Should Federal Gov't Bailout Lehman Bros.? (bankrupt, debt, status, tax)

[goodbyehollywood]

Agreed-- WaMu will go before Citi. They haven't even begun to taste the toxicity from all those California ALT-A loans. No one can survive the carnage that will hit when those loans begin resetting in the next few years. Making $700K loans on crappy little 700 SF bungalows on stated income alone-- who's gonna buy their loan portfolio?!

[Humboldt1]

Goodbyehollywood,

Ironic name given all the Alt-A loans set to reset in California for WaMu.

How about Merrill? Where are they headed? Are they next after WaMu? Merrill failing would be a much bigger deal than Bear Stearns or Lehman.

[redwhiteblue]

Originally Posted by bxlefty23

no this whole bailout thing is a joke
taxpayers (thats me and you) should not out companies who run themselves into the ground

I totally agree with you.

[baystater]

Originally Posted by Humboldt1

I think WaMu will be bailed out before Citigroup. I also think Merrill is in much worse shape than Citi.

I am assuming B of A will buy Lehman for a discount. It will be interesting to see what happens to WaMu and Merrill after this.

Agreed.


My question is how much longer....................?????????????? better yet how many times can the government interfere (in one form or another) in trying to save failing financial institutions? I thought the market could take care of itself? Guess not.

[goodbyehollywood]

I thought Merrill was more solid than most... but maybe not. I think Wachovia is very shaky-- wouldn't be surprised to see it go under. Buying that Golden West mortgage unit was a bonehead move, driven purely by greed. They were too late to the party to reap much profit and now they have exposure to the same toxic CA loans that WaMu does. Few homeowners holding those liar loans can afford the reset and now Wachovia has all those upcoming defaults and foreclosures on its books. That's going to be tough to survive.

[Lulu101]

they're also going to have bailout Ford/GM in the next few months (I heard it on the news)

[HappyTexan]

Congress just did a quiet little bailout of the Highway Trust Fund which was going to go broke at the end of this month. Add another $8 billion to the bone pile.

The Associated Press: House votes $8B relief for highway trust fund (broken link)

Best quote in the article:

"Part of the reason we are having to steal money from the general fund," said Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., is "we just went hog wild in 2005. We've got to stop this earmarking process."

[Humboldt1]

I agree that things don't look good for Wachovia due to their acquisition of Golden West.

So, WaMu, Merrill Lynch, and Wachovia may be in trouble. Lehman is already done. If the govt is going to bail out anyone it will be one of these 3 big boys.

[Lincolnian]

This whole situation is disgusting. I know people who make +$150k a year who bought second/investment homes with no money down thinking they were going to hit the lottery in real estate. Many were adjustable or interest only loans used with the intent of making a quick pop at the cheapest borrowing costs. Since many put their primary assets in LLCs they are now walking away from their obligations on their speculative investments rationalizing that they were scammed by the banks/government/whoever.

What stinks is that responsible people like myself who didn't go in over their head now have to bail them out.

The lenders are just as guilty and their corrupt executives and our government officials that loosened regulation to allow this hedonistic behavior have now put our entire financial system in jeopardy of collapse.

I have heard and read several reports that we could be facing a conservative estimate of a trillion dollars added to our federal deficit as a result of this mess that the taxpayers will be saddled with.

Where is the outrage?

[KevK]

Originally Posted by Lulu101

Do you think the Federal Gov't Bailout Lehman Bros.?

No. BUt they are going to anyway.