 million vehicles in the U.S. For perspective, consider that GM sold roughly 2.6 million vehicles in 2012. ... consumer-data research indicates that pickup-truck buyers skew Republican by a margin five to one, according to a 2008 survey. Whether GM wants to admit it or not, the “Government Motors” label did serious...

Today in the Rose Garden, President Obama announced that he’s going to keep a little under 10,000 troops in Afghanistan through 2014, half that number by the end of 2015, and will have all those forces out by the end of 2016. Putting aside the fact that this is the lowest number military advisors estimated was necessary to maintain training and some counterterrorism capability in country over not just one year but several, the decision to halve and then zero out those forces by 2016 is a reminder not only of how seriously unserious this president on strategic matters can...

TEHRAN, Iran – A billionaire businessman at the heart of a $2.6 billion state bank scam, the largest fraud case since the country's 1979 Islamic Revolution, was executed Saturday, state television reported. Authorities put Mahafarid Amir Khosravi, also known as Amir Mansour Aria, to death at Evin prison, just north of the capital, Tehran, the station reported. The report said the execution came after Iran's Supreme Court upheld his death sentence. Khosravi's lawyer, Gholam Ali Riahi, was quoted by news website khabaronline.ir as saying that his client was put to death without any notice.