AIG Bonus just tip of the ICEBERG March 22, 2009
Posted by loanarranger in Uncategorized.Tags: AIG, AIG Bonus, Bailout Eoropean Banks, Bailouts
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Many Americans are expressing outrage over the $165 million in bonuses that went to AIG executives. But that’s not the real story to the AIG FIASCO!
AIG got into trouble in part because they were involved with “credit default swaps.” AIG was essentially insuring the people who bought financial instruments such as mortgages. They were supposed to step in after a default and make the investors whole. But AIG didn’t build any reserves to do so.
SO the bottom line is this: The $165 million in bonuses is a speck of the $173 billion that went from taxpayers to AIG during their first bailout last summer. Where did the rest of the money go?
WE gave money BACK to the banks in the United States and EUROPE that bought high-risk loans. So we bailed out European banks also.
Societe Generale got $11 billion; Goldman Sachs got $8 billion; Deutsche Bank got $5 billion; and Bank of America another $5 billion. Do you understand that…Bank of America got its own bailout, plus money from AIG?!
So while we’re all angry about the AIG bonuses, the real question is should we taxpayers absorb these banks’ losses at 100 cents on the dollar?!
We should have required that the banks should only get back part of their money. WHY do we bailout Banks for their bad decisions?President Obama wants the bonuses rescinded, and that’s all well and good, but there’s a much larger problem here.
Are we wasting BILLIONS ? March 17, 2009
Posted by loanarranger in Uncategorized.Tags: Billions lost, Detroit school aid, earmarks, Obama, school aid, stimulus, stimulus bill, taxpayer, wasting taxpayer money
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As I was looking for AIG bailout articles, I ran across this WSJ article about how Billions of taxpayer money may be going down a rat hole. Obama gave a great education speech last week, but now we find that the Stimulus Bill had nothing to do with these reforms in education.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123698751663025791.html
Here is an excerpt from the article:
The stimulus bill throws an unprecedented $100 billion at the nation’s 14,000 school districts, but it subsidizes the status quo and demands little from recipients in return. The Milwaukee school system is receiving millions of dollars for additional school construction though it has excess capacity and stagnant enrollment. Detroit Public Schools, according to a recent Detroit Free Press story, “stands to reap $530 million — $355 million with no strings attached — from the federal stimulus package that will hand Michigan nearly $7 billion over two or three years. . . . In all, the state and local school districts could have at least $2.5 billion to spend as they see fit.” (Our emphasis.)
Detroit graduates a mere 24% of its students and has a history of corruption. Audits in 2001 and 2004 found $2.5 million missing or misspent, and the city’s schools superintendent was fired in December for incompetence. How does shoveling hundreds of millions of dollars more into such a system advance Mr. Obama’s reform agenda?
The President said his Education Department “will use only one test when deciding what ideas to support with your precious tax dollars: It’s not whether an idea is liberal or conservative, but whether it works.” Voters should hold Mr. Obama to that pledge.
Please Mr President, look into these Billions of bad earmarks and don’t put all your time into only Millions of AIG Bonuses!
New AIG bonus information March 17, 2009
Posted by loanarranger in Uncategorized.Tags: AIG, AIG Bailout, AIG Bonus, AIG names, Cuomo, Obama AIG
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Over the weekend, Obama administration people hit the talk shows and announced they are ”outraged” about the AIG $150 Billion in retention bonuses. They all said that there is nothing that can be done, maybe next time. Finally, outraged peaked on Monday and Obama gave a speech and proclaimed that he will try to re-open the AIG Bonus issue and try everything legal to get them back. (The bonuses were given on SUNDAY, but the Press picked up on it) Treasury secretary Geithner said he tried everything last week to stop them, with no success.
Everyone in Congress is talking tough to cameras, but still claim they can do nothing except embarrass the ones taking the Retention bonuses.
Enough Background info–here are the facts:
New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is actually DOING something. He says how can you call it a “retention bonus” for an AIG company that LOST THE MOST MONEY EVER, $60 BILLION in the last QUARTER. The Taxpayers have already given them over $160 BILLION in Bailout money and we now own 79% of the company! He asks–How can you give retention bonuses for losses? Attorney General Cuomo want a list of names of those receiving BONUSES. So far he discovered this in a letter sent to Barney Frank.
1. AIG had a deadline of 4PM yesterday to provide the Names, they did not respond.
2. 11 people received Retention Bonuses for 2008 and have already DEPARTED the company!
3. 73 People who received Bonuses are now Millionaires because of their Bonus.
4. Top 7 received more than a $4 Million Dollar Bonus.
5. Top 10 received Bonuses totalling over $42 Million.
6. Top 22 Each over $2 Million each.
GREAT JOB AG Cuomo —- Now Barney Frank and Sen Chris Dodd, please DO something! By the way, where is the US Attorney General, we taxpayers need your help also!
Another corrupt Obama appointee? March 2, 2009
Posted by loanarranger in Uncategorized.Tags: appointee, corrupt politician, Obama, Obama's urban czar
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We all know about the previous 4 nominees that quit because of Tax or corruption problems. We just found out the Republican Gregg, turned down Commerce Secretary because it was discovered that he EARMARKED Millions of dollars to closed PEASE AFB in which he and his brother have many LLCs.
Now we have one that made it into Obama’s circle.
http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/bronx/2009/02/28/2009-02-28_buildings_sprang_up_as_donations_rained_.html
“The man who is President Obama’s newly minted urban czar pocketed thousands of dollars in campaign cash from city developers whose projects he approved or funded with taxpayers’ money, a Daily News probe found.
Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion often received contributions just before or after he sponsored money for projects or approved important zoning changes, records show.Most donations were organized and well-timed.In one case, a developer became a Carrion fund-raiser two months before the borough president signed off on his project, raising more than $6,000 in campaign cash.In another, eight Boricua College officials came up with $8,000 on the same day for Carrion three weeks before the school filed plans to build a new tower. Carrion ultimately approved the project and sponsored millions in taxpayer funds for it.Carrion resigned as borough president effective Sunday and begins his new job as director of the White House Office on Urban Policy Monday.Saturday Carrion declined to answer written questions about his receipt of timely campaign contributions.
Foreclosure update March 2, 2009
Posted by loanarranger in Uncategorized.Tags: 70% foreclosures not reported, budget, earmarks, economy, forclosures rising, foreclosures, tea party
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Rick Sharga of Realtytrac recently spoke with CNBC’s Diana Olick and had a rather interesting factoid to share. He said that roughly 70% of foreclosures in their database ARE NOT listed in the MLS.
The following zip codes were chosen at random and reflect typical neighborhoods in both Ventura and Los Angeles Counties. We’re looking at condos and detached single-family residences that are active, pending sale, or contingent with bank-ups. The number of foreclosures below MLS totals include “pre-foreclosures” and “auction properties.”
:: Zip Code: 93033 :: South Oxnard, CA
# Active Listings = 213
# Pending/Cont. = 135
# Foreclosures = 910
:: Zip Codes: 91367, 91307, 91304 :: West Hills, CA
# Active Listings = 399
# Pending/Cont. = 170
# Foreclosures = 1,099
:: Zip Code: 91331 :: Pacoima/Arleta Area, CA
# Active Listings = 376
# Pending/Cont. = 206
# Foreclosures = 1,315
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/jan2009/econ-j17.shtml
“As bad as the statistics relating to the housing market are, they underestimate the full extent of the crisis, according to RealtyTrac. Banks are holding back from listing as much as 70 percent of their repossessed homes, in a likely bid to delay absorbing further losses on their balance sheets. “Either banks are overwhelmed and can’t get the houses [listed] quickly, or they’re deliberately slowing down so they don’t have to take markdowns to actual home values on their books,” Sharga said.
Banks have also delayed the speed with which they foreclose upon owners, in some cases due to new state laws that mandate longer periods of notification. Saccacio noted that in California, where such a law was passed, home foreclosures rebounded in December back to their level before the legislation was implemented. “The recent California law, much like its predecessors in Massachusetts and Maryland, appears to have done little more than delay the inevitable foreclosure proceedings for thousands of homeowners,” he said.
Such stalling tactics would only soften the economic disaster generated by the collapse of the housing market should home values suddenly reverse their downward spiral. However, all indications point in the opposite direction. Home prices have tumbled 21 percent from their peak, and it is anticipated that they will continue to fall through 2009 and the first part of 2010, according to David Wyss, chief economist at Standard & Poor’s.”
So what does this all mean? If we can’t trust headlines==without any good analysis, how are we supposed to solve the problem? We will continue to throw money at problems that don’t exist and prolong the economic recovery through 2010 and maybe decades!
In turn, the downward pressure on pricing means even more homes will go into Foreclosure, further decimating prices down the road as a vicious cycle of deflation of durable asset prices sets in.
This is going to kill off many more banks. It will lead to further unemployment. This will place more pressure on the stock market to dive even further down.
Current Foreclosures will take 12.9 months to sell off at current prices. And we’re only talking Foreclosures, not all the homes listed on the MLS.
As these Foreclosures enter the market, be it slowly or all at one time, they will continue to place pressure on downward sustained prices for homes for many years to come.
We are in for a long Recession. Or something much worse…
Why is this even important—because we are spending Trillions of dollars and budgeting today on the ASSUMPTION that 2010 will have a 3% GDP GAIN. This week, the Democrats have put 9000 EARMARKS into a spending bill, just to get us through the next 9 Months. The Republicans have no power to stop the spending.(even though Republicans are just as corrupt) That means that all Americans (not the rich) will pay enormous taxes in the future— now I’m depressed!
I am getting ready to have a throw all the lying, cheating, earmarking money for their own riches, Congressmen OUT. Most Americans do not even watch the news and have no idea how close we are to the cliff. Check out the “Tea Party” Americans that are marching all over the US to expose the hijinks of Congress to ordinary Americans.
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/03/the_st_louis_tea_party.html
