Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac caused all this.. It was their Housing loan bundles that caused the meltdown..
Fannie and Freddie were not the causes, they were merely facilitating vehicles.
The Fed’s loose money policy, the federal government’s debt accumulation policy, and the decision of governments on all levels to permit industrial-scale fraud by banks -without penalty even when they are caught - are the causes.
A more recent example of the incentives that were in play: When Wells Fargo was caught fraudulently creating millions of accounts, not a single person spent a single day in jail, and the fine was less than the profits gained from the fraud.
That’s the environment we’re talking about. No penalties for crimes, all risk offloaded to the taxpayer, so the finacaticists (I just invented that word thank you thank you) are unleashed to take any amount of speculative risk they please with no consequences whatsoever.
The SEC was formed to protect investors. It didn’t do its job.
Actually, the % of loans not backed by Fan or Fred was going up during that time.