Financial Crisis Whiteboard

Senior Editor Paddy Hirsch of Marketplace, the public radio business show, makes complicated financial concepts easy to understand in this entertaining, informative series.

Resources in this Collection

Cramdowns

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 5:57 | Audio Format: MP3
A debate is raging in Washington, D.C., about how to deal with America's foreclosure problem. One proposal is to restructure the...

Write-downs

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 7:57 | Audio Format: MP3
As markets have deteriorated, "write-downs" have figured prominently in more and more corporate reports. What are write-downs all about?...

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 7:45 | Audio Format: MP3
There's a debate in financial circles over whether banks are unfairly penalized by the requirement that they &uot;mark to market" their holdings...

Toxic assets

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 9:27 | Audio Format: MP3
If you've been following the problems encountered by the banks, you've probably come across the phrase "toxic assets." They've poisoned banks' balance sheets and brought them to...

Why 'bad banks' might be a good thing

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 6:57 | Audio Format: MP3
Marketplace Senior Editor Paddy Hirsch explains Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke's latest plan to get the economy moving – and the risk involved.

Quantitative easing

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 7:37 | Audio Format: MP3
Now the Federal Reserve has effectively cut the target lending rate to zero, it only has one more weapon in its arsenal. Quantitative easing...

A look inside hedge funds

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 10:51 | Audio Format: MP3
Hedge funds used to occupy a dark, undisturbed corner of the financial world, but over the last year they've been thrown under the spotlight....

Leveraging and deleveraging

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 8:29 | Audio Format: MP3
Leveraging – or borrowing – has been cited as one of the contributors to the financial crisis. Senior Editor Paddy Hirsch explains how the move to deleverage – or reduce debt....

Why 'Fallout' for the financial crisis?

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 8:36 | Audio Format: MP3
The meltdown of the credit and mortage markets will inflict damaging effects upon our economic future that we may not anticipate....

How credit cards become asset-backed bonds

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 7:58 | Audio Format: MP3
Mortgages aren't the only financial instruments that get turned into securities. Marketplace Senior Editor Paddy Hirsch explains how....

Margin calls and the financial crisis

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 5:27 | Audio Format: MP3
Some of the recent rapid drops in the financial markets have been fueled by margin calls. How do margin calls work? Marketplace Senior Editor Paddy Hirsch explains.

Over-the-counter, over the top

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 6:45 | Audio Format: MP3
Credit default swaps have worsened market anxiety because they are conducted in the over-the-counter market, where regulations are few and...

Getting naked in short selling

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 7:47 | Audio Format: MP3
The practice of short selling has been blamed for the collapse of several major companies' shares during the financial crisis...

The credit crisis as Antarctic expedition

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 8:23 | Audio Format: MP3
Marketplace Senior Editor Paddy Hirsch explains how banks have gotten frozen in their tracks, awaiting a rescue.

Untangling credit default swaps

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 10:47 | Audio Format: MP3
When the analysts and experts talk about the current financial crisis, they often refer to "credit default swaps"...

Crisis explainer: Uncorking CDOs

SHOW: Marketplace | Length: 6:07 | Audio Format: MP3
Marketplace Senior Editor Paddy Hirsch gives a bubbly explanation of the intricacies of "collateralized debt obligations"...