Professor Explains Financial Crisis, Part 1

In his January 24th New York Times column, Six Errors on the Path to the Financial Crisis, Alan S. Blinder, professor of Economics and Public Affairs at Princeton University, briefly summarizes the causes of the Financial Crisis. He uses a chronological approach, listing the decisions (and the alternative advice that was ignored).

According to Blinder, the cause of our troubles “was largely a series of avoidable — yes, avoidable — human errors. Recognizing and understanding these errors will help us fix the system so that it doesn’t malfunction so badly again.”

Here is a summary of his article.

Wild Derivatives. Rather than regulate these arcane financial instruments, as Brooksley E. Born, then chairwoman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission recommended in 1998, “top officials of the Treasury Department, the Federal Reserve and the Securities and Exchange Commission squelched the idea. … Does anyone doubt that the financial turmoil would have been less severe if derivatives trading had acquired a zookeeper a decade ago?”

Sky-High Leverage.  In 2004, the S.E.C. let securities firms raise their leverage sharply. Had leverage stayed at previous levels, “these firms wouldn’t have grown as big or been as fragile.”

A Subprime Surge. “The next error came in stages, from 2004 to 2007, as subprime lending grew from a small corner of the mortgage market into a large, dangerous one. Lending standards fell disgracefully, and dubious transactions became common.”

Foreclosures. “The government’s continuing failure to do anything large and serious to limit foreclosures is tragic. …Free-market ideology, denial and an unwillingness to commit taxpayer funds all played roles. Sadly, the problem should now be much smaller than it is.”

Letting Lehman Go. “The next whopper came in September, when Lehman Brothers, unlike Bear Stearns before it, was allowed to fail. … Everything fell apart after Lehman.”

“After Lehman went over the cliff, no financial institution seemed safe. So lending froze, and the economy sank like a stone. It was a colossal error, and many people said so at the time.”

TARP’S Detour. “The final major error is mismanagement of the Troubled Asset Relief Program, the $700 billion bailout fund. … Instead of pursuing the TARP’s intended purposes, (Henry M. Paulson Jr., the former Treasury Secretary), used most of the funds to inject capital into banks — which he did poorly.”

Conclusion

Six fateful decisions — all made the wrong way. Imagine what the world would be like now if the housing bubble burst but those six things were different: if derivatives were traded on organized exchanges, if leverage were far lower, if subprime lending were smaller and done responsibly, if strong actions to limit foreclosures were taken right away, if Lehman were not allowed to fail, and if the TARP funds were used as directed.

All of this was possible. And if history had gone that way, I believe that the financial world and the economy would look far less grim than they do today.