Anyone knows the interest rate of those loans ? I thought they were very low but a friend recently mentionned over 5% , hence the banks repaid the loans swiftly ?!?
They never loaned the money out to stimulate a recovery, they invested the money, paid themselves off in bonuses, and gave the money back.
I recall the loans being 0.1% and the banks loaned the money back to our govt at 2%. TALP was even a sourer deal for tax payers assigning upside down assets to the treasury and allowing profitable assets to be kept by the bailee.
Thanks Pocketchange, that's also the idea I had. Googling the issue, I came up with the following links, mentioning high TARP rates, like 7% to GM: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2010/04/23/did-general-motors-really-repay-taxpayer-bailout/ http://www.torquenews.com/106/chrysler-repays-tarp-loans-six-years-early I will google further information later on.
I particularly like Matt Taibbi's take and reporting of some of these issues: http://www.rollingstone.com/politic...-look-whos-cashing-in-on-the-bailout-20110411