Treasury Dept. Plan Would Give Fed Wide New Power
so let's the give the unconstitutional FED the powers of an unchecked dictatorship that's anti-free market? totally socialist and fascist... unbelievable...
the hubris of our 'leaders' is reaching unprecedented levels.
i'd pull my money out of everything they plan on controlling.
Treasury Dept. Plan Would Give Fed Wide New Power EDMUND L. ANDREWS
NY Times
Saturday, March 29, 2008
The Treasury Department will propose on Monday that Congress give the Federal Reserve broad new authority to oversee financial market stability, in effect allowing it to send SWAT teams into any corner of the industry or any institution that might pose a risk to the overall system.
The proposal is part of a sweeping blueprint to overhaul the nation??s hodgepodge of financial regulatory agencies, which many experts say failed to recognize rampant excesses in mortgage lending until after they set off what is now the worst financial calamity in decades.
Democratic lawmakers are all but certain to say the proposal does not go far enough in restricting the kinds of practices that caused the financial crisis. Many of the proposals, like those that would consolidate regulatory agencies, have nothing to do with the turmoil in financial markets. And some of the proposals could actually reduce regulation.
(Article continues below)
According to a summary provided by the administration, the plan would consolidate an alphabet soup of banking and securities regulators into a powerful trio of overseers responsible for everything from banks and brokerage firms to hedge funds and private equity firms.
While the plan could expose Wall Street investment banks and hedge funds to greater scrutiny, it carefully avoids a call for tighter regulation.
The plan would not rein in practices that have been linked to the housing and mortgage crisis, like packaging risky subprime mortgages into securities carrying the highest ratings.
The plan would give the Fed some authority over Wall Street firms, but only when an investment bank??s practices threatened the entire financial system.
And the plan does not recommend tighter rules over the vast and largely unregulated markets for risk sharing and hedging, like credit default swaps, which are supposed to insure lenders against loss but became a speculative instrument themselves and gave many institutions a false sense of security.
Parts of the plan could reduce the power of the Securities and Exchange Commission, which is charged with maintaining orderly stock and bond markets and protecting investors. The plan would merge the S.E.C. with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which regulates exchange-traded futures for oil, grains, currencies and the like.
The blueprint also suggests several areas where the S.E.C. should take a lighter approach to its oversight. Among them are allowing stock exchanges greater leeway to regulate themselves and streamlining the approval of new products, even allowing automatic approval of securities products that are being traded in foreign markets.
Full article here.
Treasury Dept. Plan Would Give Fed Wide New Power
The Fed??s New Powers, What Will Ron Paul Say?
[align=left]March 29th, 2008 8:14 am
The US economy is going up in flames. If Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson has his way the solution is to pump in more gasoline. Free market capitalism is being tortured and the federal regulators are holding all of the killing devices. Now they want more.
Yesterday Treasury Secretary Paulson unveiled a plan that would give the Federal Reserve the power to regulate every aspect of the US economy. They would have authority over the entire banking sector as well as the entire securities industry. Once again the well meaning do-gooders approach the problem by creating more problems and bureaucracy. An interesting question is then? will this make the Federal Reserve an actual government agency? It seems it will. Currently it is technically a private organization, more aptly a cabal.
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This proposal is reminiscent of the knee jerk reaction of the Bush administration in creating the Department of Homeland Security after 9/11. Instead of actually streamlining and cutting waste we combine wasteful departments to create a new leviathan of waste. I wonder what catchy title this new expanded Federal Reserve organization will have? I have a suggestion, the ??Department of the American Economic Apocalypse?. I can??t wait to see what the meaning will be of each color in the new ??Economic Threat Advisory System? (reference). Oh no! The economic threat level is in the Red! Sell your stocks now!
It will be interesting to see the gamut of opinion bouncing around regarding these new proposals. It already seems some Democrats in Congress are somehow of the opinion it doesn??t do enough. There is only one word for that: scary. These new regulatory suggestions will have to be approved by Congress and it is likely that they will. After all there is nothing worse than being viewed as a ??do nothing? legislator. From my perspective, in this day in age, there is nothing better.
I anxiously await the reaction to this from Ron Paul. He will no doubt echo some of the words above. On this I sincerely hope that he isn??t the lone voice of dissent. It will also be interesting to see the reaction from presumptive GOP nominee John McCain. He??s been attacked from the left about his ??do nothing? approach to the economy. Of course that is just politics. He would certainly do something. The only question is would he approve of this? I guess we??ll have answers to these questions soon enough.
Treasury Dept. Plan Would Give Fed Wide New Power
yeah i heard this on the news the other day. Just what we need, the people that helped us get into shit are gonna put us in even more shit.
