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Economy
In reply to the discussion: STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Friday, 18 May 2012 [View all]Demeter
(85,373 posts)22. Les Leopold: Don't Look Now -- Banks Are Still Ruining America: 6 Harsh Lessons from the JP Morgan F
http://www.alternet.org/story/155431/don%27t_look_now_--_banks_are_still_ruining_america%3A_6_harsh_lessons_from_the_jp_morgan_fiasco?akid=8788.227380.tbrr1O&rd=1&t=8
...The truth is that there are no good banks and bad banks among the giants of finance. Thats just a feel-good story that gives us false hope that individuals and individual institutions can fix a system that is rotten to the core.
JP Morgan Chase is no different than other big banks, except that it is the biggest. It is part of an entwined system of too-big-to-fail institutions that are ripping us off. Leading up to the 2008 crash, it was up to its eyeballs packaging and selling mortgage-backed securities that were designed to fail. It helped pump up the housing bubble, profited while it was inflating and profited again while it burst. It was forced to pay a $153 million fine last year for misleading big investors about the riskiness of mortgage-related securities it was selling just as the home-loan market was melting down.
JP Morgan helped to crash our system in 2008 and profited handsomely from the bailouts it claimed it really didnt need (but thank you very much, well take them anyway). And now it's back in the gambling business just like all the other big banks and hedge funds. And should another crash come, well again be asked to pick up the tab -- it's still too big to fail according to the conventional wisdom.
But the problem is bigger and deeper than it was even before the horrendous crash. On a day-to-day basis, these large financial institutions use their vast gambling enterprises, to extract profits from our economic system while creating little or no value in return. Economists call these profits economic rents. That's French for rip-offs. Where does this money come from if the banks are not creating new economic value? It comes from the rest of us in the form of stagnating wages, higher fuel costs and excessive financial fees on mortgages, credit cards and loans. It also comes from tax breaks for the super-rich that the rest of us have to make up. And finally it comes from the costs associated with financial crashes bailouts, job loss and deficit-related problems.
How big is big?
The top five U.S. banks own approximately 60 percent of all U.S. banking assets.
Their combined assets total $8.5 trillion which is slightly larger than Chinas GDP ($7.2 trillion).
JP Morgan Chase heads the list with $2.3 trillion in assets, which is about the size of Great Britain's GDP. Were talking big.
MUCH MORE AT LINK
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And, should Romney win in November, anyone think Mr Oompa Loompa will hold him to the same standard?
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interesting and even more interesting cameron said they couldn't back off of it.
xchrom
May 2012
#97
It's fallen below $40...back to initial IPO of $38. and NASDAQ can't even execute buy/sell orders!!
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#107
bunch of last-minute buying. S&P was -1.00% 2 min. ago. Now it's only -0.74%.
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