Bailed-Out Banks
Can’t Account for Gov’t Funds
The Associated Press has revealed that many
of the nation’s largest banks are claiming they can’t track how they’re
using the billions of dollars they have received in aid from US taxpayers.
The Associated Press contacted twenty-one banks that received at least $1
billion in government money and asked four questions: How much has been
spent? What was it spent on? How much is being held in savings? And what’s
the plan for the rest? None of the banks provided specific answers. When
Congress approved the massive bailout, it attached nearly no strings to
the money, and the Treasury Department never asked the banks how it would
be spent.
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/12/23/headlines#3
The Citi that never sleeps
... Rubin, Summers and many of their
protégés have been key advisers to Obama throughout the campaign. Last
week, Obama named Summers to be his top White House economic aide. And New
York Federal Reserve President Timothy Geithner, Obama’s pick for Treasury
secretary, worked as a senior aide to both Summers and Rubin
...
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1208/16111.html
Rubin's
Ponzi-scheme dwarfs Madoff's
A new Citigroup scandal is engulfing Robert
Rubin and his former disciple Chuck Prince for their roles in an alleged
Ponzi-style scheme that's now choking world banking.
Director Rubin and ousted CEO Prince - and
their lieutenants over the past five years - are named in a federal
lawsuit for an alleged complex cover-up of toxic securities that spread
across the globe, wiping out trillions of dollars in their destructive
paths.
Investor-plaintiffs in the suit accuse Citi
management of overseeing the repackaging of unmarketable collateralized
debt obligations (CDOs) that no one wanted - and then reselling them to
Citi and hiding the poisonous exposure off the books in shell entities.
The lawsuit said that when the bottom fell
out of the shaky assets in the past year, Citi's stock collapsed, wiping
out more than $122 billion of shareholder value.
However, Rubin and other top insiders were
able to keep Citi shares afloat until they could cash out more than $150
million for themselves in "suspicious" stock sales "calculated to maximize
the personal benefits from undisclosed inside information," the
lawsuit said.
The latest troubles for Rubin, Prince and
others emerged in a 500-page investigation by Citigroup investors
represented by law firm Kirby McInerney.
The probe was used to amend and add new
details to a blanket investor lawsuit filed against Citigroup a year ago.
The amended suit called the actions of Citi leaders "a quasi-Ponzi scheme"
to hide troubles - and keep Citi stock afloat while insiders unloaded
about 3 million shares between Jan. 1, 2004 and Feb. 22, 2008 for huge
profits. ...
Citi denied the allegations and said it
"will defend against it vigorously." http://www.nypost.com/seven/12042008/business/ponzi_scheme_at_citi_142511.htm
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