Steve Eisman analyzes the 2008 Great Financial Crisis (GFC), detailing its causes, unfolding, and aftermath. He identifies four key causes: excessive leverage, the subprime mortgage bubble, systemically important financial institutions owning subprime securitizations, and derivatives, particularly credit default swaps (CDS). Eisman recounts the failures of Bear Stearns, Lehman, and AIG, and the government interventions that followed. He criticizes the lack of prosecutions for Wall Street executives, highlighting a massive fraud related to due diligence on subprime loans. Eisman also discusses the Dodd-Frank Act, the role of regulators like Daniel Tarullo, and the Silicon Valley Bank failure in 2023, attributing it to lenient liquidity rules and a concentrated deposit base. He concludes that banks are now safer but notes the growth of unregulated private capital and increasing concentration in large banks.
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