"White House submits bill on derivatives" by Marcy Gordon, Associated Press | August 12, 2009
WASHINGTON - The Obama administration yesterday sent Congress legislation seeking to impose broad oversight on derivatives, the complex financial instruments blamed for hastening the global economic crisis.
The plan is designed to bring transparency to - and prevent manipulation in - a $600 trillion unregulated worldwide market. Credit default swaps, a form of insurance against loan defaults, account for about $60 trillion of that market. The collapse of the swaps brought the downfall of Wall Street banking house Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and nearly toppled American International Group last fall, prompting the government to support the insurance conglomerate with about $180 billion.
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The plan sent to Capitol Hill was the final section of the administration’s sweeping legislative proposal for overhauling the US financial rule book to help avert a repeat of the meltdown touched off last year. It capped a series of measures rolled out in recent weeks by the Treasury Department....
All of which have gone nowhere.
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