banks

The country is now suffering a second round of economic and financial distress stemming from the collapse of its banking system in October 2008. That crisis caused a huge loss of savings not only for domestic citizens but also for…

The word is that BofA did in fact consider declaring their Countrywide subsidiary bankrupt to ring fence the rest of the company from Countrywide. It got as far as a board vote this past summer. This Wall Street Journal video discusses…

Politicians, Treasury Secretaries, etc. would have you believe that “moral hazard” is something we should only worry about in the abstract, in the future, when they’ve moved on to another job. But now a study confirms with hard facts: moral…

Great data from from the BLS. The average annual wage in New York’s financial industry more than tripled from 1990 to 2009.

Here is the list of so-called global systemically important financial institutions by country. Who’s missing in your view?

The euro zone periphery was a sideshow. This stuff with Italy is the real deal. With yields at 6.7% and rising, it’s game over for the euro zone. The extend and pretend stuff ain’t gonna work.

Here’s an interpretation of the euro zone I have been meaning to run by you and I touched on it in the update to my post on how austerity in Europe works. In a fixed exchange rate environment like the euro area, you don’t have currency…

I would say that Stiglitz is right that Iceland did well in large measure because Iceland was not subjected to the kind of austerity that you traditionally see in these kinds of programs and which is an anti-growth policy. We are seeing the…

Liquidity crises are always solvency crises. The question is about determining which company, nation, or debtor is insolvent in a world of incomplete information. This leads to panic and a wider liquidity crisis that stresses the balance…

Sheila Bair argues that Europe's banks are undercapitalised due in large part to regulatory capture.