| Sheila Bair | |
|---|---|
| Chairperson of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation | |
| In office June 26, 2006 – July 8, 2011 |
|
| President | George W. Bush Barack Obama |
| Preceded by | Martin Gruenberg (Acting) |
| Succeeded by | Martin Gruenberg (Acting) |
| Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Financial Markets | |
| In office 2001–2002 |
|
| President | George W. Bush |
| Preceded by | Richard Carnell |
| Succeeded by | Wayne Abernathy |
| Chairperson of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission Acting |
|
| In office August 21, 1993 – December 21, 1993 |
|
| President | Bill Clinton |
| Preceded by | William Albrecht (Acting) |
| Succeeded by | Barbara Holum (Acting) |
| Personal details | |
| Born | April 3, 1954 Wichita, Kansas, U.S. |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouse(s) | Scott Cooper |
| Alma mater | University of Kansas, Lawrence |
| Profession | Lawyer |
| Religion | Lutheranism |
Sheila Colleen Bair[1] (born April 3, 1954)[2] was the 19th Chairperson of the U.S. Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC).[3] She was appointed to the post for a five-year term on June 26, 2006 by George W. Bush. Bair served as a member of the FDIC Board of Directors through July 8, 2011.[4]
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Bair is a native of Independence, Kansas. Her father, Albert, was a surgeon. Her mother, Clara, was a nurse and housewife. She received her bachelor's degree in philosophy from the University of Kansas, and worked as a bank teller for a brief period, before receiving a J.D. from the University of Kansas School of Law in 1978. In 1981, she was recruited by Senator Bob Dole, a Republican from her state, to serve as counsel on his staff in Washington.
Prior to her appointment at the FDIC, Bair was the Dean's Professor of Financial Regulatory Policy for the Isenberg School of Management at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, a post she had held since 2002. She also served as Assistant Secretary for Financial Institutions at the U.S. Department of the Treasury (2001 to 2002), Senior Vice President for Government Relations of the New York Stock Exchange (1995 to 2000), a Commissioner and Acting Chair of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (1991 to 1995), and Research Director, Deputy Counsel and Counsel to Kansas Republican Senate Majority Leader Robert Dole (1981 to 1988). While an academic, Bair also served on the FDIC's Advisory Committee on Banking Policy. Bair also pursued a seat in the U.S. Congress (she lost the 1990 Republican nomination in the 5th Kansas district by 760 votes to Dick Nichols).[5] Bair began her career in the General Counsel's office of the former US Department of Health, Education and Welfare.[6] Ms. Bair left the FDIC on July 8, 2011, when her five year term expired.[7]
Bair has published two books for children: Rock, Brock and the Savings Shock (2006) and Isabel's Car Wash (2008). Both titles show children good examples of money management.
Bair is married to Scott P. Cooper and has two children, Preston and Colleen.
Bair assumed a prominent role in the government’s response to the crisis, including bolstering public confidence and system stability that resulted in no runs on bank deposits. The FDIC did not turn to taxpayer borrowing to manage its losses and liquidity needs, instead funding them through its traditional means of assessing banks for the cost of insuring their deposits. The FDIC’s resolution practice of selling failing banks to healthier institutions, while providing credit support of future losses from failed banks’ troubled loans, saved the FDIC’s Deposit Insurance Fund $40 billion over losses it would have incurred if the FDIC had liquidated those banks.
During the congressional effort to reform the financial regulatory system, Bair successfully pushed to establish tools to end the doctrine of “too big to fail” by extending the FDIC’s resolution process to large, systemically-important financial institutions. The FDIC was also given joint authority to order the restructuring of an entity that cannot demonstrate, though a continually-monitored “living will,” that it can be unwound.
Bair is active on the international front, and pressed the Basel Committee on Bank Supervision to adopt strong capital and leverage standards, as Bloomberg BusinessWeek reported.[8]
In a fictional TV movie about the crises, Patricia Randell played Bair in the 2011 HBO movie Too Big to Fail, which was based on the popular book of the same name by New York Times journalist Andrew Ross Sorkin.
In 2009, Bair was named one of Time magazine’s “Time 100” most influential people. In 2008, Bair topped The Wall Street Journal’s annual 50 “Women to Watch List.” In 2008 and 2009, Forbes ranked her as the second most powerful woman in the world behind German chancellor Angela Merkel. Forbes described her FDIC office as "the last stop for capital-starved banks (and their insured customers) before going under."[9]
Bair has received criticism for her outspoken style and what some saw as her single-minded defense of the FDIC’s deposit insurance fund in the heat of the response to the financial meltdown in 2008. The FDIC was sued by Judicial Watch twice seeking information regarding the FDIC decision jointly with the Federal Reserve and Treasury Department to “bailout” Citi. The litigants say the FDIC was refusing to provide any information on the reasons for its support of the bailouts of certain banks stemming from the Financial Crisis of 2008, and continues to do so. Judge Emmett G. Sullivan of the US District Court (DC) said the case was not moot because the litigants continued to contest whether the FDIC reasonably interpreted the scope of his request. The FDIC says the court specifically gave the FDIC the option to submit additional evidence demonstrating that its original search was complete. The FDIC says it has done so, and the issue of the scope of the search is now before the Court.[10][11]
In addition to the legal proceedings, Bair has made the following remark, which spoke to the FDIC’s lack of statutory authority pre Dodd-Frank. In a response to the Inspector General for the TARP program, Bair remarked, "We were told by the New York Fed that problems would occur in the global markets if Citi were to fail. We didn't have our own information to verify this statement, so I didn't want to dispute that with them." In 2008, the FDIC did not have the legal authority to put large holding companies into its bank receivership process and little authority to access information outside of the insured institutions. Since these were holding companies, and not banks, the FDIC had to rely on information from other regulators. That is no longer the case. In 2010, the Dodd-Frank Act was enacted, expressly prohibiting bank bailouts by extending the FDIC’s resolution authority to close the largest financial firms and make their shareholders and creditors bear the losses without creating a systemic disruption. Dodd-Frank also gave the FDIC new authority to directly access information from large bank holding companies which are not in sound condition.[11] [12]
Bair has received many awards, including the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award and Hubert H. Humphrey Civil Rights Award.[13]
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by William Albrecht Acting |
Chairperson of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission Acting 1993 |
Succeeded by Barbara Holum Acting |
| Preceded by Richard Carnell |
Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Financial Markets 2001–2002 |
Succeeded by Wayne Abernathy |
| Preceded by Martin Gruenberg Acting |
Chairperson of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation 2006–2011 |
Succeeded by Martin Gruenberg Acting |