Senate approves sweeping Wall Street reform bill

[ProSense]

Source: Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Senate approved a sweeping Wall Street reform bill on Thursday night, capping months of wrangling over the biggest overhaul of financial regulation since the 1930s.

By a vote of 59 to 39, the Senate handed a victory to President Barack Obama, a champion of tighter rules for banks and capital markets following the 2007-2009 financial crisis that led to a deep recession and massive taxpayer bailouts.




Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20100521/pl_nm/us_financial_regulation_43

[Demeter]

1. Is It Sweeping Because All the Reforms Have Been Carefully Swept Out?

I am not impressed.

[EJSTES2005]

3. +1 Brazilian

At least 2 people stood up against this on legitimately moral grounds.......Senator Maria Cantwell due to the fact that the bill does nothing to address the 600 TRILLION dollar derivatives market, and Senator Russ Feingold saying the bill does not go far enough.

"Concern about the derivatives provisions also led Senator Maria Cantwell, Democrat of Washington, to vote against the bill, saying it still included a dangerous loophole that would undermine efforts to regulate derivative trades. Senator Russ Feingold of Wisconsin was the other Democrat to oppose the measure, saying it was not forceful enough in preventing risky behavior by financial companies.

The four Republicans to support the bill were Senators Susan Collins and Olympia J. Snowe of Maine, Scott Brown, the freshman from Massachusetts, and Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, who is up for re-election this year.."

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/21/business/21regulate.html?hp

Could have swore I read early that the vote was 60-40...maybe Chuck got a last min Rasmussen pole and changed his mind.......

[Autumn]

4. All the derivatives were

swept under the rug.

[Lagomorph]

15. Financial Reforms 'Cosmetic,' Won't Stop More Crises: Roubini

http://www.cnbc.com/id/37219897

[depakid]

16. The Democrats own this big pile of fail

Thankfully, once forced to vote, politicians can no longer merely pretend to working for the People as they do the bidding of the Banksters. So once you look beyond all of the well-documented behind-the-scenes work by Dodd to weaken financial reform, we also have his on-the-record votes on a few of the meaningful attempts at real reform:

* No on the Kaufman-Brown SAFE act to actually stop Too Big To Fail with actual laws.

* No on the Franken Amendment to finally end the horrendous scam that is the current credit ratings system.

* No on the Vitter Audit the Fed Amendment that would give true transparency to a shadowy organization that has helped destroy our economy.


And just so you don't think he can't say yes to anything...

* Yes on the Carper Amendment to actively prevent state Attorney Generals from fighting for your rights, because apparently the one lesson Senator Dodd learned from this mess is that our country will be much better off if he can just keep the next Eliot Spitzer from protecting citizens.

More: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dylan-ratigan/who-will-your-senator-sta_b_583937.html

[ProSense]

17. "No on the Franken Amendment "?

The Franken Amendment passed

Damn right the Dems own this. It's the most significant reform of the financial system in decades.

I'm sure any number of people could have done better, but given they weren't members of Congress, no one will ever know.

[depakid]

19. That particular bit referred to Dodd's vote

The main trouble here is that too big to fail institutions are still going to be taking huge risks- often unseen with derivatives, using taxpayer backed money.

[RandomThoughts]

2. Interesting choice of picture on that article.

The editorialist that picked that picture is trying to say something. An interesting phenomenon, most people assume the thought comes from the person in the picture. But in that kind of picture choice it shows something else.

[Ruby the Liberal]

5. Sweeping? Seriously?

:rofl:

[ProSense]

7. Yup,

it looks to be a serious headline.

[ProSense]

6. NYT: Senate Approves Sweeping Financial Regulations

Senate Approves Sweeping Financial Regulations

<...>

Democratic Congressional leaders and the Obama administration must now work to combine the Senate measure with a version approved by the House in December, a process that is expected to take several weeks and be completed after Memorial Day.

While there are important differences — notably a Senate provision that would force big banks to spin off some of their most lucrative derivatives business into separate subsidiaries — the bills are broadly similar, making it virtually certain that Congress will adopt the most sweeping regulatory overhaul since the aftermath of the Great Depression.

<...>

The bill already contains a version of the Volcker rule, but the Merkley-Levin amendment would have gone farther in trying to prevent conflicts of interest between banks and their depository customers.

Congressional Republican leaders, adopting an election-year strategy to oppose virtually every initiative supported by the Obama administration, voiced loud criticism of the legislation while trying to insist that they still wanted tougher policing of Wall Street. At first they tried to stop debate on the bill, and then relented after the government sued Goldman Sachs and Republicans felt their opposition was politically untenable.

link

[Francisco]

8. Somebody help me out..

Last time I checked there was no reform done whatsoever to the derivative market. Was there any changes made in the bill relating to derivatives since yesterday? Obama said he would veto any bill that didn't deal with the derivatives market, so if he signs it into law is it safe to say Obama has betrayed us?


*Edit

Maybe I should read more into it myself, but I have a bad feeling about this bill..

[Autumn]

9. Did he really say he would veto

any bill that didn't deal with the derivatives market? I haven't kept up with any news for a week except for the Gulf. If he did that is some amazing flopping around.

[Francisco]

10. Yes heres a link..

http://tpmlivewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/04/obama-says-hell-veto-financial-reform-without-derivatives-controls.php

From doing some quick reading I read the only reform made on derivatives is that their has to be a margin set aside in order to hedge there investments, maybe the progressive in me thought Obama would want to also make it more transparent or even do away with the casino like dealings done in these shadow markets. Well I guess not...I'm very disappointed to say the least..

[Autumn]

13. Thanks for the link

I think the same was said about health care.

[ProSense]

12. Here:

From the NYT:

While there are important differences — notably a Senate provision that would force big banks to spin off some of their most lucrative derivatives business into separate subsidiaries — the bills are broadly similar, making it virtually certain that Congress will adopt the most sweeping regulatory overhaul since the aftermath of the Great Depression.

Senator Kerry:

eliminates loopholes that allow risky and abusive derivative practices to go on unnoticed and unregulated - including loopholes for over-the-counter derivatives, asset-backed securities, hedge funds, mortgage brokers and payday lenders...

[unabelladonna]

11. are there real reforms in the bill?

..or is it mere window dressing?
the bankers/swindlers are at the highest levels of the gov't and it's hard to believe that timmy or larry would sign off on a bill that makes a difference.

on reading some of the above posts, it seems exactly NOTHING has been done. the crooks on wall street will still be allowed to become nauseatingly rich by producing nothing and moving money around.

does anyone know when the revolution begins? the middle class is being decimated by these roaches.

[SnoopDog]

14. Doesn't really matter if there were any 'reforms' in it or not...

All bills/laws can and are repealed...

Glass/Steagall, which would have helped to prevent the Great Bank Heist of 2008, was repealed by republican Gramm and signed by democrat Clinton.

So, when republicans are back in 'power' - bye bye reforms...

[HCE SuiGeneris]

18. Sweeping it under the rug. Tomorrow's regulation may be better, but

what about accountability for the malfeasance already perpetrated?