Here is a Wikipedia BAILOUT for every American investor with explanations of the many commonly misunderstood financial terms and economic situations:

A-E | F-J | K-Z

1. Leverage
2. Numismatic Gold Coins
3. Recession
4. Recessionary Effects
5. Regulatory Failures
6. Socialism
7. Stock Market Crash
8. Subprime Mortgage Crisis
9. Systematic Banking Crisis
10. Too big too fail policy
11. Transparency
12. Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP)
13. Uncertainty and Herd Behavior
14. Unemployment
15. Wider Economic Crisis

LEVERAGE:
Leverage, which means borrowing to finance investments, is frequently cited as a contributor to financial crises. When a financial institution (or an individual) only invests its own money, it can, in the very worst case, lose its own money. But when it borrows in order to invest more, it can potentially earn more from its investment, but it can also lose more than all it has. Therefore leverage magnifies the potential returns from investment, but also creates a risk of bankruptcy. Since bankruptcy means that a firm fails to honor all its promised payments to other firms, it may spread financial troubles from one firm to another (see 'Contagion' below).

The average degree of leverage in the economy often rises prior to a financial crisis. For example, borrowing to finance investment in the stock market ("margin buying") became increasingly common prior to the Wall Street Crash of 1929.

NUMISMATIC GOLD COINS
Coin that is valued based on its rarity, age, quantity originally produced, and condition. These coins are bought and sold as individual items within the coin collecting community. Most numismatic coins are legal tender coins that were produced in limited quantities to give them scarcity value. They are historic coins which also can be rare. The current price of gold is a minor factor when dealing with numismatic coins. Premiums are traditionally far higher than those of Bullion Coins, and values fluctuate to a much wider extent. For example, a $5 gold piece may contain $60 worth of gold and may sell for as much as $700. The minimum amount recovered from numismatic coin investments is always either its face value or its metal content. Most coins, however, sell substantially above these amounts. Since the markup over bullion value can vary widely from one dealer to another, investors need to shop around diligently to avoid paying exhorbitant markups.

RECESSION:
In economics, the term recession generally describes the reduction of a country's gross domestic product (GDP) for at least two quarters. The usual dictionary definition is "a period of reduced economic activity", a business cycle contraction.

The United States-based National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) defines economic recession as: "a significant decline in the economic activity spread across the economy, lasting more than a few months, normally visible in real GDP growth, real personal income, employment (non-farm payrolls), industrial production, and wholesale-retail sales."

RECESSIONARY EFFECTS:Some financial crises have little effect outside of the financial sector, like the Wall Street crash of 1987, but other crises are believed to have played a role in decreasing growth in the rest of the economy. There are many theories why a financial crisis could have a recessionary effect on the rest of the economy. These theoretical ideas include the 'financial accelerator', 'flight to quality' and 'flight to liquidity', and the Kiyotaki-Moore model. Some 'third generation' models of currency crises explore how currency crises and banking crises together can cause recessions.

REGULATORY FAILURES:
Governments have attempted to eliminate or mitigate financial crises by regulating the financial sector. One major goal of regulation is transparency: making institutions' financial situations publicly known by requiring regular reporting under standardized accounting procedures. Another goal of regulation is making sure institutions have sufficient assets to meet their contractual obligations, through reserve requirements, capital requirements, and other limits on leverage.

Some financial crises have been blamed on insufficient regulation, and have led to changes in regulation in order to avoid a repeat. For example, the Managing Director of the IMF, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, has blamed the financial crisis of 2008 on 'regulatory failure to guard against excessive risk-taking in the financial system, especially in the US'. Likewise, the New York Times singled out the deregulation of credit default swaps as a cause of the crisis.

However, excessive regulation has also been cited as a possible cause of financial crises. In particular, the Basel II Accord has been criticized for requiring banks to increase their capital when risks rise, which might cause them to decrease lending precisely when capital is scarce, potentially aggravating a financial crisis.

SOCIALISM:
Socialism refers to a broad set of economic theories of social organization advocating public or state ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods, and a society characterized by equal opportunities for all individuals, with a fair or egalitarian method of compensation. Modern socialism originated in the late 19th-century working class political movement that criticized the effects of industrialization and private ownership on society. Karl Marx posited that socialism would be achieved via class struggle and a proletarian revolution, and would represent a transitional stage between capitalism and communism.

The first socialists were termed utopian socialists by later socialist thinkers, and include Robert Owen, who tried to found socialist factories and other structures within a capitalist society and Henri de Saint Simon, the first individual to coin to term "socialism" and the originator of technocracy and industrial planning. The first socialists predicted a world improved by harnessing technology and combining it with better social organization, and many contemporary socialists share this belief. Later in the 19th century, Marxist socialism became more dominant. Democratic socialism is socialism by democratic means. Arab Socialism and African socialism are also notable forms of socialism. There is disagreement over the extent that National Socialism is socialist; although Adolf Hitler's party program included socialist elements, the Nazis did not nationalize industry, but instead created a highly regulated economy with state-led economic planning.

Socialists mainly share the belief that capitalism unfairly concentrates power and wealth among a small segment of society that controls capital, creates an unequal society, and does not provide equal opportunities for everyone in society. Therefore socialists advocate the creation of a society in which wealth and power are distributed more evenly based on the amount of work expended, although there is considerable disagreement among socialists over how, and to what extent this could be achieved.

Socialism is not a concrete philosophy of fixed doctrine and program; its branches advocate a degree of social interventionism and economic rationalization, sometimes opposing each other. Another dividing feature of the socialist movement is the split between reformists and the revolutionaries on how a socialist economy should be established. Some socialists advocate complete nationalization of the means of production, distribution, and exchange; others advocate state control of capital within the framework of a market economy. Socialists inspired by the Soviet model of economic development have advocated the creation of centrally planned economies directed by a state that owns all the means of production. Others, including Yugoslavian, Hungarian, Polish and Chinese Communists in the 1970s and 1980s, instituted various forms of market socialism, combining co-operative and state ownership models with the free market exchange and free price system (but not prices for the means of production). Social democrats propose selective nationalization of key national industries in mixed economies and tax-funded welfare programs and the regulation of markets. Libertarian socialism (including social anarchism and libertarian Marxism) rejects state control and ownership of the economy altogether and advocates direct collective ownership of the means of production via co-operative workers' councils and workplace democracy.

STOCK MARKET CRASH:
A stock market crash is a sudden dramatic decline of stock prices across a significant cross-section of a stock market. Crashes are driven by panic as much as by underlying economic factors. They often follow speculative stock market bubbles.

Stock market crashes are in fact social phenomena where external economic events combine with crowd behavior and psychology in a positive feedback loop where selling by some market participants drives more market participants to sell. Generally speaking, crashes usually occur under the following conditions: a prolonged period of rising stock prices and excessive economic optimism, a where Price to Earnings ratios exceed long-term averages, and extensive use of margin debt and leverage by market participants.

There is no numerically specific definition of a crash but the term commonly applies to steep double-digit percentage losses in a stock market index over a period of several days. Crashes are often distinguished from bear markets by panic selling and abrupt, dramatic price declines. Bear markets are periods of declining stock market prices that are measured in months or years. While crashes are often associated with bear markets, they do not necessarily go hand in hand. The crash of 1987 for example did not lead to a bear market. Likewise, the Japanese Nikkei bear market of the 1990s occurred over several years without any notable crashes.

SUBPRIME MORTGAGE CRISIS:
The crisis began with the bursting of the United States housing bubble and high default rates on "subprime" and adjustable rate mortgages (ARM), beginning in approximately 2005–2006. Government policies and competitive pressures for several years prior to the crisis encouraged higher risk lending practices. Further, an increase in loan incentives such as easy initial terms and a long-term trend of rising housing prices had encouraged borrowers to assume difficult mortgages in the belief they would be able to quickly refinance at more favorable terms. However, once interest rates began to rise and housing prices started to drop moderately in 2006–2007 in many parts of the U.S., refinancing became more difficult. Defaults and foreclosure activity increased dramatically as easy initial terms expired, home prices failed to go up as anticipated, and ARM interest rates reset higher. Foreclosures accelerated in the United States in late 2006 and triggered a global financial crisis through 2007 and 2008. During 2007, nearly 1.3 million U.S. housing properties were subject to foreclosure activity, up 79% from 2006.

Financial products called mortgage-backed securities (MBS), which derive their value from mortgage payments and housing prices, had enabled financial institutions and investors around the world to invest in the U.S. housing market. Major banks and financial institutions had borrowed and invested heavily in MBS and reported losses of approximately US$435 billion as of 17 July 2008. The liquidity and solvency concerns regarding key financial institutions drove central banks to take action to provide funds to banks to encourage lending to worthy borrowers and to restore faith in the commercial paper markets, which are integral to funding business operations. Governments also bailed out key financial institutions, assuming significant additional financial commitments.

The risks to the broader economy created by the housing market downturn and subsequent financial market crisis were primary factors in several decisions by central banks around the world to cut interest rates and governments to implement economic stimulus packages. These actions were designed to stimulate economic growth and inspire confidence in the financial markets. Effects on global stock markets due to the crisis have been dramatic. Between 1 January and 11 October 2008, owners of stocks in U.S. corporations had suffered about $8 trillion in losses, as their holdings declined in value from $20 trillion to $12 trillion. Losses in other countries have averaged about 40%. Losses in the stock markets and housing value declines place further downward pressure on consumer spending, a key economic engine. Leaders of the larger developed and emerging nations met in November 2008 to formulate strategies for addressing the crisis.

 

SYSTEMATIC BANKING CRISIS:
A bank run affects just one bank. A banking panic or bank panic is a financial crisis that occurs when many banks suffer runs at the same time. In a systemic banking crisis, all or almost all of the banking capital in a country is wiped out.

Systemic banking crises are associated with substantial fiscal costs and large output losses. Frequently, emergency liquidity support and blanket guarantees have been used to contain these crises, not always successfully. Although fiscal tightening may help contain market pressures if a crisis is triggered by unsustainable fiscal policies, expansionary fiscal policies are typically used. In crises of liquidity and solvency, central banks can provide liquidity to support illiquid banks. Depositor protection can help restore confidence, although it tends to be costly and does not necessarily speed up economic recovery. Intervention is often delayed in the hope that recovery will occur, and this delay increases the stress on the economy.

Some measures are more effective than others in containing economic fallout and restoring the banking system after a systemic crisis. These include establishing the scale of the problem, targeted debt relief programs to distressed borrowers, corporate restructuring programs, recognizing bank losses, and adequately capitalizing banks. Speed of intervention appears to be crucial; intervention is often delayed in the hope that insolvent banks will recover if given liquidity support and relaxation of regulations, and in the end this delay increases stress on the economy. Programs that are targeted, that specify clear quantifiable rules that limit access to preferred assistance, and that contain meaningful standards for capital regulation, appear to be more successful. Government-owned asset management companies are largely ineffective due to political constraints.

A silent run occurs when the implicit fiscal deficit from a government's unbooked loss exposure to zombie banks is large enough to deter depositors of those banks. As more depositors and investors begin to doubt whether a government can support a country's banking system, the silent run on the system can gather steam, causing the zombie banks' funding costs to increase. If a zombie bank sells some assets at market value, its remaining assets contain a larger fraction of unbooked losses; if it rolls over its liabilities at increased interest rates, it squeezes its profits along with the profits of healthier competitors. The longer the silent run goes on, the more benefits are transferred from healthy banks and taxpayers to the zombie banks.

The cost of cleaning up after a crisis can be huge. In systemically important banking crises in the world from 1970 to 2007, the average net recapitalization cost to the government was 6% of GDP, fiscal costs associated with crisis management averaged 13% of GDP (16% of GDP if expense recoveries are ignored), and economic output losses averaged about 20% of GDP during the first four years of the crisis.

TOO BIG TOO FAIL POLICY:
The Too Big to Fail policy is the idea that in economic regulation the largest and most interconnected businesses are "too big to [let] fail." This means that it might encourage recklessness since the government would pick up the pieces in the event it was about to go out of business. The phrase has also been more broadly applied to refer to a government's policy to bail out any corporation. It raises the issue of moral hazard in business operations.

The term is back to central stage since the start of the financial meltdown. The most important US company referred to as too big to fail is American International Group AIG.Some Critics see the policy as wrong and counter productive. They think big banks should be left to fail if their risk management was not effective.

TRANSPARENCY:
Transparency, as used in the humanities, when used in a social context, implies openness, communication, and accountability. It is a metaphorical extension of the meaning a "transparent" object is one that can be seen through. Transparent procedures include open meetings, financial disclosure statements, the freedom of information legislation, budgetary review, audits, etc.

TROUBLED ASSET RELEIF PROGRAM (TARP)

The Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) is a program of the United States government to purchase assets and equity from financial institutions in order to strengthen its financial sector. It is the largest component of the government's measures in 2008 to address the subprime mortgage crisis.

TARP allows the United States Department of the Treasury to purchase or insure up to $700 billion of "troubled" assets. "Troubled assets" are defined as "(A) residential or commercial mortgages and any securities, obligations, or other instruments that are based on or related to such mortgages, that in each case was originated or issued on or before March 14, 2008, the purchase of which the Secretary determines promotes financial market stability; and (B) any other financial instrument that the Secretary, after consultation with the Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, determines the purchase of which is necessary to promote financial market stability, but only upon transmittal of such determination, in writing, to the appropriate committees of Congress."

In short, this allows the Treasury to purchase nonliquid, difficult-to-value assets from banks and other financial institutions. The targeted assets can be collateralized debt obligations, which were sold in a booming market until 2007 when they were hit by widespread foreclosures on the underlying loans. TARP is intended to improve the liquidity of these assets by purchasing them using secondary market mechanisms, thus allowing participating institutions to stabilize their balance sheets and avoid further losses.

TARP does not allow banks to recoup losses already incurred on troubled assets, but officials hope that once trading of these assets resumes, their prices will stabilize and ultimately increase in value, resulting in gains to both participating banks and the Treasury itself. The concept of future gains from troubled assets comes from opinion in the financial industry that these assets are oversold, as only a small percentage of all mortgages are in default, while the relative fall in prices represents losses from a much higher default rate.
The Act requires financial institutions selling assets to TARP to issue equity warrants (a type of security that entitles its holder to purchase shares in the company issuing the security for a specific price), or equity or senior debt securities (for non-publicly listed companies) to the Treasury. In the case of warrants, the Treasury will only receive warrants for non-voting shares, or will agree not to vote the stock. This measure is designed to protect taxpayers by giving the Treasury the possibility of profiting through its new ownership stakes in these institutions. Ideally, if the financial institutions benefit from government assistance and recover their former strength, the government will also be able to profit from their recovery.

Another important goal of TARP is to encourage banks to resume lending again at levels seen before the crisis, both to each other and to consumers and businesses. If TARP can stabilize bank capital ratios, it should theoretically allow them to increase lending instead of hoarding cash to cushion against future, unforeseen losses from troubled assets. Increased lending equates to 'loosening' of credit, which the government hopes will restore order to the financial markets and improve investor confidence in financial institutions and the markets. As banks gain increased lending confidence, the interbank lending interest rates (the rates at which the banks lend to each other on a short term basis) should decrease, further facilitating lending.

The TARP will operate as a “revolving purchase facility.” The Treasury will have a set spending limit, $250 billion at the start of the program, with which it will purchase the assets and then either sell them or hold the assets and collect the 'coupons'. The money received from sales and coupons will go back into the pool, facilitating the purchase of more assets. The initial $250 billion can be increased to $350 billion upon the President’s certification to Congress that such an increase is necessary. The remaining $350 billion may be released to the Treasury upon a written report to Congress from the Treasury with details of its plan for the money. Congress then has 15 days to vote to disapprove the increase before the money will be automatically released. The first $350 billion was released on October 3, 2008, and Congress voted to approve the release of the second $350 billion on January 15, 2009. One way that TARP money is being spent is to support the "Making Homes Affordable" plan, which was implemented on March 4, 2009, using TARP money by the Department of Treasury. Because "at risk" mortgages are defined as "troubled assets" under TARP, the Treasury has the power to implement the the plan. Generally, it provides refinancing for mortgages held by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. Privately held mortgages will be eligible for other incentives, including a favorable loan modification for five years.

The authority of the United States Department of the Treasury to establish and manage TARP under a newly created Office of Financial Stability became law October 3, 2008, the result of an initial proposal that ultimately was passed by Congress as H.R. 1424, enacting the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 and several other acts.

The effects of the TARP have been widely debated. A review of investor presentations and conference calls by executives of some two dozen US-based banks by the New York Times found that "few [banks] cited lending as a priority. An overwhelming majority saw the program as a no-strings-attached windfall that could be used to pay down debt, acquire other businesses or invest for the future." The article cited several bank chairmen as stating that they had no intention of changing their lending practices to "accommodate the needs of the public sector" and that they viewed the money as available for strategic acquisitions in the future.

Moreover, while TARP funds have been provided to bank holding companies, those holding companies have only used a fraction of such funds to recapitalize their bank subsidiaries.

The Congressional Review Panel created to oversee the TARP concluded on January 9, 2009: "In particular, the Panel sees no evidence that the U.S. Treasury has used TARP funds to support the housing market by avoiding preventable foreclosures". The panel also concluded "Although half the money has not yet been received by the banks, hundreds of billions of dollars have been injected into the marketplace with no demonstrable effects on lending."
Government officials overseeing the bailout have acknowledged difficulties in tracking the money and in measuring the bailout's effectiveness.

On February 5, 2009, Elizabeth Warren, chairperson of the Congressional Oversight Panel, told the Senate Banking Committee that during 2008, the federal government paid $254 billion for assets that were worth only $176 billion.

During 2008, the companies that received bailout money had spent $114 million on lobbying and campaign contributions. These companies received $295 billion in bailout money. Sheila Krumholz, executive director of The Center for Responsive Politics, said of this information, "Even in the best economic times, you won't find an investment with a greater payoff than what these companies have been getting."

Banks that received bailout money had paid their top executives nearly $1.6 billion in salaries, bonuses, and other benefits in 2007. Benefits included cash bonuses, stock options, personal use of company jets and chauffeurs, home security, country club memberships, and professional money management.

Obama's administration has promised to set a $500,000 cap on executive pay at companies that receive bailout money, but the proposal would also allow banks to give unlimited amounts of stock to these same executives. Graef Crystal, a former compensation consultant and author of "The Crystal Report on Executive Compensation," claimed that the limits on executive pay were "a joke" and that "they’re just allowing companies to defer compensation."

UNCERTAINTY AND HERD BEHAVIOR:
Many analyses of financial crises emphasize the role of investment mistakes caused by lack of knowledge or the imperfections of human reasoning. Behavioral finance studies errors in economic and quantitative reasoning. Psychologist Torbjorn K A Eliazonhas also analyzed failures of economic reasoning in his concept of 'œcopathy'.

Historians, notably Charles P. Kindleberger, have pointed out that crises often follow soon after major financial or technical innovations that present investors with new types of financial opportunities, which he called "displacements" of investors' expectations. Early examples include the South Sea Bubble and Mississippi Bubble of 1720, which occurred when the notion of investment in shares of company stock was itself new and unfamiliar, and the Crash of 1929, which followed the introduction of new electrical and transportation technologies. More recently, many financial crises followed changes in the investment environment brought about by financial deregulation, and the crash of the dot com bubble in 2001 arguably began with "irrational exuberance" about Internet technology.

Unfamiliarity with recent technical and financial innovations may help explain how investors sometimes grossly overestimate asset values. Also, if the first investors in a new class of assets (for example, stock in "dot com" companies) profit from rising asset values as other investors learn about the innovation (in our example, as others learn about the potential of the Internet), then still more others may follow their example, driving the price even higher as they rush to buy in hopes of similar profits. If such "herd behavior" causes prices to spiral up far above the true value of the assets, a crash may become inevitable. If for any reason the price briefly falls, so that investors realize that further gains are not assured, then the spiral may go into reverse, with price decreases causing a rush of sales, reinforcing the decrease in prices.

UNEMPLOYMENT:
Unemployment occurs when a person is available to work and currently seeking work, but the person is without work. The prevalence of unemployment is usually measured using the unemployment rate, which is defined as the percentage of those in the labor force who are unemployed. The unemployment rate is also used in economic studies and economic indexes such as the United States' Conference Board's Index of Leading Indicators as a measure of the state of the macroeconomics.

There are a variety of different causes of unemployment, and disagreement on which causes are most important. Different schools of economic thought suggest different policies to address unemployment. Monetarists for example, believe that controlling inflation to facilitate growth and investment is more important, and will lead to increased employment in the long run. Keynesians on the other hand emphasize the smoothing out of business cycles by manipulating aggregate demand. There is also disagreement on how exactly to measure unemployment. Different countries experience different levels of unemployment; the USA currently experiences lower unemployment levels than the European Union, and it also changes over time (e.g. the Great depression) throughout economic cycles.

WIDER ECONOMIC CRISIS:A downturn in economic growth lasting several quarters or more is usually called a recession. An especially prolonged recession may be called a depression, while a long period of slow but not necessarily negative growth is sometimes called economic stagnation. Since these phenomena affect much more than the financial system, they are not usually considered financial crises per se. But some economists have argued that many recessions have been caused in large part by financial crises. One important example is the Great Depression, which was preceded in many countries by bank runs and stock market crashes. The subprime mortgage crisis and the bursting of other real estate bubbles around the world is widely expected to lead to recession in the U.S. and a number of other countries in 2008.

Nonetheless, some economists argue that financial crises are caused by recessions instead of the other way around. Also, even if a financial crisis is the initial shock that sets off a recession, other factors may be more important in prolonging the recession. In particular, Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz argued that the initial economic decline associated with the crash of 1929 and the bank panics of the 1930s would not have turned into a prolonged depression if it had not been reinforced by monetary policy mistakes on the part of the Federal Reserve, and Ben Bernanke has acknowledged that he agrees.