Banking Industry Structure essay

Banking Industry Structure essay Banking Industry Structure essay Banking Industry Structure essayTwo regulations that had a particularly strong impact on the banking industry in the United States were the Glass-Steagall Act (GSA) passed in 1933 that prohibited banking organizations to get involved into both investment banking and commercial banking industry, and the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) passed in 1999 that repealed the prohibition of GSA to combine investment and commercial banking. The critics of the GLBA state that it was the cause of the banking industry crisis and financial recession in 2007-2009, and that repealing the GSA was a mistake. However, analysis shows that the key factors that caused the crisis were unaffected by the GLBA and that the passage of the GLBA in fact reduced the impact of crisis on the banking industry due to greater diversification of banking services and portfolios. So, repealing the Glass-Steagall act was not a mistake, but rather a correct and timely measure that made the banking industry more competitive an d helped alleviate the impact of the crisis to a small extent.In order to evaluate the consequences of repealing the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999, it is necessary to consider the prerequisites of this legislation and the economic context that led to the creation of this Act. The considered time period is between 1927 and 1933 (Heakall, 2003). Initially, the Glass-Steagall Act was created to prevent banks from committing fraud and misusing public trust. The major events that shaped the economic context for the GSA were the economic boom in the 1920s followed by the Great Depression that started in 1929 (Heakall, 2003). One of key causes of the Great Depression was commercial speculation performed by banks – banks took huge risks to get rewards and used shady schemes to encourage their clients to invest into risky assets (Cftech.com, 1998).In 1933, commercial speculation was considered the major cause of the crisis. However, in several decades economists came to the conclusion th at the key factor of the recession was economic depression itself, while security speculation was only a minor catalyst of the financial decline (Cftech.com, 1998). Another supposed key cause of the Great Depression was the lack of nationwide banking system – banking operations in the 1920s were performed by unit banks within states (Cftech.com, 1998). Moreover, Senator Glass who was the main ideologist of the GSA 2 years later came to the conclusion that the GSA was an overregulation and attempted to have it repealed (Cftech.com, 1998). So, GSA regulations were excess and too strict from the very beginning. However, in 1956 Congress extended the GSA and created one more barrier between insurance and banking (Heakall, 2003). So, the banking industry was strongly regulated until 1999.It is also important to analyze the economic context in 1999 when the GLBA was enacted and the barriers created by the GSA were repealed. First of all, banking segment became more globalized as w ell as investment capital, so the barriers between national and foreign investments were blurred (Tatom, 2011). Furthermore, banking institutions used many ways of diversifying its trading portfolios outside the GSA regulations – for example, investment banks were allowed to trade and hold such risky assets as derivatives, debt obligations, mortgage-backed securities, etc. (Calabria, 2009).Large banking organizations emerged and gained power despite the presence of GSA regulations because of consolidation and integration processes going in the banking industry (Wallace, 2014). Therefore, the context in which the banking industry operated changed, and the GSA provisions made American banking system less diversified and less flexible compared to international players. Furthermore, the GLBA repealed only one section of the GSA – the prohibition to combine investment and commercial banking, so its impact on the whole development of the banking industry was not so â€Å"de regulatory† as the supporters of Occupy Wall Street movement claimed (Tatom, 2011).Finally, it is necessary to consider key causes of the financial recession that took place in 2007-2009 and the interrelationship of the GLBA with these factors. According to Brook Watkins (2012), the institutions that resorted to risky borrowing and investment practices were Bear Sterns, Lehman Brothers, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, AIG and Merrill Lynch; however, none of these organizations was influenced by the GSA repeal. Furthermore, those commercial banks the activities of which were expanded by the GLBA went into trouble due to investing into mortgage-backed securities and residential mortgages (Wallace, 2014). However, the GSA did not prohibit commercial banks to use the above-mentioned securities, so the repeal of the GSA did not contribute to the failure of commercial banking either. In addition, the number of financing holding companies that actually used the GLBA benefits and combine d commercial and investment banking was quite low in the pre-crisis years (Calabria, 2009).The research conducted by Collins, Kwag and Yildirim (2003) shows that the actual impact of the GSA repeal on the banking industry was the following. Banking organizations received more opportunities to diversify their portfolios, which allowed them to shift and diversify risks (Collins, Kwag Yildirim, 2003). As a result, banking industry became less risky both for stockhodlers and for regulators (Collins, Kwag Yildirim, 2003). At the same time, no significant wealth redistribution was noted, which means that the attractiveness of the considered financial sector did not increase compared to other sectors of financial industry. Collins, Kwag and Yildirim (2003) suggest that this fact can be explained by the long-term evolution of competition in the financial industry. In other words, the GLBA did not lead to excess wealth creation or commercial speculation, but instead it allowed to reduce sy stemic risks and therefore benefit both the customers and the organizations in the banking sphere.These conclusions are in line with the findings of Calabria (2009) who states that few financial holding organizations took advantage of the GLBA and combined investment and commercial banking. According to Calabria (2009), the repeal of the GSA might even have mitigated the consequences of the crisis for the banking system. In any case, repealing the GSA division between commercial and investment banking in 1999 was a timely and appropriate measure that corresponded to the demands of the economic environment.Despite the fact that there are numerous advantages of GLBA, it is important to note that there still might emerge conflicts of interest in banking involving commercial and investment banking, and it might be necessary to have proper regulation in place in order to identify such cases and to prevent speculation and fraud. However, the need for regulating potential conflicts of inte rest does not mean that banks should be prohibited to engage in commercial and investment banking as it was in the GSA times. Rather, it is necessary to pass more specified and more flexible regulations that would target conflicts of interest without affecting the ability of the banking sector to diversify portfolios.

My Last Duchess Questions for Discussion

My Last Duchess Questions for Discussion My Last Duchess is a famous dramatic monolog by poet Robert Browning. It first appeared in Brownings 1842 essay collection Dramatic Lyrics. The poem is written in 28 rhyming couplets, in iambic pentameter, and its speaker is a Duke talking about his late wife to the father of his second wife-to-be. They are negotiating the terms of the second marriage to come when the Duke reveals a portrait of his first wife (the Duchess of the title), which is hidden behind a curtain. And when the Duke begins speaking about her, what appears to be a poem about a man mourning his first wife becomes something else altogether by the end of My Last Duchess.   Discussion Questions Can you determine what the Duke is really saying to his future father-in-law?   Here are a few questions for study and discussion, to gain a better understanding of this important literary work:   How significant is the title of the poem toward our understanding of the Duke, and of his late wife?   What do we learn about the personality of the Duchess?   Is the Duke a reliable narrator? Why or why not?   How does Robert Browning reveal character in My Last Duchess? If you were going to describe the Duke, what adjectives would you use?   What are some symbols in My Last Duchess? How can we interpret the lines I gave commands/ Then all smiles stopped forever?   Was the Duke responsible for his first wifes death? If so, why would he admit this to his future father-in-law?   What is the theme of this poem? What was Browning trying to portray in the character of the Duke? Would you let your daughter marry this Duke?   How does the poem compare to other works from the Victorian period? How is My Last Duchess similar or different from Brownings other poems?

Israeli Prime Ministers Since Establishment of the State in 1948

Israeli Prime Ministers Since Establishment of the State in 1948 Since the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948, the prime minister is the head of the Israeli government and the most powerful figure in Israeli politics. Although the president of Israel is the countrys head of state, his powers are largely ceremonial; the prime minister holds most of the real power. The official residence of the prime minister, Beit Rosh Hamemshala, is in Jerusalem. The Knesset is the national legislature of Israel. As the legislative branch of the Israeli government, the Knesset passes all laws, elects the president and prime minister, although the prime minister is ceremonially appointed by the president, approves the cabinet, and supervises the work of the government. Israels Prime Ministers Since 1948 Following an election, the president nominates a member of the Knesset to become prime minister after asking party leaders whom they support for the position. The nominee then presents a government platform and must receive a vote of confidence in order to become prime minister. In practice, the prime minister is usually the leader of the largest party in the governing coalition. Between 1996 and 2001, the prime minister was directly elected, separately from the Knesset. Israeli Prime Minister Years Party David Ben-Gurion 1948-1954 Mapai Moshe Sharett 1954-1955 Mapai David Ben-Gurion 1955-1963 Mapai Levi Eshkol 1963-1969 Mapai/Alignment/Labor Golda Meir 1969-1974 Alignment/Labor Yitzhak Rabin 1974-1977 Alignment/Labor Menachem Begin 1977-1983 Likud Yitzhak Shamir 1983-1984 Likud Shimon Peres 1984-1986 Alignment/Labor Yitzhak Shamir 1986-1992 Likud Yitzhak Rabin 1992-1995 Labor Shimon Peres 1995-1996 Labor Benjamin Netanyahu 1996-1999 Likud Ehud Barak 1999-2001 One Israel/Labor Ariel Sharon 2001-2006 Likud/Kadima Ehud Olmert 2006-2009 Kadima Benjamin Netanyahu 2009-present Likud Order of Succession If the prime minister dies in office, the cabinet chooses an interim prime minister, to run the government until a new government is placed in power. According to Israeli law, if a prime minister is temporarily incapacitated rather than dies, power is transferred to the  acting prime minister, until the prime minister recovers, for up to 100 days. If the prime minister is declared permanently incapacitated, or that period expires, the President of Israel oversees the process of assembling a new governing coalition, and in the meantime, the acting prime minister or other incumbent minister is appointed by the cabinet to serve as an interim prime minister. Parliamentary Parties of the Prime Ministers The Mapai Party was the party of the first prime minister of Israel during the formation of the state. It was considered  the dominant force in Israeli politics until its merger into the modern-day Labor Party in 1968. The party introduced progressive reforms such as the  establishment of a welfare state, providing a minimum income, security, and access to housing subsidies and health and social services. The Alignment was a group of consisting of the Mapai and Ahdut Haavoda-Poalei Zion parties around the time of the sixth Knesset. The group later included the newly formed Israel Labor Party and Mapam. The Independent Liberal Party joined the Alignment around the 11th Knesset. The Labor Party was a parliamentary group formed in the course of the 15th Knesset after Gesher left One Israel and included the Labor Party and Meimad, which was a moderate religious party, that never ran independently in Knesset elections. One Israel, the party of Ehud Barak, was made up of the Labor Party, Gesher and Meimad during the 15th Knesset. The Kadima was established towards the end of the 16th Knesset, a new parliamentary group, Achrayut Leumit, which means National Responsibility, split off from the Likud. Approximately two months later, Acharayut Leumit changed its name to Kadima. The Likud was established in 1973 around the time of the elections for the eighth Knesset. It consisted of the Herut Movement, the Liberal Party, the Free Center, the National List and Greater Israel Activists.

Information systems Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Information systems - Essay Example For Aalsmeer Flower Auction the first thing that needs to be done is to analyze and obtain the information requirements for the auction site. In order to do this they must first device a strategy for information gathering. An information strategy is defined as the process for capturing, integrating, processing, delivery and presentation of information in a constituent in a timely manner (Majid, 2007). Thus, information and requirements gathering forms the foremost and the most important part of the development process. The first step in gathering information is to conduct user surveys and a companywide review so that the development team can gain a better insight on the problem domain and the kind of solution it requires (Hansen et all, 1999). The development team will conduct meetings with the board of Aalsmeer flower auctions to determine what kind of auction strategy they will follow and what key features will be needed in the end product. The case study requires us to develop an online auction for buyers and sellers to interact, place orders, set prices and then receive goods through a distribution channel. Aaslmeer has to record the data for the financial transactions, customer details, distribution channels and ratings for individual customers and suppliers. The prices in the online auction will be set using the demand and supply mechanism. Buyers will bid on the products and sellers will determine the best the bid and then sell the products to the highest bidder. The auction will start off with a base price, which is then increased consequently when buyers bid on the product. The bidding process ends after a stipulated time and the highest bid becomes the selling price. The prices of different products will be stored in a database. The prices will usually follow world prices for flowers and related products, which

Luxury Vehicles Are Exported To China Research Paper

Luxury Vehicles Are Exported To China - Research Paper Example This controversial business opportunity has been caused by the fact that the same luxury cars are sold at very different prices in China where customers in china can only get the same cars with almost three times the prices in USA. For instance, as Grossman (para 1) says, a BMW X5xDrvive35i is sold by BMW at an average of $56,025 in USA and the same car sells at $153,176 in China. These big differences in price between the two countries mean that individuals and even companies in the USA can buy a car and ship it to China, sell it at slightly lower price than the amount BMW is selling it in China and make a huge profit of over a hundred percent of what it costs them to buy and ship the car to China. The government has cramped down on this business, in most cases freezing the bank accounts of the people associated with these business. The fact that the buyers involved in this business are not breaking any laws but only taking advantage of a market loophole means that there is nothing that is not legal in what they are doing. Cramping on them and freezing their bank accounts is something that is against the constitution of the United States that gives every citizen maximum liberty. There are firms which have been set up to buy cars from the US Auto dealers and then shipping them from the US to China. To avoid suspicion, the companies train people to be buying the cars for them and them handing over the car to them. An individual is hired and recruited on how to buy the cars from the dealers. As Goldstein (para 28) reports, these recruits are trained so that they can buy the cars on behalf of these firms without raising suspicion. The buyers then walk into a dealership and buy the car they have been instructed to buy, go home with it and stay with it for some time. The person gets paid a few hundred dollars and the company takes the car from them so that they can ship it to the target market. These buyers who act as agents of these

Are women better of today than they were fifty years ago Research Paper

Are women better of today than they were fifty years ago - Research Paper Example A brief account of how women were treated and hat their position was five decades ago from now, can be obtained with reference to Betty Friedan’s writing in the book titled â€Å"The Feminine Mystique†. Critics have been arguing regarding the contribution of the book in Women’s liberation movements back in the 1960s. Undoubtedly, the book had been a benchmark in feminist literary developments to make the society realize what the actual problem was in positioning women as a strictly homely character. THESIS STATEMENT This thesis aims to elaborate on the position of women fifty years ago in comparison to that their social position now. Betty Friedan’s arguments and discussions in her â€Å"The Feminine Mystic† have thus been referred in this context. Providing a rational account, this thesis aims at obtaining an insight as to whether women were better five decades ago or they are now. DISCUSSION Life Of The Women In The Past Decades – As narrat ed in Betty Friedan’s â€Å"The Feminine Mystic†, the life of the women in the 20th century revolved round their family. Their ambitions and desires were not treated with importance in the society. In a poignant manner, the book verses about the weak self-consciousness and the dominated position of women in the later period of World War II until the 1960s. Women were, back then, portrayed as a character who either willfully or through social pressures were obligated to sacrifice and abandon their career for the sake of their family. The book by Friedan was extensively credited fifty years ago for kindling the women movement of the 1960’s in order to obtain a better accomplished life. The women of the 20th century were not given equal status in the society; they were lacking self-motivation and the support from their family for a better life outside their personal boundaries, such as in politics. The traditional believe that women cannot pursue any career and tha t they are better off as wife and mother, restricted them from taking initiatives to be independent before five decades. During that period, women also lacked attitude that they can be a decision maker and that they can lead an independent life. They had a dependent mentality and hence lacked the feeling of fulfillment and accomplishment (Coontz, â€Å"Why Gender Equality Stalled†). As argued by Friedan in her book, the real problem for women being dominated fifty years ago was their weak self-consciousness; in other words, the problem was more within the then women than it was within the orthodox social structure. Addressing the inherent feminist issue in the 1960s’s society, the book by Friedan undoubtedly works out a juncture for the development of women; their personification and the way they used to be pictured. Subsequently, it contributed to the Women’s liberation movement in the 1960s, rewarding a breakthrough in the approach and attitude of women. When going through the book now, one can easily codify the antiquated societal structure 50 years ago, which many will argue to have changed extensively in today’s world, while others may not. As was obvious in the later period of the 20th century, a certain change in the attitude and behavior of women was observed along with their attempt to augment their self-esteem in comparison to the male members of the society. Indeed, the

Critically evaluate the achievements of feminism's first wave Essay

Critically evaluate the achievements of feminism's first wave - Essay Example One of the major achievements for this â€Å"first wave† was securing the vote for women (also known as suffrage), occurring in 1918 (and extended to younger women in 1928) in the United Kingdom (Fisanick, 2007) and at similar times in many other Western countries. The purpose of this essay is to explore women’s suffrage in the U.K. and the U.S. from the perspective of the achievements made by feminism’s â€Å"first wave†. To do this, many of the achievements of feminism’s â€Å"first wave† will be critically examined in their historical and modern context to evaluate their success in the wider frame of feminism. Firstly, it is important to define â€Å"first wave† feminism. Walby (2011) suggests that the â€Å"first wave† of feminism, in Britain at least, had ended with the winning of women’s suffrage in 1918 and 1928, as described above. Walby (2011) also describes a wave as being present in many areas of sociology, imp acting the discipline by making it more relevant to the input of interest and achievements during the â€Å"wave†. Taking this into account, we can understand that the â€Å"first wave† of feminism is therefore an input of ideas, research and action into feminism that led up to the winning of women’s suffrage in the early parts of the 20th century. ... The origins and starting dates for â€Å"first wave† feminism are more difficult to define. Some scholars believe that â€Å"first wave† began with the influence of the Enlightenment and changes in Protestantism (Apetrei, 2010). These changes in society as a whole led to more liberal thought that was based around humanism, although these changes were not limited to the position of women (Apetrei, 2010). Within the U.S., the feminist movement can also be linked to changes in society as a whole, such as the anti-slavery movement which sought to equalize individuals within the state. Squire (1993) suggests that there are many similarities between the lives of slaves in parts of the United States and that of women around the same time, such as the inability to vote and lack of property rights. Despite these early signs of feminism and debates about the official start date for â€Å"first wave† feminism, obvious changes had been made to the lives of women in the U.S. and the U.K. One of the first important documents for women was the Seneca Falls Declaration from 1848, which discussed a number of female-related rights issues. One important conquest for the Seneca Falls group was the Married Women’s Property Act, passed in 1848, which allowed a woman the right to keep property that was her own, rather than it automatically becoming part of her husband’s estate (Fisanick, 2007). Eisler (1987) suggests that this was a huge gain towards the equalization of women in society, particularly as it allowed women to participate in the economic sphere on a more equal basis. However, this achievement for â€Å"first wave† feminism was not received particularly well and was a minor gain (Apetrei,