It is shameful that these companies, who are our leaders, can’t manage their assets correctly or safely? I think we need to help “SOMEWHAT” but soon let the final problems crash are rebuild.
“Save” Citi. This phrase has no meaning or context. Time to see exactly what monetary sins that are being covered over and where the money going.
Its not about saving it is about taking.
I have a bank account with Citi and a Smith Barney IRA with money in their Bank Deposit Program and 2 growth funds…There is something that says: investment products not FDIC insured…..Should I be worried about losing it all? or am I protected?
What is going on? I cannot stop being amazed, or shocked, by the bad banking news we all get…I have completely lost my trust in the USA and EU banks and part in the so called governments we ought to have..Today it’s Citi…but there are others: How can AIG mess up 60 billion?? Are your eyes glued closed????? Has everbody stopped paying their insurance?? Or WHAT? Others, a car maker GM…how can you lose 20 billion with just producing not so good cars?? Incredible air of stupidity must be all around these so called companies. Let them fail! Take ALL bonusses back from the last 3 years, seize their properties…jail those “mothers” at the top for putting honest working people on the street.
It is better to sacrify a few 100 peoples lives for 1000’s honest others! It’s cheaper too!
Let Citi fail only at the top…..proscecute top players from 2006 to now, take their money to help the ones that need it!
Tghe question is why should we save CITI, what form should CITI take to accomplish those ends and, what is the cost of those achieving those ends. As far as I have heard, there has been no intelligent rational answer to those questions. In the absence of answers, my skepticism about paid off pols and greedy bankers tells me that the pols want to pour taxpayer money into the banks to buy votes in the short term and to pour money into the private pockets of their sugar daddies. Can the governemnt accomplish anything besides creating a mountain of debt is debatable.
If we save Citi or any other bank, some of the same terms should be imposed on Citi as on GM. That is that ALL of the bank employees, including executives, should be receiving the same compensation as the non union automakers in the South. For most, it would be a huge reduction to receive even what the Detroit union autoworkers actually receive, despite republican propaganda.
As far as James comment about the lobbying, Citi alone has ALREADY recived more than the entire auto industry was requesting. And it still is not enough, they want more? It’s time for the banksters and stock shufflers to come down to live like the rest of us.
Citi Group is going down and if you have any money in it you should take it out. I know that when the S&L were closed in the late 1980’s it took me two weeks to get my money from one that failed. The FDIC does not have enough money to handle Citi going under but the government can not stop it they have $500 billion in toxic never to be collected credit card and business loans in Asia, hundreds of thousands of business bankruptcies in America. And millions of unemployed home owners in America in bankrutcy or just walking away from their houses.
Citi is going down and do not have money in it when it does.
Before any more taxpayer relief is offered to Citigroup, former Citi Director Robert Rubin should be required to return the $115 million that he has collected in compensation from Citi to the U.S. Treasury. If its acceptable for the federal government to claw back the profits of Madoff’s investors who withdrew their money before Madoff’s arrest, then the Citi insiders like Rubin who profited from the bank’s speculative activities should also take the hit before the U.S. taxpayer does. They can’t say they didn’t know Citi’s strategy posed risks. After all, “as long as the music is playing, you’ve got to get up and dance. We’re still dancing”.
Maybe; here’s what I’d be willing to do:
– Seize C and AIG as bankrupt organizations, but don’t pay anything for it. I think this is called conservatorship.
– Sell off the good pieces at the best prices the market will pay.
– Then, liquidate the toxic assets for whatever you can get.
– Taxpayers get whatever money we’ve already put in, first. Any money left over goes to debtholders and then shareholders, in that order.
It’s not that hard; the FDIC does this every day.
Stop the bailouts; they’re wasting good money after bad.
It’s hard to make a case for any of the bailout activity the Government has done in the past let alone stepping in to prop up Citi.
Yet against constituency wishes the Government has plowed ahead with bailouts and guarantees and some things done by the Fed we know nothing about because they won’t tell.
There has to be a point where we draw the line and let the chips fall where they may. As much as the collapse of Citi will likely bring on a tsunami of credit events triggering massive transfer of wealth I say it must be done. If we don’t rid the rot from the system we will never move on.
I’m sure there will be cases made for stepping in and providing further assistance, but while it’s disguised behind helping the citizens of this country, it really only helps the powerful elite.
Should the Govt. help Citi? NO! Should we let the market take care of the problem? YES!
Is there any better prospects if we let Citi die? Would it help the government if the other 3 banks need assistance?
I think the government has as much business saving Citi as they do GM, none.
So why is saving GM about “saving jobs”, and Citigroup not? Does Citi not employ people? I believe they both employ roughly as many people. Granted, I have lost count with all of the recent layoffs at both companies.
Ahh yes, but Citigroup is not unionized. I guess they need more lobbyists, huh?
Please don’t tell me that GM didn’t do anything “bad” (SUV in every driveway, LA subway, planned obsolescence) and that Citi did.
I’m not sure about the government saving any business, I’m generally of the opinion that these businesses should survive or die on their own, it is thanks to these big banks that we’re in the mess we’re in now.
BUT as a citibank mortgage holder, this kinda scares me …
This would be a good opportunity for the government to use Citi as the bad bank that is has been pondering upon.
Then let it die.
If I were writing to the President I would say this about the whole general idea of having good money save bad money.
Dear Mr. President,
Is it really right to further burden the Real Economy with those parts of the Financial Economy that are failing?
Most of us would probably guess that three-quarters of the formerly ‘vibrant’ Financial Sector was artificial, phony, of no productive use, only useful to itself, and needed to contract. It was a millstone around the neck of the Real Economy. It was created out of nothing. It was a con.
Why keep it alive?
The stock market goes further. Its verdict is that maybe 90% of the Financial Sector needed to be eliminated, if we look at how that sector is now valued by investors. Of course that valuation reflects BOTH the bad parts and good parts — Bad Banks and Good Banks, or parts thereof.
And yet one bailout is offered after another?
When will it end?
These are Zombies. They need to die. They want to die. Please put them out of their misery. They want peace. They want to be buried. They don’t really want to consume the flesh of the living. They have no choice.
And yet we keep them alive. They will continue to want to eat the living. That is the only way they know how to live.
They are a danger to all of us. They will continue to burden the productive sectors. They will eat the young of the living before those young (businesses) even see the light of economic day. When will this travesty stop?
What logic is there to only further burden those American taxpayers that are still productive with the huge debts these bailouts require?
The government under normal circumstances needs the productive private sector for its own survival. At least that is a social contract that most of us are willing to acquiesce to.
Do we also have to continue feeding the Zombies?
I have to acknowledge BNN’s Kevin O’Leary for this — he is big on letting Zombies die.
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“Budgeting does not create alifetime of wealth but only alifetime of worry and doubt. A budget is actually a MONEYMAKING KILLER, not a MONEYMAKER.” from -The sensible saver – of MARK W.MILLER