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Geithner and the three bears: momma bear, papa bear and baby bear.

There are three scenarios for the toxic assets.
1) Some assets are worth more than the market price. The banks will not sell the assets at a discount.
2) Some assets are worth less than the market price. The buyers will not pay a premium to purchase them.
3) Some assets are worth the market price and the government subsidizes the transaction.

Or the assets are too cold, too hot or just right.

The government is still stuck purchasing the worst toxic assets. The banks will still keep the best toxic assets. The rest will be bought by private investors with a government subsidy.

I hope President Obama will figure out a way to pay for the war on leverage.

I am sorry, this is one of the weirdest segments I have ever heard...and it tells me nothing has changed. It is very depressing. Brian is representing the interests of the very people who created this mess. It is simply incredible that for a response to this plan we go to a set of Wall Street insiders, both professional and amateur. Really strange.

The entire "financial services" industry, as with the entire "Gaming" (read Casino) industry, with all the jobs they provide, was set up for the sole purpose of bilking people, where only "the house" always wins. In the case of the financial industry, you can substitute CEOs and top management for "the House." When I was growing up in the '50s, hardly anyone had money in Wall Street, and nobody had a credit card. There was store credit here and there, and layaway plans, and to buy a house you needed 20% down and a good steady job or solid small business to qualify. People know they had to save in put money in their FDIC-insured bank or in US savings bonds, Christmas clubs, etc.
The creation of an excess consuming society built on a mountain of debt that increasingly required even foreigner governments to invest in our Treasure bills to sustain, was the building of a stack of cards that had to collapse sooner or later. This excess housing is only symptomatic of the "easy credit" economy that has brought us to the brink of national bankruptcy, and let's hope we don't go over that brink.

That whole segment could have been produced for Bloomberg Radio. Only on Bloomberg they would have let, at least, one token "populist" get on the air!

Brian gives out the number....people call in, then reframes the segment and the screener tells people to get off the line to make room for the "investors".

God forbid reporters for Barrons and the WSJ should have to deal with calls from ordinary Americans who aren't filthy rich.

Then....you go into a segment on the poor unemployed and how folks with jobs can be charitable.....that's not balance; that's insulting.

You are running WNYC as a cash cow to get "contributions" from people with tons of money and corporations......clearly the "public" in public radio is gone. You've become 100% gentrified.

Republican/right wing lite. Drink up.

Barons and WSJ? And now we know what Rupert the Yakup Boy thinks.

I found it interesting that your guest repeatedly used the word "regime" to describe the Obama administration. Is this another step to the Republican rebranding of this White House as Communist?

That last caller made a great point: why should the millionaire elitists who negotiated this deal with the other millionaire elitists who destroyed the banking industry feel like they can now re-negotiate? Oh wait, is it because both parties were/are playing with MY money?

The real question is: Why would they feel at all compelled to act responsibly? And the answer is: They don't.

Ya home sales rose in February from January was cause January was an all time low so anything was up...statistics is the art of lying with numbers.

ya Brian its over the DOW is up

At least one of your guests or callers is comparing this to the Resolution Trust Corporation, but the comparison is outright false. The US took over -- completely -- failed Savings & Loans back in the 80s. Risk was socialized but so too was profit.

To the caler talking about post-facto rule changing... did the folks at AIG play by "the rules"?

I don't think so.

There is a difference between this relatively "small" (6 to 1) leverage and leverage created in a normal market scenario: This one is funded by the U.S. TAXPAYER, not private investors.

While I think that cleaning up these toxic "legacy assets" by private firms with public initiative is necessary (think Resolution Trust during S&L crisis), there must be a recognition that the taxpayer is the big worm on the hook.

This is hogwash.At the end of the day this is a means to keep the you rich propped up.If you lower the price of the assets by 70% today then you would have a market as that is the true value if any for most of these assets.
This is only going to prolong the bubble and we the tax payers will paying more in another year.
This is a racket and they are pulling a fast one and being stupid people will accept this.

If the Geithner deal is so good, why not allow individuals -- non-institutional investors -- to buy these 'assets'.

The basic flaw in the Geithner scheme remains, as Krugman noted, that Geithner, Paulson, Bernanke, and the rest, _begin_ with the assumption that these assets are severely undervalued. So they are attempting to establish a price flaw.

Another note, I have tried repeatedly to call Senators Gillibrand and Schumer this morning. Lines are constantly busy, so my guess is they are getting at least some feedback on this.

ya great...another shell gets added to the game

The Toxic Asset Market -- Love It!

The folks who brought us the Chicago Climate Exchange Market, who fancied themselves as the absolute epitome of absurdity -- are slapping their heads.

Just as Coca Cola must have done with the introduction of bottled tap water, I assume.

On an economic level, you can dump as much brown and yellow together as ya like and it still won't come out to green.

The government foots most of the money and adopts most of the risk. Paul Krugman's essay in today's Times nails the problem with Geithner's giveaway to financial institutions.

It's no wonder the markets are thrilled today. The US government is just giving them $1 trillion of our money with astonishingly few strings attached.