Bernanke Saw ‘Manageable’ Europe Debt Exposure at U.S. Firms
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Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke told two lawmakers in mid-July that U.S. financial companies’ exposure to Europe’s sovereign-debt crisis is “manageable.”
Analyses by Fed banking supervisors suggest that “in general, institutions’ direct net exposures to Greece, Ireland and Portugal, including to the banks domiciled there, are manageable relative to their capital,” Bernanke said in identical letters to the Republican senators, Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and Bob Corker of Tennessee. The comments, dated July 14, were obtained today by Bloomberg News in Washington.