China, U.S. eye pact to help troubled banks: sources

[Frank Booth]

Source: Reuters

HONG KONG (Reuters) - Chinese and U.S. regulators are negotiating a pact aimed at encouraging Chinese financial institutions to buy into small and medium-sized banks in the United States, bankers briefed on the plan said on Tuesday.

Chinese bankers have complained that it's been difficult for them to set up branches or invest in banks in the world's leading economy, due partly to U.S. regulators' tough supervision and strict approval process for financial deals.

But the global financial landscape has been revamped by the credit crisis, and cash-rich Chinese banks are now bigger players on the world scene and are scouting around for investment targets.

To illustrate the global shake-down, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (Shanghai:601398.SS - News; HKSE:1398.HK - News) is now the world's biggest bank by market value, while Citigroup Inc (NYSE:C - News), once the world's No.1 bank, is worth the same as a second-tier commercial bank in China.

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"I feel lots of uncertainties still exist in the U.S. financial market and we want to keep a distance from these toxic assets at this moment," said Ma Weihua, CEO of Merchants Bank, China's sixth-largest lender by assets.

Read more: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/China-US-eye-pact-to-help-rb-3640275453.html;_ylt=AkdY6b8PmT8uIA.u0Q05swK7YWsA;_ylu=X3oDMTE1aG5oOW5tBHBvcwM4BHNlYwN0b3BTdG9yaWVzBHNsawNjaGluYXVzZXllcGE-?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=6&asset=&ccode=

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For well more than decade, the Chinese banks have been notorious for their amount of non-performing loans. Now, they're afraid to invest in American banks that are too toxic. This really illustrates what a mess we're in.

[Deja Q]

1. Gotta love it. And why always the banks? When not making shifty deals,

they depend on the people who deposit, withdraw, and take loans from.

Trickle-down is a hoax.

[Soylent Brice]

2. gotta pay off our chinese overlords somehow...