Fmr CEO of Citigroup Sandy Weill: time to break up the banks

[Enki]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/2 ... 01274.html

In a stunning reversal, a former big bank CEO who crusaded for policies that helped create the so-called "too-big-to-fail" banks now says we need to break up the banks.

"What we should probably do is go and split up investment banking from banking, have banks be deposit takers, have banks make commercial loans and real estate loans, and have banks do something that's not going to risk the taxpayer dollars, that's not going to be too big to fail," former Citigroup Chairman and CEO Sanford "Sandy" Weill told CNBC on Wednesday morning.

It's a shocking statement coming from Weill, who was responsible for turning Citi into one of the largest banks in the world. During his tenure, he bought up one financial institution after another and orchestrated the merger of Travelers Group and Citibank in 1998--at the time, the largest merger in history. He retired as CEO of Citigroup in 2003 and stepped down as chairman in 2006.

"Is Sandy Weill now considered a 'born again banker'?" Joseph Saluzzi, co-founder of Themis Trading and prominent Wall Street critic, tweeted Wednesday morning when Weill's statements made the rounds.

Weill was pivotal in lobbying for the succesful repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999, a 66-year-old law that had separated commercial banking from investment banking.

Some blame the financial crisis, in part, on that appeal.

[Parodite]

Good news. Seems to me that this ought to be the No1. issue in the presidential elections, any elections anywhere. But will it?

[YMix]

But will it?

hahaohwow.jpg

[Juggernaut Nihilism]

I obviously agree, but that prick has got some serious goddamn nerve.

[Parodite]

But will it?

hahaohwow.jpg

I share that feeling

[noddy]

despite the king cnut example we have all witnessed (GFC et all) its politically impossible to admit that the politicians and bankers are just bumbling twats like the rest of us.

aka, they cant break up the banks because thats an admission that all the promises of stability and control are lies, you only play the safety through diversity card if you accept that everyone is fallable and noone should be given these levels of control over us all.

id say the left wing calls for more control, more centralisation are more likely than a breakup and more competition... nationalised banks that are then abused for pork barrelling the incumbent agenda.

[Mr. Perfect]

I obviously agree, but that prick has got some serious goddamn nerve.

Not really, it's the popular thing to say. All upside and no downside.

[Juggernaut Nihilism]

I obviously agree, but that prick has got some serious goddamn nerve.

Not really, it's the popular thing to say. All upside and no downside.

I didn't mean that he had courage. I meant that he had nerve the way a retired bar owner, having sold his establishment and now living comfortably, would have nerve by agitating for prohibition.