By the end of the day, the Ken Lays of Wall Street could be $700,000,000,000.00 richer.

[girl gone mad]

The "smartest guys in the room" on Wall Street had a brilliant plan.


Convince working Americans that they can "own" their own $500,000 starter home on a minimum wage salary by paying only the interest forever.

Exploit rare "adjustable rate" mortgages, which have low introductory rates, knowing that new buyers pay close attention to monthly payments, not price. Promise that by the time the mortgage resets, interest rates will be lower, even though interest rates are already at historic lows.

Encourage heavy speculation in the real estate market with reports of a new paradigm (everybody who doesn't buy now will be priced out forever. Anybody who buys now will be rewarded with a lifetime of riches as their property continues its 30% yearly price increase).

Devise clever schemes to leverage, repackage, overrate and combine the loans into complex financial instruments.

Use the firms' centuries-old reputations and America's superpower status to sell the derivatives to foreign investors, newly flush with cash and inexperienced with American finance.

Collect record salaries and bonuses, year after year.

When the pyramid scheme collapses and the easy money dries up, demand $700 Billion of America's future earnings by threat of systemic collapse.


Just imagine all of the fun that Enron could have had with almost 1 Trillion dollars.

What could possibly go wrong?

:sarcasm:

[girl gone mad]

1. If you want a better bill..

contact your congressperson and ask him or her not to rush this through.

https://forms.house.gov/wyr/welcome.shtml


The government already has tools in place to help ease the credit crunch.

-The Fed can directly and immediately inject liquidity, something that it does on a regular basis.

-The SEC can temporarily suspend mark-to-market rules for these financial institutions, allowing them to value their toxic assets at above market rates.

-The FDIC limit could be raised. As a lone measure, this would easily pass.

-Failing the above, the President could declare a bank holiday for the illiquid banks to temporarily halt the outflow of cash.

These stopgap solutions would be reversible and could buy us enough time to have proper hearings with input from non-interested experts.

[dailykoff]

2. We need this or we will loose everything!!!11

How can you be so blind? I'm going to loose my ass on all my dumbass "investments"!!!1111 :cry: :cry: