'Break Up The Banks' Bill Gains Steam In Senate As Wall Street Lobbyists Cry Foul

[unhappycamper]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/08/break-up-the-bank-bill-senate_n_3040095.html



n this file photo taken Saturday, May 5, 2012 shows Sen. Sherrod Brown speaking before a campaign rally at Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio. Brown has introduced a bill to force banks to carry a higher percentage of their assets as capital.

'Break Up The Banks' Bill Gains Steam In Senate As Wall Street Lobbyists Cry Foul
Zach Carter
Ryan Grimosted
04/08/2013 6:18 pm EDT | Updated: 04/08/2013 11:59 pm EDT

WASHINGTON -- Momentum to break up the nation's largest banks is building quickly on Capitol Hill, just weeks after a unanimous, symbolic vote in the Senate to end taxpayer subsidies to Wall Street. The latest sign of this swift and unexpected shift in the political wind came Monday when Rob Nichols, a lobbyist with the Financial Services Forum, attacked new capital standards proposed by Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and David Vitter (R-La.) as "comically high."

The Brown-Vitter bill is, in fact, designed to put banks in a difficult position. As Brown told HuffPost in February, he hopes to move legislation this year to break up big banks; Vitter echoed Brown's comments on the Senate floor. By crafting a bill that requires banks with more than $400 billion in assets to hold at least 15 percent of those assets in hard capital, the senators hope to encourage the handful of multitrillion-dollar behemoths to split up into smaller firms.

Brown has been pursuing this line of attack for years, pushing a 'break up the banks' bill during the 2010 debate over the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill. Wall Street endured the heat, however, and emerged from the fracas without having to downsize.

But bank lobbyists are growing increasingly wary of the Senate. On Monday, Financial Services Forum CEO Nichols attacked the Brown-Vitter bill in Politico's "Morning Money," a D.C. newsletter focused on the financial industry. The entry was headlined: "WALL STREET REACT TO BROWN/VITTER: 'COMICAL.'"

[Demeter]

1. Stunning News

We'll have to see how far this effort can go before Obama and his Masters shut it down.

Probably the only reason it's gotten this far is Jack Lew is in Europe, chivvying the Germans.

[newfie11]

2. Exactly

I can't see Obama letting this go.

[progressoid]

3. Yeah, I've been let down so many times it's hard to get excited by this.

One wants to have hope but the reality looks grim.

[florida08]

4. best news I've heard in a long time

Break them up..where's the petition for me to sign!

[hay rick]

5. Dem and diaper boy raise a stink.

This may be "comical" but they aren't laughing. If this keeps up Barack will have some 'splainin to do.

[mbperrin]

6. Break 'em up! nt