Templeton the Rat, "Charlotte's Web," by E. B. White Back Forty Only a cocktail that starts with a powerful base (the other Tennessee Whiskey, George Dickel), soured with lemon, balanced with maple syrup, and topped with orange bitters will do for a gourmand like Templeton.
It's not applicable to banks, insurance underwriters and brokerage houses or anything else over-leveraged and subjected to big hits to net worth from soured assets on the balance sheet.
Some of the nation's biggest lenders are turning to the courts to collect money they are owed on a range of debts, from credit card balances to soured auto loans, judges and lawyers for consumers say.
As they work through a glut of soured debts, from credit card balances to overdue auto loans, some of the big lenders are going to court to get what they are owed, according to interviews with judges, lawyers for consumers and federal regulators.
Irish taxpayers are also being asked to cover the cost of another government plan, this one to scrub soured and healthy loans from banks' balance sheets and place them in a separate entity.
In early 1998 it soured and was sour for close to 18 months.
There is still some doubt about the utility of the tests, as investors have been concerned that soured loans have been hidden on the balance sheets of institutions like German Landesbanken and Spanish savings banks.
Henry M. Paulson Jr., the Treasury secretary, has put top priority on bailing out financial institutions by buying up soured mortgages and mortgage-backed securities, so banks and other lenders can clean up their balance sheets and get back to normal lending.
Because of the continuing anxiety about soured mortgages and the need for banks to keep large volumes of loans on their own balance sheets, Mr. Barbera said, the credit crisis is extending beyond subprime mortgages to many kinds of business borrowers.
Because the investment bank was saddled with billions of dollars of hard-to-sell soured mortgages and real estate assets on its books, Repo 105 gave Lehman a way to improve the appearance of its balance sheet.
