Bear Stearns was on the receiving end of an indirect loan from the Federal Reserve on Friday. Though Bear is the fifth-largest securities firm in the U.S. (and the ninth largest bank in the world), it’s an investment bank, not a commercial lender. The Fed can’t loan directly to investment banks, so the loan had to be routed through a willing third-party, in this case JP Morgan. It turns out that last week’s big US$200 billion loan facility was probably set up to make this three-way transaction possible.
March 17th, 2008 |
Dan Denning |
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Continued