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The Subprime home mortgage collapse...a Primer. It's ALL about the CRA of 1977 Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) of 1977 - This required banks to offer credit throughout their entire market area for “underserved” populations and small businesses. The CRA gave incentives to help low income borrowers become “home owners”. Liberals call this group “low income borrowers”. Conservatives call them a RISK!The CRA was passed by the Carter administration. In 1995 the Clinton administration authorized subprime loans under the CRA. Democrats added these provisions for the securitization of subprime loans and then ENFORCED the lending to high risk individuals. By 2000,...

A BBC production of the last days of Lehman Brothers is a must see. You have to read between the lines a bit, but the production shows how Treasury Secretary Paulson treated Lehman different from the way he handled others that had just as many problems as Lehman. In a nice touch, the BBC hints that Paulson tipped off former Goldman man, and then Merrill CEO, John Thain, of the trouble ahead----which was behind Merrill's sale to Bank of America. The dramatization does a nice job of showing Thain's style in landing an incredible $29 per share for Merrill from...

JOHN KING (host): If you pick up Maureen Dowd's column in The New York Times this morning, she goes through Congressman (Joe) Wilson's statement, some of the other things, and she says in her -- she has come to the conclusion, quote: "Some people just can't believe a black man is president and will never accept it." Does the president believe that some of these attacks are based on his race? WHITE HOUSE PRESS SEC. ROBERT GIBBS: I don't think the president believes that people are upset because of the color of his skin. I think people are upset because...

LONDON (Reuters) – The former deputy Governor of the Bank of England said he was "astounded" the U.S. government let Lehman Brothers go under, and that the bank's collapse marked a clear moment when people lost confidence in the markets. Sir John Gieve said in an interview with Sky News he had fully expected U.S. authorities to step in this time last year to rescue the stricken investment bank, as it had done earlier with peer Bear Stearns. The Federal Reserve put up $29 billion in March 2008 to underwrite JP Morgan Chase's (JPM.N) rescue of Bear Stearns, and was...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – The top White House economic adviser Lawrence Summers received more than five million dollars last year from the hedge fund D.E. Shaw and collected 2.7 million in speaking fees from Wall Street firms benefiting from government bailout money, The New York Times reported Saturday. Citing new financial information about top officials in the administration of Barack Obama, the newspaper said Summers had made 40 paid appearances, including a speech to the investment firm Goldman Sachs, for which he was paid 135,000 dollars. Summers, a former president of Harvard University and treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, leads...

Lawrence Summers, a top economic adviser to U.S. President Barack Obama, was paid about $5.2 million by hedge fund D.E. Shaw in the past year, disclosure forms released by the White House showed on Friday. Summers was also paid $2.7 million in speaking fees by a range of organizations and companies, including several troubled Wall Street financial firms. The disclosure documents on Summers and other White House officials advising Obama on the global financial crisis covered 2008 and the first few months of this year. Summers became an official adviser on January 20 when Obama took office. Summers, who was...

Quietly and almost unnoticed by most Americans, the US Federal Government introduced a fourth branch to its political structure in 2006. As you know we already had three branches; they are: § The Judicial: the Supreme Court § The Executive: the President § The Legislative: Congress This pretty much has us covered in terms of political strategy… but what about financial issues? Everyone knows Congress has no clue how to allocate capital. And the Executive Branch doesn’t exactly have a great track record when it comes to financial matters either (we’ve run a deficit virtually every year since 1970). Shouldn’t...

LONDON (MarketWatch) -- American International Group Inc has been forced to post more than GBP500 million as collateral to cover possible defaults on rental payments on properties in Canary Wharf leased by Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and Citigroup Inc. The move was triggered by a fall in the credit rating of AIG, which provides securitization to insure the leases. AIG posted cash collateral of approximately GBP224 million to cover Lehman's lease on 25-30 Bank Street and GBP276.3 million to cover Citigroup's rental obligations at 33 Canada Square. There is no suggestion that either tenant is likely to default, even though...

The sudden crash in oil prices might be the smoking gun that shows speculation, rather than supply and demand, drove the huge run-up in oil futures last year. Daniel Fine of the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology’s Center for Energy Policy told participants at a forum in Albuquerque Jan. 16 that massive, speculative trading by investment banks like Lehman Brothers, hedge funds and others is what drove oil above $140 per barrel.

Former Lehman boss sells mansion to wife for US$100 FALLEN Lehman Brothers chief executive Richard Fuld sold his $US13.3 million mansion to his wife for just $US100 last November, according to Florida real estate records. The 62-year old executive, who could face civil lawsuits after overseeing the storied investment bank's collapse into bankruptcy proceedings last September, transferred ownership of the 3.3 acres seaside home to Kathleen Fuld on November 10, records show. The couple had jointly bought the home for $US13.75 million in March 2004, as first reported by Cityfile.com. Mr Fuld has been blamed for Lehman's collapse on September...

January 26, 2009 Ex-Lehman chief sold $13m home to wife for $100 (Susan Walsh/AP) Christine Seib in New York Richard Fuld, the disgraced former chief executive of Lehman Brothers, sold his $13.3 million (£9.6 million) Florida mansion to his wife in November for $100, according to real estate records. Mr Fuld, who is widely blamed for the collapse of Lehman Brothers in September last year, bought the house with his wife, Kathleen, in March 2004 for $13.75 million. On November 10, the 62-year-old banker transferred the seaside mansion into Mrs Fuld's name in return for $100. Mr Fuld is expected...

As much as $75 billion of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. value was destroyed by the unplanned and chaotic form of the firm's bankruptcy filing in September, according to an internal analysis by the company's restructuring advisers. A less-hurried Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing likely would have preserved tens of billions of dollars of value, according to a three-month study by the advisory firm, Alvarez & Marsal. An orderly filing would have enabled Lehman to sell some assets outside of federal bankruptcy-court protection, and would have given it time to try to unwind its derivatives portfolio in a way that might have...

It's not easy being Alan Greenspan these days. As the former Federal Reserve chairman, he urged government regulators to take a light touch while banks like Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers buried themselves—and the economy more generally—under a mountain of debt. Now that his reputation is plummeting faster than the stock market, he's been forced to admit a "flaw" in his hands-off ideology. Of course, things look entirely different to members of "free-market advocacy groups," as they like to be called. One such group is the Ayn Rand Institute, named after the matriarch of the movement, whose antigovernment and anti-regulation...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Jim Rogers, one of the world's most prominent international investors, on Thursday called most of the largest U.S. banks "totally bankrupt," and said government efforts to fix the sector are wrongheaded. Speaking by teleconference at the Reuters Investment Outlook 2009 Summit, the co-founder with George Soros of the Quantum Fund, said the government's $700 billion rescue package for the sector doesn't address how banks manage their balance sheets, and instead rewards weaker lenders with new capital. Dozens of banks have won infusions from the Troubled Asset Relief Program created in early October, just after the Sept...

Executives passing the buck for failures win no sympathy. "They need to man up and take responsibility," said Warren Bennis, U of So California. "They kept believing in their own omniscience thinking they can get away with anything." CEO's summoned to Capitol Hill offered a variety of excuses for their failures. Lehman Brothers' Richard Fuld said that management did "everything we could to protect the firm." Fuld's 8-year compensation totaled $484.8M. Harvey Mackay, author of "Swim With the Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive: "They all have chapped lips from kissing the mirror too much."

Democratic Presidential candidate Barack Obama was quick to blame the bankruptcy of Wall Street giant Lehman Brothers on Republicans’ “failed philosophy”. Obama’s September 15 comments were repeated throughout the media--yet reporters have not noted Obama’s glaring conflict of interest—the Lehman debt owed to a bank owned by the financier who loaned millions of dollars to Tony Rezko. Jockeying among the other debtors seeking repayment under Chapter 11 bankruptcy rules is BNP Paribas, a large French bank whose largest single private shareholder is Nadhmi Auchi’s General Mediterranean Holdings (GMH). BNP Paribas is owed $250 million by Lehman. Nadhmi Auchi is an...

October 11, 2008 Lehman Brothers demise triggers huge default Tom Bawden in New York and Suzy Jagger in Washington Lehman Brothers, the bust investment bank, triggered one of the biggest corporate debt defaults in history yesterday as it emerged that the US Federal Reserve is harbouring grave concerns about whether Washington’s $700 billion (£413 billion) bailout fund will avert a financial meltdown. An auction of Lehman’s bonds yesterday determined that the bank’s borrowings were worth only 8.625 cents on the dollar. The valuation leaves the insurers of the debt a bill of about $365 billion. It is not clear whether...

Journalists are trained to “follow the money” – to uncover who donates how much to what campaign, especially in the midst of a presidential election. When Lehman Brothers CEO Richard Fuld testified before the House Oversight Committee Oct. 6, the media criticized his wealth and spending amidst financial turmoil in his company and on Wall Street. But conspicuously missing was the story of Fuld’s political contributions. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Fuld has donated to Democratic candidates over Republican candidates by a margin of almost 5-to-1 in the last 15 years. He has given $106,400 to Democratic candidates...

FULD, RICHARD NEW YORK,NY 10285 LEHMAN BROTHERS/MANAGING DIRECTOR 4/9/07 $10,000 Democratic Senatorial Campaign Cmte (D) FULD, RICHARD NEW YORK,NY 10019 LEHMAN BROTHERS/CHAIRMAN AND CEO 1/28/08 $2,000 Reed, Jack (D) FULD, RICHARD S GREENWICH,CT 06831 LEHMAN BROTHERS/CHAIRMAN AND CEO 5/29/07 $2,300 Clinton, Hillary (D) FULD, RICHARD S JR GREENWICH,CT 06831 LEHMAN BROTHERS/CHAIRMAN AND CEO 10/19/07 $2,300 Clinton, Hillary (D) FULD, RICHARD S JR GREENWICH,CT 06831 LEHMAN BROTHERS/FIANCE 5/30/07 $2,300 Obama, Barack (D) FULD, RICHARD S JR GREENWICH,CT 06831 8/28/08 $-2,300 Clinton, Hillary (D) FULD, RICHARD S MR JR GREENWICH,CT 06831 10/22/07 $10,000 National Republican Senatorial Cmte (R) FULD, RICHARD S MR...

WASHINGTON (AFP) — US lawmakers Monday grilled the head of Lehman Brothers demanding he justify some 500 million dollars he had earned since 2000, as well as huge bonuses sought for top executives even as the bank failed.

Network verifies reports Richard Fuld was attacked for financial institution's bankruptcy. It seems anxiety from the financial crisis is reaching new highs, but the tipping point for one individual came at the Lehman Brothers gym in the midst of the company’s collapse. While former Lehman CEO Richard Fuld was testifying before the House Oversight Committee Oct. 6, CNBC reported he had been punched in the face at the Lehman Brothers gym after it was announced the firm was going bankrupt. CNBC and Vanity Fair contributor Vicki Ward said Fuld was attacked at the gym on a Sunday following the bankruptcy....

WASHINGTON – The now-bankrupt investment bank Lehman Brothers arranged millions in bonuses for fired executives as it pleaded for a federal lifeline, lawmakers learned Monday, as Congress began investigating what went so wrong on Wall Street to prompt a $700 billion government bailout. The first in a series of congressional hearings on the roots of the financial meltdown yielded few major revelations about Lehman's collapse, and none about why government officials, as they scrambled to avert economic catastrophe, declined to rescue the flagging company while injecting tens of billions of dollars into others. But it allowed lawmakers still smarting from...

Stocks decline amid global worries credit crisis is spreading; Dow falls below 10,000 NEW YORK (AP) -- Wall Street tumbled again Monday, joining a sell-off around the world as fears grew that the financial crisis will cascade through economies globally despite bailout efforts by the U.S. and other governments. The Dow Jones industrials skidded nearly 500 points and fell below 10,000 for the first time in four years, while the credit markets remained under strain. The markets have come to the sobering realization that the Bush administration's $700 billion rescue plan won't work quickly to unfreeze the credit markets, and...

TOKYO — Nomura Holdings Inc paid only $2 for the European and Middle Eastern equities and investment banking operations of collapsed Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc, sources familiar with the transaction said Friday. Nomura’s acquisition agreement with Lehman called for allowing Nomura to refrain from taking over the Lehman divisions’ assets, including the assets they had acquired for their proprietary trading, the sources said.

"GE slashes earnings view for 2008, but shares gain" by Marketwatch shows that General Electric is off about 38% from its high of about 42 only a year ago. Furthermore, "GE currently makes about 45% of its earnings from the financial unit, called GE Capital." From where we sit, General Electric's problems are the direct result of a management belief, as exemplified by the company's membership in the Climate Action Partnership, that the company does not have to create genuine value to earn a profit. As described by Kimberly Strassel's "If the Cap Fits: Why our CEOs are warming to...

WASHINGTON — The FBI is investigating four major U.S. financial institutions whose collapse helped trigger a $700 billion bailout plan by the Bush administration, The Associated Press has learned. Two law enforcement officials said Tuesday the FBI is looking at potential fraud by mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and insurer American International Group Inc. Additionally, a senior law enforcement official said Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. also is under investigation. The inquiries will focus on the financial institutions and the individuals that ran them, the senior law enforcement official said.

STAFF at Lehman’s New York office who helped to cause the world’s biggest corporate bankruptcy are to share in a $2.5 billion bonanza. The bonus, which has been described by London staff as a “scandal” has been pledged by Barclays Capital, the British-based bank that last week acquired Lehman’s American operation and took on 10,000 staff. The $2.5 billion (£1.4 billion) pot, which has been ring-fenced as part of the acquisition, has caused huge resentment among the 5,000 staff in the firm’s European and Middle Eastern operations who are not guaranteed to be paid after this month. There are, however,...

Fury at $2.5bn Lehman bonus Nomura and Barclays table bids today for US giant’s London operation as bank’s administrator likens collapse to EnronJohn Waples and Danny Fortson STAFF at Lehman’s New York office who helped to cause the world’s biggest corporate bankruptcy are to share in a $2.5 billion bonanza. The bonus, which has been described by London staff as a “scandal” has been pledged by Barclays Capital, the British-based bank that last week acquired Lehman’s American operation and took on 10,000 staff. The $2.5 billion (£1.4 billion) pot, which has been ring-fenced as part of the acquisition, has caused...

U.K. Prime Minister Gordon Brown said Saturday that he is working with U.S. authorities to get billions of dollars returned to Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.'s London operations from the firm's U.S. business. Responding to questions at the start of his Labour Party's conference, Mr. Brown said he wanted to make sure the money was returned in the interest of the investment bank's U.K. employees. The transfer of $8 billion has become a target of inquiry by Lehman clients as well as PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, which is overseeing the insolvency proceedings of Lehman units in London. Within the past several days, PricewaterhouseCoopers...

Fury at $2.5bn Lehman bonus Nomura and Barclays table bids today for US giant’s London operation as bank’s administrator likens collapse to Enron John Waples and Danny Fortson STAFF at Lehman’s New York office who helped to cause the world’s biggest corporate bankruptcy are to share in a $2.5 billion bonanza. The bonus, which has been described by London staff as a “scandal” has been pledged by Barclays Capital, the British-based bank that last week acquired Lehman’s American operation and took on 10,000 staff. The $2.5 billion (£1.4 billion) pot, which has been ring-fenced as part of the acquisition, has...

A U.S. bankruptcy judge approved a revised version of Barclays' deal to purchase the core U.S. business of Lehman Brothers. In a Manhattan court hearing that started on Friday and lasted past midnight, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge James Peck approved the sale, saying he had found no better alternative for the assets Lehman sought to sell. "This week more than any other week since I was appointed to the bench I have felt the awesome power of this job," Peck told a packed Manhattan court room, at the end of a nearly seven-hour hearing

"It was sad to see Merrill go down as well," said the voice from inside Lehman Brothers this week as he pondered his own future. "But at least they screwed the shorts. That was good to see."[snip] Yesterday, SEC Commissioner Cox responded to the pressure. The SEC instituted a "Hard T+3 Close-Out Requirement," meaning that short sellers and their broker-dealers must deliver securities by the close of business on the settlement, three days after the sale. It's an answer to previous complaints about the prevalence of so-called "naked" short selling: that is, selling shares that you don't actually have in...

How much will he make this year? Question/Comment: Last year Lehman Brothers' CEO Richard Fuld, Jr. made $71 million. Today his company collapsed. How much will he make this year? Paul Solman: I don't know about this year. You've covered last. In 2006, according to Forbes.com, he was the 5th highest-paid CEO in America: "Total Compensation $122.67 mil; 5-Year Compensation Total $375.81 mil."

ALBANY, N.Y. - New York's pension funds for state workers and teachers face several hundred million dollars in losses from Lehman Brothers' collapse, and both have a large stake in troubled Merrill Lynch & Co., which agreed to a buyout by Bank of America. Monday's shocks to financial markets affected retirement investments of more than a million state and municipal workers, retirees and beneficiaries, as well as some 400,000 in the teachers' pension system. Both pension funds also have holdings in troubled American International Group Inc. "We have a lot of exposure in index funds that's going to give us...

Lehman Brothers has agreed to sell its North American investment banking and capital markets businesses for $1.75bn to UK lender Barclays, which will use the acquisition to boost its US investment banking prowess without having to assume Lehman’s crippling liabilities.

I have written here before that government interference in the economy delays the inexorable forces of economic laws, which in turn magnifies the corrections that must inevitably take place. More government regulation was not going to save Lehman Brothers from bankruptcy. It may have delayed bankruptcy, but reality would still triumph in the end to produce an even greater disaster. A government doing everything it can to forestall and conceal the most catastrophic pending collapse in economic history should not be trusted with anyone’s assets. The failure of Social Security will make Lehman Brothers look like chump change. Lehman did...

Wall Street's grim news has plenty of people worried about their pocketbooks. Lawmakers are among them, not only concerned with how to boost the economy but with their own personal finances tied to companies that are struggling. The richest members of Congress seem to be the most invested in the companies at the center of the Wall Street shake-up. According to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, nine lawmakers have between $785,900 and $1.8 million of their own money invested in Merrill Lynch, the brokerage firm that agreed over the weekend to sell itself to Bank of America for $50...

Billionaire George Soros's hedge fund may have lost at least $120 million on its stake in Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., mostly acquired in the second quarter, as the investment bank suffered its worst financial result. Maybe he wants his money back from Obama, maybe thats why Bambi needs donation. Couldnt happen to a nicer guy......

Throughout the campaign season Obama has attacked Wall Street’s financial sector and run a campaign based largely upon his “good judgment”. The problem with Obama’s rhetoric rests in the fact that tucked away in his database of 2.5 million donors is the approximately 180,000 power brokers that have funded nearly 60% of his campaign. Included in this list are the more than 594 campaign bundlers including 15 lobbyist bundlers who have accounted for over $140 million in contributions. Included in this list are just 36 bundlers accounting for over $18 million dollars, with two bundlers raising over $1 million, and...

LONDON (Reuters) - The bankruptcy filing of Lehman Brothers (LEH.N) is another blow for the hedge fund industry, though the writing has been on the wall long enough for many to have reduced their exposure to the U.S. investment bank. Legendary fund manager George Soros, who runs around $18 billion in assets, looks likely to have had his fingers burned after raising his stake in Lehman to 9.5 million shares in the second quarter. A spokesman for Soros Fund Management declined to comment on the composition of their portfolio. British activist hedge fund Algebris will also probably have taken a...

They called him the Gorilla – the brawler known as the scariest man on Wall Street. In a world where the top brass are generally suave, no wonder Dick Fuld stood apart. Mr Fuld, 62, joined Lehman Brothers in 1969 after his first career as an air force pilot came to an abrupt halt when he got into a fist fight with a commanding officer. He tough-talked his way to the top and turned a $102 million loss in 1993, the year before he took over as chief executive, into a $4.2 billion profit last year. Along the way, he...

We literally feel our readers' pain for today's 504 point drop in the DJIA because of Lehman Brothers' impending collapse on the stock market, because it impacts our own investments. However, we will shed no tears for Lehman Brothers itself, and we are not particularly surprised that it is going south. Furthermore, even if Lehman Brothers disappears tomorrow, it will in no way affect the United States' remaining ability to create genuine wealth. Henry Ford told us long ago that there are exactly three ways to create wealth: mine it, grow it, or make it, but Lehman Brothers apparently had...

BREAKING NEWS Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc says filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy; says no subsidiaries will be included in filing 12:34am EDT

Three of the biggest names on Wall Street - Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch and AIG - poised to buckle under the seismatic credit crunch pressure. The global financial system faced its biggest test in at least half a century this morning after some of the world’s leading firms took drastic emergency action in America in the face of a worsening international economic crisis. Lehman Brothers, one of the world’s biggest investment banks, was on the verge of collapse after a weekend of talks to find a willing buyer ended without success. Hank Paulson, the US Treasury Secretary, led the efforts...

ON THE BRINK... BARCLAYS Abandons Talks... Feds Balk at putting up taxpayer money...

Unable to find a savior, the troubled investment bank Lehman Brothers appeared headed toward liquidation on Sunday, in what would be one of the biggest failures in Wall Street history.

The fate of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.'s darkened early Sunday afternoon with Barclays PLC, the sole remaining bidder for the 158-year-old Wall Street firm, telling federal regulators that it is walking away from a transaction, people familiar with the matter say. The situation was rapidly evolving, and it's possible Barclays or another bidder would emerge to save Lehman before markets opened Monday. But with the government balking at putting any taxpayer money at risk for Lehman, the likelihood of a transaction was dimming. That would leave an orderly liquidation as the most likely scenario, a dramatic outcome for a once-powerful...

** EXCERPT ** In May, David Einhorn, one of the most vocal short-sellers on Wall Street, made no secret he was betting against Lehman Brothers. Now, some investors are afraid that fund managers like him will take advantage of the climate of fear stirred up by the troubles of Lehman to target other weak financial firms whose declining share price would bring them rich rewards. At emergency meetings over the weekend, the heads of major financial institutions urged Timothy R. Geitner, the president of the New York Fed, and Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr., to consider having the Securities...

...Moreover, the hypocrisy of these politicians is beyond belief as most Americans fail to recognize that even as their elected officials demonize these executives, they are accepting millions of dollars from them in the form of campaign contributions. For instance, it is no secret that Senator Dodd who chairs the the powerful Senate Banking Committee has accepted millions in the past years from financial institutions. In his Presidential campaign more than a 1/3 (over $5.5 million) of the contributions Dodd received came from Finance and Banking related industries. Since 2003, Dodd has received more than $9.5 million in contributions from...

Big fund firms among top holders in sinking stocks By Svea Herbst-Bayliss Wed Sep 10, 5:19 PM ET Some of America's biggest and best-known mutual fund companies likely suffered heavy losses multiple times this week because they had large holdings in the market's worst performing stocks. AllianceBernstein Holding LP (AB.N), which invests $675 billion, may have been the biggest casualty. It ranked as the top shareholder in ailing investment bank Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc (LEH.N), where it owned 65.6 million shares, and crippled mortgage company Fannie Mae (FNM.N), where it owned 134.2 million shares, at the end of June. At...