It’s kind of weird to see Bloomberg News savaging the big banks like this, but we have to give them credit for reporting the facts. I just read the article and my first impression is that there is less news here than meets the eye. Yes, we now have details about how much money the Fed lent to banks and when they did it. And, yes, the information exposes the CEO’s of CitiGroup, Bank of America, and JP Morgan as enormous liars. But I also see a lot of lawmakers trying to run for cover by claiming ignorance. We all knew that the Fed had lent many trillions of dollars to the banks. Lawmakers knew it, too. The lack of transparency didn’t fool anyone, it just allowed them to do the banks’ bidding without consequences to themselves. It’s not right to say that more information would have changed a bunch of lawmakers’ minds and led to stronger reform and a breakup of the banks. More information would have scared lawmakers into voting for stronger reform.
