March 11 (Bloomberg) -- GMAC Inc., the auto and home lender rescued by the U.S. government, may have overpaid its top executives after receiving taxpayer funds, according to a report by the panel overseeing the Troubled Asset Relief Program.
Pay packages for executives at GMAC and other TARP recipients “raise significant questions, which the panel will continue to study,” the Congressional Oversight Panel said in a report released today. “These include whether particular levels of compensation are either necessary or appropriate.”
Barclays is on the hunt for a retail bank to help it bolster its presence in the U.S., the WSJ reports.
No deal is imminent and the U.K. bank has only just started shopping around. Here are some possible candidates, and thoughts on which might make a target more or less attractive:
U.S. Sen. Jim Webb's proposal to require a hefty tax on billions of dollars in
bonuses paid to some executives of financial institutions bailed out by the federal government hit a roadblock in the Senate on Tuesday.
Senate leaders set aside the Virginia Democrat's amendment, which would require a one-time, 50 percent tax on bonuses exceeding $400,000 that were paid to employees of 13 companies that received more than $5 billion from the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP.
Over 140 U.S. lenders folded in 2009 alone. To remedy the financial void left in their wake, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation wants public pension funds, which safeguard the retirement funds of millions, to buy in part or in whole the banks that couldn't manage to keep their depositors' funds.
"Direct investments may allow funds such as those in Oregon, New Jersey and California to cut fees for private-equity managers, and the agency to get better prices for distressed assets," anonymous sources reportedly told Bloomberg News.
When sales were hot two years ago, Ernest East had no idea how hard it would be to keep his business, Miz Lynn's Pies, alive for its 10th anniversary late last month.
When the recession cooled sales of his sweet potato pies, East ran from big banks to non-profit business loan programs for cash to tide him over.
DES MOINES, Iowa - An analyst downgraded two regional banks on Thursday and upgraded one, reflecting concerns that some may struggle to repay the federal government's bailout money, while others have repaid already and appear to be on their way to healthy profitability.
Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. analyst Kevin St. Pierre said redemption of the government's Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, is a clear sign of a bank's ability to generate capital.
It's an article of faith among the business and government elite that bailing out Wall Street prevented another Great Depression.
America had to do it, the thinking goes, to avoid a much worse fate.
How much worse? Try unemployment at 25 percent, not 10 percent. Try millions cast out of their homes, not hundreds of thousands. Try years of depression and pain for everyone, rather than recession and pain for many.
Wall Street does not like the political speech it's hearing from Washington, so it's using its Supreme-Court-granted right to make its money talk. Specifically, Wall Street is shifting more of its money to Republicans. But it's not immediately obvious that Republicans can win votes by siding with Wall Street. So Wall Street's bigger bet on Republicans may not end up paying off.
Bank of America Corp. will ask shareholders Tuesday morning to authorize an increase to its amount of outstanding common stock as part of the bank's plan to pay back government bailout funds.
Bank of America in December agreed to repay $45 billion in loans it received from the government under its Troubled Asset Relief Program.
If passed, the number of authorized shares of the bank's common stock would increase by 1.3 billion to 11.3 billion.
In a ruling that freed Bank of America from some legal problems, a federal judge wrote on Monday that he had reluctantly approved a $150 million settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
But even as the judge, Jed S. Rakoff of the Southern District of New York, approved the settlement, he delivered harsh words for the S.E.C., saying that the agreement was “half-baked justice at best.”
