When Hindsight into the Great Financial Crisis is 20/20
//
0
/Wow! The architects of the policy response to the Great Financial Crisis cannot stop themselves from showing how unfit they were for... Read More
Why Has So Little Changed Since Lehman Failed in 2008?
///
The Financial Times’ Martin Wolf looked at the response to the Great Financial Crisis and discovered the problem with Committee to Save... Read More
Turns Out Surrendering to Wall Street in 2008 Was a Bad Idea
It has taken a decade, but the Committee to Save the Banks’ decision to surrender to Wall Street is finally being seen... Read More
Senator Warren’s Call to Drain the DC Swamp
///
A tremor went through the Opacity Protection Team today when Senator Elizabeth Warren called for ending its capture of the process by... Read More
Committee to Save the Banks had a Lasting Negative Impact
The Committee to Save the Banks (Hank Paulson, Ben Bernanke and Tim Geithner) has had a lasting negative impact on both the... Read More
RBS Settlement Highlights Need for Transparency Label Initiative
The Statement of Facts released as part of the $4.9 billion RBS subprime mortgage-backed securities settlement with the US Department of Justice... Read More
It is Always Easier to Make Money Through Predation
As demonstrated by the hundreds of billions of dollars of fines paid by the Too Big to Fail banks, where possible Wall... Read More
Wall Street’s Business Model of Fraud: Subprime Mortgage Edition
Trust, but Verify. The three most important words in investing. By design, our financial system is suppose to ensure investors have access... Read More
Wall Street’s Derivatives Casino Still Opaque to Regulators
///
Michael Greenberger’s paper on the ongoing opacity of Wall Street’s derivatives casino serves as a reminder why restoring transparency is so important.... Read More
With Such Friends [as Academics], Who Needs Lobbyists?
///
The title for this post comes from Stanford business school professor Anat Admati’s “It Takes a Village to Maintain a Dangerous Financial... Read More
How Wall Street Conquered the World Without Firing a Single Shot
///
The preface to Transparency Games has aged well and is more relevant today than when I wrote it: There are events, such as the... Read More
Did Hank Paulson Dominate Bernanke’s Thinking?
When I was writing Transparency Games, I noted how important the panicked look on Ben Bernanke’s face was to Hank Paulson getting $750... Read More
The Con-Artist Wing of Economics: Central Bankers
The Federal Reserve lead response to the acute phase of the Great Financial Crisis was based on deceit. The entire narrative used... Read More
Contagion: A Product of Opacity on Wall Street
Bankers are great story tellers. Perhaps their greatest self-serving story is the one they tell about contagion. By definition, contagion occurs when... Read More
Saving the Volcker Rule
To no one’s surprise, Wall Street is about to finish off the Volcker Rule as a constraint on its business practices. The... Read More