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Bank Of England Exposes US Cronyism: Questions Why Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Is Not Too Big To Fail

Tyler Durden's picture




 

If you thought currency-wars were a problem, just wait until crony-wars begin. In a stunning show of disagreement among the omnipotent, The FT reports that a Freedom of Information Act request has confirmed The Bank of England wrote to US authorities seeking clarity about Berkshire’s absence from a provisional list of "systemically import" (Too Big To Fail) financial institutions (SIFIs). The US Treasury declined to comment...

 

With MetLife suing the US government to try to escape being deemed systemically important by Washington (which means the firm may need to hold more capital to cover unexpected losses and could face a requirement to draw up “living wills” to make them easier to wind down in a crisis), The FT reports on questions over Berkshire Hathaway's status...

British regulators have challenged their US peers over their apparent reluctance to subject Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway to tougher scrutiny as part of a worldwide push to make the financial system safer.

 

The Bank of England has written to the US Treasury asking why Berkshire’s reinsurance operation — among the world’s most powerful — was left off a provisional list of “too big to fail” institutions drawn up by the Financial Stability Board.

Regulators have already deemed nine primary insurance companies — including AIG of the US, Germany’s Allianz and UK-based Prudential — globally “systemically important”, a designation that could lead to higher capital requirements.

The failure to designate reinsurers has angered insurance companies, which argue reinsurers are more important to the financial system.

 

The Basel-based FSB was expected to make the reinsurance list public last year. But in November, following consultation with national authorities, it postponed the decision “pending further development of the methodology”.

 

In a sign that disagreement between global regulators may be holding up the process, it has emerged that Bank of England officials wrote to US authorities in October seeking clarity about Berkshire’s absence from a provisional list.

 

The Bank confirmed the existence of the letter in response to a request under UK Freedom of Information legislation from the trade publication Risk.net. However, it declined to disclose the letter’s contents.

And here's the punchline...

In the parallel US process, Berkshire crosses thresholds that would allow it to be designated, with more than $50bn in assets and more than $3.5bn of derivatives liabilities.

 

However, the final decision is made by a council of US regulators which has not yet opted to subject Mr Buffett’s company to increased oversight.

So - the bottom line is that you can be a big to fail as you like but if you have the government in your pocket, you are untouchable... and it seems international regulators are none too pleased at this 'one rule for you, another rule for us' plan...

*  *  *

While no comment was received from Warren Buffett, Berkshire Hathaway, The US Treasury, we suspect the following explains why Buffett's business is not being treated as a SIFI...

 

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Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:07 | 6012489 knukles
knukles's picture

Stick that up yer butt and smoke it, CNBS
    Criminal Enterprise

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:19 | 6012535 knukles
knukles's picture

I got it!  It's a rhetorical question!

 

                                                      Maniacal laughter

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:24 | 6012544 So Close
So Close's picture

I for one am not worried about the B man losing money.  He picks well run companies and buys them leaving their management intact.  Winning formula.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:51 | 6012624 Richardk888
Richardk888's picture

Bullshit! He is the apitome of crony capitalism getting special treatment and deals via the Federal Goverment

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 19:01 | 6012655 MonetaryApostate
MonetaryApostate's picture

He's just a greedy asshole who's profiteering in a system the English brought into existence, call it crony capitalism if you want to, but I'd rather look at it like the Club Royal charade.... (Posturing if you will)

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 19:59 | 6012848 eatthebanksters
eatthebanksters's picture

They give Buffet a medal and leave him alone...in exchange for big bucks to their campaign coffers.  Fucking oligarchs...

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 20:34 | 6012973 Surly Bear
Surly Bear's picture

B-SIFI

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:24 | 6012555 Stuck on Zero
Stuck on Zero's picture

Here are more rhetorical questions: Isn't reinsurance a huge scam?  How can any company claim to insure assets that it can't possibly cover?  Won't all reinsurance companies vanish in a significant downturn?

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:29 | 6012568 kaiserhoff
kaiserhoff's picture

 

 

Yes

They Lie

Hell Yes

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 20:35 | 6012978 Stained Class
Stained Class's picture

How did MBIA survive the shitstorm last time?

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:26 | 6012557 kaiserhoff
kaiserhoff's picture

I'll take:

Who is too cheap to buy Becky a set of tits, for fitty cent, Alex.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 19:42 | 6012787 knukles
knukles's picture

And it's the Daily Double!
What I'd like to know is if Uncle Warren paid for her orthadontia.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 19:03 | 6012634 MonetaryApostate
MonetaryApostate's picture

It is rhetorical, because the first question that came to mind was, "Why are the Royal Pedophiles Too Big To Jail?"

The whole damn system is corrupt, now we get to see them take pot shots at one another, and of course Club Royal is broke, so they are going to have to start taxing the hirelings at the top, because those at the bottom are taxed to the max & we all know it's TRUE!

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 23:20 | 6013436 golden torch
golden torch's picture

I'm making over $7k a month working part time. I kept hearing other people tell me how much money they can make online so I decided to look into it. Well, it was all true and has totally changed my life. This is what I do... www.globe-report.com

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:07 | 6012493 gladih8r
gladih8r's picture

The treasury declined to comment because of the "mouth full of bankster dicks" syndrome.

Tue, 04/21/2015 - 07:47 | 6013935 Eirik Magnus Larssen
Eirik Magnus Larssen's picture

Your nickname is hilarious, by the way.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:11 | 6012502 kaiserhoff
kaiserhoff's picture

There should be zero too big to fails, and too big to jails.

When the rule of law returns, it will be a screaming bitch with bells on.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:20 | 6012539 kchrisc
kchrisc's picture

"screaming bitch with bells on."

Leading the guillotines.

Liberty is a demand. Tyranny is submission.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 20:01 | 6012856 eatthebanksters
eatthebanksters's picture

What, you don't like it when the US Executive Branch behaves like Putin?

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 22:12 | 6013250 bilejones
bilejones's picture

Well, fuckwit, what evidence do you have that the US Executive Branch is acting in the best interests of their Country?

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:11 | 6012509 HowdyDoody
HowdyDoody's picture

That ribbon round the neck looks a little loose. It should be done up tighter, significantly tighter, just to make sure it doesn't come loose and fall off.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:13 | 6012514 Dr Benway
Dr Benway's picture

Few things make me as sick to my stomach as the worship of crony criminal Warren Buffoon as some sort of genius "investor". If you can engineer a bail out by your oligarch connections any time you stand to make losses, that's not "investing" at all.

Reminds me of a scene in Casino. Joe Pesci's gangster character comes up with a brilliant "gambling" system: any time he wins he collects from the bookie, any time he loses he tells the bookie to go fuck himself.

The day that disgusting leatherfaced crony dies I will pop a bottle of champagne to mark the occasion. Unfortunately it will in all likelihood be of natural causes, when he deserves much much worse.

 

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:13 | 6012516 no more banksters
no more banksters's picture

Good news. Let the war begin between them until their self-destruction. We can watch eating popcorn.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:58 | 6012647 MonetaryApostate
MonetaryApostate's picture

Something tells me the world will be eating bullets in the interim, unfortunatley....

After all, it's how the elite turn lead into gold... (E.g. War!)

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:15 | 6012522 ekm1
ekm1's picture

I am stunned.

I predicted banker suicides and assassinations, but this one I thought about but never considered it would happen.

 

Buffett is losing control. wooooooooooooow.

 

Something was wrong that only Buffett's trains were going off rails, not grain or goods trains, but I never considered Buffett would lose control like this.

 

wow. I need to analyzie this more. This is intriguing

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:16 | 6012526 cassotto
cassotto's picture

because it's a holding company you dumb fck

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:20 | 6012537 suteibu
suteibu's picture

Buffett is on the top of the list of those getting immortality treatments.  What psychopath (government bureaucrats/regulators/politicians, etc) in their right mind (heh) would want to piss off this man?

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:28 | 6012562 Urban Redneck
Urban Redneck's picture

It's not about Buffet.  

Jack Lew & Janet need to pay the Jizya.

NWO.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:23 | 6012545 kchrisc
kchrisc's picture

Some Zionist intrigue yet to be determined.

Liberty is a demand. Tyranny is submission.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 19:22 | 6012706 Sinnedi
Sinnedi's picture

Cool CIA meme bro

 

When touching on such themes, Reagan echoed the work, and sometimes the phrasing, of occult scholar Manly P. Hall.

From the dawn of Hall’s career in the early 1920s until his death in 1990, the Los Angeles teacher wrote about America’s “secret destiny.” The United States, in Hall’s view, was a society that had been planned and founded by secret esoteric orders to spread enlightenment and liberty to the world.

In 1928, Hall attained underground fame when, at the remarkably young age of twenty-seven, he published “The Secret Teachings of All Ages,” a massive codex to the mystical and esoteric philosophies of antiquity. Exploring subjects from Native American mythology to Pythagorean mathematics to the geometry of ancient Egypt, this encyclopedia arcanaremains the unparalleled guidebook to ancient symbols and esoteric thought. “The Secret Teachings” won the admiration of figures ranging from General John Pershing to Elvis Presley. Novelist Dan Brown cites it as a key source.

Proof 

http://m.imgur.com/q5xlGxf

Even more proof

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6bVa6jn4rpE

No one talks about this I wonder why??

I guess my enlightenment is consuming McDonalds and Pepsi till I die

 


 

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 20:13 | 6012885 kchrisc
kchrisc's picture

Good comment, but I must add that not only do I know little about the occult, or mysticism, but since my main mission is to inform, I would never resort to using it in a discussion with a sheeple. You shouldn't as well.

That is not to say you should not have an interest in it, or even that you should not share it within your circle of friends, but if you want to awaken someone, the occult, mysticism, and related, along with aliens, will just turn them off.

One must keep it to hard facts, with verifiable evidence. Evidence, not proof, as proof is open to interpretation. The key is real evidence, or at least real enough for a sheeple to grasp.

So the videos of the Twin-Towers nearly free-falling is evidence open to interpretation. "Back and to the left" is evidence that is open to interpretation. Some inscribed book full of statements and symbols is not evidence. It is not open to interpretation, only to belief or disbelief.

My friends and I discuss these type things occasionally, but none of us would ever discuss them with a person whose attention we were trying to get.

I am NOT attacking your, or anyone else's, beliefs, just indicating that their is a time and a place for such discussions. And when trying to get a sheeple to take what you have to say about the state of things is not the time of the place.

Liberty is a demand. Tyranny is submission.

 

Note: I did not down-arrow you, as you took the time to write an articulate comment that added to the discussion, whether I agreed or not, and did not subtract.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 20:53 | 6013039 nailgunnin4you
nailgunnin4you's picture

 ^^^ shilluminati!!

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:24 | 6012549 richiebaby
richiebaby's picture

Godzilla vs Mothra  Rothschild vs Buffett?

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:27 | 6012558 suteibu
suteibu's picture

"vs"....riiiight.  The only person getting in trouble over this is the BOE idiot who dared to ask the question.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 18:28 | 6012566 ekm1
ekm1's picture

Rothchilds are defunct. Rockefellers are defunct.

Current oligarchs are Koch bros, Adelson, Bill Gates etc.

 

Koch bros are MORTAL enemies with Buffett.

 

This is absolutely stunning.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 19:30 | 6012740 nailgunnin4you
nailgunnin4you's picture

You're getting your signals crossed buddy. Financiers own capitalists, do you honestly think the Koch brothers even register on the rothschildian radar? Those idiot Koch brothers have to create gov-enforced monopolies to get their bread, that takes time and money (money they pray the banks will loan them). A rothschild can create money out of thin air and loan it to a country at interest. Their power, like any bankowner, is unrivalled by mere businessmen/capitalists who are forced to provide goods or services, however dubious, to earn money. Gates, Koch et al can only ever hope to be comfortable serfs in this bankster world, and their best chance to remain comfortable is to do the bidding of the very bankers you perceive to be defunct. 

 

What good is $100 billion in 2015 when in 2030 $100b buys you a loaf of bread? 'Rich' people are just like us, except they have more to lose if they trip up on the banker's hampster wheel.

 

Those who must go to great lengths to hide their true wealth and power, are the truly wealthy and powerful.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 19:01 | 6012656 WTFUD
WTFUD's picture

. . . and under that kindly old facade lurks a parasitic sociopath second only to Rothschild. Filthy Cunt who's pulling McStain & Neocon Strings. Die Hard you BASTARD.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 20:08 | 6012878 RichardParker
RichardParker's picture

Some pearls of wisdom to the plebes coutesy of Chuckie Munger;

“Hit the economy with enough misery and enough disruption, destroy the currency, and God knows what happens,” Munger said. “So I think when you have troubles like that you shouldn’t be bitching about a little bailout. You should have been thinking it should have been bigger.”

There’s danger in just shoveling out money to people who say, ‘My life is a little harder than it used to be...  At a certain place you’ve got to say to the people, ‘Suck it in and cope, buddy. Suck it in and cope.’""

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2010-09-20/berkshire-s-munger-say...

I'm amazed that no one has ever tried to drive a stake through this vampire's heart. LOL

 

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 21:42 | 6013176 Livermore Legend
Livermore Legend's picture

Indeed....

On all 3........

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 22:49 | 6013331 razorthin
razorthin's picture

I can't wait until the next financial shit storm when it becomes Berkshire Halfaway and that skinking Methuselah comes out of his cave never more.

Mon, 04/20/2015 - 23:04 | 6013398 gagasonnoni
gagasonnoni's picture

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Tue, 04/21/2015 - 04:45 | 6013776 jmcadg
jmcadg's picture

Give the man a break. He bailed out the whole paradigm by giving up his physical silver. That's one world patriotism right there!

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