Thread: What is everyone hearing?

The FBI is investigating Fanny Mae, Freddie Mac, AIG, and Lehman Bros. Altogether there are 26 companies being investigated for fraud, and a bunch of other charges.

Sources: FBI investigating possible fraud by Fannie, Freddie, Lehman, AIG and their executives

By LARA JAKES JORDAN | Associated Press Writer
7:09 PM CDT, September 23, 2008

WASHINGTON (AP) _ The FBI is investigating four major U.S. financial institutions whose collapse helped trigger a $700 billion bailout plan by the Bush administration, The Associated Press has learned.

Two law enforcement officials said Tuesday the FBI is looking at potential fraud by mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and insurer American International Group Inc. Additionally, a senior law enforcement official said Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. also is under investigation.

The inquiries will focus on the financial institutions and the individuals that ran them, the senior law enforcement official said.

The law enforcement officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigations are ongoing and are in the very early stages.



Officials said the new inquiries bring to 26 the number of corporate lenders under investigation over the past year.

Spokesmen for AIG, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac did not immediately return calls for comment Tuesday evening. A Lehman spokesman did not have an immediate comment.

Just last week, FBI Director Robert Mueller put the number of large financial firms under investigation at 24. He did not name any of the companies under investigation but said the FBI also was looking at whether any of them have misrepresented their assets.

Over the past year as the housing market cratered, the FBI has opened a wide-ranging probe of companies across the financial services industry, from mortgage lenders to investment banks that bundle home loans into securities sold to investors. Mueller has previously said the FBI's hunt for culprits in the nation's subprime mortgage crisis focused on accounting fraud, insider trading, and failure to disclose the value of mortgage-related securities and other investments.

The investigations revealed Tuesday come as lawmakers began considering whether to approve emergency legislation that would give the government broad power to buy up devalued assets from troubled financial firms.

The bailout proposed by the Bush administration is aimed at helping unlock credit and stabilize badly shaken markets in the United States and around the globe.

In the past two weeks, the government has taken over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the country's two biggest mortgage companies, with a bailout plan that could require the Treasury Department to put up as much as $100 billion for each of them over time if needed to keep them afloat as mortgage losses mount.

Last week, the Federal Reserve provided an emergency $85 billion loan to AIG, which teetered on the brink of bankruptcy. Lehman Brothers was forced to file for bankruptcy after attempts to engineer a private rescue fell apart. All the companies were laid low from bad bets on complex mortgage-related securities.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke made the joint decision last week that the only way to stop the carnage was to deal with the root cause of all the troubles, billions of dollars of bad mortgage debt sitting on the books of major financial companies. This debt has triggered the worst credit crisis in decades, causing credit markets to essentially freeze up despite the fact that the Fed joined with major central banks around the world to pump billions of dollars of reserves into the financial system.

Additionally, the FBI is investigating failed bank IndyMac Bancorp Inc. for possible fraud. Countrywide Financial Corp., formerly the nation's largest mortgage lender and now owned by Bank of America Corp., is also under scrutiny.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/poli ... 7450.story

Above article posted here:

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-132827.html

Here is a good article posted by Zeezil.

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-132873.html

Thanks, April. I was being lazy.

Originally Posted by April

I've got a feeling that this request for a bailout.....which they thought they were going to panic everyone into falling for.........has opened a Pandora's Box and this thing is going to turn into something certain folks never expected in a million years to happen

God works in mysterious ways.

He most certainly does April and I, personally, have never, not for a second, believed He had foresaken us.

His solution might not leave us unscathed in the process, but the tide is turning and this is all starting to crash down around the heads of the most evil, corrupt, and greed driven amongst us.

The Markets created this crisis, they were the ones that made massive and obscene amounts of money, and now that they've failed, they're demanding that the public which they have screwed for decades must bail them out! This BAILOUT at the point of a financial gun is a rotten idea all round!

After eight years of virtually no oversight at all, and no effective legal constraints, this is how the private mega-giants of finance chose to manage themselves, after all the regulations were lifted in order for them to rake in obscene profits; with an investment-to-reserve ratio of roughly between 80 or 100 to one: This debt crisis was inevitable

I read in the Houston Chronicle that there is rising opposition among the Republicans in Congress. I have seen several quotes from Republican Congressmen that they will not support it but my Congressmen have yet to make a statement.

By Tom Curry
National affairs writer
MSNBC
updated 1 hour, 27 minutes ago

Tom Curry
National affairs writer

WASHINGTON - After risk-taking on Wall Street brought the financial system to its knees, Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill are taking part in their own risk-taking exercise.

With Congress about to adjourn and with elections in less than six weeks, lawmakers are wrestling with what the Bush administration calls a must-pass bill — a $700 billion proposal to rescue the U.S. financial sector.

But it seems increasingly questionable that the bill — still in its drafting stages — will pass by Congress' self-imposed deadline of Friday, when it is supposed to adjourn for the elections.


Among rank-and-file congressional Democrats, there is deep anger that the end result is likely to be a bailout designed by the Bush administration but made possible only by sufficient votes from Democratic members of Congress.

Yet Democrats face the risk that they will be blamed if they fail to pass a rescue bill and Main Street America feels the impact of an economic disaster.

Enough votes to block passage?
Meanwhile, many Republicans also are skeptical. Some say that so far they are not seeing the impact of the credit crisis in their districts. So it is entirely possible that there might be enough disaffected Democrats and Republicans to prevent the bill from being passed in its current form.

One of the problems is that Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson faces a credibility gap on Capitol Hill that many trace to the Bush administration's handling of the Iraq war, launched long before Paulson signed on in 2006.

After a day of questioning by members of the Senate Banking Committee on Tuesday, Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke will return for another grilling Wednesday afternoon before the House Financial Services Committee.

“As much as I admire Secretary Paulson and Ben Bernanke, this administration has no credibility at all,â€

I heard this morning that Paulson retired 2 years ago as CEO of Goldman Sachs with 140 million dollars!