I think the whole lawsuit was frivolous. AIG shoud have been allowed to fail and then Hank and all of the shareholders would have been left with nothing. Complainig about not getting better terms for something he should not have gotten in the first place was horse-bleep. Hope Hank wasted millions of dollars trying the case. Just pissed off my tax dollars were wasted defending it.
Dave,
It’s about property rights. You are correct that AIG should have been left alone to fend for itself. If that ended up in bankruptcy court, and all the shareholders lost their money, so be it. But the government shouldn’t be allowed to step in and impose whatever terms they want, no matter how punitive. And the main reason the government took AIG over was to make sure the counterparty to their credit swaps got paid 100 cents on the dollar. In other words, the government used AIG to fund part of the bailout, and it cost AIG shareholders $22 billion, which was the profit us taxpayers received. And by the way, where did THAT money go?
The money went to many foreign banks and investors Pauldz. They came out smelling like a rose with AIG bailout money that taxpayers provided. They were just as culpable as American banks were.
I stay up with the news dude. Too bad you don’t. Banks in Scotland, Germany and other places were included.
June 15, 2015 at 4:42 pm
And you know this how? says:
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Wally, thank you very much for providing a link so I am able to read about what Agent was saying. I appreciate you citing a source and posting your comment with a lack of negativity, unlike Agent’s reply.
Wally, some on this blog must have been taking a long hiatus from the real world. It was even on Huffington Post, newspapers, Fox. Almost all had some version of where all that AIG bailout money went.
June 16, 2015 at 10:58 am
And you know this how? says:
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Why are you still insulting me, Agent? I asked to learn and Wally enlightened me. I don’t need you to tell me I don’t live in the real world because I didn’t know. Not everybody knows everything. That is why I asked. I asked to learn. Your negativity and insulting attitude are unnecessary and unbecoming of someone who is supposed to be an adult.
Hey And, you insulted my intelligence intimating I made it up on where the money went. Had you been paying attention, you would have known it too. You probably didn’t hear Frank saying Fannie & Freddie was sound right before the meltdown, did you?
June 17, 2015 at 8:08 am
And you know this how? says:
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If you think someone asking you how you know something is an insult of your intelligence, you’re crazy. Like 100% crazy.
I asked how you knew something. I didn’t insult you. I didn’t demean you. I merely asked how you knew what you knew.
You must have some serious mental issues if someone says to you ‘how did you learn that?’ and you reply with ‘since you’re calling me dumb, I will insult you instead of answering your question.’ 100% crazy. No doubt.
June 15, 2015 at 3:02 pm
Dave says:
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I see your point Paul. And agree I don’t like any government getting involved in any business or bailout. Once they started down this road though, they needed to take great caution to not put tax payer dollars at risk and to reward taxpayers for any risk they/we did take. Bottom line AIG signed a pact with the devil, asked for more bailout money after they started down a path of their own choosing and were stuck with the consequences of numerous bad decisions. They should have been allowed to fail, and if the Feds believed the banks needed some bailout from the failure of AIG, they should have worked out deals with the banks covering some (not all) of the losses incurred from the bad credit default swaps and then worked out a deal to reward us for that risk. A lot of bad players here most of which got more than they deserved (except for Lehman who was allowed to fail). I don’t feel sorry for any of them, or the big bonuses they got prior to this or the big AIG bonuses after this. And I don’t feel sorry for Hank. And I hope the next time something like this happens, more are allowed to fail. I have bailout fatigue.
Dave, a little off subject, but congratulations to your Black Hawks for the Stanley Cup victory. Chicago needed a winner from their sports teams. Do you think Harry Reid will demand they change their mascot? After all, it might be racial.
The $25 billion should still be paid, just to other stock holders for other insurance carriers and financial institutions. By providing the bailout to AIG caused unindenting harm to shareholders for profitable financial institutions as they would have to take on these Customers and grow their own businesses, thus restraining investors from seeing double digit growth. Isn’t that what the stock market is all about, winners and losers? So the government just interfered with the shareholders for AIG losing, and the shareholders for other financial institutions from winning. However, to pay the $25billion would be almost difficult to distribute, but the point should have been made, thus restricting the Federal Government of ever pulling a stunt like this again.
Old Hank pulled the first stunt getting into trouble with sub prime mortgages and requiring a $182 billion bailout. He has no one to blame but himself. AIG has been an outlaw company for many years. I have no sympathy for them or with Greenberg.
‘Old Hank pulled the first stunt getting into trouble with sub prime mortgages…’
That is factually wrong. While Greenberg was running AIG it was very cautious about subprime–in 1993 he fired AIG Financial Products head Howard Sosis because he wanted to take more risk with derivatives of subprime MBS, than Greenberg was comfortable with.
AIG was still the soundest financial services company in the world until 2005. That’s when Eliot Spitzer orchestrated Greenberg’s ouster as CEO, and replaced him with supposedly ‘good corporate governance’ types (I.e. Spitzer’s friends). Only then did AIG-FP go hog wild on credit default swaps. In the seven months after Greenberg left, they wrote more CDS than in the seven previous years of Greenberg’s tenure.
One of the things Greenberg insisted on was NOT putting up collateral on the CDS they wrote. He relied on AIG’s AAA credit rating only. Had Greenberg remained as CEO AIG would never have been in the position it found itself in in 2008. There would have been no collateral call, and no liquidity crisis.
WSJ 06/15/2015: Judge Wheeler wrote in his ruling that “the weight of the evidence demonstrates that the government treated AIG much more harshly than other institutions in need of financial assistance” and “publicly singled out AIG as the poster child for causing the September 2008 economic crisis,” though the “evidence supports a conclusion that AIG actually was less responsible for the crisis than other major institutions.”
I find it very interesting that no one has brought up the fact that this ILLEGAL bailout occurred during President GW Bush’s administration. If it occurred while President Obama was in office, it would be all his fault.
Actually Ron, it happened under Pelosi, Reid, Barney Frank & Chris Dodd’s watch. GW warned them about 17 times that Fanny & Freddy needed to be reigned in and it was totally ignored. Frank actually said that both were sound and no need for any other scrutiny of their operations. Didn’t he have a boyfriend working for Freddy at the time? The only thing GW was guilty of was having an asleep at the switch head of the SEC who wasn’t doing his job on the credit default swaps going on with Wall Street.
Thank you Dave. I am sure troll Ron will not believe anything if it smacked him upside his head. To get the timeline correct, Pelosi/Reid took control of Congress in 2007 and the meltdown was the result of their actions/innactions, not Bush. The same thing would have happened under Obama’s watch as well had he been in the White House.
You said,”The same thing would have happened under Obama’s watch as well had he been in the White House.”
That is factually inaccurate. What you should have said was either, “the same thing would LIKELY have happened under Obama’s watch as well had he been in the White House”;or “In my opinion, the same thing would have happened under Obama’s watch as well had he been in the White House.”
The financial collapse could have been the same, worse, not as bad, or not occurred at all.
Sorry Ron, I am not into splitting words like you are. We do have a track record to go on for the past 61/2 years and yes, the same thing would have happened with the triumvirate of Pelosi/Reid/Obama in charge of everything. Their level of incompetence is unparalleled in American politics. The only administration which was similarly incompetent was Jimmy Carter and it took Ronald Reagan to straighten out his mess.
Thank you for continuing to prove how poor the reading comprehension is of the right.
At what point did I say ANYTHING about who is to blame? All I did was point out a simple fact. Unless you have proof that GW Bush was not the President when this ILLEGAL bailout occurred, SHUT UP!!!!!!!!
You want to blame President Obama for every negative thing that has occurred during his term, yet give Republican Presidents a pass and find a way to blame Democrats.
Fact: The 2 largest economic collapses began during Republican administrations and ended under Democratic administrations. Note: I said absolutely nothing about who or what is to blame for the collapses nor credit for the recoveries. Unless you have facts to disprove this, keep your comments to yourself.
Thank you Ron for proving you are the biggest Progressive troll and defender of Obama that you voted for twice. Your lack of reading comprehension is now legendary. Perhaps you forgot that I criticized Bush for having an incompetent head of the SEC who should have recognized all the wheeling and dealing by Wall Street and AIG and put a stop to it. Congratulations, we have incompetents heading up every major department and agency of the Federal Government currently and most are blatant Socialists per the list I gave you in the last blog.
Only on IJ can a Conservative get 171 thumbs down on a post. By the way Ron, I did not thumb you down for apologizing to me. I think someone who agrees with your leftist positions didn’t like you apologizing to me and thumbed you down.
June 17, 2015 at 1:24 pm
Ron says:
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Agent,
I would imagine there are many sites that would thumb down Conservatives much more than that. Who on IJ has not been excessively thumbed down at one point?
Why must you play the victim all of the time. Maybe you are a Liberal.
June 17, 2015 at 1:32 pm
Stan says:
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Agent is a big puss and a bigger coward. He’s also an idiot.
June 17, 2015 at 1:49 pm
Rosenblatt says:
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Agent – ever think it’s how you come across in your posts that gets voted down instead of your viewpoint(s)?
Example: I see your hidden comments above when someone asked you how you knew something and you insulted them multiple times, even after they said they just wanted to know so they could learn too.
Ever think THAT is one reason why some of your posts get thumb-downed — after all, those comments had no Conservative tones in them yet they are now hidden.
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
LOL
I think the whole lawsuit was frivolous. AIG shoud have been allowed to fail and then Hank and all of the shareholders would have been left with nothing. Complainig about not getting better terms for something he should not have gotten in the first place was horse-bleep. Hope Hank wasted millions of dollars trying the case. Just pissed off my tax dollars were wasted defending it.
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
The money went to many foreign banks and investors Pauldz. They came out smelling like a rose with AIG bailout money that taxpayers provided. They were just as culpable as American banks were.
“The money went to many foreign banks and investors” And you know this how?
What Agent says has been widely reported. For example:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/03/16/aig-90-billion-bailout-fu_n_175190.html
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
Wally, thank you very much for providing a link so I am able to read about what Agent was saying. I appreciate you citing a source and posting your comment with a lack of negativity, unlike Agent’s reply.
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
Why are you still insulting me, Agent? I asked to learn and Wally enlightened me. I don’t need you to tell me I don’t live in the real world because I didn’t know. Not everybody knows everything. That is why I asked. I asked to learn. Your negativity and insulting attitude are unnecessary and unbecoming of someone who is supposed to be an adult.
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
If you think someone asking you how you know something is an insult of your intelligence, you’re crazy. Like 100% crazy.
I asked how you knew something. I didn’t insult you. I didn’t demean you. I merely asked how you knew what you knew.
You must have some serious mental issues if someone says to you ‘how did you learn that?’ and you reply with ‘since you’re calling me dumb, I will insult you instead of answering your question.’ 100% crazy. No doubt.
I see your point Paul. And agree I don’t like any government getting involved in any business or bailout. Once they started down this road though, they needed to take great caution to not put tax payer dollars at risk and to reward taxpayers for any risk they/we did take. Bottom line AIG signed a pact with the devil, asked for more bailout money after they started down a path of their own choosing and were stuck with the consequences of numerous bad decisions. They should have been allowed to fail, and if the Feds believed the banks needed some bailout from the failure of AIG, they should have worked out deals with the banks covering some (not all) of the losses incurred from the bad credit default swaps and then worked out a deal to reward us for that risk. A lot of bad players here most of which got more than they deserved (except for Lehman who was allowed to fail). I don’t feel sorry for any of them, or the big bonuses they got prior to this or the big AIG bonuses after this. And I don’t feel sorry for Hank. And I hope the next time something like this happens, more are allowed to fail. I have bailout fatigue.
Dave, a little off subject, but congratulations to your Black Hawks for the Stanley Cup victory. Chicago needed a winner from their sports teams. Do you think Harry Reid will demand they change their mascot? After all, it might be racial.
Pauldz: the AIG Board voted and approved the plan.
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
‘Old Hank pulled the first stunt getting into trouble with sub prime mortgages…’
That is factually wrong. While Greenberg was running AIG it was very cautious about subprime–in 1993 he fired AIG Financial Products head Howard Sosis because he wanted to take more risk with derivatives of subprime MBS, than Greenberg was comfortable with.
AIG was still the soundest financial services company in the world until 2005. That’s when Eliot Spitzer orchestrated Greenberg’s ouster as CEO, and replaced him with supposedly ‘good corporate governance’ types (I.e. Spitzer’s friends). Only then did AIG-FP go hog wild on credit default swaps. In the seven months after Greenberg left, they wrote more CDS than in the seven previous years of Greenberg’s tenure.
One of the things Greenberg insisted on was NOT putting up collateral on the CDS they wrote. He relied on AIG’s AAA credit rating only. Had Greenberg remained as CEO AIG would never have been in the position it found itself in in 2008. There would have been no collateral call, and no liquidity crisis.
WSJ 06/15/2015: Judge Wheeler wrote in his ruling that “the weight of the evidence demonstrates that the government treated AIG much more harshly than other institutions in need of financial assistance” and “publicly singled out AIG as the poster child for causing the September 2008 economic crisis,” though the “evidence supports a conclusion that AIG actually was less responsible for the crisis than other major institutions.”
BTW, Hawks Win!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojM4VQ3VWN4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRErZkwu3SA
I find it very interesting that no one has brought up the fact that this ILLEGAL bailout occurred during President GW Bush’s administration. If it occurred while President Obama was in office, it would be all his fault.
Actually Ron, it happened under Pelosi, Reid, Barney Frank & Chris Dodd’s watch. GW warned them about 17 times that Fanny & Freddy needed to be reigned in and it was totally ignored. Frank actually said that both were sound and no need for any other scrutiny of their operations. Didn’t he have a boyfriend working for Freddy at the time? The only thing GW was guilty of was having an asleep at the switch head of the SEC who wasn’t doing his job on the credit default swaps going on with Wall Street.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMnSp4qEXNM
Thank you Dave. I am sure troll Ron will not believe anything if it smacked him upside his head. To get the timeline correct, Pelosi/Reid took control of Congress in 2007 and the meltdown was the result of their actions/innactions, not Bush. The same thing would have happened under Obama’s watch as well had he been in the White House.
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
Thank you Ron for proving you are the biggest Progressive troll and defender of Obama that you voted for twice. Your lack of reading comprehension is now legendary. Perhaps you forgot that I criticized Bush for having an incompetent head of the SEC who should have recognized all the wheeling and dealing by Wall Street and AIG and put a stop to it. Congratulations, we have incompetents heading up every major department and agency of the Federal Government currently and most are blatant Socialists per the list I gave you in the last blog.
Agent,
Fair enough.
I apologize for missing your criticism of President GW Bush.
Only on IJ can someone get thumbs down for apologizing.
Yuuuuuuuuuuuuuup
Only on IJ can a Conservative get 171 thumbs down on a post. By the way Ron, I did not thumb you down for apologizing to me. I think someone who agrees with your leftist positions didn’t like you apologizing to me and thumbed you down.
Agent,
I would imagine there are many sites that would thumb down Conservatives much more than that. Who on IJ has not been excessively thumbed down at one point?
Why must you play the victim all of the time. Maybe you are a Liberal.
Agent is a big puss and a bigger coward. He’s also an idiot.
Agent – ever think it’s how you come across in your posts that gets voted down instead of your viewpoint(s)?
Example: I see your hidden comments above when someone asked you how you knew something and you insulted them multiple times, even after they said they just wanted to know so they could learn too.
Ever think THAT is one reason why some of your posts get thumb-downed — after all, those comments had no Conservative tones in them yet they are now hidden.