Archive for August 2nd, 2009
Big Texas bank on verge of failure
Guaranty Bank, which counts Carl Icahn as one if its backers, is teetering on the edge of insolvency. But it may not be easy for regulators to find a buyer.
NEW YORK (Fortune) — Guaranty Bank is hardly a household name. But the Austin, Texas-based thrift’s looming failure is shaping up as a big headache for bank supervisors — not to mention a black eye for Carl Icahn and others in the smart money set.
Guaranty (GFG) could be soon seized by the government in what would be the biggest bank failure in a year that has already had 64 of them. Last week, the bank warned investors to expect a federal takeover after regulators forced a writedown of its risky mortgage investments and a bid to raise new capital failed.
Guaranty has $13.4 billion in assets and operates 160 branches in Texas and California — two of the three best banking markets in the nation, thanks to their size and population growth.
But the bank’s capital problems and its smallish, scattered network of branches could detract from Guaranty’s appeal, making it tough for regulators to find a buyer quickly — or without substantial federal subsidies.
Just when we all thought government could not get any stupider.
Question; What caused the housing crisis? GSE, or Government Sponsored Entities backed risky mortgages with Fannie and Freddie, thereby encouraging people and businesses to do whatever it took to get people into homes they could not ever afford. Fast forward to today and the highly “successful” government program, cash for clunkers. Designed to encourage economic activity and get gas guzzling (but otherwise fine) cars off the road to help the environment, which appears to be working just fine.
So government is once again encouraging more loans, even at a time when the reason we got into this mess is because we have too much debt and can’t pay it back! The government is trying to entice you to sell your perfectly good, albeit gas guzzling car which is probably ALREADY paid for, so you can FINANCE and go into more debt to get a new one. This is our modern day classic government-whore mentality. Thinking they always know better and can shape and mold this economy like a Mr. Potato head.
Furthermore, New-car dealers say the cash-for-clunkers program has helped jump-start sales, but financially strapped used-car dealers say the federal program could drive them out of business. Haha, wow epic fail again.
To throw epic flames of fail onto an already ridiculous program, in order to sign-up for the program you have to let the U.S. government have complete and total access to your PC! Not just that, but you give access to any FOREIGN governments who may want access to your computer and any and all files on it. Wtf? What on earth does Cash For Clunkers have to do with spying on the type of files (porn) we download?
My suggestion – keep your clunker, but lets dump these congressional ass-fuckers.