Will there ever be an end to the bailouts? Despite the media reports from the US banks who are going to round up another $75 billion (a questionable number itself) from private investors, it still strikes me as overly optimistic. Remember that it was the UK who kicked off this ugly cycle when Northern Rock collapsed so they could be ahead of the US in this newest round of trouble. The Guardian:
Richard Lambert, director general of the CBI, said: "The fact is that for all the injections of taxpayers' money, the credit markets are still not working properly."This also comes back to the continuation of banking practices despite a once-in-a-lifetime failure. You would expect to see some kind of change in terms of how these people are treated but no, hardly a hint of real change. This is great news for bankers but not so much for everyone else.
Bank of England officials are concerned that big banks now supported by the taxpayer, such as Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds Banking Group, are struggling to increase lending volumes, as they had promised in return for help from the government.
The governor, Mervyn King, and several other members of the Bank of England's monetary policy committee are said to be unconvinced by talk of green shoots that has helped propel the FTSE 100 share index up by more than 20% over the last month.
