MetaFilter posts tagged with Banks

If Potter gets a hold of this building and loan, there will never be another decent house built in this town.

Anything — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 02:41:40 -0800

Frank Capra meets Collateralized Debt Obligations:

The idea is simple: If enough people who have money in one of the big four banks move it into smaller, more local, more traditional community banks, then collectively we, the people, will have taken a big step toward re-rigging the financial system so it becomes again the productive, stable engine for growth it's meant to be. It's neither Left nor Right -- it's populism at its best.

Move your money.

Used for centuries, end of lifed October 31st 2018 - The Cheque

Mutant — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 03:55:21 -0800

They were first known as "Praescriptiones" and used by The Romans from around 100BC ¹. Employed by Perisans of the Sassanid Dynasty during the third century, they were then known as "Saqqs". They have been found in Egyptian ruins dating from the 12th century, about the same time as The Knights Templar bolstered their use by issuing written instruments, redeemable for cash to pilgrims bound for holy land bound. Even so, it took another five centuries for the cheque to be adopted by England. Closely related to Bills of Exchange, cheques were originally issued by Goldsmiths, who allowed depositors to issue negotiable claims - cheques - against gold held on deposit. Later codified by successive acts of Parliament, cheques have remained largely unchanged for centuries. In fact the last big innovation we've witnessed with cheques was the introduction of magnetic ink some 53 years ago. However with the rise of electronic payment systems cheque use has declined sharply, to the point where The Payments Council, the organisation responsible for operating the UK's interbank payments systems, will retire cheques effective 31 October 2018 . Pensioners and others critical of bankers were unimpressed by the move, while banks supported the idea, citing the high per cheque processing cost. ¹ as documented by Durant in The Story of Civilization, Vol 3, Caesar and Christ.

Wall Street's Near Death Experience

SeizeTheDay — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 17:21:32 -0800

Wall Street's Near Death Experience

"I rob banks for a living, what do you do?"

kirkaracha — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 08:38:26 -0800

John Dillinger was paroled from Indiana State Prison in May 1933 after serving eight years for assault and battery and attempted robbery and launched a Midwest Crime Wave from June 1933 to June 1934. Dillinger was embittered by his prison sentence. His accomplice "pleaded not guilty, stood trial, and was sentenced to two years." Dillinger "confessed, was convicted of assault and battery with intent to rob, and conspiracy to commit a felony, and received joint sentences of 2 to 14 years and 10 to 20 years." June 10, 1933: Dillinger robbed his first bank, in New Carlisle, Ohio. September 22, 1933: After Dillinger robbed a bank in Bluffton, Ohio, Dayton police captured Dillinger at a girlfriend's apartment. He was sent to the county jail in Lima, Ohio. When he was frisked police found plans for a prison break. Footage of Dillinger yucking it up with prosecutor Robert Estill ended Estill's career. September 26, 1933: Harry Pierpont, Charles Makley, and eight other inmates escaped from the Indiana State Penitentiary following Dillinger's escape plan and using guns he'd smuggled into the prison. October 12, 1933: Pierpont, Makley, and two accomplices broke Dillinger out of the Lima, Ohio jail, killing Sheriff Jesse Sarber in front of his wife and his deputy. ("Charles Makley Was Framed!") January 25, 1934: Dillinger and his gang were captured in Tuscon, AZ, after a fire in their hotel when firemen recognized them from their mugshots. March 3, 1934: Dillinger broke out of the Lake County Jail in Crown Point, Indiana, according to legend using a fake gun he carved out of wood and painted with shoe polish. He stole a car during the escape and crossed state lines, sparking an FBI manhunt led by Melvin Purvis. April 23, 1934: FBI agents accidentally killed a local resident and two innocent Civilian Conservation Corps workers and "Baby Face" Nelson killed Agent Carter Baum during a bungled capture attempt and shootout at the Little Bohemia Lodge ("Dillinger only left because he had to!!!") in Manitowish Waters, Wisconsin. July 22, 1934: Dillinger was killed in an ambush outside the Biograph Theater in Chicago. The movie was Manhattan Melodrama ("A human document, picturing every exciting phase of life in the world's greatest metropolis!"). Newspaper illustration: "How death was dealt to death-dealing John Dillinger." The killing made the FBI famous and movies about G-Men superseded the gangster movies popular in the early 1930s. Dillinger went to the movies with Polly Hamilton and Anna Sage (Ana Cumpanas), the "Woman in Red" (she actually wore an orange skirt and white blouse). Sage had set up Dillinger in exchange for a cash reward and a promise to help prevent her deportation. She was deported anyway. More info: Dillinger learned about robbing banks from a fellow inmate who worked for for Butch Cassidy's Wild Bunch. "What I Knew About John Dillinger" by longtime girlfriend Evelyn Frechette. Polly Hamilton reminisces about "Jimmy Lawrence." Vintage newsreels. Detailed timeline (scroll down). Another timeline. Lists of gang members and their fates, and banks robbed by Dillinger and his associates. Theories that the real Dillinger wasn't killed at the Biograph persist, but a 2006 documentary concluded that it was the real deal (The Straight Dope agrees). A post-mortem photograph sparked stories that Dillinger was especially well-endowed and other myths, but it's really his arm in rigor mortis.

Obama's Bank Changes

atmosphere — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 18:32:08 -0800

US unveils banking reform plans. But will the proposed measures adequately address the causes of the current crisis? The bottom of the article contains some US media reactions, inluding the Huffington's "The Good, The Bad and The Ugly".

Protect Yourself, Your Family, Your Identity

netbros — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 11:42:49 -0800

The commercials are all over television — and they certainly are attention-grabbing. They’re the ones where the heavy, bald guy is sitting in his easy chair talking in a squeaky female voice about all the clothes he bought — including a bustier. Or the little old lady speaking with the gruff voice of a younger man about the sweet motorcycle she now owned. Identity theft is a serious crime — one that is occurring with an alarming frequency. The Identity Theft Manifesto explains how criminals get your personal info, and what you can do about it.

Accidental movement of large sums of money to the wrong people.

johannahdeschanel — Thu, 21 May 2009 00:08:22 -0800

Couple flee after bank mistakenly gives them 10m $

"They frankly own the place"

Joe Beese — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 10:25:39 -0800

The second most powerful United States Senator admits, "And the banks -- hard to believe in a time when we're facing a banking crisis that many of the banks created -- are still the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill. And they frankly own the place." Glenn Greenwald discusses.

A New Way Forward

geos — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 09:17:14 -0800

Nationalize. Reorganize. Decentralize. anewwayforward.org wants you to organize a protest on April 11^th to express your frustration and disapproval with how our elected officials have handled the economic crisis.

The Beginning Of The End.

gman — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 14:21:44 -0800

Frontline: Inside The Meltdown. Synopsis here. There is an interactive timeline at the bottom of the first link.

Treasury paid $100 for every $66 in assets in top-ten TARP deals

shivohum — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 20:40:02 -0800

The Congressional Oversight Panel, headed by Harvard Law professor Elizabeth Warren, notes in its third monthly report that for every $100 Treasury spent on its ten largest TARP deals, it received back only $66 worth of assets -- significantly less than for roughly comparable private parties.

"And maybe they’re hoping we’ll buy their bezzle."

orthogonality — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 11:25:28 -0800

The savings and loan’s decision not to settle the lawsuit made no economic sense for a solvent institution, but it made perfect sense if their principle objective was to maintain the false appearance of solvency for as long as possible. The savings and loan was undoubtedly inflating all of their assets, including my homely little lawsuit, to postpone the inevitable.
What reminded me of that incident from my late, unlamented law practice was the persistent failure of financial institutions to modify mortgages voluntarily. It makes perfect economic sense for a safe and sound institution to avoid the ruinous costs of foreclosure by agreeing to reduce the principal and monthly payment for homeowners who can pay a mortgage, but not the one they’ve got. But according to the National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys, fewer than ten percent of mortgage modifications in November reduced the principal. About half added late payments and penalties to the principal, and either increased monthly payments or added payments at the back end of the mortgage. If a borrower was in default already, what’s the chance the borrower can make a higher monthly payment?

Brad Miller, US Congressman for the Thirteenth District of North Carolina advances a possible motivation for the apparently illogical behavior of US banks.

Deals of the Day

SeizeTheDay — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 17:39:09 -0800

House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank gave a bank, whose capital ratio equaled only 1.88% of assets at the bank, versus a desired level of about 6%, TARP money after heavy lobbying. Frank inserted into the bill a provision to give special consideration to banks that had less than $1 billion of assets, had been well-capitalized as of June 30, served low- and moderate-income areas, and had taken a capital hit in the federal seizure of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. (WSJ link) In other news, Merrill disclosed compensation and benefits expenses of $15 billion for 2008, down 6 percent from 2007. That number includes salaries, benefits, retirement payments, commissions for financial advisers and severance for laid-off employees. Bank of America, which has four times as many employees, reported $18.4 billion in personnel expenses in 2008, down slightly from 2007. ~ Charlotte Observer Merrill, through John Thain, former CEO of Merrill and who recently resigned from BofA (this morning), paid this bonus to his employees in December as opposed to January (a highly unorthodox move), just prior to the deal's consummation (as he was still CEO). Meanwhile, BofA, in a memo earlier this month, Lewis said the bank has “significantly reduced the targets for yearend compensation,” with higher-ranking employees taking the bigger reductions. Lewis has recommended that he and his top reports not receive bonuses for 2008. In other news, regional banks, once thought to be spared from the worst credit losses, have shown mixed results.

Suckers going down in Iceland

Kattullus — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 15:48:58 -0800

While the Wall Street financial crisis gripped the world Icelanders woke up one day to find that the Icelandic state had forcibly taken over the country's 3rd biggest bank, Glitnir. The worry is now that one of the two larger banks could also fail and the state wouldn't have the resources to do anything as the two remaining of the big 3 have assets totaling 10 times the GDP of Iceland. While the Central Bank claims it was the only option in a bad situation, prior bad blood between one of the Central Bank's directors, a former Prime Minister, and the main owner of Glitnir have some wondering if Icelanders have just been witness to "the biggest bank robbery in Icelandic history." [Warning: The story you are about to read may make you reconsider the verisimilitude of soap operas]

teh free markets, ur doin it wrong

Asparagirl — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 16:46:37 -0800

LOLFed. Doan cry, emo banker! If you hate the latest financial crisis news, but love image macros, then this is the site for you. It's like I Can Has Cheezburger meets the Wall Street Journal.

But if the vaults are empty, what will Scrooge McDuck swim in?

Asparagirl — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 20:58:40 -0800

According to the latest biweekly numbers released last Thursday by the Federal Reserve, for the two weeks that ended January 16th American banks had negative $1.3 billion in non-borrowed reserves. This is, historically, extremely unusual; just two months ago they had $30 billion (positive, of course) in non-borrowed reserves. The only reason some banks haven't been shut due to insufficient -- negative! -- reserve requirements is that the Federal Reserve is currently loaning them enough money through the brand new TAF (Term Auction Facility) program (also running in Canada and Europe) to make up their shortfalls. Today's TAF press release says that 52 American banks or institutions are currently receiving loans totaling ~$40 billion -- but the Fed refuses to name who they are. The banks' collateral for these TAF loans are those same yucky hard-to-price CDO's that caused the banks' liquidity problems in the first place -- and the Fed is purposely using outdated prices for the collateral to prevent their being marked-to-market and thus collapsing CDO prices and freezing matters even further. Not surprisingly, some economists see the creation of the TAF as a backdoor bailout of banks in trouble. But how much longer can this go on? [via] Coincidentally (one hopes), the banking system in the virtual online world Second Life has just collapsed following a run on their banks due to inappropriate valuations and bad counterparty risk, wiping out many players' real-world investments...

Oh, the humanity!

Skeptic — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 02:57:20 -0800

HorribleEconomicNewsFilter: Rogue trader costs his bank 7 billion dollar. Take that, Nick Leeson!

50 fun facts about banks.

jbickers — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 12:05:50 -0800

50 fun facts about banks.

The total value of all your mines, mills, money bins, and so fourth is one multiplujillion, nine obsquatumatillion, six hundred and twenty-three dollars and sixty-two cents!

JBennett — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 13:42:10 -0800

A miniature of Scrooge McDuck's money bin. (in the words of the model maker) This is a set of images documenting a model of the world's richest duck's money bin, built by me, using blueprints created by the great Don Rosa and Dan Shane.And remember Carl Barks - the mind behind the idea of a man storing all his money in a giant concrete bin.

Hail Abacha

infini — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 13:29:59 -0800

Dear Friend, I am a Swiss Banker currently in possession of over $ 1 Billion in funds stashed away by the late dictator Mobutu Sese Seko of the Congo. Our Swiss Confederation President Micheline Calmy-Rey said her government is holding just $6.6m frozen in accounts. "We discussed the question of Mobutu's funds and my government is prepared to restore the money to the DR Congo as soon as possible," Ms Rey told reporters in the DR Congo capital, Kinshasa, after talks with Mr Kabila. But we can help you get the rest of the 92.4 million dollars if you will just send us your bank account number and call to confirm your ID and pin number.

Elaborate Yarn Scam

booksherpa — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 13:05:23 -0800

Blue Moon Fiber Arts, an independent Oregon-based online yarn store, has a sock yarn club that knitters can join and receive a bimonthly shipment of sock yarn and other goodies. They have run it before with great success, and it has grown in popularity to the point that they have a waiting list to get in. When they started it up again for the new year, their bank decided they were running some sort of scam because that many people couldn't possibly be interested in sock yarn. Wrong. You don't mess with knitters. This is a group that has raised over $275,000 in the past year for Doctors Without Borders just because a popular knitblogger asked them to. Not surprisingly, the knitbloggers are pissed. There's already a knitalong underway in protest.

Genesis announces tour!

notmtwain — Wed, 08 Nov 2006 16:54:58 -0800

Turn It On Again Tour announced - Banks, Collins and Rutherford tour again! Died and gone to heaven, I have! Never thought this would happen again in my lifetime. Phil, Tony and Mike haven't toured since pre-internet days.... Gosh, this is probably the very first announced (real) Genesis tour to ever hit the web...

Bank penalty charges for exceeding limits or returning direct debits etc are unenforceable at law and you can get them back

sgt.serenity — Sat, 17 Jun 2006 03:35:13 -0800

Bank penalty charges are unenforceable at law and you can get them back.

If Banks were Bands, which would they be?

darsh — Wed, 17 May 2006 06:34:57 -0800

If Banks were Bands, which would they be? A Bloomberg columnist writes about the 'personalities' of the world's big investment banks, and compares them to well-known bands. Some amusing, and insightful, descriptions

God's Own Party

digaman — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 09:53:52 -0800

Former GOP senior strategist Kevin Phillips wrote the political Bible of the New Right, The Emerging Republican Majority. He coined the term "Sun Belt." He voted for Reagan twice and still considers himself a staunch Republican. But now Phillips, the author of a new book called American Theocracy, is warning that the party of George Bush and Karl Rove ("W brand Republicans," in the phrase of GOP pollster Jan van Lohuizen) has become "God's own party" -- the champion of a convergence of "petroleum-defined national security; a crusading, simplistic Christianity; and a reckless credit-feeding financial complex." Phillips also cautions that the W-brand party's "sense of how to win elections comes out of a CIA manual, not out of the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution." [Phillips was also discussed here.]