TARP Banks Still Lobbying

“The top 10 recipients of the government's $700 billion financial bailout spent about $9.5 million on federal lobbying during the first three months of the year,” reports the Associated Press. General Motors spent nearly $3 million, while Citigroup, AIG, and JP Morgan all spent more than $1 million. So on what, exactly, are they spending TARP money? On finding ways out of TARP, suggests The Wall Street Journal. “The banking industry is aggressively lobbying the Treasury Department to make it less costly for financial institutions to get out of the Troubled Asset Relief Program.” The banks are worried that the government will convert its “warrants” to common shares so taxpayers can receive more of a return when the banks recover. “To do that, banks must either buy them back from the government or allow the Treasury to sell them to private investors.”