AIG Update: Bush TARP Loans Repaid in Full With Billions in Interest

Back in April 2009, my brother Joe Hoft contributed this guest post here at Gateway Pundit – Setting the Record Straight on AIG – where he argued that AIG, Citibank and other companies had come under a great deal of pressure by the same people who had the most to do with getting these companies in their current predicament in the first place. Joe added:

The Bush administration went to Congress more than 10 times in the years preceding this disaster (17 times in 2008 alone), asking for a review and changes to Freddie and Fannie with no avail. Bush then stepped in and offered loans to several of these institutions in order for them to stay afloat. The goal was to push liquidity back in the market place. One of the largest insurance companies in the world – AIG, came calling and the government offered them a loan. Loans were given to other entities as well. The key here is that these entities were given loans not grants.

Well recently AIG paid off its debt to America – every dollar.

Today my brother Joe sent this in:

I told you so –

AIG has paid off its debt to the nation. According to the InsuranceJournal.com, “Since September 2008, America committed a total of $182.3 billion in connection with stabilizing AIG during the financial crisis. Since then, through asset sales and other actions by AIG, the Federal Reserve, and the U.S. Department of the Treasury, the government recovered the $182.3 billion, plus a combined positive return of $22.7 billion – for a sum total of $205 billion. On Dec. 14, 2012, the U.S. Treasury sold its last remaining shares of AIG stock for proceeds of approximately $7.6 billion.”

Per propublica.org now the country has only $155 billion in outstanding loans from the TARP and related programs put in place to stabilize the economy in 2008. The banks and insurance companies have repaid their debts and then some. The government actually made money on these loans. The remaining balance can be attributed to four entities – Fannie, Freddie, General (Govt) Motors and a small amount to Chrysler. It’s doubtful whether these loans will ever be repaid.

This saga raises some questions –

Will all those who jumped on the Democratic band wagon that complained about the money lost to AIG but never said a word about Fannie, Freddie and the auto bailouts, now repent? Will there finally be public outrage of the huge salaries at Freddie and Fannie given to the like of Raines and others who then went to work for Obama? When Democratic strategists talk about budget deficits will they now note that the majority of the 2008 deficit under GW has been repaid in the Obama years? It’s doubtful the answers to these questions will ever be ‘yes’.

Joe Hoft moved to Hong Kong in 2012 after he was asked to set up a regional Asia Pacific department for his company. As Executive Director Asia Pacific Global Audit, Joe travels from Tokyo to Sydney, attends Board Audit Committees and works with corporate management throughout the region. His company is one of the largest corporations in the US.

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Jim Hoft is the founder and editor of The Gateway Pundit, one of the top conservative news outlets in America. Jim was awarded the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award in 2013 and is the proud recipient of the Breitbart Award for Excellence in Online Journalism from the Americans for Prosperity Foundation in May 2016. In 2023, The Gateway Pundit received the Most Trusted Print Media Award at the American Liberty Awards.

You can email Jim Hoft here, and read more of Jim Hoft's articles here.

 

Thanks for sharing!