Are Banks in trouble?

              The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (F.D.I.C) closed 5 banks recently bringing the total number to 39 for the year.  The F.D.I.C shut down banks in Florida, Georgia and Michigan last Friday, a total of five closures. The F.D.I.C seized First National Bank of Central Florida, based in Winter Park, with $352 million in assets and Cortez Community Bank of Brooksville, Florida, with $70.9 million in assets.  In 2010, authorities seized 157 banks that succumbed to mounting soured loans and the hobbled economy.  Florida and Georgia have been the hardest hit states for bank failures this year.  A total of twenty-nine banks were shut down in Florida last year and 16 in Georgia.  Counting the shutdowns recently on Friday, four Florida banks have been closed this year alone and 10 in Georgia.  It was the most in a year since the savings and loan crisis which happened over two decades ago.  Which makes you wonder if our hard earned money is safer stuffed under our mattresses at home then in our banks?  The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation does insure your money up to a sum of 250,000 dollars if the banks do fail.  With many banks being closed down this early in the year, it does raise awareness of our current economic crisis we are dealing with as a nation.  With our economy still struggling you can guarantee the F.D.I.C will seize more banks by the end of the year. 

We Do Need To Try Harder

After I read your article http://thebrainofbryan.blogspot.com/, I cannot help but also too realize the problems with our education system today.  When I was in high school I could also recall walking the stage telling myself how did that one individual earn enough credits to graduate when he or she wasn't present half of the time.  The nations education system has fallen over the last couple of decades and are struggling to keep up with other foreign countries education.  Compared to other foreign nations, the United States has the biggest education spending budget which spent an estimated 26.5 billion alone in 2002.  With all this government spending on education you cannot help but ask yourself what is the problem?  I also believe having the best qualified teachers for the job would also help with the problem.  Attendance is another problem with our public schooling, most schools are way to soft on this matter.  The Government pays the schools based on the number of students walk across the stage.  Teachers just don't have the passion for teaching anymore and don't care to watch their students succeed.  We are not preparing our students for the real world but sheltering them from the reality.  We have the funding and resources for our students to succeed in life with a good education, our teachers just need to challenge the students more.      

The Truth to the Federal Reserve Bailout

             At the height of the financial crisis in the fall of 2008, the Federal Reserve loaned as much as 3 trillion dollars worth through its "discount" loan window.  Hardly any loans are now being made through the program because banks are in stronger financial shape and economic conditions have improved.  Earlier this week the government released the names of the company's and banks that received bailout money.  The biggest borrowers from the 97 year old discount window as the program reached its crisis era peak were foreign banks.  Accounting for at least 70 percent of the $110.7 billion borrowed during the week in October 2008 when use of the program surged to a new record.  

            The central bank is being forced to take the action because commercial banks had lost a court battle to keep the information private.  With the current turmoil happening in Libya, a current company part owned by the central bank of Libya also received a substantial sum of bailout money.  Six European banks were among the top 11 companies that sold the most debt overall for a combined 274.1 billion to the Commercial Paper Funding Facility.  The disclosures may stoke a reexamination of the risks posed to United States taxpayers by the central bank’s role in global financial markets.  Other foreign discount window borrowers on October 29, 2008, included Society Generale (GLE)SA, France’s second largest bank, and Norinchukin Bank, which finances and provides services to Japanese agricultural, fishing and forestry cooperatives.  A Paris based Society Generale borrowed $5 billion that day, and Tokyo based Norinchukin borrowed $6 billion. 

              Makes you think what is our government doing passing out money that we don't have to foreign banks and companies over seas?  We have our own financial problems here in the United States with hard working citizens not being able to pay their mortgage's on their homes and the unemployment rate being so high.  The problem with our government is that they are always putting other foreign countries problems first and not focusing about ours first as a country.