I wish the author would have done some further legwork and cited actual trades Goldman was involved in shorting Fannie and or Freddie after June of 2008 when they were fed this info. It's a short window to cover as they left the 'investment' banking business in late Sept of that same year. That or document meetings between Paulson and Goldman traders Swenson and Birnbaum prior to the spring of 2007 when they crushed the market short-selling crap mortgages to the tune of $4 billion.
Found these Paulson statements odd to say the least....
Quote:
In April 2007 delivered an upbeat assessment of the economy, saying growth was healthy and the housing market was nearing a turnaround. "All the signs I look at" show "the housing market is at or near the bottom," Paulson said in a speech to a business group in New York. The U.S. economy is "very healthy" and "robust," Paulson said.
In August 2007, Secretary Paulson explained that U.S. subprime mortgage fallout remained largely contained due to the strongest global economy in decades.
In May 2008, The Wall Street Journal wrote that Paulson said U.S. financial markets are emerging from the credit crunch that many economists believe has pushed the country to the brink of recession. "I do believe that the worst is likely to be behind us," Paulson told the newspaper in an interview.
On July 20, 2008, after the failure of Indymac Bank, Paulson reassured the public by saying, “it's a safe banking system, a sound banking system. Our regulators are on top of it. This is a very manageable situation.”
On August 10, 2008, Secretary Paulson told NBC’s Meet the Press that he had no plans to inject any capital into Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. On September 7, 2008, both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac went into conservatorship.
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The OWS crowd needs to wake up and instead of focusing on further taxing the 1%, focus on reducing the government's involvement in anything but governing. The idea of something being too big to fail is ludicrous and a set up for a ripoff.
Goldman got $10 billion in TARP money, paid it all back plus 20% interest in under a year. The CBO estimates total liabilities for Fannie/Freddie at $238 billion with the Federal Reserve in for $47 billion and the Treasury Department in for $85 billion. To keep it liquid.
While what Paulson did regarding releasing info to Goldman is criminal, what he did with Fannie/Freddie is $238 billion dollars.
12-02-2011, 10:15 AM
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