Financial Crises And Its Effects On Global Economic Crisis

The mortgage crisis of 2007 marked catastrophe for millions of homeowners who suffered from foreclosure and short sales. Most of the problems involving the foreclosing of families’ homes could boil down to risky borrowing and lending. Lenders were pushed to ensure families would be eligible for a loan, when in previous years the same families would have been deemed too high-risk to obtain any kind of loan. With the increase in high-risk families obtaining loans, there was a huge increase in home buyers and subsequently a rapid increase in home prices. As a result, prices peaked and then began falling just as fast as they rose. Soon after families began to default on their mortgages forcing them either into foreclosure or short sales. Who was to blame for the risky lending and borrowing that caused the mortgage meltdown? Many might blame the company Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, but in reality the entire system of buying and selling and free market failed home owners and the housing economy.

The housing crisis of the late 2000s rocked the economy and changed the landscape of the real estate business for years to come. Decades of people purchasing houses unfordable houses and properties with lenient loans policies led to a collective housing bubble. When the banking system faltered and the economy wilted, interest rates were raised, mortgages increased, and people lost their jobs amidst the chaos. This all culminated in tens of thousands of American losing their houses to foreclosures and short sales, as they could no longer afford the mortgage payments on their homes. The United States entered a recession and homeownership no longer appeared to be a feasible goal as many questioned whether the country could continue to support a middle-class. Former home owners became renters and in some cases homeless as the American Dream was delayed with no foreseeable return. While the future of the economy looked bleak, conditions gradually improved. American citizens regained their jobs, the United States government bailed out the banking industry, and regulations were put in place to deter such events as the mortgage crash from ever taking place again. The path to homeowner ship has been forever altered, as loans in general are now more difficult to acquire and can be accompanied by a substantial down payment.

The dot-com bubble in 2000 was the start to the, still current, historically low interest rates – all thanks to the Federal Reserve. Since interest rates were so low, many Americans decided that now was the time to get the “American Dream” and buy houses, since the values were going up and mortgage and insurance rates were so low. By serially refinancing, people were quite literally treating their homes as a money bank, and not thinking twice of the equity they were loosing in the process, because they thought that the value would only go up, while their mortgages would decrease, and were blinded by the so called “American Dream”.

So what exactly happened to the subprime mortgage market that caused all of this? It actually goes back to 1998 with the Glass-Steagall legislation, which separated regular banks and investment banks was repealed in 1998. This allowed banks, whose deposits were guaranteed by the FDIC to engage in highly risky business because they were guaranteed their deposits up to $250,000 per depositor. Following the dot-com bust in 2000, the Federal Reserve dropped rates to 1 percent and kept them there for an extended period. This drop in rates caused bank managers to have to go after higher-yielding bonds because they could no longer make decent yields off of municipal bonds or treasury bonds. They, like Wall Street, got creative with lending, and went after high-yield mortgage-backed securities like subprime mortgages which were mostly dominated by non-bank originators but because of the demand, many banks and private sector lenders jumped on board to increase profits.

Real estate values further rose, luring lenders into taking more risks in their financial transactions. All this was done in the hope of raking in huge sums of dollars since the prices of the mortgages had gone up. Consequently, a large number of people, including those who would not have qualified under normal conditions, were able to secure mortgages. They soon realized that they had blundered but it was too late. Due to increased supply of homes being disposed off by lenders and other financial institutions, the demand went down sharply. There was no more money flowing in the economy as many people now stopped taking the mortgages. This could have resulted into the mortgage crisis.

The federal government reacted to the financial crisis that emerged in 2007 and affected industries in many ways. This crisis caused an economic meltdown that saw a lot of people lose their jobs, homes, and savings. The Federal Reserve implemented several solutions that were designed to improve the liquid assets of the financial institutions and create favorable conditions in financial markets. These solutions resulted in changes to the Federal Reserve's financial records. The solutions were enforced so as to fulfill the Reserve’s objectives on financial policies which involve employment and price inflation.

During 2007 through 2010 there existed what we commonly refer to as the subprime mortgage crisis. Through deduction of readings by those considered esteemed in the realm of finance - such as Ben Bernanke - the crisis arose out of an earlier expansion of mortgage credit. This included extending mortgages to borrowers who previously would have had difficulty getting mortgages; this both contributed to and was facilitated by rapidly rising home prices. Pre-subprime mortgages, those looking to buy homes found it difficult to obtain mortgages if they had below average credit histories, provided small down payments or sought high-payment loans without the collateral, income, and/or credit history to match with their mortgage request. Indeed some high-risk families could obtain small-sized mortgages backed by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), otherwise, those facing limited credit options, rented. Because of these processes, home ownership fluctuated around 65 percent, mortgage foreclosure rates were low, and home construction and house prices mainly reflected swings in mortgage interest rates and income.

Leading central banks around the world assisted in regaining the financial system and bringing the economy back to good terms at the peak of the financial crisis. Together they helped stop the financial system from upturning, and with tremendous effort, helped reestablish financial and economic stability. The United States’ central bank is known as the Federal Reserve, and they are accountable for making sure the country’s financial system functions effortlessly. During the crisis of 2007-2009 the Federal Reserve was passive and did not take the lengths necessary to help stop or slow down the upcoming crisis. Throughout this paper I will discuss what steps were taken and what steps should have been taken to help the United States during this time of financial instability.

effectively encouraged frivolous spending and heavy borrowing allowing people to live beyond their means. Low interest rates also increased the discount value of assets and therefore increased their value. This created a house price boom in the UK and US. It was in the US that this twined with high levels of borrowing created the subprime lending market, whereby individuals with poor or no credit history borrowed vast subs of money to buy

The housing market crash, which broke out in the United States in 2007, was caused by high risk subprime mortgages. The subprime mortgage crisis resulted in a sudden reduction in money and credit availability from banks and other lending institutions, which was referred to as a “credit crunch.” The “credit crunch” and its effect spread across the United States and further on to other countries across the world. The “credit crunch” caused a collapse in the housing markets, stock markets and major financial institutions across the globe.

There has been a debate for years on what caused the Financial Crisis in 2008 and if there was one main cause, or a series of unfortunate events that led to the crisis. The crisis began when the market was no longer funding many financial entities. The Federal Reserve then lowered the federal funds rate from 5.25% to almost zero percent in December 2008. The Federal Government realized that this was not enough and decided to bail out Bear Stearns, which inhibited JP Morgan Chase to buy Bear Stearns. Unfortunately Bear Stearns was not the only financial entity that needed saving, Lehman Brothers needed help as well. Lehman Brothers was twice the size of Bear Stearns and the government could not bail them out. Lehman Brothers declared bankruptcy on September 15, 2008. Lehman Brothers bankruptcy caused the market tensions to become disastrous. The Fed then had to bail out American International Group the day after Lehman Brothers failed (Poole, 2010). Some blame poor policy making and others blame the government. The main causes of the financial crisis are the deregulation of banks and bank corruption.

One of the first indications of the late 2000 financial crisis that led to downward spiral known as the “Recession” was the subprime mortgages; known as the “mortgage mess”. A few years earlier the substantial boom of the housing market led to the uprising of mortgage loans. Because interest rates were low, investors took advantage of the low rates to buy homes that they could in return ‘flip’ (reselling) and homeowners bought homes that they typically wouldn’t have been able to afford. High interest rates usually keep people from borrowing money because it limits the amount available to use for an investment. But the creation of the subprime mortgage

An increase in loan packaging, marketing and incentives encouraged borrowers to undertake difficult mortgages so they believed that they would be able to refinance quickly at more favourable terms. People borrowed money to buy the house and then expected the price to rise and sold so that they could pay off the debt which owed to the bank and demanded a new loan to buy another house. However, once the interest rate began to rise and house’s price dropped in 2007, refinancing became more difficult and banks could not collect their mortgages.

This chapter is about the background of 2007-2008 financial crisis. The 2007-2008 financial crisis has a huge impact on US banking system and how the banks operate and how they are regulated after the financial turmoil. This financial crisis started with difficulty of rolling over asset backed commercial papers in the summer of 2007 due to uncertainty on the liquidity of mortgage backed securities and questions about the soundness of banks and non-bank financial institutes when interest rate continued to go up at a faster pace since 2004. In March 2008 the second wave of liquidity loss occurred after US government decided to bailout Bear Stearns and some commercial banks, then other financial institutions took it as a warning of financial difficulty of their peers. In the meantime banks started hoarding cash and reserve instead of lending out to fellow banks and corporations. The third wave of credit crunch which eventually brought down US financial system and spread over the globe was Lehman Brother’s bankruptcy in August 2008. Many major commercial banks in US held structured products and commercial papers of Lehman Brother, as a result, they suffered a great loss as Lehman Brother went into insolvency. This panic of bank insolvency caused loss of liquidity in both commercial paper market and inter-bank market. Still banks were reluctant to turn to US government or Federal Reserve as this kind of action might indicate delicacy of

In this essay, we are trying to look at the factors responsible for the global financial crisis in 2008-09 which started in US and later spread across the world. By now, a lot of studies have been done on the global financial crisis of 2008. We explain briefly the role of the financial engineering which leads to combination of various financial securities, the actual risk of which is not clearly assessed and hence leading to the financial crisis. There were also some serious lapses in regulation and failure of the rating agencies in assessing the risks assumed by the financial products which accentuated the crisis.