Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the bill being considered today, H.R. 1256, the Swap Jurisdiction Certainty Act. Although couched as an innocuous bill to ensure that US banks have clarity about how swaps and derivatives trades are to be managed between U.S. and non-U.S. entities, in reality this bill will significantly impede efforts to apply strong regulations on Wall Street banks trading in these financial products. The size of the global swaps market is staggering. According to the Bank for International Settlements, at the end of last year, the total notional value of outstanding over-the-counter swaps was over 632 trillion dollars. Again, 632 trillion dollars. In comparison, the gross domestic product of the entire United States was just 15.1 trillion dollars at the end of last year. The swaps market is over 40 times larger than the entire U.S. economy; in fact, the swaps market is 10 times larger than the entire global economy. This market is also truly global in scope. Many of our major Wall Street banks, such as J.P. Morgan, Bank of America, and Goldman Sachs, have significant foreign subsidiaries. Bank of America alone has subsidiaries in approximately 40 countries. Given the massive size of this market, we need the strongest possible rules over swaps transactions in foreign subsidiaries that could adversely affect U.S. banks and bank holding companies.…”