Monthly Archives: March 2010

Paul Krugman writes about the current financial reform efforts, and uses a great metaphor for regulatory regimes. Greek armies were specialized and fought better when they had great leaders, while Roman armies were more generic but robust to poor leadership. … Continue reading →

David Leonhardt has a good writeup of where financial reform stands in his Sunday magazine article Heading Off the Next Financial Crisis. Let’s look at the uses of the word “discretion” in the piece (my bold): It would be foolish … Continue reading →

Given that the major health care debate, which has been taking up a lot of oxygen in the room, is over, everyone is now turning their attention to financial reform. So I’ve decided to write a little 10-page brief that … Continue reading →

I dropped the ball on doing the 10 most influential books list the past two weeks (lots of people are playing). If you can handle one more, I’ll submit my “gut list.” I can’t tell if I give off a … Continue reading →

It’s been a while since I’ve written about interchange fees. The Credit Card Con, a project centered around credit card swipe fees, has a new report out (pdf). I hear a lot about how the interchange fee is determined by … Continue reading →

Here is Tim Fernholz responding to my earlier worries about resolution authority as expressed in the Dodd bill. My first worry was that the $50 billion dollar fund wouldn’t be enough to handle resoluton: Next, there is a $50 billion … Continue reading →

Tim Fernholz writes about the Department of Defense working towards building a Consumer Financial Protection Agency with Treasury (my bold): Today, Secretary Tim Geithner followed up by meeting with David Julian, the director of the DoD’s Office of Personal Finance, … Continue reading →

It’s been a while since we’ve talked about about those second liens and mortgage writedowns (I, II). Since then John Cassidy did some investigating and James Kwak responded to his arguments in language I still find convincing. To recap: Writing … Continue reading →

Picture if you had a woodshop filled with oily rags, no ventilation, no exits, a woodshop that was always catching on fire. One thing to do is to get a fire extinguisher. That is the resolution authority of the financial … Continue reading →

I’ll continue to talk the rest of this week about the Dodd Bill – I’m working on approaching it a few different ways. But Kevin wants answers. First off: But healthcare is (pretty much) a done deal now, so what … Continue reading →