We need more financial regulations...not less

The story below is must read for all, especially those who think financial reform (Dodd-Frank) went too far.  To all those in Congress who want to repeal Dodd-Frank, here’s the story about the big banks you are defending and why Dodd-Frank didn’t go far enough.

Bloomberg
11-28-11

Secret Fed Loans Gave Banks $13 Billion

By Bob Ivry, Bradley Keoun and Phil Kuntz

Federal Reserve and the big banks fought for more than two years to keep details of the largest bailout in U.S. history a secret. Now, the rest of the world can see what it was missing.

The Fed didn’t tell anyone which banks were in trouble so deep they required a combined $1.2 trillion on Dec. 5, 2008, their single neediest day. Bankers didn’t mention that they took tens of billions of dollars in emergency loans at the same time they were assuring investors their firms were healthy. And no one calculated until now that banks reaped an estimated $13 billion of income by taking advantage of the Fed’s below-market rates, Bloomberg Markets magazine reports in its January issue.

Saved by the bailout, bankers lobbied against government regulations, a job made easier by the Fed, which never disclosed the details of the rescue to lawmakers even as Congress doled out more money and debated new rules aimed at preventing the next collapse.

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