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Economic Crisis

  1. November 19, 2009 02:18 PM

    Prospect’s Take on Too Big to Fail

    By Ryan Chittum

    The British magazine Prospect has one of the better explainers on too big to fail I've yet seen. It's a very good overview of the problem—a one-stop shop if you still haven't figured out why we're always calling on the press to emphasize it.

    It starts with an excellent lede recalling analyst Dick Bove's "buy" recommendation of Citigroup several...

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  2. November 19, 2009 10:23 AM

    A Good Bloomberg Profile of Elizabeth Warren

    By Ryan Chittum

    Bloomberg this morning posts a really good profile of Elizabeth Warren, who, despite much of the press's dismissal of her earlier this year, has become one of the most influential people in Washington. Her Consumer Financial Protection Agency is very likely to become law soon, and it's quite possible she could be picked to head it.

    This has the...

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  3. November 17, 2009 05:22 PM

    The Debt Privilege

    By Ryan Chittum

    We all know too much debt is at the root of the economic crisis. And we've seen lots of step-back pieces on the conditions that created the environment for that debt creation—monetary policy, of course, but also the advent of securitization, the credit-default swap, etc.

    But we haven't seen much in the news pages on another 30,000-foot-view reason: The tax...

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  4. November 17, 2009 01:32 PM

    Misplaying the SIGTARP Report

    By Ryan Chittum

    Did the Federal Reserve have any leverage in its negotiations with AIG counterparties, the ones it paid one hundred cents on the dollar to for stuff worth far less? And if it did have some, how much?

    That's the nut of the whole question, flared anew today by the release of a report on the deals by the Special Inspector...

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  5. November 17, 2009 10:27 AM

    The Backdoor-Bailout Report Coverage

    By Ryan Chittum

    Here's a win for the press, namely The New York Times and Bloomberg.

    The government, or one of its internal watchdogs anyway, the TARP Inspector General, looks at the AIG backdoor bailout of Wall Street (and France and Germany, etc.) that the two outlets have been writing about since way back last September.

    You'll not be surprised to find that...

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  6. November 16, 2009 01:56 PM

    Bloomberg: Bankers Doubling Down in Vegas

    By Ryan Chittum

    Bloomberg has an interesting real estate story showing how banks are getting entangled in the wreckage of their loans.

    Deutsche Bank forced developer Ian Bruce Eichner to hand it the keys to his Cosmopolitan Resort & Casino in Las Vegas. Well, not exactly the keys. The project is still far from complete and, in some nice color, Bloomberg reports...

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  7. November 12, 2009 01:47 PM

    NYT Examines the Impact of the Crisis on Kids

    By Ryan Chittum

    A few weeks ago I praised a Sesame Street special, of all things, for putting a human face on the impact of the economic crisis on families. Today, The New York Times does something similar with a page-one story and audio slide show on kids whose parents have been laid off.

    The Times profiles a family in...

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  8. November 11, 2009 02:16 PM

    A Snapshot of a Journalist at Work on Bear Stearns

    By Ryan Chittum

    With Bear Stearns' Ralph Cioffi and Matthew Tannin in the news, Janet Tavakoli passes along an excerpt from her new book we thought might be interesting to Audit readers—not only because it relates to Bear hedge funds' doings, but also because it shows a good business journalist at work.

    In this case it's Matthew Goldstein, then of BusinessWeek...

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  9. November 11, 2009 11:30 AM

    Some Misses on the Bear Stearns Acquittals

    By Ryan Chittum

    The only Wall Street executives to be charged in the crisis walked away from a Brooklyn courthouse free men after a jury cleared them of lying to investors and insider trading.

    But the stories about Bear Stearns' Ralph Cioffi and Matthew Tannin are a bit incomplete.

    For one reason why, check out financial journalist William Cohan on Bloomberg...

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  10. November 09, 2009 03:33 PM

    LAT a Bit Wide of the Mark on Health Care

    By Ryan Chittum

    The Los Angeles Times's David Lazarus beats back an accusation of using a red herring—and then goes on to push a bit of a straw man.

    He writes about WellPoint, the biggest private health insurer in the country, cutting health benefits for its own employees:

    If our biggest private health insurer has to jack up the cost of coverage...

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  11. November 09, 2009 10:20 AM

    Good WSJ Story on the Wall Street-Subprime Nexus

    By Ryan Chittum

    The Wall Street Journal has a good scoop on a story showing the connection of Wall Street to the shadier parts of the subprime industry.

    It reports on a settlement between mom-and-pop investors, who got snowed into lending to a company called American Business Financial Services Inc., and J.P. Morgan, Bear Stearns, and Credit Suisse, who lent money to...

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  12. November 05, 2009 06:33 PM

    Thursday Links: Goldie’s Gall, Chait Check, FSA

    By Ryan Chittum

    The Wall Street Journal reported a couple of days ago that Goldman Sachs (an Audit funder) is trying to buy tax credits from Fannie Mae to offset its profits. Take it from here, Floyd Norris:

    Goldman, you may recall, was saved with taxpayer money when the panic spread last year. A naïve person might think such a company...

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  13. November 05, 2009 10:25 AM

    Bloomberg Examines the Bank Lobby’s Armor

    By Ryan Chittum

    Bloomberg spotlights the Consumer Financial Protection Act and uses it as a jumping-off point for a smart story on the state of the finance-lobby's might.

    The theme is that the financial industry is still awfully powerful but—and this is a new thing—not all-powerful anymore, particularly when it comes to consumer-facing businesses.

    That's why the CFPA has been pretty much...

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  14. November 04, 2009 02:10 PM

    McClatchy: Goldman Laid Down with Dogs

    By Ryan Chittum

    Dean Starkman has been applauding McClatchy's series on Goldman Sachs (an Audit funder) for a couple of days now. Add another Audit appreciation today.

    McClatchy has been doing what Dean has been calling for for a long time now: Looking much more closely at how Wall Street fueled the mortgage crisis and how it was deeply...

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