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LadyEllen -> RBS & HBOS - "Bailout 2 - This Time Its Secret" (11/24/2009 2:50:44 PM)
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The Bank Of England today disclosed that it had had to loan £62 billion at the end of 2008, to Royal Bank of Scotland and Halifax Bank of Scotland, to keep them from going bankrupt.
Not news? Well, this was in addition to the billions they got in shareholder funding to prop them up, the write offs and write downs and all the rest. And it was secret, not even disclosed to Parliament but sanctioned by Gordon Brown and the Chancellor, to prevent another run like Northern Rock the year before. In other words, these two banks were well busted, beyond even the billions pumped in from the public purse - in further other words, the money pumped in by shareholders had also been lost.
City Minister Lord Myners today refused to answer the question posed by Channel 4 News as to whether this is or was the only such instance.
And best of all, the Lloyds Bank was encouraged, (some would say obliged), at this very same time to merge with HBOS. A merger which reduced Lloyds, which had been rather sensible throughout, to near collapse itself and which was leveraged to great extent by the billions loaned to prop up a failing balance sheet.
Shareholders in Lloyds feel very much aggrieved that there wasnt the disclosure required in such transactions, feel very much aggrieved that they were made to pay over the odds for HBOS in a distorted market and very much aggrieved at the can of worms they acquired which sent their shareholdings plummet. Presumably many lawsuits shall follow, for many millions or even billions - which the taxpayer will presumably pick up.
Meanwhile, Fred Goodwin lives the high life in Monaco on his healthy pension settlement, settled early and over the odds by government sanction, where no one can bother him.
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