Archive for June, 2009

Wasn’t it nice of our government to “allow” some banks to pay back money. We wouldn’t want to see rampant abuse of that permission would we?

U.S. officials on Tuesday gave 10 of the nation’s biggest banks approval to pay back a combined $68 billion of taxpayer money pumped into them to combat the credit crisis.

The Treasury Department did not name the banks but many of them are likely to announce they are making repayments and their names eventually will be published in routine Treasury reports.

This translates into “You are allowed to pay back the money that most of you were forced to take in the first place.”

It seems the storm is subsiding, even for just a bit.

Fewer U.S. workers filed new claims for jobless benefits for a third straight week last week and productivity rose at a stronger-than-expected pace in the first quarter, data showed on Thursday, supporting budding hope that the recession was losing force.

Initial claims for state unemployment insurance benefits fell 4,000 to 621,000 in the week ended May 30, the Labor Department said. The week covered the Memorial Day holiday, which could have had an impact on the data.

General Motors Corp said on Tuesday it reached a tentative deal to sell its Hummer brand to a privately held Chinese heavy machinery maker, part of an effort to drop four unprofitable vehicle lines and leave bankruptcy as a leaner company.

GM, a day after filing for bankruptcy, said in a statement that it reached a memorandum of understanding with Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery Co for the sale. Tengzhong said it will retain Hummer’s senior management and operational team.

Stupid.

When you make a deal with the devil, there’s always a price to pay.

PMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N) and American Express Co (AXP.N) on Monday announced plans to sell $5.5 billion of common stock, hoping to position themselves to quickly repay funds from the government’s bank bailout plan.

JPMorgan will sell $5 billion of stock and American Express will sell $500 million. The JPMorgan offering will be priced by Tuesday morning, a person close to the matter said. The person was granted anonymity because the timing is not public.

If they’re able to sell the stock and “buy themselves out of TARP” they never should have taken the TARP funds in the first place.

Oh, cool! They’re coming out of bankruptcy just in time to sit idle while all the automative manufacturers are in bankruptcy. Well, almost all of them.

Delphi Corp (DPHIQ.PK) said on Monday it has reached a deal to sell most of its global operations to private equity firm Platinum Equity, allowing the car parts supplier to emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

When it comes time to buy my next car, it won’t be a GM made vehicle. If I could get something for it, I would trade in my GMC right now for a Ford.

GM could have filed bankruptcy, closed 12 plants, and laid off 20,000 people without any help from our government.

Oh how the mighty have fallen.

Citigroup Inc’s (C.N) run of ignominy has now come to this: losing its coveted spot in the Dow Jones industrial average (.DJI) to a former unit.Dow Jones Indexes on Monday said the property and casualty insurer Travelers Cos (TRV.N) will replace Citigroup in its flagship 30-stock index of blue-chip stocks, effective June 8.Citigroup shares have traded below $5 since mid-January, and bottomed at 97 cents on March 5, after huge losses led to a series of federal bailouts. Taxpayers could end up owning 34 percent of what was once the world’s largest bank by market value.

Imagine what these companies, and our economy, might look like if politicians like Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama didn’t start mortgaging our kids future to “rescue” everyone.