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WASHINGTON (AFP) – The Senate will soon issue findings of a probe of the US mortgage meltdown that fueled the global financial crisis, with Goldman Sachs likely to face fresh embarrassment over its role, the Wall Street Journal reported Sunday. The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, whose high-profile inquiry commission subpoenaed Goldman's and other executives last year, is due to release its report on the subprime implosion of 2007 and 2008. The paper, citing people familiar with the matter, said the report was expected to release emails from securities firms that developed or sold subprime mortgages and financial vehicles including...

WASHINGTON, March 29 (Reuters) - The U.S. Treasury's bank bailout program will move into a profit for the first time on Wednesday with the expected repayment of $7.4 billion in taxpayer funds, Treasury officials said. The transfers to the Troubled Asset Relief Program will push recoveries from banks to $251 billion in repayments of capital, dividends, interest and other income. It invested $245 billion in banks during the financial crisis to help avert a U.S. financial system collapse. The officials did not identify the banks expected to repay funds. But SunTrust Banks Inc and Key Corp said on March 18...

Countrywide’s VIP program is the first subpoena target for House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), said a committee aide. The “Friends of Angelo” program, named for former Countrywide CEO Angelo Mozilo, has been under committee investigation since 2008 for allegedly granting generous mortgage deals to influential government officials, lawmakers and employees at Fannie Mae. “Countrywide orchestrated a deliberate and calculated effort to use relationships with people in high places in order to manipulate public policy and further their bottom line to the detriment of the American taxpayers even at the expense of its own lending standards,”...

Iceland’s special prosecutor into the banking crisis has confirmed that raids have taken place today and that arrests have been made. The Central Bank of Iceland is among the institutions under investigation. Special Prosecutor, Olafur Thor Hauksson told Visir.is that house searches are taking place in at least three places today as part of investigations into the central bank, MP Bank and Straumur Bank......

Republican presidential nominee John McCain cornered President George W. Bush into convening a White House summit on the financial crisis – one that top administration officials thought could hurt the administration’s response to the crisis, Mr. Bush says in a new memoir. Mr. Bush writes that Mr. McCain, trailing in the polls and seeking to appear on top of the crisis, asked him to convene a special meeting to discuss a rescue package for the financial markets. Mr. Bush says he told the Arizona senator that he would first check with Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson to make sure a meeting...

In shocking news, the New York Times cites figures that investors withdrew $33.12 billion from domestic stock market mutual funds in the first seven months of this year when billions of dollars should have been expected to be flowing in.

VP Biden's bullish remarks--that $862B stimulus created or saved some 3.6M jobs--are part of a WH push to convince deeply skeptical voters that the economy is on a comeback.......Repubs question the validity of the numbers.

W arren Buffett went to great lengths over the weekend to defend the behavior of Goldman Sachs, a company that is under attack from Washington. But the big question might turn out to be who will defend Buffett? Not only does the Oracle of Omaha own a large stake in Goldman, which he bought during the financial crisis, he also received at least one phone call from then-Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson in September 2008, during the height of the financial crisis. According to Paulson's phone log, which The Post received under a Freedom of Information Act request, Buffett got a...

Warren Buffett offered a vigorous defense of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Saturday, saying the embattled firm hadn't engaged in improper activity and shouldn't be blamed for the losses of its clients. Goldman has been reeling from Securities and Exchange Commission allegations that the bank had engaged in fraudulent activities in relation to a mortgage deal called Abacus 2007-AC1. Goldman says it did nothing wrong. The billionaire investor said he fully supported Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein. Asked if he could choose a successor for Mr. Blankfein, Mr. Buffett said: "If Lloyd had a twin brother I'd go for him." Buffett also...

In 2004, Paolo Pellegrini was out of a job, living in a one-bedroom apartment in Westchester County, N.Y., with little money in the bank. He soon managed to land a gig working for hedge-fund manager John Paulson. Today, after helping Paulson & Co. score $20 billion with a bet against housing and pocketing about $175 million for himself, Mr. Pellegrini is an unnamed but key character in the government's lawsuit against Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (NYSE: GS), according to people familiar with the matter. The government alleges the bank deceived investors by selling them mortgage securities that the hedge fund...

Any time Erin Burnett tells a guest "You will not be back, you have to be more polite than that" you know the "guest" is telling the truth, the one commodity rarely if ever discussed on General Electric's circus station. Enter (or rather, exit) R&R Consulting's Sylvain Raynes, a structured finance expert, who at 3:10 into the clip takes on what he calls the "public relations officers" for Goldman, and asks "is it all right if I am a little critical?" Apparently the answer is no. First, Sylvain completely destroys Cramer's false "breaking news" about Goldman being long Abacus... And...

The SEC has filed civil charges against Goldman Sachs and its banker Fabrice Tourre for its role in structuring subprime mortgages, which it structured at the behest of hedge funders like John Paulson. Goldman shares are off 10%. At issue is the lack of disclosure of Paulson's role in selecting the assets that went into the CDOs. There is also an allegation that John Paulson was presented as having gone long the CDO, when in fact he was short.

The billionaire hedge fund manager at the center of an alleged fraud hatched at Goldman Sachs, a leading investment bank, has given tens of thousands of dollars to both parties. Campaign fundraising records show that John A. Paulson, founder and chairman of the hedge fund Paulson & Co., gave $30,400 to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee in June, qualifying him as a major Democratic donor. He also gave $2,300 to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) reelection campaign in February of last year and $4,800 to Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) last April, according to records filed at...

A volcanic cloud over Wall Street Apr 16th 2010 | NEW YORK From Economist.com The charges against Goldman could have far wider consequences IS THE most powerful and controversial firm on Wall Street about to get the comeuppance that so many think it deserves? On Friday April 16th America’s Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed civil charges against Goldman Sachs and one of its vice-presidents, Fabrice Tourre, for allegedly defrauding investors by failing to disclose vital information about a financial product linked to subprime mortgages, as America’s housing market was starting to wobble. Goldman’s shares tumbled, dragging down stockmarkets. The...

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SIXTEEN months ago, our financial system teetered on the brink of collapse. The Treasury, the Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation took actions that were unpopular and previously unthinkable — but absolutely necessary to stave off an economic catastrophe in which unemployment could have exceeded the 25 percent level of the Great Depression. These temporary actions have ended or will end. And our financial system is much more stable. But it is critical that we learn from the financial crisis and put in place reforms to avert a repeat of 2008 or something even worse. Congress must pass...

Hank Paulson tells how he brought us back from the brink of financial collapse by bending the rules of the free market. Stop sniping at Hank Paulson. The former Treasury Secretary saved the day by overcoming his predilection for free market capitalism and he didn't do it to save Goldman Sachs, his and my alma mater. His pragmatic boldness helped save the capitalist system from a possible total collapse.Read On The Brink, Inside the Race to Stop the Collapse of the Global Financial System (Business Plus, $28.99) and get Paulson's take on the whole affair. The facts are these: In...

Finally, raising his voice over the din, Obama said loudly, "I'd like to hear what Senator McCain has to say, since we haven't heard from him yet." The room went silent and all eyes shifted to McCain, who sat quietly in his chair, holding a single note card. He glanced at it quickly and proceeded to make a few general points. He said that many members had legitimate concerns and that I had begun to head in the right direction on executive pay and oversight. He mentioned that Boehner was trying to move his caucus the best he could and...

DeepCapture has picked up something I've written about before, but none of these folks seem to put together the "big picture", as I outlined yesterday on my Blogtalk show. As Fiderer explains, Paulson asked the banks to create those CDOs “so that they could be sold to some suckers at close to par. That way, Paulson’s hedge fund could approach some other sucker who would sell an insurance policy, or credit default swap, on the newly minted CDOs. Bear, Deutsche and Goldman knew perfectly well what Paulson’s motivation was. He made no secret of his belief that the CDOs subordinate...