http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troubl...am#Timeline_of_changes_to_the_initial_program
Timeline of changes to the initial program
On October 14, 2008, Secretary of the Treasury Paulson and President Bush separately announced revisions in the TARP program. The Treasury announced their intention to buy senior preferred stock and warrants in the nine largest American banks. The shares would qualify as Tier 1 capital and were non-voting shares. To qualify for this program, the Treasury required participating institutions to meet certain criteria, including: "(1) ensuring that incentive compensation for senior executives does not encourage unnecessary and excessive risks that threaten the value of the financial institution; (2) required clawback of any bonus or incentive compensation paid to a senior executive based on statements of earnings, gains or other criteria that are later proven to be materially inaccurate; (3) prohibition on the financial institution from making any golden parachute payment to a senior executive based on the Internal Revenue Code provision; and (4) agreement not to deduct for tax purposes executive compensation in excess of $500,000 for each senior executive."[7] The Treasury also bought preferred stock and warrants from hundreds of smaller banks, using the first $250 billion dollars allotted to the program.[8]
The first allocation of the TARP money was primarily used to buy preferred stock, which is similar to debt in that it gets paid before common equity shareholders. This has led some economists to argue that the plan may be ineffective in inducing banks to lend efficiently.[9][10]
In the original plan presented by Secretary Paulson, the government would buy troubled (toxic) assets in insolvent banks and then sell them at auction to private investor and/or companies. This plan was scratched when Paulson met with England's Prime Minister Gordon Brown who came to the White House for an international summit on the global credit crisis.[citation needed] Prime Minister Brown, in an attempt to mitigate the credit squeeze in England, merely infused capital into banks via preferred stock in order to clean up their balance sheets and, in some economists' view, effectively nationalizing many banks. This plan seemed attractive to Secretary Paulson in that it was relatively easier and seemingly boosted lending more quickly. The first half of the asset purchases may not be effective in getting banks to lend again because they were reluctant to risk lending as before with low lending standards. To make matters worse, overnight lending to other banks came to a relative hault because banks did not trust each other to be prudent with their money.[citation needed]
On November 12, 2008, Secretary of the Treasury Henry Paulson indicated that reviving the securitization market for consumer credit would be a new priority in the second allotment.[11][12]
On December 19, 2008, President Bush used his executive authority to declare that TARP funds may be spent on any program he personally deems necessary to avert the financial crisis. This has allowed President Bush to extend the use of TARP funds to support the auto industry, a move supported by the United Auto Workers.
On December 31, 2008, the Treasury issued a report reviewing Section 102, the Troubled Assets Insurance Financing Fund, also known as the "Asset Guarantee Program." The report indicated that the program would likely not be made "widely available."[13]
On January 15, 2009, the Treasury issued interim final rules for reporting and record keeping requirements under the executive compensation standards of the CPP.[14]
On January 21, 2009, the Treasury announced new regulations regarding disclosure and mitigation of conflicts of interest in its TARP contracting. [15]
On February 5, 2009, the Senate approved changes to the TARP that prohibit firms receiving TARP funds from paying bonuses to their 25 highest-paid employees. The amendment was proposed by Christopher Dodd of Connecticut as an amendment to the $900 billion economic stimulus act yet to be passed. [16]
On February 10, 2009, the newly confirmed Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner outlined his plan to use the $300 billion or so dollars remaining in the TARP funds. He intended to use $50 billion for foreclosure mitigation and use the rest to help fund private investors to buy toxic assets from banks. Nevertheless, this highly anticipated speech coincided with a nearly 5 percent drop in the S&P 500 and was criticized for being short on details.[17]
On March 23, 2009, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner announced a Public-Private Investment Program (P-PIP) to buy toxic assets from banks' balance sheets. The major stock market indexes in the United States rallied on the day of the announcement rising by over six percent with the shares of bank stocks leading the way. [18] P-PIP has two primary programs. The Legacy Loans Program will attempt to buy residential loans from bank's balance sheets. The FDIC will provide non-recourse loan guarantees for up to 85 percent of the purchase price of legacy loans. Private sector asset managers and the U.S. Treasury will provide the remaining assets. The second program is called the legacy securities program, which will buy mortgage backed securities (RMBS) that were originally rated AAA and commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) and asset-backed securities (ABS) which are rated AAA. The funds will come in many instances in equal parts from the U.S. Treasury's Troubled Asset Relief Program monies, private investors, and from loans from the Federal Reserve's Term Asset Lending Facility (TALF). The initial size of the Public Private Investment Partnership is projected to be $500 billion.[19] Economist and Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman has been very critical of this program arguing the non-recourse loans lead to a hidden subsidy that will be split by asset managers, banks' shareholders and creditors.[20] Banking analyst Meridith Whitney argues that banks will not sell bad assets at fair market values because they are reluctant to take asset write downs.[21] Removing toxic assets would also reduce the volatility of banks' stock prices. This lost volatility will hurt the stock price of distressed banks. Therefore, such banks will only sell toxic assets at above market prices.[22]
On April 19, the Obama administration outlined the conversion of Banks Bailouts to Equity Share