Sources: Extensive regulatory overhaul planned (Soro$ approved no doubt)

AP on Yahoo ^ | 3/25/09 | Martin Crutsinger - ap

[NormsRevenge]

WASHINGTON – The Obama administration is proposing an extensive overhaul of financial regulations to increase oversight of such exotic instruments as credit default swaps that have been blamed for contributing to the worst financial crisis to hit the country in seven decades.

Officials said Wednesday that the administration will seek to regulate the market for credit default swaps and other types of derivatives and require hedge funds to register with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner was scheduled to outline the administration's proposals in testimony Thursday before the House Financial Services Committee. Administration officials provided details of the plan ahead of the testimony only on condition of anonymity.

The program the administration was presenting to Congress will also include a recommendation for creation of a systemic risk regulator, possibly at the Federal Reserve, to monitor risks to the entire system.

[ari-freedom]

yeah let’s have a bureaucracy run by incompetents try to regulate the most dynamic, decentralized system in the world.

[WellyP]

The Soros Mafia at its finest!

[DannyTN]

Here's my preliminary take on this...

1. Clearly the derivative financial products and credit swaps need to be regulated. Why banks were ever allowed to rely on credit swaps without regulators examining the safety of the credit swaps is beyond me.
2. Obama wants to combine the Fed and the FDIC under one banking regulator. I think it's a bad idea. I think the admin rationale is that with multiple regulators, nobody takes responsibility for anything new. A valid point. But with a consolidated regulator, you're likely to have a single focus, a potentially worse threat.
3. One claim is that the new Fed would have authority to regulate or take over any firm that could have global ramifications, but require Treasury approval to do so. This is too dangerous, and could grease the path to socialism.
4. Any such authority needs to be carefully and narrowly defined. Yes the AIG's of the world need to come under scrutiny before U.S. banks do business with them. But that doesn't mean the U.S. should have power to take them over.
5. The U.S. isn't going to be able to regulate or take over global firms that aren't headquartered in the U.S., so this implies probable U.N. involvement. That is also very very dangerous and should be avoided at all costs. A consortium of our closets friends should be able to apply sufficient pressure on any global firm, without relying on the U.N.. And NO Obama, Hamas is not one of our closest friends.
6. Clearly Congress failed to address the growing risks and unbalances in the system in a timely fashion. So I'm supportive of some form of mechanism that recognizes new threats. I'm not ok, with giving any Federal agency carte blanche over the economy. Even without a Kenyan born Muslim Marxist at the helm.