Wednesday, September 30, 2009  Guaranteed by the FDIC!  The
point of my post yesterday about the FDIC was not to point out
that the FDIC is broke - everyone knew that. The FDIC's release
yesterday gave us some serious insight into just how bad the
financial situation is: the FDIC's estimates for losses continue
to grow, and their time frame for replenishing the DIF (Deposit
Insurance Fund) continues to be pushed out. In addition, the
assets held by the FDIC are deteriorating in quality. The
scariest thing to me is that the FDIC continues to try to
disguise the health of the banks by using accounting tricks -
like allowing them to spread out the prepayment of FDIC fees
over three years when recognizing the costs, and failing to
charge the banks a special assessment to replenish the DIF.
Then, after I wrote the post, I came across this gem via
Calculated Risk: "Citigroup Inc. (C) priced a $5 billion
government-backed bond Tuesday, its second benchmark-sized bond
offering this month under the U.S. Federal Depos