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AIG loses $62bn in 3 months. Sixty-Two Billion.
- Thread starter gofreak
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HamPster PamPster
Member
I waited all weekend for the Bad Bank episode of This American Life. Hopefully it will shed some additional light on how this is even possible. I mean... wow. I could burn every paycheck I get for the next 50 years and it won't come close to matching what they did in a day
Joe Shlabotnik
Banned
Heh, I probably should have phrased that to ask why our government isn't politely suggesting some international participation. I understand why Europe isn't volunteering.Jackl said:
Joe Shlabotnik said:
Europe wouldn't even bailout the eastern bloc, I seriously doubt they could muster up support for a foreign based company. Quite frankly neither of us knows the terms of US propping up this firm so hard. But I'm fairly sure much backroom talking has been done over it.
MrPing1000
Member
Thanks for the $78.0 million!
Minsc
Gold Member
So we just write them a check now, and then they see if they can double their record?
I mean hell, if you can get refunds & blank checks for all your high-risk loans gone bad, why bother regulating them and giving out realistic loans that people can afford to pay?
AIG should go. I just don't care, these huge companies that are "too important" get everything they want.
The whole point of "high-risk" loans is that they're HIGH-RISK. If you make your entire company off them, then surprise, surprise, you're likely to get fucked over. And now everyone's realized that's happened, so we just put a band-aid on it, and let them go on with their billions in pocket (paid to all the CEOs)?
No. I need to read more about it, but that's my uninformed stance.
I mean hell, if you can get refunds & blank checks for all your high-risk loans gone bad, why bother regulating them and giving out realistic loans that people can afford to pay?
AIG should go. I just don't care, these huge companies that are "too important" get everything they want.
The whole point of "high-risk" loans is that they're HIGH-RISK. If you make your entire company off them, then surprise, surprise, you're likely to get fucked over. And now everyone's realized that's happened, so we just put a band-aid on it, and let them go on with their billions in pocket (paid to all the CEOs)?
No. I need to read more about it, but that's my uninformed stance.
BigGreenMat
Member
kaching said:
Are you kidding me? Go talk to just about anyone and they STILL BELIEVE THIS. I talk to people at my job who are very intelligent (PhDs) who bought a condo last year or are looking to buy a house this year and I still hear them talking about how they are just throwing their money away on rent and that a house is a great investment and all of this other junk. It is amazing how strong and deep the beliefs about owning a house go.
Minsc
Gold Member
Bowser said:
The thing I hate is I think these companies KNOW that and take advantage of it. They know they're so damned important that they can almost factor it in and profit off it. They surely gave out huge amounts of money knowing that in the end, when it all went down, they'd be covered, because they are too important.
MrSardonic
The nerdiest nerd of all the nerds in nerdland
Staggering.
RBS in the UK also posted the largest loss in British corporate history...while their ex-CEO is getting slammed in the press for getting a pension worth nearly £700m a year up to a total of £16m.
These banks have been run so badly and are really on the edge of collapse. They have to be nationalised. At the moment, all we are doing in Europe and the US is pissing money down a well; taking on all the bad assets and leaving the banks with the remains that might be profitable.
These are pretty exceptional circumstances too and I see no justification at all for letting bankers walk away with pay-offs, massive pensions, or claim bonuses or increased salaries. The idea that we will lose "intelligent" people if they don't get paid enormous sums is beyond ridiculous given that it is those very people who have been pivotal in fucking the global economy and sucking money up the ladder into their pockets with little to no down-side for them now.
RBS in the UK also posted the largest loss in British corporate history...while their ex-CEO is getting slammed in the press for getting a pension worth nearly £700m a year up to a total of £16m.
These banks have been run so badly and are really on the edge of collapse. They have to be nationalised. At the moment, all we are doing in Europe and the US is pissing money down a well; taking on all the bad assets and leaving the banks with the remains that might be profitable.
These are pretty exceptional circumstances too and I see no justification at all for letting bankers walk away with pay-offs, massive pensions, or claim bonuses or increased salaries. The idea that we will lose "intelligent" people if they don't get paid enormous sums is beyond ridiculous given that it is those very people who have been pivotal in fucking the global economy and sucking money up the ladder into their pockets with little to no down-side for them now.
Minsc
Gold Member
~Kinggi~ said:
Well, for one, we'd probably learn our lesson. When the entire world turns in to a hostile environment and riots/muggings/murders are an hourly occurrence everywhere, maybe, just then, maybe, a few people who aren't being completely oppressed by the filthy rich organization would remember how it all started 500 years from then when some revolution forms.
Hmm. On second though, bail the bastards out, and let them keep their mansions and 100K cars, I'll deal with it.
BigGreenMat said:
Hell, some people are walking away from their upside down house and using the tax credit to buy a new house. If both husband and wife aren't on the original mortgage, the other one can get a loan, take advantage of the tax credit and they both walk away from the original one, leaving 20+% for the banks/AIG to cover. Sure it'll mess up the original owner's credit for a couple of years, but why not buy the comparable house across the house for 1/2 the price of your own?
With each AIG bailout, taxpayers are pretty much footing the bill for the loss in home value.
HankScorpio
Member
i just don't understand ?!?!?!?!?
mr jones said:
Shit asset cascade event. More banks go under, so do markets, Sovereign wealth funds, mutuals, pension plans take on more dmg. More people leave the market, less credit is available. Business/job collapse.
Personally I don't think the government can fund enough money to plug all these holes and eventually they're going to lose everything.
Way too late. Now if they fail, they fail with billions of our dollars. The point of pumping in more money to stabilize is to minimize losses. Too much has been put in to just let them fail now. They should have been allowed to fail in the first place. IMO, the amount of money that has been spent globally could have been used to socialized restructuring of the system following the collapse. The collapse and recovery might have been faster than keeping the system on life support like it is now. But I say that with no professional knowledge, just my gut. PEACE.GodofWine said:
half a moon
Banned
Did you watch the movie? You can't swim to land in the middle of an Ocean. Also, the longer you stay out of the water the better your chances are to individually not get hypothermia and get rescued by a small boat.ahoyhoy said:
Pimpwerx said:
If they're losing $62B a quarter, then propping them up is going to be more expensive than letting them fail very rapidly. The USA would be better off just making a new central bank, letting the others blow over like trailers in a hurricane, and thus we take over the world, muahahahahaha.
Jackl said:
This is what I don't understand. How is that not happening now? AIG just lost over a third of one-hundred fifty billion dollars, in one quarter. AIG's stock is under 50 cents a share. People are bailing out now. Taxes are going to have to rise this year to compensate for government spending, and the country's "debt" is going to escalate in the next year, as they take out IOUs against the countries that need AIG to stay afloat.
So if that much is going to happen if the US government doesn't provide any more money to AIG, what will happen if they do provide another large loan?
jamesinclair
Banned
Could you imagine if Lenin or Marx were around today?
The rhetoric theyd be spitting out would be amazing
The rhetoric theyd be spitting out would be amazing
And yet the guys on Wallstreet keep screaming that we need less regulation, more bailouts and we can't increase taxes or the poor Joe's who only take home $250,000 will really start to suffer.lawblob said:
I never really despised the finance guys before but if you listen to those assholes talk for just 5 minutes these days it is all you can do to stop from throwing something through the television.
to the folks that say "We should just let them fail, it's the free market afterall, right?!"
do you realize how many other people and corporations have money invested into AIG? It isn't just a matter of AIG failing, it's someone losing their investment, or even worse, someone on the brink of retirement watching their 401K shrink to 1/3 of what it was. and we're not just talking america... we're talking most advanced financial countries and unions. investments, gone. jobs, gone. insurance equities, gone. GM being "too big to fail" is definitely debatable.... not AIG. If AIG went under, the current economic situation would be the golden years compared to the depression the WORLD would be thrown into.
and I hate saying that. I hate the thought of nationalizing AIG or any financial institution... but at this point if we don't, the company will crumble and the world will fall. AIG's leadership is so far corrupt and gone when it comes to running the company effectively that they are just doing everything they can right now to make sure they get paid and the money trickles down the employment ladder as far as it can.
do you realize how many other people and corporations have money invested into AIG? It isn't just a matter of AIG failing, it's someone losing their investment, or even worse, someone on the brink of retirement watching their 401K shrink to 1/3 of what it was. and we're not just talking america... we're talking most advanced financial countries and unions. investments, gone. jobs, gone. insurance equities, gone. GM being "too big to fail" is definitely debatable.... not AIG. If AIG went under, the current economic situation would be the golden years compared to the depression the WORLD would be thrown into.
and I hate saying that. I hate the thought of nationalizing AIG or any financial institution... but at this point if we don't, the company will crumble and the world will fall. AIG's leadership is so far corrupt and gone when it comes to running the company effectively that they are just doing everything they can right now to make sure they get paid and the money trickles down the employment ladder as far as it can.
Geeker said:
That's actually good news. They intend to restructure, break up the company and in so doing get themselves out of the culpability void they have with the American public.
When Lehman collapsed and AIG edged to the brink last fall there was a day or two when the credit market froze completely. Why was that a problem?mr jones said:
Well, among many many other problems, some firms make payroll by taking out short-term loans on the commercial paper market. If that dries up they can't pay their employees.
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