The American Taxpayer: Wall Street’s #1 fee payer

For decades Main Street has been no fan of Wall Street, but in the last few years the general public has probably made banker bashing a national pastime. They have vilified financiers as greedy and immoral, they have blamed them for the recent turmoil, and all in all have been just total dicks about Wall Street.

Imagine their horror when they find out that they top the rankings in fees to its most hated enemy.

Thomson Reuters has recently released their quarterly fee review and of the nearly $58 billion in fees received by banks worldwide for the first 9 months of this year, $1.15 billion came from the US government, snatching themselves the top spot over China and the Sumitumo Financial Group. Majority of the US fees came from bond offerings from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

The review came with bank rankings for each product and its total, and would have been a populist nightmare if the Vampire Squid came out on top. However it was JP Morgan who collected the most in fees at $3.7 billion, Bank of Ameria then tied with Goldman Sachs with $3 billion each.

So is this a win for Wall Street over Main Street?

Will this cause more furor as Business Insider alluded?

I don’t think so, but for me this affirms one thing: each needs the other unequivocally.

Main street should realize that sooner.