A wide range of sweeping changes to the 401(k) system were proposed Tuesday at a hearing on how the market crisis has devastated retirement savings plans.
The House of Representatives on Friday approved a $700 billion bailout package and passed it along to President Bush who immediately signed it into law.
A program that allows seniors to make charitable contributions from their individual retirement accounts was extended to 2009.
The Senate breathed new life into the government’s scuttled $700 billion bailout package this evening when it approved a modified version of the bill by a vote of 74 to 25.
Two days after the House rejected a $700 billion financial services bailout bill by a vote of 228 to 205, the Senate will be voting this evening on a slightly revised package in the hopes of pushing the controversial legislation forward.
Financial advisers, economists, and others fear that the country may plunge into a deep recession — and possibly even a depression — if congressional leaders don’t hammer out an alternative rescue plan following Monday’s failed vote.
“It matters little what path a bill takes to become law. What matters is that we get a law,” said President Bush today.
“We need to work as quickly as possible to get something done as soon as possible,” he told reporters at the White House after the financial bailout bill defeat yesterday.
The proposal includes boosting FDIC insurance limits on bank deposits, changing the SEC rules on mark-to-market fair value accounting, launching a net worth certificate program, resurrecting the old security transfer tax and introducing a mechanism to stem to the flood of foreclosures.
The House of Representatives approved legislation yesterday that would relieve about 25 million middle-class taxpayers from paying the alternative minimum tax this year.
“The last six months ... have made abundantly clear that voluntary regulation doesn’t work,” Mr. Cox said in prepared testimony at a hearing of the Senate Banking Committee.
Lawmakers must take steps stabilize a financial situation that could pose “very serious consequences” for the U.S. “financial markets and for our economy," said Fed chief Ben Bernanke.
The historic bailout may be as low as $100 billion to $200 billion, rather than the $700 billion being requested by the administration, House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank, D-Mass. said yesterday.
A group of the world's largest hedge funds are planning to sue the Financial Services Authority for millions of pounds of losses allegedly resulting from the regulator's ban on short selling, according to a report in the Sunday Telegraph.
U.S. markets are poised to open sharply higher this morning after top government officials from the administration and Congress announced a several actions last night intended fight the mounting financial crisis, according to published reports.
Legislation that would set up the Office of Insurance Information within the Department of the Treasury has stalled in the House.
The chief executive of a subprime lender who lost a $65 million lawsuit against Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc. is demanding another bite at the apple.
The Securities and Exchange Commission would have explicit power to bar people associated with investment advisory firms for violating securities law under legislation unanimously approved yesterday by the House of Representatives.
The office of New York insurance superintendent James Wrynn has ordered embattled bond insurer Financial Guaranty Insurance Co. to halt claims payments.
Don Saxon leaves amid allegations that his agency let thousands of convicted criminals work in the mortgage business.
