tailieunhanh - The Savings and Loan Crisis and Its Relationship to Banking

Perhaps the most far-reaching regulatory change affecting net worth was the liberal- ization of the accounting rules for supervisory goodwill. 19 Effective in July 1982, the Bank Board eliminated the existing ten-year amortization restriction on goodwill, thereby allow- ing S&Ls to use the general GAAP standard of no more than 40 years in effect at the time. This change was intended to encourage healthy S&Ls to take over insolvent institutions, whose liabilities far exceeded the market value of their assets, without the FSLIC s having to compensate the acquirer for the entire negative net worth of the insolvent institution. 20 Not surprisingly, between June 1982 and December 1983 goodwill rose from. | Chapter 4 The Savings and Loan Crisis and Its Relationship to Banking Introduction No history of banking in the 1980s would be complete without a discussion of the concurrent crisis in the savings and loan S L industry. A review of the S L debacle as it is commonly known today provides several important lessons for financial-institution regulators. Moreover legislation enacted in response to the crisis substantially reformed both bank and thrift regulation and dramatically altered the FDIC s operations. The causes of this debacle and the events surrounding its resolution have been documented and analyzed in great detail by academics governmental bodies former bank and thrift regulators and journalists. Although the FDIC had a role in monitoring events as they unfolded and indeed played an important part in the eventual cleanup until 1989 S Ls were regulated by the Federal Home Loan Bank Board FHLBB or Bank Board and insured by the Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation FSLIC within a legislative and historical framework separate from the one that surrounded commercial banks. This chapter provides only an overview of the savings and loan crisis during the 1980s with an emphasis on its relationship to the banking crises of the decade. The discussion also highlights the differences in the regulatory structures and practices of the two industries that affected how and how well failing institutions were handled by their respective deposit insurers. A brief overview of insolvencies in the S L industry between 1980 and 1982 caused by historically high interest rates is followed by a review of the federal regulatory structure and supervisory environment for S Ls. The government s response to the early S L crisis is then examined in greater detail as are the dramatic developments that succeeded this response. The corresponding competitive effects on commercial banks during the middle to late 1980s are outlined. Finally the resolution and lessons learned are .