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Obama's TARP 2 Signals an End to Mark to Market

I doubt that mark to market accounting will get tossed. But, iif Obama suspebd it, financials will rally big.

The SEC and FASB accountants are ideologs. They lack common sense.
Millions of jobs are lost, and trillions of taxpayers' money are thrown away because of these people!

JPMorgan Chase: Poisoned by Bear's 5,000 Counterparties

JP Morgan needs to disclose the cash flows on the level 3 assets plus all the statistics regarding delinquencies, foreclosures, net charge-offs, interest rates, insurance, maturities, geographic concentrations, single issuer concetrantion, and average lives, etc. These data will help to allay fears and uncertainties. Not all level three assets are toxic.

Investment Banks, Rumors, the Trough, and Fair Value Accounting

Are up referring to FAS 157 (Fair Market Value Accounting) or FAS 115 (Accounting for Investment securities)?




Behind Schwarzman Spat With Wasserstein Over Fair Value Lies FASB Rule 115

An argument between two Wall Street titans seated in director’s chairs at Per Se restaurant in New York in October has escalated into a fight over an obscure accounting rule known as Statement No. 115. Five weeks ago the dispute was over so-called fair-value accounting, which requires companies to record assets every quarter to reflect market value. In one chair was Blackstone Group LP (BX) Chairman Stephen Schwarzman, who said the standard had aggravated the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression (the fiction, how dare investors find the gall to ask us what our assets are really worth in the open market???). In the other was Lazard Ltd. Chairman Bruce Wasserstein, who said the rule gives investors an honest look at corporate earnings (the facts: The Truth! The Truth! You can’t handle the TRUTH! – channeling Jack Nicholson in “A Few Good Men”).

Now banks, which have been unsuccessful in getting regulators to revamp fair-value, also known as mark-to-market, are trying to win revisions to another U.S. Financial Accounting Standards Board requirement that could preserve billions of dollars of their capital. Hey, if at first you don’t succeed, lobby, lobby again…

“Financial institutions, which have been woefully incompetent in running their own firms, are now trying to avoid providing investors with accurate numbers depicting the large losses they have suffered under their mismanagement,” said Lynn Turner, the Securities and Exchange

Investment Banks, Rumors, the Trough, and Fair Value Accounting

The mark- to- market accounting almost destroyed the financial system in late September when the broad bond market dropped over 15%.

Market prices can be maniplated. Can the foundation of the economy and the accounting profession rest on the value of something that can be manipulated?

Can a person believe that the current 3 month T Bill yield is a fair market value? It's only a snapshot of value for liquidity purposes but a long-term fair value.

Confusing a fair value and a liquidity value is a mistake.