Asset Quality Quotes

Observation over many years has taught us that the chief losses to investors come from the purchase of low-quality securities at times of good business conditions. The purchasers view the good current earnings as equivalent to 'earning power' and assume that prosperity is equivalent to safety.

What can you do in order to save your own banks?

What people don't realize is that China papered over its last two credit bubbles, those in 1999 and 2004. The banks were never bailed out - they just exchanged their bad loans for questionable bonds from quasi-state organizations.

The financial crisis was linked to the fact that banks had excessive leverage and too many risky assets. The solution is not to try to dictate to banks what they can do or not do, but to require them to strengthen their capital to absorb potential losses and hold less risky assets.

The liabilities are always 100 percent good. It's the assets you have to worry about.

And so Fannie Mae produces very strong results for investors in - when interest rates are high and when interest rates are low, in recession and during booms.

Nobody is going to invest in the Italian banks unless they trust their balance sheets.

Negative interest rates hurt banks' balance sheets, with the 'wealth effect' on banks overwhelming the small increase in incentives to lend.

I have a very, very great balance sheet, so great that when I did the Old Post Office on Pennsylvania Avenue, the United States government, because of my balance sheet, which they actually know very well, chose me to do the Old Post Office, between the White House and Congress, chose me to do the Old Post Office.

What are we focused on? Return on equity. We don't need these great big tier one assets. I'm very happy with getting tier two, tier three assets; that's what Glencore has been good at.