CBO: TARP Costs Double

Well, that's quite an adjustment. The original cost was projected to be 189 Billlion. Funny how things change.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. congressional budget analysts have raised their estimate of the net cost to taxpayers for the government's financial rescue program to $356 billion, an increase of $167 billion from earlier estimates.

The TARP cost projection was raised due to changes in financial market conditions, new transactions and a shift in expected timing of payments, the CBO said.

Comments

[Philip McDaniel]

TARP costs to double according to the CBO? Probably much more than that if this article in the wsj online is correct:
“… and that same bank is begging to give the money back. The chairman offers to write a check, now, with interest. He's been sitting on the cash for months and has felt the dead hand of government threatening to run his business and dictate pay scales. He sees the writing on the wall and he wants out. But the Obama team says no, since unlike the smaller banks that gave their TARP money back, this bank is far more prominent. The bank has also been threatened with "adverse" consequences if its chairman persists. That's politics talking, not economics.”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123879833094588163.html
This does not sound good at all.