Federal Reserve avoids Freedom Of Information Act request
Posted by Frugal on November 10th, 2008
Bloomberg has filed a Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA) request against against Federal Reserve for requesting the collateral information on some two trillion dollar that Federal Reserve has accepted as collateral. Federal Reserve however refused to comply.
You can read through details here from PrudentInvestor, or from the original blogger at NakedCapitalism who revealed this, or directly from Bloomberg. One of the arguments used by Federal Reserve for not complying to FOIA request is that
The Fed staff planned to recommend that Bloomberg’s request be denied under an exemption protecting “confidential commercial information,” according to Alison Thro, the Fed’s FOIA Service Center senior counsel. The Fed in Washington has about 30 pages pertaining to the request, Thro said today before the filing of the suit. The bulk of the documents Bloomberg sought are at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which she said isn’t subject to the freedom of information law.
Why would a federal agency NOT subject to FOIA law? The “not-so-obvious” inference drawn by NakedCapitalism is that Federal Reserve Bank of New York is a private, non-federally owned bank, and therefore, not subject to FOIA. In the past, I’ve read articles on financialsense.com, directly accusing Federal Reserve as a non-federal agency. There are extensive articles written (here from financialsense, and another elsewhere), and when I read thru them, I always felt like I’m reading fairy tales. How can it possibly be that US Federal Reserve is a private organization, which is printing all the US dollars? I mean, how it can possibly be at all? For the first time, Federal Reserve is acknowledging directly that at the minimum, there is some suble differences between Federal Reserve Bank of New York, versus Federal Reserve Bank in Washington.
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November 10th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
The Fed is transparent in that it is subject to the oversight of
Congress. Is twice a year not fast enough? The intent of Congress in
shaping the Federal Reserve Act was to keep politics out of monetary
policy. Legislation requires that the Federal Reserve reports annually
on its activities to the Speaker of the House of Representatives.
http://nomdeals.blogspot.com
November 11th, 2008 at 3:39 am
At $2trillion, I can’t imagine that US companies are the only ones borrowing. This is probably the crux of the problem: non-US entities borrowing from the fed as well as major private entities. I think what we don’t want is a huge political scare over shoring up non-US entities, which are important for our economic stability since foreigners own a lot of US debt.
November 12th, 2008 at 10:54 am
History of the Federal Reserve:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=by430chzT98
November 12th, 2008 at 9:33 pm
This market is crazy, My 800k retirement is now worth a paltry 408k as of today.
November 13th, 2008 at 3:20 am
@Bo: congratulations, now go out and buy some more stocks and funds since they cost half as much to get twice as much.
November 14th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
If you look in the phone book of any city where a federal reserve bank is located, the number is in the yellow pages or business section not in the government section. Just a fun little fact there.
Our country allows a private bank to print money and then charge interest on the loans of that money.
November 16th, 2008 at 8:30 pm
I can’t wait until January when we can take some of your funds to help pay for people like me who need it more. You still have way too much money and my government will get our share soon.
Obama Mama’s for Change