http://www.citypaper.com/digest.asp?ColumnTitle=Crash Course en-us Copyright 2009 Baltimore City Paper http://www.citypaper.com/digest.asp?id=19210 The Wall Street Journal has an interesting story today explaining that AIG has gotten back several billion dollars in collateral it posted last year against losses in the credit-default swap market. But, most of the "bad" contracts, which now look not-so-bad, were "closed out" by the government bai ... Thu, 29 Oct 2009 00:00:00 EST http://www.citypaper.com/digest.asp?id=19162 Watch Frontline's historical retelling of the roots of the financial crisis. Yes, folks, it's derivatives, and Brooksley Born, the former head of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, fought the good fight, trying to get them regulated and transparent, in 1998. The usual suspects (Rubin, Summers ... Wed, 21 Oct 2009 00:00:00 EST http://www.citypaper.com/digest.asp?id=19160 Gaithersburg-based AmeriDream, Inc. is prominently mentioned in a Huffington Post story looking at seller-funded down payment assistance (DPA) programs for new home buyers. The programs allow home builders to give a three percent down payment to possibly unqualified buyers by laundering it through a ... Wed, 21 Oct 2009 00:00:00 EST http://www.citypaper.com/digest.asp?id=19128 Alan Greenspan has changed his mind, proving finally that he has one. As Bloomberg reports, Greenspan told the influential crowd at the Council on Foreign Relations yesterday that the too-big-to-fail doctrine must end:"If they're too big to fail, they're too big," Greenspan said today. "In 1911 we b ... Thu, 15 Oct 2009 00:00:00 EST http://www.citypaper.com/digest.asp?id=19124 The Wall Street Journal crunched some numbers and declared that, even though 10 percent of U.S. citizens are out of work while most of the rest are taking pay cuts, the Gilliganesque bunglers in the financial sector are again partying like its 1999, only more so. According to the Journal: Total co ... Wed, 14 Oct 2009 00:00:00 EST http://www.citypaper.com/digest.asp?id=19095 The New York Times says CitiGroup is selling its secretive oil-trading arm, Phibro, to Occidental Petroleum, apparently to avoid bad publicity. Still no one's questioning the idea that the head guy in a business division that yields $400 million a year is all by himself worth $100 million a year. ... Fri, 09 Oct 2009 00:00:00 EST http://www.citypaper.com/digest.asp?id=19093 The Federal Housing Administration's boss is saying he'll need no bailout, "absent any catastrophic home-price decline." The New York Times is flashing red on this one, and it's an entertaining read. U.S. Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.): A 7-plus percent FHA foreclosure rate is no bad thing: "I don't ... Fri, 09 Oct 2009 00:00:00 EST http://www.citypaper.com/digest.asp?id=18603 In a Times Sunday Mag preview Columnist and Princeton Economics Professor Paul Krugman expends a lot of words explaining how the fellow Nobelists at the University of Chicago have been cranky and absurd since, at least, the mid-'70s. The story is headlined, "How Did Economists Get It So Wrong?" The ... Thu, 03 Sep 2009 00:00:00 EST http://www.citypaper.com/digest.asp?id=18602 Michael Greenberger, Rock Off Crew, Robert Strupp, and many other Baltimore folks are featured in a video clip viewable on Amy Goodman's Democracy Now! site It's a preview of Leslie and Andrew Cockburn's new documentary, American Casino, which illustrates how credit default swaps and other derivati ... Wed, 02 Sep 2009 00:00:00 EST http://www.citypaper.com/digest.asp?id=18561 (via Ocala Star-Banner; HT Robb Strupp)Florida-based Taylor, Bean and Whittaker, formerly the nation's 12th-largest loan originator and servicer, has filed for bankruptcy reorganization amid new sanctions by the Florida Office of Financial Regulation, the Ocala [Florida] Star-Banner reports: In a n ... Wed, 26 Aug 2009 00:00:00 EST http://www.citypaper.com/digest.asp?id=18560 Good news today as Bloomberg News won its federal lawsuit to find out which giant corporations the Federal Reserve lavished big money on, and how much. It's pretty outrageous that it took a nine-month legal battle to get this basic information, but that's life in a democracy, right? Of course, ... Tue, 25 Aug 2009 00:00:00 EST http://www.citypaper.com/digest.asp?id=18481 Aug. 7: Colonial BancGroup announces governmental actions. Seems that on "August 6, 2009, it was informed by the U.S. Department of Justice that it is the target of a federal criminal investigation relating to the Company's mortgage warehouse lending division and related alleged accounting irregular ... Mon, 10 Aug 2009 00:00:00 EST