Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Goldman Sachs Will Pay $5B to Settle Financial-Crisis Claims

npr.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 118 posts

Re: Goldman Sachs Will Pay $5B to Settle Financial-Crisis Claims

#41

Post by oceanstone »

tn13 wrote: post #35
suprgeek wrote: post #30

So the company that was one of lead bad actors in a global crisis that wiped out lots of little folks gets - No execs (or anybody else) go to Jail Continues to do business as usual Pays a small fraction of its profits in fines (but gets to keep the multi-billions of tax-payer money under various govt. programs) Admits to no wrong doing Basically a speeding-ticket that gets dismissed when you pony up the cash after be…

And interestingly almost all politicians of all hue and color and with capacity to do something seem to be siding with them.

Bernie Sanders wants to break up the banks that took bailout money, creating smaller banks that are no longer "too big to fail." What are people's thoughts on this proposal?

Re: Goldman Sachs Will Pay $5B to Settle Financial-Crisis Claims

#42

Post by tim333 »

oceanstone wrote: post #36
tim333 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There should really be some way to punish the individuals responsible, even just a fine comparable to the bonuses they made, rather than just having their employer pay compensation while those responsible continue to get richer.

Is there a definitive list somewhere? If there was, a boycott could be organized.

I think one of the problems is that it's hard to allocate blame. The guy selling iffy securities will probably claim he thought they were good and so on. I'm not quite sure how you fix that. Require the bank to list individuals as part of the settlement perhaps?

Re: Goldman Sachs Will Pay $5B to Settle Financial-Crisis Claims

#43

Post by ttctciyf »

Relevant wikipedia link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture

Edit to add:

For a specific Goldman Sachs context, see for example: http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/sep/26/us-regulator...

Maybe there's some reason I missed that this didn't make a bigger or longer-lasting splash.

Re: Goldman Sachs Will Pay $5B to Settle Financial-Crisis Claims

#44

Post by isnullorempty »

oceanstone wrote: post #41
tn13 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And interestingly almost all politicians of all hue and color and with capacity to do something seem to be siding with them.

Bernie Sanders wants to break up the banks that took bailout money, creating smaller banks that are no longer "too big to fail." What are people's thoughts on this proposal?

I don't think this is the correct approach, it's not the size of the company that is the problem. In fact large companies (not monopolies) can produce/offer services/products that smaller companies can't due to the scale (i.e. mobile banking). What should happen is the employees or execs responsible should have gone to jail for life for the destruction they caused providing a deterrent effect, and also much stronger regulation policed by a truly independent regulator with the teeth to act.

Re: Goldman Sachs Will Pay $5B to Settle Financial-Crisis Claims

#45

Post by qaq »

OK this would not be popular opinion here, but it's a problem of people that bought those products and not GS. They went to same biz schools and were paid millions to run their funds. It's their job to do due diligence on the deals they make with GS or any other counterparty.

Re: Goldman Sachs Will Pay $5B to Settle Financial-Crisis Claims

#46

Post by jevgeni »

suprgeek wrote: post #30

So the company that was one of lead bad actors in a global crisis that wiped out lots of little folks gets - No execs (or anybody else) go to Jail Continues to do business as usual Pays a small fraction of its profits in fines (but gets to keep the multi-billions of tax-payer money under various govt. programs) Admits to no wrong doing Basically a speeding-ticket that gets dismissed when you pony up the cash after be…

Could you elaborate on the multi-billion gov't subsidies to GS?

Re: Goldman Sachs Will Pay $5B to Settle Financial-Crisis Claims

#47

Post by jevgeni »

jynnantonnyx wrote: post #20
VeilEm wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> that they knew weren't priced correctly Things are priced at what they will sell for. It's more that they were hiding information about the risk (which of course would have drastically lowered the value and the price people would be willing to pay). I think the difference is significant, however.

I have a box for sale labeled AAA. Price $5. Guaranteed to contain $6. Email me for details.

So, did anybody e-mail you?

Re: Goldman Sachs Will Pay $5B to Settle Financial-Crisis Claims

#48

Post by jevgeni »

shrewduser wrote: post #33
deciplex wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you expand on the significance of this difference? I guess you're asserting that the "correct price" is the one that someone will pay for it, and that something is only "incorrectly priced" if no one will buy it. But the point is precisely that no one would have bought these goods for the indicated price had GS not obfuscated what they were selling in the first place. It seems to me that you're really splitting h…

there's no difference. they weren't priced correctly is a perfectly reasonable thing to say, and synonymous with they lied about their level of risk.

CDO's are huge and complicated deals. All the little details are documented in the prospectus. Granted it's 700 pages long on average, but maybe people shouldn't be buying 2-3 billion USD securities if they don't have the capacity to understand and model them properly.

Re: Goldman Sachs Will Pay $5B to Settle Financial-Crisis Claims

#49

Post by gadders »

qaq wrote: post #45

OK this would not be popular opinion here, but it's a problem of people that bought those products and not GS. They went to same biz schools and were paid millions to run their funds. It's their job to do due diligence on the deals they make with GS or any other counterparty.

It used to be in the 90's/2000's in the UK that all was fair in love and war between banks - they are the big boys and are supposed to know what they are doing.

If you rip off "widows and orphans" though you will get punished severely.

Re: Goldman Sachs Will Pay $5B to Settle Financial-Crisis Claims

#50

Post by decisiveness »

oceanstone wrote: post #41
tn13 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And interestingly almost all politicians of all hue and color and with capacity to do something seem to be siding with them.

Bernie Sanders wants to break up the banks that took bailout money, creating smaller banks that are no longer "too big to fail." What are people's thoughts on this proposal?

The type of separation he's talking about would limit the ability of banks to affiliate with each other in a risky manor, as they had leading up to the crisis.

In an attempt to accomplish this, Elizabeth Warren has drafted a reasonable, 21st century take [1] on Glass-Steagall, which Senator Sanders supports.

[1] http://www.warren.senate.gov/files/documents/21stCenturyGlas...

Post reply on HN