Jim Rogers on the Bear Stearns bailout

http://themessthatgreenspanmade.blogspot.com/2008/03/jim-rogers-on-bear-stearns-bailout.html

Monday, March 17, 2008
Jim Rogers on the Bear Stearns bailout

Bloomberg tracked down Jim Rogers somewhere in Asia and he was none too pleased with the way the U.S. government has been throwing its money around.

On why Bear Stearns was bailed out:

You know the reason they did it this way was because, if Bear Stearns had to declare bankruptcy, you'd realize that Bear Stearns paid out billions of dollars in bonuses in January - six weeks ago. If he let them go into bankruptcy, they all would have had to send back their bonuses.

This is what they're doing, they're doing it so they don't have to give back their bonuses. That's why they didn't put them into bankruptcy. Jamie Dimon has gotten a great deal because the Federal Reserve is paying for it. The Federal Reserve is using taxpayer money to buy a bunch of Bear Stearns traders' Mazeratis.

On letting banks fail:

Investment banks have been going bankrupt since the beginning of time. What are you talking about? Let somebody go bankrupt - it's not the end of the world.

You remember what happened in the 70s when they tried this tactic - when Arther Burns kept printing money. Finally, interest rates had to go to over 20 percent and they had to bring in Paul Volcker who had to take draconian measures and put the country into a serious recession. How much more money do you think the Federal Reserve has?

On risks to the banking system:

In 1966, the entire Japanese financial community went bankrupt. Every broker in Japan was in bankruptcy. Japan came out of that and became one of the great powerhouses of the world.

In 1907, everbody on Wall Street was bankrupt. Everybody was bankrupt in 1907. America recovered from that and had a very nice future. Are you telling me that we're never going to have bankruptcies in the financial community again?

On Alan Greenspan's role in this mess:

The first two central banks in America failed. Between Greenspan and Bernanke - I've written this, it's in my book, long before this happened - they're setting up the failure of the central bank. The demise of the Federal Reserve.

The first two failed, this one is going to fail too - because of Greenspan and Bernanke. Greenspan laid the perfect foundation for Bernanke.

Interestingly, four or five Bloomberg articles used quotes from this interview but none of the material above. They just used excerpts from the first part of the clip on the U.S. dollar and commodities.

Labels: Federal Reserve, Financial Bubbles