Some Thoughts on the Bailout, Or Whatever You Want to Call It

Today is the start of a pretty big week in the U.S. since it is anticipated that there will be a bailout in place by the end of the week. Naturally, Congress has decided they want greater regulatory oversight, especially over executive pay. My own greatest fear is that Congress will try and politicize the rescue plan instead of crafting something that might actually work.

What Congress should do, along the lines of reviving the Resolution Trust Corp., is create a separate, independent firm like the RTC but free from some of the political constraints of the RTC. I would suggest that someone in Washington take a close look at KAMCO, the “bad bank” or South Korean version of the RTC. You can see an overview of Kamco, here.

Kamco was formed in South Korea after the Asian debt crisis and has succeeded beyond anyone’s wildest expectations. Some of the lessons to be learned from Kamco are:

1) Non-political;
2) Clear mission and mandate along with adequate funding;
3) Professional management paid at market rates….this would include bonuses if earned;
4) All profits returned to the funding source….i.e. the government to the general revenues funds;
5) Exhaustive transparency.

Outside of the “non-political” aspect of Kamco, the above model could be easily followed in the U.S. One of the key issues is who would be tapped to run Kamco. Since there is a political aspect to the above, it is, perhaps, inevitable that someone who has big-time finance experience and has been “on the inside” be considered. My own list? In no particular order….Mitt Romney, Michael Bloomberg, Robert Rubin.

There are others, I’m sure, but those three come readily to mind.