Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Former Citigroup CEO Weill: Break up the banks

Sandy Weill, the former Citigroup chairman and CEO credited with building the bank into a financial superpower, now says big banks should be split up.

In a wide-ranging CNBC interview, Weill suggested investment banks should be split from banks that provide retail and commercial banking services.

That’s an unusual outlook from Weill, who pushed the government to overturn the Glass-Steagall law that requires deposit-taking institutions to separate from risky investment banks.

The law was put in place after the 1929 stock market crash.

Citigroup became one of the nation’s problems during the financial crisis -- a poster-child for “too big to fail” with the government spending $45 billion trying to keep it afloat.
Read the rest here.

3 comments:

The Archer of the Forest said...

No argument here.

Anonymous said...

Any bank CEO who suggests breaking up the banks must be expecting a big personal financial gain from it.
Angela

Anonymous said...

As an employee of one of Mr. Weill's biggest competitors - who would likely loose his position in a break up - he is correct. Personal gain or not, TBTF does not work in our economy. CEO's and senior executives must feel the hot breath of failure on their necks. I only wish politicians could be held similarly accountable.

Nikolaus