Rbs

[Pragmatopian]

I entirely agree that, if there was any discretion in the award of this pension fund, the Government should never have agreed to it. The guy made some terrible decisions in his mismanagement of the bank and should be thoroughly ashamed of himself. It's obscene for him to be given anything other than the bare minimum to which he's legally entitled other than a hard kick up the ass. However if the Government did agree to it, it seems a little disingenuous to try and renege on that deal now and turn the guy into a scapegoat for their own incompetence in handling the situation.

 

That said, I would fully support a decision to pursue criminal and civil legal action against him and his fellow directors personally to the full extent possible for any transgressions committed during their time in charge (assuming any claim has a good chance of success). Essentially the government has no choice but to sort out the mess that the corporates have created, but steps should be taken in pretty short order to bring errant executives and regulators to account for any criminal behaviour and mismanagement that they perpetrated, rather than allowing them to melt away into the night. The claim that they are innocent victims of unprecedented economic circumstances may hold for some, but certainly not for all.

[Cambon]

the government agrees he should keep his pension. Now that he is actually leaving the government decides to change it's mind about the pension calling it obscene. What a load of tossers!

The government are claiming that they originally understood the pension was contractually underwritten. It transpires now, apparently, that it is actually discretional. That reads a little differently to your version.

 

 

Gordon Brown - "There will be no more boom and bust."

 

Governments always tell the truth, don't they?

 

They are just trying to cover up what is really going on.

 

Besides, will you all be complaining in a few years time when RBS share price is back up to a couple of quid and the government start selling the tax payers shares returning 2 or 3 or maybe 4 times their investment? The answer is yes, because the tax payer will then be wanting tax cuts etc.

[keyboarder]

Sir Fred Goodwin has left RBS, so any turnaround will unlikely be down to him.

[Tugger]

I think I read that 94% of shareholders backed Goodwin's takeover of ABN Amro, which appears to be the deal that broke RBS's back. They may have been given misleading information about the deal, but if not, they've got noone to blame but themselves. And if you tell me that there are two possible factual scenarios - one where Brown, Darling & co are lying and one where they are telling the truth and someone else is lying, I'll back the former.

 

Fred fucked up, but his bosses, the shareholders, let him. Brown and Darling have compounded it.

[Albert Tatlock]

Besides, will you all be complaining in a few years time when RBS share price is back up to a couple of quid and the government start selling the tax payers shares returning 2 or 3 or maybe 4 times their investment? The answer is yes, because the tax payer will then be wanting tax cuts etc.

Well if 1 million people in the UK lose their jobs (not unrealistic at the moment) and it costs about £15K a year to keep each of them - there's the £15 billion that'll cost. Then all the tax they don't pay while they're unemployed - quite a few more £billion.

 

Then if the £325 billion (RBS only - there are more to come) worth of 'potentially toxic debts' do go toxic?

 

Joe Public has been screwed, and the banks are still screwing him by driving perfectly SME profitable businesses into the ground while they rebuild their own capital.

 

There's only one winner here - the banks (or specifically, the boards/directors that have driven us all over the cliff in the first place). And the govt are impotent now they have given them all our money - they are giving confusing advice telling the banks to rebuild their capital, whilst they have not forced them to lend as a condition of getting public money.

[Cambon]

There's only one winner here - the banks (or specifically, the boards/directors that have driven us all over the cliff in the first place). And the govt are impotent now they have given them all our money - they are giving confusing advice telling the banks to rebuild their capital, whilst they have not forced them to lend as a condition of getting public money.

 

Only one winner? If that is the case it is joe public who cannot have his house reposessed for 6 months, who can go bankrupt a the drop of a hat and have a clean slate in just two years, who has been living the highlife for the past 10 years on borrowed money that they cannot pay back (worldwide). Lets not forget that UK joe public is over a £trillion in debt to the banks and finance houses and the government does everything it can to protect joe public, sod the banks.

 

In reality, this is the government paying the banks directly, to bail out joe public.

[Jimcalagon]

Sir Fred Goodwin has left RBS, so any turnaround will unlikely be down to him.

 

 

Well he's improved the management of the company - by leaving.

[thebees]

It looks more and more like a pyramid of cards and a very precarious one at that.

[manshimajin]

Essentially the government has no choice but to sort out the mess that the corporates have created.

I think the whole charabanc full of Governments, regulators and corporates created this mess. They fed off each other like Satan's children. Governments loved low interest rates and people living off credit - they were raking in huge amounts of money from increasing house prices, VAT receipts, stamp duty and burgeoning consumer spending. Last thing they wanted to do (not just in the UK) was to slow things down or limit borrowing.

 

Of all the world's banks only 11 have now a credit rating of AA. 4 of these are in Australia which had much tighter regulation and where the Reserve Bank starting increasing interest rates very early to dampen the housing bubble that had emerged. The ECB, the BoE and the Federal Reserve were very late slowing the party - and by the time the Fed started to do this it actually exacerbated the situation.

 

Governments have learned the mantra 'the problems we are experiencing are global - it's not our fault'.

[La_Dolce_Vita]

Only one winner? If that is the case it is joe public who cannot have his house reposessed for 6 months, who can go bankrupt a the drop of a hat and have a clean slate in just two years, who has been living the highlife for the past 10 years on borrowed money that they cannot pay back (worldwide). Lets not forget that UK joe public is over a £trillion in debt to the banks and finance houses and the government does everything it can to protect joe public, sod the banks.

 

In reality, this is the government paying the banks directly, to bail out joe public.

 

And so the public should be the winners, but considering the costs I don't think the public is. Joe Public may be technically 1 trillion pounds in debt but it is their money. The public are the one's that make the economy go round, they do the work.

[SteveP]

Having lost my savings in KSFIOM, do I now need to worry about the money in my Isle of Man Bank current account?

 

What does everyone else do to keep their money safe? I tried opening a UK bank account (because they seem to get bailed out by UK government as needed) but was told that I couldn't without being a UK resident.

[Twitch]

Having lost my savings in KSFIOM, do I now need to worry about the money in my Isle of Man Bank current account?

 

What does everyone else do to keep their money safe? I tried opening a UK bank account (because they seem to get bailed out by UK government as needed) but was told that I couldn't without being a UK resident.

 

I keep mine in IOM Bank and have no worries having it deposited there. Hopefully you'll get your savings back in due course.

[Slim]

Having lost my savings in KSFIOM, do I now need to worry about the money in my Isle of Man Bank current account?

What does everyone else do to keep their money safe? I tried opening a UK bank account (because they seem to get bailed out by UK government as needed) but was told that I couldn't without being a UK resident.

 

If you've got more than 50k, I imagine it'd be prudent to spread it around a few different banks.

[The Old Git]

I tried opening a UK bank account (because they seem to get bailed out by UK government as needed) but was told that I couldn't without being a UK resident.

 

I opened a Smile (Co-Op) account with no problems. I got a letter from the IOM tax dept to say I was an IOM resident and tax payer so I get my interest from the UK bank gross.

[manxman2]

we have a large systematic failure here; the media and government trying to punish one man to appease the masses is exactly what scapegoating is

Totally agree with that.

 

There should be a public enquiry into all of this, identifying exactly what happened and who was responsible for what. People's names need to be linked to the £billions of taxpayers money that has been needed to bail the banks out. Plus the names of those that have failed to regulate and identify problems (even when glaring failures been pointed out to them in the past) also need to be identified. Then there should be a series of prosecutions, disqualifications from directorships, and even bans on working in senior positions in finance.

 

Too many people at present are going to get away with they're part in all this, including govt people, and probably end up doing the same to us in another 10/15 years - while in the meantime laughing all the way from the bank.

 

Why should only Joe Public pay the price, not just in terms of taxpayers money, but in terms of business, jobs, security and pensions etc. etc.

 

totally agreed .. the americans {fbi} are atleast doing forensic accounting etc of the ratings agencies {the ones that rated toxic stock as triple A investment vehicles } that made all these finacial stings possible in the first place as the onus on them was critical .. and without doubt some will swing publicly for their fraudulent actions in what has been a world wide fraud of unparralled proportions ever witnessed.... and rightly so .. however once again the greymen the politicians who made it all possible both here and america will walk away with their bribes in which ever form they were paid integrity intact..

 

this fraud in essence has turned out to be the worlds biggest ever pyramid scheme.. {the musical chairs of subprime }