Even as policy makers worked on details of a $700 billion bailout of the financial industry, Wall Street began looking for ways to profit from it.
Financial firms were lobbying to have all manner of troubled investments covered, not just those related to mortgages.
At the same time, investment firms were jockeying to oversee all the assets that Treasury plans to take off the books of financial institutions, a role that could earn them hundreds of millions of dollars a year in fees.
Paid by YOU, taxpayers!!!!
Nobody wants to be left out of Treasury’s proposal to buy up bad assets of financial institutions.
“The definition of Financial Institution should be as broad as possible,” the Financial Services Roundtable, which represents big financial services companies, wrote in an e-mail message to members on Sunday.
The group said a wide variety of institutions as varied as mortgage lenders and insurance companies should be able to take advantage of the bailout, and that these companies should be able to sell off any investments linked to mortgages.
The scope of the bailout grew over the weekend. As recently as Saturday morning, the Bush administration’s proposal called for Treasury to buy residential or commercial mortgages and related securities. By that evening, the proposal was broadened to give Treasury discretion to buy “any other financial instrument.”
You better WAKE the FUCK UP, Americans!!!!
The lobbying became particularly intense because Congress plans to approve a package within just two weeks, without the traditional hearings and committee process.
The QUICK WAY to FASCISM!!!! Thanks for letting us down, Congress!!!
“Of course there will be fierce lobbying,” said Bert Ely, a financial services industry consultant in Alexandria, Va. “The real question is, Who wouldn’t want to be included in the package?”
Mr. Ely said the open-ended nature of the Treasury’s plan could be interpreted to mean that the government was open to acquiring “any asset, anywhere in the world.”
There were signs of the industry’s fingerprints on drafts of the legislation released over the weekend.
What a fucking surprise!!!
While an earlier draft said that only firms with headquarters in the United States could sell assets to the government under the program, a later version said sellers could include any financial institution. Securities firms were initially excluded but were included in a version released Sunday afternoon.
To see the list of looters lining up, see... --MORE--"
