#2008 Financial Crisis

[captain-303]

The 2008 financial crisis is to me what the 2nd Impact is to the Eva pilots

[theculturedmarxist]

Warning signs of the instability of the global financial system abounded in the months leading up to the 2008 Lehman Brothers crash. Among these early signs were the astounding revelations about UBS, the world’s largest private bank, by Stephanie Gibaud, who was employee at the bank’s French division. Gibaud refused instructions given to her and other employees to delete all their company files. In doing so, she helped reveal a vast web of corruption and fraud linking UBS to a shadowy tax evasion scheme. More than 15 years later, Gibaud has endured harassment, professional ostracization, lawsuits, and threats. She joins The Chris Hedges Report to speak on her ordeal and the extent of corruption in the international banking system.

Chris Hedges:  Stephanie Gibaud in June, 2008, was ordered by one of her managers at the UBS Bank in Paris, to destroy all her computer files that related to customers with offshore accounts in Switzerland. The order came in the wake of the 2007 American banker, Bradley Birkenfeld’s disclosure of client information to the US Department of Justice, which suggested that UBS was facilitating massive tax evasion schemes for its American clients, which ultimately led to a penalty of $780 million. Swiss banks have long been havens for those seeking to avoid taxes. In 2014, for example, Credit Suisse, which would also plead guilty to sheltering money for its clients so they could avoid paying taxes, had to pay $2.6 billion in penalties.

Gibaud, however, was the only bank employee at UBS who refused to delete her files. She protested to UBS management and French regulators. Her documents would eventually help to identify 38,000 offshore bank accounts amounting to $12 billion. UBS responded by trying to fire her as part of a mass redundancy of 100 employees during the 2008 financial crisis. The French Ministry of Work intervened, but her life at UBS became excruciating. She suffered harassment and discrimination along with social and professional isolation. She endured constant anxiety and depression. UBS fired her finally in 2012. She was sued for defamation by the bank after writing her book, The Woman Who Knew Too Much, part of a series of lawsuits that plague her to this day.

She requested compensation totaling 3.5 million euros and the judge gave her 4,500 euros, which barely covered her legal fees. UBS was eventually forced to pay a record fine in 2019 of $4.9 billion, but Gibaud found herself financially ruined and blacklisted from the financial sector where she had spent her career. The French legal system does not compensate whistleblowers, unlike the US. The Commodities Future Trading Commission, for example, recently awarded an anonymous whistleblower around $200 million for providing information about Deutsche Bank’s manipulation of the LIBOR benchmark. Birkenfeld, who exposed UBS’s offshore accounts for American clients, was handed a check from the US Treasury for $104 million, minus taxes. Gibaud is currently battling in the French courts to become the first legally recognized whistleblower, which could pave the way for greater protection and compensation.

[frankenstein-was-a-grad-student]

The hardest era to write about from a technology standpoint must be 2008-2015. Shockingly small changes in narrative can have a dramatic impact on the accuracy of your setting and the tools your characters can deploy. I cannot figure out when Paul Murray thinks he’s set his book The Bee Sting. It’s described as “post 2008 financial crash Ireland” with a car dealership going under. Yet, everyone seems to have a smartphone (glass screen for typing so I’d assume iPhone which is insane from both a class perspective and a European perspective) with mostly reliable internet, Instagram is the app of choice for the teen protagonist (despite not even existing until October 2010), memories from years before including Minecraft (released 2011), characters text each other gifs, and the teen boy wants to buy the Nintendo switch. Leads us to believe we’re in minimally 2017 (by the switch), or at least late 2010 (by use of Instagram forgiving the switch). In the latter most generous scenario we need to believe that this teenager in Ireland downloaded Instagram almost immediately after it came out as well as all her friends AND her 12-13 year old little brother already has a burner account. Moreover, we need to believe her phone internet was good enough to constantly have access to it. It all seems rather unlikely.

I was very excited to read this book because it existed in such a fun era for children and young adults: the tackiest phones (give me a Razr or a T Mobile sidekick), the joy of logging onto the internet to check 9gag or Imgur, T9 texting, the displays of class and wealth evident from the type of phone you had or whether or not your parents had fast enough internet to watch YouTube in anything other than 360p.

Being a kid in this era was strange—technology grew with you in a 0-60 kind of way. Sad to see Murray hasn’t quite captured that in this otherwise lovely work.

[mlobsters]

flipping between documentaries in the background while i paint and movies. i've got the big short on right now and like. wow what a cast. but also

the way this is framed, like no one else could see it coming. but OH MY FUCKING GOD. yes we could!! we KNEW about all the subprime mortgages. we SAW house prices climbing up astronomically.

they just had people go out to miami in this movie to check on homeowners in these mortgage bonds.... i'm fucking losing my shit because

I OWNED A HOUSE IN MIAMI IN 2008*

if you were paying attention at all, you knew about the housing bubble. it was fucking insane. how could some fucking 28 year old IT person in miami know about this and UGH--

listen. if the bernie madoff story taught me anything, it was that the desire for money makes people put massive blinders on. to things they should really know better about, considering their JOB is to know these things.

so yeah. people were talking about it, it's not like i had my nose to the grindstone researching. i was just paying attention to the news and the housing market around me. but $$$$ > everything

it was motherfucking disgraceful what they did to people, getting them into these horrible loans and fucking their lives over.

aaaAAAHHHHHHH

*(bought the house with ex in 2003 before all this, was a traditional fixed rate 30 year. got divorced, he bought me out of the mortgage and had to try to sell the house post-crash. did eventually sell, at a small loss)

[bitchesgetriches]

A Brief History of the 2008 Crash and Recession: We Were All So Fucked

Keep reading.

If you liked this article, join our Patreon!

[nevermind-stop-forever]

Oh! The 2008 recession was really fucked up! The banks knew the whole time! And did nothing! Told no one!

[ponguon]

hi how do i us ethis website

[wabble-dee]

i think that the people who maed him cycle all day are probablu bad people and i think they should be puncished.

it reminds me of myself, i'm in a constand cycle every fday and i would like a snack.

[maysshortmoviereviews]

Bank of Dave (2023)

🎬Based on the true-life experiences of Dave Fishwick. Telling the story of how a working class Burnley man and self-made millionaire fought to set up a community bank.

📝A truly uplifting, feel good and inspirational story which will leave you with a smile. Recommend watch especially during cold winter nights.

[click-daddy]

Rate my McMansion

[cuntyko]

Child of Divorce (core)-

It's almost reflex to turn experiences into aesthetics... I mean it is way more efficient to reminisce thinking in this frame so I can see the appeal right. But for the oldies that don't get it ill explain what I'm droning on about now.

my philosophy is that George Bush broke America and going along with that we start with explaining the core essence of this "core"

like with the recession alone he tore like millions of families apart. i mean i know divorce was also prevalent in the 90s or whatever with like half of your 2nd grade class maybe a little less had divorced parents BITCH i cannot think of one person in second grade whose parents were still together. he really generated the flops that propelled this era forward

picture this you're in Rc Willey with your mom to furnish her new house during on of those miscellaneous american holidays that they use as an excuse to sell sell sell whatever they got. I think of this time I smell bath and body works candles and think open houses, joint custody, feeding the kids sugar to buy their love, lol the child exchanges … my dad would dead ass tell my mom to drop us off front of the pub next to a Cheesecake Factory and he was totally drinking when we got there. but yea packing shit up to go back and forth from one house to another one being a significantly better experience…. the parent you favored most you would most likely have a better living environment and nicer room setup, probably eat better. if you would have friends over there was always a preference on who you wanted to go with. things were ghetto fab dysfunctional but a somewhat working system that if you were really clever you could really take advantage of.

[bitchesgetriches]

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[orange-fantasy]

YES

[ponguon]

who played the drums

answer quick please

[wabble-dee]

Good Idea:

Try hiding miniature figures of Rodney Dangerfield around strangers' houses. They'll be struck with glee whenever they find a tiny version of the classic American baseballer in their laundry basket.

Just a little thing to do to make the world a happier place.