Category: Regulation

The pay puzzle: Part 1, what should happen, executive level

28 January, 2010 (11:29) | Banks, Compensation, Regulation, Speculation, Subprime, Theory, US News | No comments

By: David A. Smith
 
With the economy in the tank and banks (including the Federal Reserve) making record profits, populist ire has settled on the bankers themselves.  
 

Were you paid a great deal of money?
Yes, we … uh …
Guilty!  Until proven innocent!
 
Deservedly so?  That question is implicit in a lengthy Steven Brill piece in the New [...]

Rumpelstiltskin’s fee: Part 2, the motives

26 January, 2010 (11:40) | Banking, Legislation and policy, Regulation, Subprime, TARP, Theory, US News | No comments

By: David A. Smith
 
[Continued from yesterday's Part 1.]
 
When the court adjourned yesterday, I was representing my client Rumpelstiltskin, doing business as Uncle Sam’s Club financing,
 

“You pays your money and you gets your loan.”
 
Mr. Stiltskin is single-handedly keeping the American financing system flowing with liquidity, and –
 
[Your Honor, must I listen to these public-gallery outbursts [...]

Rumpelstiltskin’s fee: Part 1, the libels

25 January, 2010 (10:48) | Banking, Legislation and policy, Regulation, Subprime, TARP, Theory, US News | No comments

By: David A. Smith
 
If it please the court –
 
Comes now my client, your honor, the United States government, affectionately known as Rumpelstiltskin – who having rendered a valuable, nay an essential, service to the fair maiden investment banks and her father the banking industry, is now being both cheated of the compensation which he demanded [...]

Great laws from little blog posts grow

14 January, 2010 (11:43) | Homeownership, Regulation, Soft equity, Tax credits, US News | No comments

By: David A. Smith
 
If virtue is its own reward, can an AHI post change a law? 
 

One blog post = one wing flap?
 
Though I would never claim such a thing, Dr. Zhong Yi Tong, principal analyst of the Washington DC homeownership tax credit, traces a direct link between a July, 2003 AHI report and the [...]

The biggest invisible stories of the decade: Part 7, effects not yet visible

13 January, 2010 (11:59) | Capital markets, Decade, Essential posts, Global news, Innovations, Regulation, Theory, US News | No comments

By: David A. Smith
 
 [Continued from yesterday’s Part 6 and the preceding and Part 1,  Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, and Part 5]
 
As 2009 opened, virtually the entire credit-crunch tidal wave had sloshed through the financial markets. 
 

At least we’re still here
 
Single-family home prices appeared to be bottoming, albeit at lower levels and with much [...]