Conflicts of interest, excessive risk-taking and failures of government oversight triggered the financial crisis and helped push the country into the deepest recession since the Great Depression, concludes a new report by the U.S. Senate.
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Getty Images The Goldman Sachs booth on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange |
The two-year, bipartisan probe by the Senate Investigations Subcommittee examined the economic crisis and the role played by Wall Street in creating it.
The Republican and Democrat co-chairs of the committee agree on its findings.
"The report tells an inside story of economic assault that cost millions of Americans their jobs and their homes while wiping out investors, good business and [the] market," said Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich).
"It shows without a doubt that lack of ethics in some of our financial institutions who embraced known conflicts of interest to accomplish wealth for themselves, not caring about the outcome for their customers," said Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla).
Much of the 635-page report focuses on the investment banking giantGoldman Sachs and its mortgage-related investments.
Congressional investigators say Goldman [GS 160.17 
-0.25 (-0.16%) 
] bought and sold billions of dollars in high-risk mortgage related investments, actively marketed poor quality CDOs to clients around the world, and then bet against its clients' interests and the mortgage market by taking large short positions in those transactions.
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