Capital Purchase Program

The Capital Purchase Program or CPP is a preferred stock and equity warrant purchase program conducted by the US Treasury's Office of Financial Stability as part of Troubled Assets Relief Program (aka, TARP). According to the first congressionally mandated oversight report published by GAO, " primary focus was expected to be the purchase of mortgage-backed securities (MBS) and whole loans... within 2 weeks of enactment... the Treasury announced that it would make $250 billion of the $700 billion available to U.S. financial institutions through purchases of preferred stock." Because preferred stock is similar to debt in that it gets paid before common stock, some economists have questioned whether the buying of preferred stock by the CPP will be effective in getting banks to lend. Other economist have argued that the capital purchases represent a taxpayer subsidy of unsecured creditors. A review of investor presentations and conference calls by executives of some two dozen US-based banks by the New York Times found that "few cited lending as a priority. An overwhelming majority saw the bailout program as a no-strings-attached windfall that could be used to pay down debt, acquire other businesses or invest for the future." In a letter to Congress the Director-designate of the National Economic Council Larry Summers said that the Obama administration would place tighter controls on how CPP funds could be used. In particular, the second $350 billion dollars would include restrictions on the payment of common stock dividends and executive compensation. Professor Summers also promised greater disclosure and more attempts to tie the funds to foreclosure mitigation efforts.

On January 16, 2009 the Congressional Budget Office estimated that of the first $247 billion of securities purchased represented 26 percent ($64 billion) subsidy to the banks receiving funds. In his speech on February 10, 2009, the new Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner announced the Capital Assistance Program. This signaled an end to the capital purchase program.

A Government Accountability Office (GAO) report from March of 2012 gave further details, stating "As of January 31, 2012, the Department of the Treasury (Treasury) had received $211.5 billion from its CPP investments, exceeding the $204.9 billion it had disbursed. Of that amount, $16.7 billion remains outstanding, and most of these investments were concentrated in a relatively small number of institutions. In particular, as of January 31, 2012, 25 institutions accounted for $11.2 billion, or 67 percent, of outstanding investments. As of November 30, 2011, Treasury estimated that CPP would have a lifetime income of $13.5 billion after all institutions exited the program."