Bailout

Geithner in the hot seat

By Felix Salmon

The New York Fed has announced that its decision to try to squelch AIG disclosures had nothing whatsoever to do with Tim Geithner. Who was the president and CEO of the bank at the time, and is famous for his attention to detail. But Geithner had every opportunity, both at the Fed and at Treasury, to agitate for greater transparency and for the release of even more emails. He never did so, and my feeling is that if nobody asked him about the AIG disclosures it was because there was no need to do so: his attitude to such things was clear.

It’s going to be very interesting to see Geithner’s congressional testimony on this subject. The Fed statement hints at one of those “I had no idea what my subordinates were doing” defenses, which is going to look pretty bad. But what alternative does he have? “The US public couldn’t handle the truth”?

Full post as published by Macroprudential on January 08, 2010 (boomark / email).