The Obama Administration desperately wants a strong economic recovery, or so it says, but does it have any idea how to encourage one?
It says it wants job growth, but its policies keep raising the cost of creating new jobs. It says it wants small business to take risks, but it keeps reducing the rewards if those risks succeed.
And it says it wants banks to lend more money, even as it keeps threatening to punish bankers if they make too many bad loans or make too much money.
If there is a lack of lending by banks to small businesses, the President might consider cutting out the CEO middlemen and speaking directly to the regulators who work for him.
Forcing banks to write down the value of small-business loans that are still performing has become the specialty of bank regulators who are now trying to make up for the bubble years. Whenever a commercial building serves as collateral, no matter the quality of the borrower, the loan becomes suspect.
The result is a reduction in bank capital, a disincentive to make the next loan and perhaps even a calling of the loan, forcing a sale of the property.
Operating with perfect pro-cyclical precision, regulators who were asleep during the housing boom and its epidemic of liar loans now target current loans to companies with steady cash-flow.
This does not encourage new lending.
Meanwhile, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke's near-zero-rate interest policy encourages banks to borrow cheaply and then invest in safe long-end Treasurys instead of riskier commercial loans.
The Obama Treasury has explicitly supported this Fed policy as a way for banks to play the yield curve to rebuild their balance sheets.
Mr. Obama summed up his White House meeting with the bank CEOs by once again blaming them for the financial crisis and suggesting that they have an obligation to support regulation written by Barney Frank (D., Mass.) and Senator Chris Dodd (D., Conn.).
You have to smile at that irony.
No two Members of Congress did more to encourage the financial crisis, by preventing reform of the government-sponsored housing behemoths Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
By ignoring Washington's role in creating the credit mania, Mr. Obama is hardly offering confidence that his financial reform efforts will prevent a repeat.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704869304574596092863514668.html