In finance, a credit derivative refers to any one of "various instruments and techniques designed to separate and then transfer the credit risk" or the risk of an event of default of a corporate or sovereign borrower, transferring it to an entity other than the lender or debtholder.
The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company. Founded in 1869, Goldman Sachs is headquartered in Lower Manhattan in New York City, with regional headquarters in many international financial centers. Goldman Sachs is the second largest investment bank in the world by revenue and is ranked 55th on the Fortune 500 list of the largest United States corporations by total revenue. In Forbes Global 2000 2023, Goldman Sachs ranked 34th. It is considered a systemically important financial institution by the Financial Stability Board.
A collateralized debt obligation (CDO) is a type of structured asset-backed security (ABS). Originally developed as instruments for the corporate debt markets, after 2002 CDOs became vehicles for refinancing mortgage-backed securities (MBS). Like other private label securities backed by assets, a CDO can be thought of as a promise to pay investors in a prescribed sequence, based on the cash flow the CDO collects from the pool of bonds or other assets it owns. Distinctively, CDO credit risk is typically assessed based on a probability of default (PD) derived from ratings on those bonds or assets.
The American subprime mortgage crisis was a multinational financial crisis that occurred between 2007 and 2010 that contributed to the 2007–2008 global financial crisis. The crisis led to a severe economic recession, with millions losing their jobs and many businesses going bankrupt. The U.S. government intervened with a series of measures to stabilize the financial system, including the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).
A synthetic CDO is a variation of a CDO that generally uses credit default swaps and other derivatives to obtain its investment goals. As such, it is a complex derivative financial security sometimes described as a bet on the performance of other mortgage products, rather than a real mortgage security. The value and payment stream of a synthetic CDO is derived not from cash assets, like mortgages or credit card payments – as in the case of a regular or "cash" CDO—but from premiums paying for credit default swap "insurance" on the possibility of default of some defined set of "reference" securities—based on cash assets. The insurance-buying "counterparties" may own the "reference" securities and be managing the risk of their default, or may be speculators who've calculated that the securities will default.
This article provides background information regarding the subprime mortgage crisis. It discusses subprime lending, foreclosures, risk types, and mechanisms through which various entities involved were affected by the crisis.
Credit rating agencies and the subprime crisis is the impact of credit rating agencies (CRAs) in the American subprime mortgage crisis of 2007–2008 that led to the financial crisis of 2007–2008.
AIG Financial Products Corporation (AIGFP) is a subsidiary of the American International Group, headquartered in New York, New York, with major operations in London. The collapse of AIG Financial Products, headquartered in Wilton, Connecticut, is considered to have played a pivotal role in the global financial crisis of 2008–2009.
The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission (FCIC) was a ten-member commission appointed by the leaders of the United States Congress with the goal of investigating the causes of the financial crisis of 2007–2008. The Commission has been nicknamed the Angelides Commission after the chairman, Phil Angelides. The commission has been compared to the Pecora Commission, which investigated the causes of the Great Depression in the 1930s, and has been nicknamed the New Pecora Commission. Analogies have also been made to the 9/11 Commission, which examined the September 11 attacks. The commission had the ability to subpoena documents and witnesses for testimony, a power that the Pecora Commission had but the 9/11 Commission did not. The first public hearing of the commission was held on January 13, 2010, with the presentation of testimony from various banking officials. Hearings continued during 2010 with "hundreds" of other persons in business, academia, and government testifying.
Magnetar Capital is a hedge fund based in Evanston, Illinois. The firm was founded in 2005 and invests in fixed-income, energy, quantitative, and event-driven strategies. The firm was actively involved in the collateralized debt obligation (CDO) market during the 2006–2007 period. In some articles critical of Magnetar Capital, the firm's arbitrage strategy for CDOs is described as the "Magnetar trade".
Inside Job is a 2010 American documentary film, directed by Charles Ferguson, about the late-2000s financial crisis. Ferguson, who began researching in 2008, said the film is about "the systemic corruption of the United States by the financial services industry and the consequences of that systemic corruption", amongst them conflicts of interest of academic research, which led to improved disclosure standards by the American Economic Association. In five parts, the film explores how changes in the policy environment and banking practices helped create the financial crisis.
Maiden Lane Transactions refers to three limited liability companies created by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in 2008 as financial vehicles to facilitate transactions involving three entities: the former Bear Stearns company as the first entity, the lending division of the former American International Group (AIG) as the second, and the former AIG's credit default swap division as the third. The name Maiden Lane was taken from the street on the north side of the Federal Reserve Bank's Manhattan location.
Many factors directly and indirectly serve as the causes of the Great Recession that started in 2008 with the US subprime mortgage crisis. The major causes of the initial subprime mortgage crisis and the following recession include lax lending standards contributing to the real-estate bubbles that have since burst; U.S. government housing policies; and limited regulation of non-depository financial institutions. Once the recession began, various responses were attempted with different degrees of success. These included fiscal policies of governments; monetary policies of central banks; measures designed to help indebted consumers refinance their mortgage debt; and inconsistent approaches used by nations to bail out troubled banking industries and private bondholders, assuming private debt burdens or socializing losses.
Steven Eisman is an American businessman and investor known for having shorted collateralized debt obligations (CDOs), thereby profiting from the collapse of the US housing bubble in 2007–2008.
The 2007–2008 financial crisis, or the global financial crisis (GFC), was the most severe worldwide economic crisis since the Great Depression. Predatory lending in the form of subprime mortgages targeting low-income homebuyers, excessive risk-taking by global financial institutions, a continuous buildup of toxic assets within banks, and the bursting of the United States housing bubble culminated in a "perfect storm", which led to the Great Recession.
Merrill, previously branded Merrill Lynch, is an American investment management and wealth management division of Bank of America. Along with BofA Securities, the investment banking arm, both firms engage in prime brokerage and broker-dealer activities. The firm is headquartered in New York City, and once occupied the entire 34 stories of 250 Vesey Street, part of the Brookfield Place complex in Manhattan. Merrill employs over 14,000 financial advisors and manages $2.8 trillion in client assets. The company also operates Merrill Edge, a division for investment and related services, including call center counsultancy.
The Big Short is a 2015 American biographical crime comedy-drama film directed and co-written by Adam McKay. Co-written by Charles Randolph, it is based on the 2010 book The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine by Michael Lewis showing how the 2007–2008 financial crisis was triggered by the United States housing bubble. The film stars Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling, and Brad Pitt, with John Magaro, Finn Wittrock, Hamish Linklater, Rafe Spall, Jeremy Strong, and Marisa Tomei in supporting roles.
Howard Hubler III, known as Howie Hubler, is an American former Morgan Stanley bond trader who is best known for his role in the fifth largest trading loss in history. He made a successful short trade in risky subprime mortgages in the U.S., but to fund his trade he sold insurance on AAA-rated mortgage-backed collateralized debt obligations that market analysts considered less risky, but also turned out to be worthless, resulting in a massive net loss on his trades. His actions while handling credit default swaps (CDS) directly resulted in the loss of roughly US$9 billion during the 2007–08 financial crisis—the largest single trading loss in Wall Street history when adjusted for inflation, and the largest at the time. The only bigger single losses in nominal terms came in 2012 with Bruno Iksil and in 2021 when Bill Hwang lost around $10 billion on total return swaps.
Goldman Sachs, an investment bank, has been the subject of controversies. The company has been criticized for lack of ethical standards, working with dictatorial regimes, close relationships with the U.S. federal government via a "revolving door" of former employees, and driving up prices of commodities through futures speculation. It has also been criticized by its employees for 100-hour work weeks, high levels of employee dissatisfaction among first-year analysts, abusive treatment by superiors, a lack of mental health resources, and extremely high levels of stress in the workplace leading to physical discomfort.
