How to Reinvent GM on $1 a Year

Detroit – (BP) In a recent pitch to Congress, top executives at GM, Ford and Chrysler said they were willing to take only $1 in salary in 2009 if they ended up tapping into a much hoped-for infusion of federal monies. That idea, along with other job and cost cutting aimed at reinventing the “Big [...]

Auto Industry Appeal

December 3, 2008
Dear Secretary Paulson,
I am writing to you in my capacity as CEO of Joe’s Auto here in Baltimore. Our company may not be as big as Ford or GM, but times are tough for us too, and as part of the American auto industry, we could use your help.
Our operations are relatively small: [...]

In re: General Motors Corp.

Washington – (BP) This week, top executives from the “Big 3″ U.S. automakers are appearing before Congress once again, trying to make a case for a quick injection of billions of dollars in federal aid.
General Motors Corp. (GM) says that without an immediate bailout from  Washington of at least $4 billion, it may not [...]

Bailout Perspective: Pakistan needs (and gets) less than Citigroup

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has approved a loan for Pakistan, amounting to $7.6 billion to shore up the economy.
The loan will “support the country’s economic stabilization program,” the IMF said in a brief statement.
Pakistan will immediately access $3.1 billion of the loan under a 23-month facility, with the rest phased in, subject to  [...]

Auto Industry Cries Foul

Executives at GM, Ford and Chrysler are howling in outrage today as news spreads that the US Treasury will inject $20 billion into beleaguered Citigroup in exchange for preferred shares.
Treasury Secretary Paulson announced the plan today under the TARP program. The FDIC has also said it will guarantee up to $306 billion of risky [...]

Bureau of Engraving and Printing Facing Paper Crisis

It has come to this: Uncle Sam is about to run out of the paper to print money on.
The United States Treasury Bureau of Engraving and Printing (BEP) prints billions of Federal Reserve Notes for delivery to the Federal Reserve System each year. Fidelity Printers, the company that tirelessly churns out bank notes for BEP, [...]

Bush on Midnight Regulatory Ramble

The Bush Administration has mere hours left to publish a host of new regulations if they are to take effect before the January 20, 2009 swearing-in of President-Elect Barack Obama.
In particular, the Bush Administration is taking aim at the environment. The new rules eliminate the input of federal wildlife scientists in some endangered species cases, [...]

Not Another Dirty Dick?

Dick Cheney is in hot water again. Well, warm water. A Texas grand jury has charged Vice-President Dick Cheney for “organized criminal activity” related to alleged abuse of private prison inmates.
The indictment was overseen by county District Attorney Juan Guerra, an outgoing prosecutor at the end of his term of office. He cites the case [...]

The Case for GM in Chapter 11

Things are not well at General Motors. Its new sobriquet may well be “General Malaise”. Share prices are at historic lows and corporate leadership suggests rather urgently that if GM does not receive a chunk of a $25 billion proposed government bailout for the auto industry, it will run out of operating capital before [...]

Got TARP?

The government loves acronyms. The newest acronym came to us when the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 (the “Act”), more commonly referred to as the $700 billion bailout bill, created the Troubled Assets Relief Program (“TARP”), giving broad authority to the Secretary of the Treasury (the “Secretary”) to purchase troubled assets. 
The Secretary has [...]