What about wages?
"The chancellor said the banks had promised to reduce bonus payments and to inform the public on what bonuses are actually paid out."
Nothing about salaries though, so they can do whatever the *beep* they want with that.
Unions and small biz doubt Osborne's bank promises
The Trades Union Congress and small business groups are doubtful that George Osborne has tamed the British banks or extracted a meaningful promise on business lending. Osborne made clear that his Project Merlin, the deal done today – a £2.5bn tax on bank profits, a pledge to increase small business lending and reduce bankers' …
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Wednesday 9th February 2011 16:02 GMT ted frater
my money versus their money
I think the banks should be allowed to do what they like, invest where they want, in anything they think they can make a killing.
So long as its their own money.
Not mine ,not yours or any other depositors unless they specifically give their permission to risk it without recourse for anyone to bail them out if they lose any or all of it.
so we need to have a 2 tier banking system with the customer deciding how and where his money is placed.
It must be now some 50 yrs ago I worked for a Canadian insurance investment co, There were not allowed by the canadian government to have any assets on their books that were worth less than their purchase price at the annual government audit .
Our lot could learn something there.
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Wednesday 9th February 2011 16:53 GMT Ivor 1
I remember when all this was fields
This is essentially asking for a new Glass-Steagall Act - the separation of investment and retail banking?
Isn't one of the problems here that the banks are essentially in negative equity?
They used (example figures) the 10bn they had (that savers had deposited) to gamble on risky collaterised debt package gayness in the hope that they could turn that 10bn into 100bn, thus covering the original 10bn, paying 10bn in bonuses and still having 80bn with which to place more bets.
Except they blew the stack and the gayness was toxic as hell - they not only didn't make any money but the assets they bought are now worth £48.36. So they are 10bn short of even being able to cover the 10bn they originally used (and they hope no-one needs to withdraw more than £40 or so in the meantime!). But they still need to pay bonuses, or the so-called "experts" they employ might go and get better-paid jobs elsewhere (yes I imagine there's quite a queue of employers in the banking sector right now, desperate to hire incompetent morons) - so they are refusing to lend to try to build their funds back up to the level where they can have another bash at it.
It's like the film Lock Stock - we all chipped in to deal the banks into a high-stakes poker game and they spanked it all up the wall while holding a pair of 4s. Now the market wants Sting's pub and the banks are asking us to keep lending them money (they promise to pay us a whopping 0.01% interest if we do) so they can play again next week.
In the meantime (while they amass their next stake) they of course cannot lend money to anyone, as that would delay their ability to re-enter the game and take another tilt at Mad Harry's Dildo Windmill.
Looks like we all picked the wrong week to give up sniffing glue.
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Wednesday 9th February 2011 16:45 GMT Anonymous Coward
Kill the Economy, just so long as you can do your MP expenses
And the politicians find another 2.5Bn reasons for the UK financial services industry to relocated to some place with regulation by sanity rather than "sound byte" vote grubbing on live media broadcast.
If you want to know why you can't find a job in the UK, look no further than all the Fin Serv and IT support roles being advertised in Zurich and Geneva!
At some point they have to wake up to the fact that Banks only need assests (held in bits and bytes) and communications (internet), they do not have to be located in the UK, their employee's do not have to be located in the UK, they can go anywhere they can get a decent land line (not normally the UK either - thank you BT open reach!)
But hay they get to claim their expenses and super pension for another 5 years, and then go through the rolving door to NED seats and consultancies. THEY won't be trying to get a main stream job in the UK when they lose an election.
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Wednesday 9th February 2011 23:03 GMT Yet Another Anonymous coward
So thats all right then
We (customers) still can't get them to lend us any of the money we (taxpayers) lent them interest free, But they are going to have to be a little more creative in how they hide how much they pay themselves .
Great thats all OK then, I can't expand my business but as long as they aren't getting a bonus - I feel good!
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Thursday 10th February 2011 01:16 GMT Mike Bell
@ted frater
The problem is that the banks will *always* be spending your money and not theirs.
With the active collusion of governments all around the world, banks exist by lending overwhelmingly more money than they own (or hold on deposit) to borrowers. That in itself would not be so bad, but the government makes up the enormous difference by effectively printing the money that's conjured into existence every time a loan is created. Not in times of crisis, but on a day by day basis.
The whole financial world is one big con. The closer you are to the money, the more of it you can trouser. And if Joe Public really understood what was going on, they'd have the bankers lined up in stocks.
Google "Fractional Reserve System". It's the biggest stitch-up in history.
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Thursday 10th February 2011 01:22 GMT Anonymous Coward
No news there then?
To be fair we can't really expect the unions to say things like "the new government is the best thing ever! ever!"
But at least some attention seems to be drawn to how local authorities work (Trafford ~ maintaining frontline services, Manchester ~ 25% cuts rather than 15%, ... [based on UK news reports])
The biggest test is: will they be re-elected. All the other bleatings fade unto nothingness with this self imposed blah- blah de blah-blah?
This topic is closed for new posts.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
