OMG, WTF, AIG???
AIG just keeps staying as classy as ever. From
Politico:
AIG ships billions in bailout abroad
Billions of American taxpayer dollars used to bailout insurance giant AIG are flowing to some of the largest foreign banks in the world, according to new documents released by beleaguered company Sunday.
The revelation seemed sure to cause political complications for President Barack Obama and his economic team, already on the defensive Sunday over why they couldn�t stop AIG from doling out $165 million in bonuses to some of its top corporate officials � even as the company was receiving a massive infusion of taxpayer funds.
The documents AIG released account for some of the more than $180 billion in aid that AIG has received, and they detailed for the first time which financial firms are benefitting from the federal handout.
In all, AIG disclosed payments of $105.3 billion between September and December 2008. And some of the biggest recipients were European banks. Societe Generale, based in France, was the top foreign recipient at $11.9 billion, Deutsche Bank of Germany got $11.8 billion and Barclays, based in England, was paid $8.5 billion.
Here in the U.S. , Goldman Sachs received $12.9 billion. Edward Liddy, the government-installed CEO of AIG, sat on the board of directors of Goldman Sachs until he joined AIG.
He took the position while President Bush's Treasury Secretary, Henry Paulson�who until joining the administration had served as Goldman's Chairman and CEO�arranged the insurance company's initial government bailout.
This is getting downright unreal. What sense of entitlement do these managers have that allows them to take a bailout and then to turn around and run the business as usual.
If a little guy -- person or small business -- takes any money, they have to seriously change their way of doing business (ie: bankruptcy, business loan, etc...). Not so much for the big swinging dicks in the banking industry.
Posted by DaveH at March 15, 2009 6:19 PM