US shares tumbled on Tuesday and Treasury yields fell as investors signalled disappointment at plans by the Obama administration to deploy up to $2,000bn to clean up toxic assets in the financial system and restart credit markets. Tim Geithner, Treasury secretary, said the authorities would also subject the biggest US banks to a stress test and provide additional capital if required. But analysts criticised the lack of detail in plans for a private-public partnership to buy toxic assets, and the omission of hoped-for guarantees on wider portfolios of troubled assets and said the plan lacked the cohesion necessary to boost confidence. Has Obama’s presidency already failed? asks the FT’s Martin Wolf. See also  FT Alphaville’s “fact sheet” and a separate FT analysis, “Long on scale, short on detail”.

This entry was posted by Gwen Robinson on Wednesday, February 11th, 2009 at 5:48 and is filed under Capital markets. Edit this entry.