bank bailout

Fitch Ratings has downgraded Ireland three notches from A to BBB , citing the costs of restructuring the Irish banking system, the country's weak growth prospects, and uncertainty about its economy due to the deepening financial crisis, despite the international economic assistance it received last month.

The Citigroup bailout is officially over: The U.S. Treasury has sold the last of its shares of the bank. Overall, the U.S. government netted $12 billion in profit from the $45 billion bailout.

The U.S. Treasury Department is offering up its remaining Citigroup shares, a move that marks the end of one of the federal government's largest bank bailouts. But the Treasury says it will hold out for an "acceptable price" for the 2.4 billion shares.

Bank of America has told U.S. regulators that it has met the final condition that was set on its plan to exit the government's Troubled Asset Relief Program. BofA, which repaid $45 billion in TARP funds in December 2009, needed to raise $3 billion in capital by the end of 2010.

Citigroup on Monday morning reported third quarter net income of $2.2 billion, topping Wall Street estimates and marking its third consecutive quarterly operating profit. Citi shares were up as much as 2.3% in premarket trading.

Investors received another sign Friday that the U.S. economy is continuing to heal: The 2010 U.S. budget deficit came in at a smaller-than-predicted $1.29 trillion. Though it was still the second-highest deficit on record, the numbers reflect growth in tax revenues, and thus in the economy.

The Federal Reserve chief warned Monday that the government must figure out how to shrink huge budget deficits, which now pose a "real and growing" threat to the U.S. economy.

Herbert Allison, Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Financial Stability, is the latest member of the Obama economic to leave ahead of what many expect to be crushing losses for the Democrats in November.

Mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac may not even exist in their current forms after a revamp of the U.S. housing finance system, Assistant Treasury Secretary Michael Barr said on Tuesday. Moreover, "private gains will no longer be subsidized by public losses," he said.

"It felt like the world was on fire," recalls financial writer Andrew Ross Sorkin, whose book Too Big To Fail covers the crisis at its peak. In an interview, he discusses the meltdown, its aftermath, the quest for power on Wall Street and why more regulation is still needed.