The horse is long out of the barn, but Congress may soon step in to correct this problem with credit default swaps.
S. 961, introduced just yesterday in the Senate, would authorize the regulation of credit default swaps and other swap agreements.
Really super – now that the market for credit default swaps has [...]
TPMMuckracker published a nice summary of the collapse of AIG on Friday. If you’re interested in Congress’ role in creating the disaster, here’s a key line: “In 2000, Congress passed the Commodity Futures Modernization Act, which further reduced the already weak regulation of derivatives like credit default swaps.”
Back in October, in a post called [...]
In early February here on this blog, I wrote favorably about the somewhat fanciful idea of televising the conference committee on the economic stimulus bill.
If conference committee meetings were televised, members of the conference committee would be constrained to explain what they were doing and why. That would be a good thing.
Well, the conference [...]
The U.S. government is modifying its rescue of troubled insurer AIG so that it will take $40 billion in stock. Meaning: Your investment in AIG is about $130. The average U.S. family is invested to the tune of about $400.
That’s in addition to the $1,000-per-family plunked down earlier on financial services companies.