ninjadude Posted March 8, 2013 #1 Share Posted March 8, 2013 Look, that this is the policy of the U.S. Justice Department has been pretty obvious for quite a while. The unwillingness to prosecute the big banks in spite of some of the most egregious and obvious financial fraud in American history in the run-up to 2008's financial collapse has become legendary. But the HSBC case, where thousands of emails over many years along with a great deal of other evidence proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that the bank was laundering money for some of the most murderous and evil drug cartels and terrorists on the face of earth, made it crystal clear that once your bank becomes a certain size, the DOJ considers you beyond prosecution. For anything. Too Big To Jail, to the hundredth power. And the penalty they did get? A fine worth approximately five weeks worth of profits -- after raking in massive profit from these drug cartels and terrorist-linked groups for many years. http://www.alternet....s-are-above-law Eric Holder's confession that the big banks are too big to prosecute, either for the 2008 fraud or for illegal money laundering mean that they must be broken up by anti-trust laws. A company cannot be above the law. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+OverSword Posted March 8, 2013 #2 Share Posted March 8, 2013 Eric Holder's confession that the big banks are too big to prosecute, either for the 2008 fraud or for illegal money laundering mean that they must be broken up by anti-trust laws. A company cannot be above the law. But do you for one moment believe that the current administration will act on this? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Silver Thong Posted March 8, 2013 #3 Share Posted March 8, 2013 But do you for one moment believe that the current administration will act on this? Who do you think owns both parties? So no nothing will come of this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ninjadude Posted March 8, 2013 Author #4 Share Posted March 8, 2013 But do you for one moment believe that the current administration will act on this? I can always hope. Elizabeth Warren is p***ing the big banks off right and left. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bama13 Posted March 11, 2013 #5 Share Posted March 11, 2013 http://www.alternet....s-are-above-law Eric Holder's confession that the big banks are too big to prosecute, either for the 2008 fraud or for illegal money laundering mean that they must be broken up by anti-trust laws. A company cannot be above the law. Dang, from the title I thought this was going to be a thread about the Federal Government. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeremiah65 Posted March 12, 2013 #6 Share Posted March 12, 2013 In a rare occasion ninjadude...I agree with you. No one should be above the law. The Banksters need to be investigated and where criminal negligence or conspiracy to commit fraud is found, they should be jailed and fined...take back everything the gained through shady dealings. I know everyone jumped around like their head was on fire and said we must prop them up and opened the doors to throw money at them...I completely disagree with that. I completely disagreed with the Wall Street Bailouts. These people essentially stole money from their investors and then turned to the Gov and said "Real" capitalism does not work that way...what we have now is an illusion of capitalism...it has been perverted and twisted. Crony capitalism isn't "real" capitalism... 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tiggs Posted March 12, 2013 #7 Share Posted March 12, 2013 Eric Holder's confession that the big banks are too big to prosecute, either for the 2008 fraud or for illegal money laundering mean that they must be broken up by anti-trust laws. A company cannot be above the law. IMO, they need to re-enact Glass-Steagall, in order to split up commercial banks and investment banks. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frank Merton Posted March 12, 2013 #8 Share Posted March 12, 2013 Seems to me big banks can offer economies of scale and compete with overseas banks much better. If they are too big to fail (which I take it means that their failure would seriously harm the economy), then have a nationalization law in place, take them over, fire and prosecute the offenders, wipe out the stockholders and probably the bondholders too, and then hold a public offering and make them public again. Artificially keeping banks small strikes me as begging for inefficiencies, secure little quasi-monopolies that can't be taken over lest the result be "too big" and failure to compete effectively internationally. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frank Merton Posted March 12, 2013 #9 Share Posted March 12, 2013 Those boys in the picture look too well fed for the part; even their clothes look too warm. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tiggs Posted March 12, 2013 #10 Share Posted March 12, 2013 Seems to me big banks can offer economies of scale and compete with overseas banks much better. If they are too big to fail (which I take it means that their failure would seriously harm the economy), then have a nationalization law in place, take them over, fire and prosecute the offenders, wipe out the stockholders and probably the bondholders too, and then hold a public offering and make them public again. I don't believe that the issue is in terms of size, per se. I believe it's in terms of mixed function. In the US (as most Western Countries), the Government underwrites the money that people have in commercial bank savings, in order that they feel safe using those banks to hold their money in. So. If you have a commercial bank where people save their money tied with an investment bank where large amounts of money can be made or lost - then, effectively, when things go badly wrong, then the Government underwrites that loss to those funds. What happened back in the 2008 financial crisis was that the amount of money on deposit at insured banks was $4.5 trillion and the amount of money in the FDIC fund - the fund that the government keeps to repay bank failures, was very much smaller - at just $45.2 Billion. So, basically - propping up the banks saved the Government from potentially running up an additional $4.45 Trillion tab - just in restoring American citizen's bank deposits alone - with no hope of having that money returned. By splitting the two - as investment banks are not underwritten by the Government - they can collapse and burn, as and when. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aztek Posted March 12, 2013 #11 Share Posted March 12, 2013 well banks are pretty successful for themselves. too big to prosecute, that i agree. they got all the money, they can buy anyone, any judge, and looks like they bought holder too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
awest Posted March 12, 2013 #12 Share Posted March 12, 2013 IMO, they need to re-enact Glass-Steagall, in order to split up commercial banks and investment banks. Wouldn't matter, they actually got rid of glass steagall in order to not have to stop the citigroup merger, which actually happened before the repeal because they already knew without a doubt that it would pass. Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act passed about 6 months after the merger happened, how convenient. Nonetheless, when they did merge it was still illegal, and they should have been prosecuted for it but nothing ever game of it. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ninjadude Posted March 12, 2013 Author #13 Share Posted March 12, 2013 Artificially keeping banks small strikes me as begging for inefficiencies, secure little quasi-monopolies that can't be taken over lest the result be "too big" and failure to compete effectively internationally. I don't think we need to make them small. That would be too far the other way. But certainly if they are too big to fail and too big too prosecute, then they are clearly too big. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ninjadude Posted March 13, 2013 Author #14 Share Posted March 13, 2013 What happened back in the 2008 financial crisis was that the amount of money on deposit at insured banks was $4.5 trillion and the amount of money in the FDIC fund - the fund that the government keeps to repay bank failures, was very much smaller - at just $45.2 Billion. Plus the amount of money that was "bet" in undocumented and unregulated derivatives was several quadrillion dollars. More money than exists on the planet. They are still trying to figure out how to deal with that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
awest Posted March 13, 2013 #15 Share Posted March 13, 2013 Plus the amount of money that was "bet" in undocumented and unregulated derivatives was several quadrillion dollars. More money than exists on the planet. They are still trying to figure out how to deal with that. Wow, I was about to debate you on this then looked and found out we do indeed have a 1.4 quadrillion derivatives bubble. That is just disguting... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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