If the US taxpayer is going to help the banks in any way (including more free money loans) it's critical that the US government gets major concessions from the banks. We've repeatedly been assured by the banks that all is well and there are no more problems but a $60 billion hole is not insignificant.
For starters, we have to get back to the critical issue of breaking up the too-big-to-fail mega banks. Somehow (cough, lobbyist money) the issue fell off the radar among the political class. What surprise will be next?
The 19 largest US banks are at least $50 billion short of meeting new capital requirements under the Basel III accords, according to rules proposed by the Federal Reserve.
The biggest among them would probably need billions of dollars more by the 2019 deadline to comply fully with the rules.
Smaller US lenders are about $10 billion short of the requirements, the Fed said on Thursday.
The Fed’s proposals, which will be phased in from next year, are part of a larger package implementing the Basel III accords in the US.
