Financial News

[Balta1701]

GS blinks, settles.

Goldman Sachs has agreed to pay $550 million to the Securities and Exchange Commission, one of the largest penalties ever paid by a Wall Street firm, to settle charges of securities fraud linked to mortgage investments.

 

The S.E.C. filed a lawsuit against Goldman in April, accusing the bank of securities fraud. The settlement came just days before Goldman is scheduled to report its second-quarter earnings.

 

Under the terms of the deal, Goldman will pay $300 million in fines to the Treasury Department, with the rest serving as restitution to investors in the mortgage-linked security. Goldman will not admit wrongdoing, though it will admit that its marketing materials for the investment “contained incomplete information.”

Cue the GS defenders telling me how clearly they did nothing wrong since they didn't admit wrongdoing.

[Balta1701]

I assume those are war totals? Which were over 10 years of time, and which were spent during one of the highest economic times we've had? Yeah, kinda the same.

Nope, those were the quoted 10 year values of the 2001 and 2003 tax cut packages. That could have knocked the deficit down by more than 2x the value of the 2010 Stimulus package.

[Jenksismyhero]

Nope, those were the quoted 10 year values of the 2001 and 2003 tax cut packages. That could have knocked the deficit down by more than 2x the value of the 2010 Stimulus package.

 

and neither offered ANY economic benefit?

[Balta1701]

and neither offered ANY economic benefit?

So, you're willing to agree that government deficit spending is expansionary?

[Jenksismyhero]

So, you're willing to agree that government deficit spending is expansionary?

 

It can be. But I wouldn't/don't feel comfortable doing it when we don't really have a stable economy and 10-12% unemployment. We could just be digging our hole even deeper.

[Balta1701]

It can be. But I wouldn't/don't feel comfortable doing it when we don't really have a stable economy and 10-12% unemployment. We could just be digging our hole even deeper.

So, you'd argue that deficit spending is ok in times of economic expansion and a bad thing in times of economic contraction.

 

Yeah, I'd say that's a pretty good explanation for the policies that got us to 10% unemployment.

 

Or 25% unemployment in the case of Hoover.

[Jenksismyhero]

So, you'd argue that deficit spending is ok in times of economic expansion and a bad thing in times of economic contraction.

 

Yeah, I'd say that's a pretty good explanation for the policies that got us to 10% unemployment.

 

I'd argue not doing it at all actually. Cut half the bulls*** spending the government does and the deficit would take care of itself (including social services, medicare, defense spending).

[Balta1701]

I'd argue not doing it at all actually. Cut half the bulls*** spending the government does and the deficit would take care of itself (including social services, medicare, defense spending).

You do realize that Medicare pays for itself right? Cutting it doesn't change the deficit one bit. Just leaves a lot of elderly people bankrupt.

 

Will give you props on the defense spending note, because really, that's the only thing worth noting in discretionary spending.

[Jenksismyhero]

You do realize that Medicare pays for itself right? Cutting it doesn't change the deficit one bit. Just leaves a lot of elderly people bankrupt.

 

Will give you props on the defense spending note, because really, that's the only thing worth noting in discretionary spending.

 

cutting medicare funding or scaling it back means more tax dollars can be spent on deficit reduction.

 

 

[jasonxctf]

So, you'd argue that deficit spending is ok in times of economic expansion and a bad thing in times of economic contraction.

 

which is the exact opposite of Macro Economics 101.

[kapkomet]

which is the exact opposite of Macro Economics 101.

 

 

Keynsian economics doesn't work, but I'm glad that you think it does.

[Balta1701]

You do realize that Medicare pays for itself right? Cutting it doesn't change the deficit one bit. Just leaves a lot of elderly people bankrupt.

I'd like to retract this statement and issue an apology for making it, both to Jenks and anyone who read it. Totally spaced the 2003 Drug Benefit, for example, which was paid for entirely out of deficit spending from the general fund. Usually I fact-check better than that.

[Balta1701]

Keynsian economics doesn't work, but I'm glad that you think it does.

I'm glad you can discount 75 years of economic debate with one sentence. I'm overwhelmed by the power of your facts.

[mr_genius]

market down big today

[NorthSideSox72]

market down big today

We'd gone up 7% in the past couple weeks, on basically nothing more than buying an oversold market. The market was due to come back a bit.

 

[Balta1701]

We'd gone up 7% in the past couple weeks, on basically nothing more than buying an oversold market. The market was due to come back a bit.

Disappointing results from about 3 major firms and plummeting numbers for consumer confidence and inflation as well.

[Cknolls]

Disappointing results from about 3 major firms and plummeting numbers for consumer confidence and inflation as well.

 

 

Inflation?

[Balta1701]

Wachovia; the official bank of international cocaine smuggling.

This was no isolated incident. Wachovia, it turns out, had made a habit of helping move money for Mexican drug smugglers. Wells Fargo & Co., which bought Wachovia in 2008, has admitted in court that its unit failed to monitor and report suspected money laundering by narcotics traffickers -- including the cash used to buy four planes that shipped a total of 22 tons of cocaine.

 

The admission came in an agreement that Charlotte, North Carolina-based Wachovia struck with federal prosecutors in March, and it sheds light on the largely undocumented role of U.S. banks in contributing to the violent drug trade that has convulsed Mexico for the past four years.

 

‘Blatant Disregard’

 

Wachovia admitted it didn’t do enough to spot illicit funds in handling $378.4 billion for Mexican-currency-exchange houses from 2004 to 2007. That’s the largest violation of the Bank Secrecy Act, an anti-money-laundering law, in U.S. history -- a sum equal to one-third of Mexico’s current gross domestic product.

 

“Wachovia’s blatant disregard for our banking laws gave international cocaine cartels a virtual carte blanche to finance their operations,” says Jeffrey Sloman, the federal prosecutor who handled the case.

 

Since 2006, more than 22,000 people have been killed in drug-related battles that have raged mostly along the 2,000-mile (3,200-kilometer) border that Mexico shares with the U.S. In the Mexican city of Ciudad Juarez, just across the border from El Paso, Texas, 700 people had been murdered this year as of mid- June. Six Juarez police officers were slaughtered by automatic weapons fire in a midday ambush in April.

I'm sure someone in a moment will tell me how they were justly working around repressive government restrictions on capital flow.

[kapkomet]

It's funny how you always find information to condemn everything but your massive government.

[Balta1701]

It's funny how you always find information to condemn everything but your massive government.

Because if I point out anything bad that was done by the government prior to the last 8 months or so, the response I get is that "oh, you just blame bush for everything".

 

For example..."I think it was a bad thing that the MMS spent 10+ years taking money and bribes and cocaine and hookers in exchange for doing zero oversight on offshore drilling proposals."

 

"How dare you blame Bush for the oil spill! There's nothing he could have done! You just want to ban oil!"

[Cknolls]

Rumors out there that the Fed will stop paying interest on reserves in an attempt to spur bank lending. They are currently paying .25%. Good Luck with that. You cannot force people to borrow money. Ammo is running low, and the last bullet of the FED will point inward on itself.....Also rumors that there will be gold backed bonds in the future.

[Cknolls]

GM this morning announces it is acquiring AMERICREDIT for its "subprime " borrowing capability. The more things change ...the more things stay the same...That GM needs a subprime borrower to sell cars says it all.

[Balta1701]

Did a solid job of sweeping this under the rug.

The government's pay czar scolded 17 banks for handing out $1.6 billion in excess executive pay while benefiting from taxpayer bailout funds at the height of the financial crisis. But he will not force banks to return any of the money.

I'll await Kap telling me how that's too mean of the government anyway and they deserved his tax dollars. If only they'd taken more, then the economy would be fixed.

[kapkomet]

Did a solid job of sweeping this under the rug.

I'll await Kap telling me how that's too mean of the government anyway and they deserved his tax dollars. If only they'd taken more, then the economy would be fixed.

 

 

They didn't "benefit" from anything as most of these were contracts already in place.

[Balta1701]

They didn't "benefit" from anything as most of these were contracts already in place.

So, your argument is that once those companies went bankrupt without the Fed/Congressional intervention, they'd have kept their gigantic salaries from the defunct company?