focus: imperium

Today the leaders of JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs journeyed to Capitol Hill to answer questions before the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission. Here is a short round-up of the best questions from the three-hour grilling:

"If, as the crisis showed, the overleveraging of financial institutions was one of the contributing factors in the crisis, why are you opposed to a strict cap on the leverage (debt) a financial institution can take on?"

"Given the huge risks you have taken during the crisis, should investment banking and retail banking co-exist in the same institution? Why shouldn't proprietary trading-bets with a bank's own money- be outlawed?"

You may link the FCIC's website here. They have full transcripts of all hearings and some cool reports and figures and other good stuff. Cha cha!!

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Al-Qaeda has been linked to an international network of private jets used to transport drugs and weapons according to a Homeland Security report viewed by Rueters. The covert fleet consists of twin-engine, executive jets and Boeing 727's that ferry illicit cargo from South America to Africa en route to Europe. Since 2006, 10 aircraft have been discovered using a specific flight route attributed to al-Qaeda trafficking. The report indicates that the planes were discovered purely by chance and warns that the actual number of aircraft is much larger.

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2009 witnessed the most Afghan civilian causalities since the US toppled the Taliban government in late 2001. 2,412 civilians were killed in "war-related violence" according to a report by the UN Assistance Mission for Afghanistan. 70% of fatalities were caused by Taliban attacks while 25% were caused by pro-government forces. There has been a 28% reduction in deaths by the International Security Assistance Forces since 2008.

A pdf of the UN Assistance Mission's full report is available here.

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The authorities are having trouble deporting a radical Jamaican-born Muslim cleric because international airlines have refused to take him and Tanzania refused Kenya’s attempt to send him there, officials said Tuesday. The cleric, Abdullah el-Faisal, who officials say may have inspired the Nigerian man accused of trying to bomb an American airliner last month, had entered Kenya from Tanzania. “We have no intention of allowing him to enter into our country,” Tanzania’s Home Affairs minister, Lawrence Masha, said, saying no formal request had been made.

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Asian stock markets have fallen upon the news that China will increase capital requirements for its banks. Investors and governments around the world percieve a general tightening in Chinese fiscal stimulus as the country appears to the be leading the way upwards, out of last year's recession.