Imagine Citi Group, America's 3rd biggest bank, with a 27% stake held by the government, went hostlile and took over Goldman, Americas 5th biggest bank. Imagine the reason for going hostile was that GS and its management had been pissing the government off for a number of years.It soon transpires that GS has been cooking the books and that Lloyd Blankfein had done a runner. Imagine the outcry if because of this hostile takeover Citi needed yet another bailout! I am going to assume we are all capitalists on this site. Capitalism can not work in a world of government bailouts. Also I can assure Seeking Alpha 2 that Andre Borodin will be sharing a cell with Khodorkovsky. Nothing wrong with being a billionaire...but when you got there by financially sodomising your country don't think the government hasn't made a little note of it in their little black book of vengeance.
Yes, but as I wrote above, (1) it's not happening in an English-speaking country, so (unfortunately) it's not of interest to many people (2) given the bailouts seen since 2008, (unfortunately) people are used to governments giving free money to banks
I suppose, in these very strange economic times, it's just very naive of me to want businesses, large or small, to be held financially accountable for the decisions they make...
unfortunately in the eyes of governments and central banks, failing banks are a special case, and deserve a big stash of free money from taxpayers.
It's not in Western press because to run this story would be equal to recognizing Russia as a viable state with a working economy and this bailout as a "shock". In Western eyes, Russia isn't, and consequently, this bailout ain't much of a shock in a country of widespread corruption. And it's true. Now if they ran a story on how the Yeltsin family had robbed 150 million people, that would be something. But when that money sits in your banks, why bother?