In addition to the strangeness of the idea that UBS-a bank that used to have "Switzerland" in its name-would relocate to the US, the US Treasury has no business encouraging a race-to-the-bottom dynamic where banks try to play one country off the other to avoid regulation. www.ft.com/content/fc27...

The financial crisis led to the politics of our current moment. And yet elite failures in both the lead-up and response to the crisis remain under-examined and under-appreciated. Very difficult to break the cycle without fully reckoning with that.

Bessent on tariffs: "This is one of President Trump's signature policies, and traditionally the Supreme Court does not interfere with a president's signature policy."

Days before the July 29-30 meeting, Kugler asked Powell for a waiver so that she could trade during the blackout period in order to get rid of impermissible holdings. That request was denied. Ms. Kugler did not attend the meeting and on Aug 1 she resigned

Suspect stock trading appears to have caused resignations of a Fed governor (Kugler) and regional bank president (Bostic). These were individual failures but also institutional ones that affect the Fed’s credibility and independence by giving Trump inroads to influence the composition of the FOMC.

My paper with @vanloo.bsky.social and @lanemiles.bsky.social showing that more than 15% of US companies have potentially illegal interlocking board members is now published in the Columbia Law Review columbialawreview.org/content/anti...

NEW: The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Eugene Scalia (Gibson Dunn) have gone to SCOTUS asking the justices to stop California's corporate disclosure climate bills (SB261 and SB253) from going into effect. The first of the two bills takes effect on Jan 1. The application is Docket No. 25A561.

The FHFA is being corrupted in an attempt to help the president’s political agenda. But these efforts could well have the opposite of their intended effect by undermining confidence in the integrity of the US housing markets.

Atlanta Fed President Raphael Bostic will retire when his current five-year term expires at the end of next February.

The I.R.S. Tried to Stop This Tax Dodge. Scott Bessent Used It Anyway. www.nytimes.com/2025/11/12/u...

WSJ: Fannie Mae watchdogs who were removed from their jobs had been probing if Trump appointee Bill Pulte had improperly obtained mortgage records of key Democratic officials, including New York Attorney General Letitia James. www.wsj.com/finance/regu...

President Donald Trump will host financial industry executives for dinner Wednesday at the White House, according to two sources

Starting to think that putting a deeply partisan sycophant with no housing policy expertise in charge of US housing policy was not a great idea.

The book also illustrates how the creation of the national banking system was meant as a tool to finance the Union cause. Important historical lessons there about the broader social role and purposes of finance, including private financial institutions.

More fun in private credit. @bloomberg.com $BLK www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Some of the ethics staffers fired at Fannie Mae recently were looking into complaints against an ally of FHFA director Bill Pulte, @rachelsiegel25.bsky.social scoops: www.washingtonpost.com/business/202...

This seems significant. "U.S. GDP growth in the first half of 2025 was almost entirely driven by investment in data centers and information processing technology, according to Harvard economist Jason Furman."

Democrats badly need leadership who understands that their goal must be *winning* and delivering policies that improve people’s lives—not merely making something a “major factor.”

Republicans had predicted that Democrats would cave on the government shutdown as soon as the election was over because they were only keeping the standoff going to motivate their base.

We’re going to be looking very strongly at the Packers and Stockyards Act of 1921.

This is called being “Too Big to Fail.” Even the CEOs of the biggest Wall Street banks know better than to explicitly state that they expect taxpayer bailouts.

Victory coins for attendees at the Federalist Society convention citing major conservatives wins at the Supreme Court:

Today, OpenAI’s CFO said the US government should guarantee the debt the company takes on to finance its infrastructure build. Not a sign of a sustainable business model that can stand on its own. www.wsj.com/tech/ai/open...

Earlier this week, I watched Sam Altman join Steve Kerr for a conversation about "innovation, leadership, and San Francisco," here's what they said (plus some stray thoughts on SF in the third tech boom) defector.com/an-evening-w...

It seems to me that, if one accepted the government’s arguments in the tariff case, a Democratic president would have a strong argument for using IEEPA to impose a financial transactions tax.

AOC: We have a future to fight for, and we're either going to do that together or you're going to be left behind. It's not about Progressive. It's not moderate, it's not liberal. This is about do you understand the assignment of fighting fascism right now? And the assignment is you come together…

This is no doubt meant to send a message to the justices, but a Treasury Secretary’s time is an extremely valuable commodity and this is a waste of it.

The @federalreserve.gov is expecting to cut about 30% of its workforce dedicated to bank supervision and regulation by the end of 2026. This is in addition to its broader move to weaken the substantive regulations that apply to the banking industry. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

I’ve been talking with Ohio farmers. It turns out they don’t like their tax dollars bailing out the same country that undercut their harvest.

A scenario that would have been unthinkable just a few months ago is now a topic at the FOMC presser.

Social Security Administration Commissioner Frank Bisignano’s move into government couldn’t have been better timed, helping the former Fiserv chief avoid hundreds of millions of dollars in losses from the company’s plunging stock price.

Secretary Bessent already spent $20 billion bailing out Argentina — now he wants Wall Street to kick in $20 billion more, possibly guaranteed by taxpayers. The big banks need to reject this deal. Taxpayers shouldn’t foot the bill for Trump’s political favors.

* BANK OF ENGLAND PROBES DATA CENTER LENDING AMID AI BUBBLE FEAR @bloomberg.com 🇬🇧

Early 20th century "bucket shops" let people gamble on commodities but frequently defrauded them. Federal law distinguishes legitimate trading from gambling prohibited under state anti-bucket shop laws. We're now in the process of collapsing that distinction, in effect creating modern bucket shops.

At around 9 a.m. on Thursday morning, around 200 protesters gathered at the end of the bridge that leads to Coast Guard Island in Alameda, where the Trump administration had threatened to deploy federal Border Patrol agents.

In 2023, Binance was fined $4.3 billion for processing billions of dollars worth of crypto transactions involving sanctioned jurisdictions, including Iran, Russia, Cuba, and Syria. This enables the worst regimes in the world to benefit the President's corrupt crypto business.

Just thinking about how Trump argued he may have had grounds to fire Jerome Powell for cause for not seeking proper approval from the National Capital Planning Commission for modifications to the Fed’s renovation plans.

More amazing developments in the Argentina bailout. The syndicate of private banks Treasury is pressuring to lend to Argentina is concerned there isn’t enough collateral to secure the loan so they want a credit enhancement (ie, partial guarantee) from Treasury. www.wsj.com/finance/arge...

Kudos to @ddayen.bsky.social whose robosigning reporting got Steve Mnuchin named as one of 4 comparators in Comey's selective prosecution section. The other 3 are Jeff Sessions, Scott Pruitt, and Tom Price. legacy.www.documentcloud.org/documents/26...

Whenever the government is thinking about crypto regulation we're told it's not needed because "code is law." But when crypto traders start losing money, it turns out that, actually, law is law. There's probably a lesson there.

With today’s AWS outage, people might be interested in this report, specifically sections 6.3-6.5 on concentration risks and the impacts of consolidation in cloud services. home.treasury.gov/system/files...

Per @politico.com , the lobbyists are basically treating Article I as dead.

Certain parts of the US government are still running.

Trump's offer of a bailout for Argentina's Milei came with a big string attached and then blew up in his face. www.nytimes.com/2025/10/15/w...

Shohei Ohtani this is just stupid...

A deeply unserious statement on the Fed’s decision today to ignore the financial implications of climate change from the supposedly moderate, institutionalist candidate to be the next Fed chair.

The Fed, FDIC, and OCC proposed climate-related financial risk management principles for public comment before adopting them in 2023. Today, the agencies rescinded them with no notice and comment. Once again, the APA only applies in one direction. SMDH. www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/p...

It might be easy to dismiss this as "No harm-no foul." That would miss the larger issue that if it's easy for this type of "honest" mistake to happen, what prevents a *dishonest* mistake using the same method?