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  • Carlos Lam: 
  • Comments (563)
  •  • Instablog (2)
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  Good! Firms taking TARP money would've gone under had the feds not dumped taxpayer money into them. The best investment bankers should be working for firms that are successful, not at banks that are holding their hand out to Uncle Tim [Geithner].

  Mar 20 03:46 PM | Link | Reply
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  • Edward, Lor...: 
  • Comments (35)
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  Live by the sword, die by the sword. They took the salt, they can take the shaft.

  Mar 20 03:53 PM | Link | Reply
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  • css1971: 
  • Comments (94)

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  • css1971.wikispaces.com/
  "Populist perception is that everyone working in a big investment bank was greedy and/or incompetent. That is simply not true."
  
  Really? The evidence says otherwise.
  
  Anyone working at a bank taking TARP cash is rightly tainted for life.
  
  

  Mar 20 04:01 PM | Link | Reply
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  • Jolly_Rancher: 
  • Comments (361)
  •  • Instablog (4)
  The captains slink away from the sinking ships and live again to destroy another day.

  Mar 20 04:11 PM | Link | Reply
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  • Annualgain: 
  • Comments (97)
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  I hate the fact that people working at AIG are getting bonuses at all. But I hate Congress even more for disregarding the rule of law. Contracts are contracts. How can we criticize Venezuela for nationalizing foreign investments within their borders, or China for ignoring intellectual property rights, or Zimbabwe for taking land from farmers, when we, the mighty U.S., can't observe our own laws? Contracts are supposed to mean something. The government has overstepped its bounds here by refusing to honor contracts made with the employees of AIG.

  Mar 20 04:12 PM | Link | Reply
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  • BJS: 
  • Comments (10)
  Well at least no one has (yet) suggested that all big bank employees be:
  
  1) stoned to death
  2) burnt at the stake
  3) drawn and quartered
  
  Things could be worse or maybe that will be Monday's news.
  
  

  Mar 20 04:12 PM | Link | Reply
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  • elliotz: 
  • Comments (96)
  Congres and the dirty politicians like dodd and frank pushed for cheaper and easier to qualifie for mortgages, consumers ate up these mortgages thinking that they could buy a house and flip it in a year for 100k profit. Someone please tell me why are the bankers the only ones getting blamed? I know it is much easier to blame a scapegoat then to look in the mirror and take responsibility for your actions. And why should those that work in IB or CB that had nothing to do with structuring CDO's and whose buisness are profitable for their bank not be rewarded for their hard work? Unfort by the time Americans wake up we will be in a big pile of shit with what these politicians are doing today.

  Mar 20 04:14 PM | Link | Reply
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  • coloneldebu...: 
  • Comments (475)
  •  • Instablog (4)
  That's likely the last bullet in the Fed's gun. Right before hand guns and bottled water become currency.
  
  
  On Mar 20 04:12 PM BJS wrote:
  
  > Well at least no one has (yet) suggested that all big bank employees
  > be:
  >
  > 1) stoned to death
  > 2) burnt at the stake
  > 3) drawn and quartered
  >
  > Things could be worse or maybe that will be Monday's news.
  >

  Mar 20 04:33 PM | Link | Reply
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  • user344210: 
  • Comments (145)
  Dodd and Frank must go home every day and breath a huge sigh of relief that they've lived another day without being strung up. God truly does protect fools. These guys are living proof.
  
  
  On Mar 20 04:14 PM elliotz wrote:
  
  > Congres and the dirty politicians like dodd and frank pushed for
  > cheaper and easier to qualifie for mortgages, consumers ate up these
  > mortgages thinking that they could buy a house and flip it in a year
  > for 100k profit. Someone please tell me why are the bankers the only
  > ones getting blamed? I know it is much easier to blame a scapegoat
  > then to look in the mirror and take responsibility for your actions.
  > And why should those that work in IB or CB that had nothing to do
  > with structuring CDO's and whose buisness are profitable for their
  > bank not be rewarded for their hard work? Unfort by the time Americans
  > wake up we will be in a big pile of shit with what these politicians
  > are doing today.

  Mar 20 04:40 PM | Link | Reply
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  • Vanderpool: 
  • Comments (13)
  Too be fair, not all firms taking TARP money needed it. Some did it because the government wanted them too. For those people, this is unfortunate.
  But for the firms that have needed it: AIG, Citi...etc (and are now our all time biggest "welfare queens") it seems appropriate that bonuses not be paid.
  I understand that, at least in some cases, "Bonuses" were contracted prior to the determination of the year's profits or losses. Is that a bonus?
  It seems more like a predetermined salary with a portion paid out as a "bonus". I wonder if the tax consequences of this sort of set up were?
  Maybe the difference is that when "Joe six pack" hears his tax money is going to pay "Bonuses" to the "Wizard of Wall Street" he thinks that the "Bonus" is "Merit" based and he wonders what is so "meritorious" about the results these organizations on Wall Street produced? (He might actually think their work is criminal.)
  Now, the "Wizards and those who played the game, they see it in a more sophisticated way. (Kind a Like they saw CDO's...) The bonuses were "Predetermined". Based on the assumption that "Past performance IS a predictor of future results" Therefore, they feel they are "owed" the money IN SPITE of outcome. Some might call this "Noblesse Oblige"... or a creeping sense of entitlement.
  
  

  Mar 20 04:59 PM | Link | Reply
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  • Edward, Lor...: 
  • Comments (35)
  •  • StockTalk (1)
  Aye, drawn and burnt are in order. But stoning is for savages.

  Mar 20 05:25 PM | Link | Reply
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  • Leftfield: 
  • Comments (963)
  Bonuses for whatever reason should be prorated over some period of time. Upfront commissions and large instant bonuses have been utterly abused by too many managements in this country. Instant rewards for toxic financial products makes no sense.
  
  The opportunity has been afforded the geniuses of leverage and upfront bonuses and commissions to destroy the economy. They took it. Their ongoing shameful greed has them continuing to take bonus pay from the taxpayers directly.
  
  I agree with the comments that we need to watch what the other hand of our shameless leaders is doing with the trillions they're playing with. But, retroactive selective taxation is nothing new. Rules and tax laws are constantly changed; it's a great plague in this country usually.
  
  Naturally these people will use their paid compliant politicians and boards to find ways around taxation of bonuses. We need to keep voting incumbents out until we have some that give us a real reason to keep them.
  
  

  Mar 20 05:31 PM | Link | Reply
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  • User 273178: 
  • Comments (20)
  Wow, so secretaries, tellers, and support staff, and those not involved in the problem areas deserves to be tainted and targeted for life?
  
  Do people actually believe that EVERYONE is guilty?
  And that it's ok for Congress to write legislation to target 400 people with high taxes? Slippery slope, dangerous precedent when we give a few the power to target those they don't like in punitive ways.
  If Congress had let them fail, and if Congress didn't make a mess of things, this wouldn't be an issue. A failed company has no bonuses to pay anyway. And it would have been 1 less time we violated the constitution last week (actually 2).
  
  
  On Mar 20 04:01 PM css1971 wrote:
  
  > "Populist perception is that everyone working in a big investment
  > bank was greedy and/or incompetent. That is simply not true."
  >
  > Really? The evidence says otherwise.
  >
  > Anyone working at a bank taking TARP cash is rightly tainted for
  > life.
  >

  Mar 21 02:13 PM | Link | Reply