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The state’s law targeted Wall Street banks for wading into the debate over guns in the U.S. Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. also haven’t underwritten munis sold by the state and its cities, schools, and transit agencies since the legislation took effect. Bank of America and Citigroup are the top two underwriters in the $4 trillion U.S. municipal market.

Citigroup has repeatedly said it can comply with the legislation and that it doesn’t discriminate against firearm entities. In June, the bank said in a blog post that its policy “simply requires our clients to use best practices when selling firearms.” …

Citigroup took a key step to restart its public-finance operations in Texas by submitting a letter last month verifying its compliance with the new law.

The bank sent a so-called standing letter to the Texas Attorney General’s office, a requirement for banks if they want to do business with Texas and its local governments after the legislation took effect.

— Amanda Albright in Citi Says Ready to Resume Texas Muni Business After Gun Spat

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

99 COMMENTS

    • Exactly. Fuck them. As well as Chase, Bank of America, Goldman, Wells and all the rest who threw their torches onto the stake. 😮

      • Worse, they won’t ‘discriminate’ in Texas, but still will in the rest of the nation.

        Did Texas stipulate that national companies must have the same policy everywhere?

      • Idk about you guys, but I would put a grand on the bet of them aggregating data on who purchased what and where, to exploit at a later date. Mark my words.

        Only the surface bs has changed in a transparent effort to gain profit, they themselves have not. Personally, I would not touch them, or any of the other steaming dung heaps that were behind the 2007(8) subprime mortgage crisis. To big to fail, my ass.

        • Worse is, they are back selling the same shit sandwich derivatives, all over again…

        • No doubt. Set up for failure is the current modus operandi. Regarding the general public, a movie line comes to mind.

          Daaamn King, you dumb…

          – Dead Presidents

    • BofA, Citi, Chase are certainly 3 of the top 10 despicable POS banks in the US. Middle finger to them.

      Get Woke Go Broke.

    • Mri doesn’t make any other business adhere to citi’s idea of “best practices “
      So they are still discriminating against gun companies.
      No Texas business until they treat all customers equally

  2. Fuck ’em.

    They will still work against gun business, but be more sneaky about it…

    • I am surprised that banking behemoths such as CitiBank would even care about losing Texas municipal bonds which would represent something like 1% or less of those giant banks’ holdings.

      • Muni bonds are big financial levers. They are crucial to Citi’s overall risk analysis. Citi can take on riskier, potentially more lucrative investments because they have these large and extremely safe investments balancing them. By removing the safe bet, you increase the risk profile if the entire portfolio.

    • Geoff,

      I tried replying to your reply about components in a previous article and my comment, which initially had the tag, “Your comment is awaiting moderation,” never appeared.

      • Yes u_s , I’ve had the same thing happen recently… maybe they are being carried away by the recent solar winds.

      • most auto-moderation is keyword-generated. you just have to find out which word the auto-moderator doesn’t like and replace or misspell it.

        sometimes a poster is assigned random-ban – their posts are allowed or deleted randomly on no basis at all. I think the idea is to discourage the poster without having to say “you’re banned”.

    • Thus I will try one last time to provide some information.

      Your description of the mystery component said that it acted like a voltage amplifier and like a vacuum tube. That screams of a Field Effect Tramsistor (FET). Having said that, those were readily available (in low-power varieties) in the late 1970s and were not experimental.

      What is far more likely to have been experimental in the late 1970s are high-power metal oxide semi conductor field effect tramsistors (MOSFET). As you might imagine there are countless available devices today.

      The real trick is figuring out which readily-available modern device will function well.

      (Note: my previous comments kept getting flagged–my best guess was the amplifying device so I substituted the letter “m” for the letter “n” hoping to avoid a moderation situation.)

      • It’s not a FET, not even a GASFET (SP?) or a JFET, or MOSFET. It is literally a ‘Unicorn’.

        If memory serves, they called it a SET device. FETs are voltage devices, same as that SET device.

        Here’s the web page where the explanation lies buried, somewhere :

        https://www.firstwatt.com/diy.html

        Feel free to dive down into a seriously deep rabbit-hole on those pages…

        • OK, here’s a review with a photo of the custom device, the part number includes Pass’s name :

          http://www.6moons.com/audioreviews/firstwatt12/1.html

          EDIT – The amplifier is considered to be on the very high-end side, the choice of the device greatly impacts the sound quality.

          On those type of amps, anything other that the original part is considered sacrilege by those folks…

        • Pass writes :

          “May 19, 2010: “I’m in the process of spending six digits on a small run of special Jfet power amplifiers, my own version of the ‘SI’ Vfets you may recall from the Yamaha and Sony efforts of the 70s and related to the Digital Do Main product showcased recently on your site. Remarkable parts. Their curves look like triodes, with an output conductance on the order of 4 to 8Ω.”

          So, it is a FET of some sort, apparently…

        • i read it as static induction transistors, he says they display like a triode and are used in radar app’s(?).

        • Yeah, on the outbound (TX) or inbound (RX) of the radar I don’t know. The guy is one of those scary-smart guys who kinda stumbled into audio amp designing…

        • I must apologize at not participating much in this discussion. It’s nothing personal, though if I go on much, the unicorn as it was termed earlier, is a dead giveaway. I’ll give you all a tip:

          Papa Pass has other SET designs found here. Freely available to the public, but you cannot build them with the intent to sell, much like diy firearms.

          https://www.passdiy.com/project/amplifiers/the-zen-amplifier

          You won’t find many willing to share their trade secrets. Nelson’s quite unique that way, & he is a kind, helpful, & demure legend. DiyAudio store is authorized to, & carries pcb’s for those not able to make their own.

          @tsbhoa.p.jr

          Not quite right, SIT is a type of transistor. SET is a mode of particular peculiarity to Class A operation available to a very limited selection of transistors that can be, unintentionally by design, run this way without burning down the house. Were it software, you’d call it an accidental beneficial bug. Beneficial to everything but your power bill, that is. Glorious sounding space heaters is what they are.

      • Software engineers often get triggered by certain words and I am totally convinced that they are all liberals. They are soy boys mainly from California or an eastern state where they have been beaten into the submissive slaves that big corporations want.

    • Geoff,

      If you know the D.C. supply voltages, the final amplifier stage rated output power, and the circuit diagram, it should not be too hard to determine what parameters a substitute power MOSFET should have and then identify a suitable modern replacement–assuming that is what you are trying to replace of course.

      • I’m well-familiar with cross-referencing transistors, that SIT device is a completely different critter.

        The audio geeks have been going nuts over the sound of those devices.

        Anyways, a brief perusal looks like another manufacturer is producing them, so all hope is not yet lost… 🙂

        • The industry is moving towards carbon based
          ” MOSFETs, ” as they are able to handle both high and low Schottky barrier interfacing and would be handy for building your garage built
          phased-array 40 megawatt plasma rifles.

        • i’ve got my el34 and 84 mentor, he’s verifiable.
          but the kid at stereo rehab (it comes right up in a search) knows more than any brain i’ve encountered; fixes everything audio started when he was nine. strange business model, only open fri/ sat afternoon, no signage, does repairs the rest of the week. they list 773.7654236 but it’s best to email him (casper) at the email provided online. if sit’s are available he’ll know.

        • Such brilliant insights from a barely literate human traffic cone who has never known the pleasures of a woman 🤣🤡.

        • Geoff,

          Not sure if you already know the mechanics involved–I could explain the basic principles of audio amplifiers and why several audio buffs claim that vacuum tube (and FET equivalent) amplifiers sound “better or richer or softer” than traditional amplifiers. The underlying principles are actually fairly simple although very few people seem to know what they are.

          Anyhow, this is getting beyond the scope of this website. If we want to continue further, we should do it offline or in a different venue.

        • My background is more high-power RF amplifier related, but I dabble in higher-end AF as well. Tubes and FETs harmonic on odd-orders, transistors even-orders, and all kinds of claims from all kinds of folks on what sounds ‘nicer’.

          tsbhoa.p.jr – You in the Chicago area have some of the biggest home-made RF amplifiers, like well over 10 Kw, parked on CB channel 6… 😉

        • Geoff PR,

          Ah, you are on the right track with one of the dominant factors. Although I think you reversed it–tubes and FETs create even order harmonics (octaves of the source material) which sound pleasing to the human ear whereas bip0lar junction tramsistors create odd order harmonics which are not pleasing to the human ear.

          Somewhat related, tubes (and FETs as well I believe) tend to “gently knee over” when they approach maximum levels whereas bipolar junction tramsistors abruptly hit their maximum which creates a lot of harmonically unrelated garbage and sounds even worse than odd harmonics.

          It would not surprise me if there is some non-linear interm0dulation stuff going on as well in bip0lars that does not occur in tubes and FETs.

    • I have, a former back was purchased by Citi back in the late 80s/early 90s. Actually twice during the mad period of bank mergers. Citi is a shit organization.

      • What, is the “mad period of bank mergers” over? Since when?, I have just been advised (last week) that my bank has “become part of” another bank I’ve never heard of, after being swallowed up a bit over a year ago in a “merger” or whatever. I am currently using checks I bought for an account which has not existed for a year, during which it was an account which no longer exists now. After I originally (25 years ago) opened the account in order to have a local account, after banking with USAA for 30-odd years to avoid changing banks every couple years. Bride suggests we go back to USAA for the duration, and I’m seriously considering, since long distance banking works better than it did when I began over 50 years ago.

  4. In my humble opinion Texas has done more to restore and preserve Texans and American citizens rights than any other state while trying to fend off assaults on economics and liberty from the Federal Government.

    • Yeah, I just hope that they’ve taken action to fend off freezing temps against their energy grid… my energy bills in Mn are going through the roof this winter as a result of last winter’s shortsightedness at the other end of I-35.

      • Agree, it was a unique set of events, Power plants off-line for maintenance in winter when demand is usually low, snow on solar panels and frozen wind turbines that were not winterized with lubricant rated for 9 degrees. Texas gets 28% of it’s electric power from solar and wind. They are working on it, but its going to take a few years to build a more robust grid. Texas is the only state that has it’s own power grid.

        • Wasn’t even the renewables that were the problem; they couldn’t have made up the deficit even if they were all working properly. Their conventional natural gas generation plants went down because they weren’t winterized. Renewables didn’t help any, but they weren’t going to save anything, either; even if you put the interstate interconnect and the renewables together at full capacity, you’ve still got massive outages. THere was just too much generation capacity missing.

        • If you depend on any INTERUPTABLE supply for prime power, particularly something as unreliable as wind/solar, you’re a moron. ONLY suitable for offgrid location/application.

        • No, but will be building soon on land I own in far western SD … not the end of the Earth, but you can see it off of a short stepladder.

      • I still can’t understand why nuclear is off the table, and especially thorium reactors which can also burn spent fuel from uranium reactors.

        Chernobyl in summary was poorly designed, badly made, and incompetently run. Mayak was much worse with many incidents happening over many decades.

        Until Fukushima the worst western nuclear accident was Three Mile Island. France is dependent on nuclear power for about 80% of their electricity.

        • Southern Cross,

          Nuclear is off the table because it is “icky”.

          Nuclear is “icky” for three reasons:
          1) It is scary.
          2) It creates nuclear waste which is dangerous.
          3) Its reliability undermines justifications for wind and solar.

        • Uncommon_sense, doesn’t it also decrease rainbows and harm unicorns, or is all that just part of “icky”?

      • My power in Austin was normal except for one night before the main problems when it was out for around 6 hours, causing the loss of most of the plants in our greenhouse but no other damage. Other than that, only problem was high costs due to ineffectiveness of heat pumps at those temperatures, causing lower efficiency. Cause for high bills in MN is that it is too damn COLD! I suspect I would be horrified by electric bills for an equivalent house in MN. Otherwise I haven’t a clue how TX electric grid is any skin off your nose.

    • Software engineers often get triggered by certain words and I am totally convinced that they are all liberals. They are soy boys mainly from California or an eastern state where they have been beaten into the submissive slaves that big corporations want.

  6. Just like every other corporate activist they want to shit all over the untermensch while still selling product to that untermensch.

    Screw’em all. They won’t be freezing when they can’t fill their oil tanks at a 100+% markup this year or skipping meals when food jumps over 50% or losing their jobs because they don’t want to risk god knows what in the coming years because some richer-than-you geriatric retards are cowering from a 99.8% benign cold.

    Screw’em all.

  7. Lick tip of finger, hold high in the air, feel the political winds and the direction they’re now blowing…

    “Ah, yes…we want to do business with you again, please…”

    • I Haz a Question,

      As I said above, I am having a really hard time believing that behemoth banks care about losing Texas municipal bonds which would represent something like 1% or less of their total holdings.

  9. Discrimination, etc. came along with Gun Control and never stops riding along with Gun Control. And discrimination is what happens when fools see only the smiley face side of Gun Control. Failure to question if their is Rot hiding below the surface of Gun Control always leads to disaster. Due to the push-back I feel like these monetary geniuses looked a little deeper into Gun Control and are backpedaling their way out of what is a sneaky backdoor Gun Control shthole.

  11. Woke corporations need to get unwoke, go back to serving law abiding customers, and feel enough pain that it is a learning experience.

  12. its policy “simply requires our clients to use best practices when selling firearms.”

    There’s a weasel phrase. “Best practices” as defined by whom? I’m sure those in the gun control camp would say best practice includes not selling “assault weapons”.

  13. Does Citi Group require that their other clients behave according to their dictates? Car Dealers, Butchers, Grocery Stores, Auto Mechanics, etc. are they required to adhere Citi’s policies or do they just have to not behave in a criminal manner???

    I agree, Texas should let Citi know they received their letter and they will get back to them in a year or so, maybe. Let’s see how they behave during that time in other states, let them sweat.

    “Give a man a Gun and he will Rob a Bank. Give a man a Bank and he will Rob Everyone”

    • “Does Citi Group require that their other clients behave according to their dictates?”

      rather citi group requires that clients behave according to their business risk models or citi group won’t do business with them. should they not? free market and all that.

    • Debbie W.,

      I am having very mundane posts flagged for moderation and some removed as well.

      It is quite disturbing to say the least and does not bode well going forward.

      • Yeah me too…sadly ttag has been far more hinky than recently. Pizzing off your supporters is no way to run a blog.

      • most auto-moderation is keyword-generated. you just have to find out which word the auto-moderator doesn’t like and replace or misspell it.

        and maybe your posts aren’t as mundane as you feel, to you or to others. I’ve seen people fly off into hysterical gasket-blowing fits over what I thought was an ordinary statement.

  16. If Texas wanted to punish them further, then they should have made the law differently. However, if there is no carrot, only stick, then there is no incentive for the companies to really change. “We have to go elsewhere, after doing what was asked of us, because those gun people are crazy and vindictive”. I’d argue the same for convicted criminals. They did their time, punishment was served, they have changed their ways to live within established boundaries, they should be free. It’s the other side that wants to see punishment continue. Just like during a discussion, we need to be the adults in the room, distinctly to show we are the rational, logical, civil ones.

  17. So I assume the Libertarians are against this TX law that says multi-billion dollar Banks have to serve everyone. Just like the FL law that says multi-billion dollar Tech Companies must serve everyone. Which Libertarians say they are against.

    “Just go out and found your own bank or your own Tech Company.”

    Just like Gab or Parler did???

    • No, Chris T, what THIS ‘libertarian’ says is that Texas has the absolute right to do business with whatever banks it chooses not to do business with, for any reason it chooses (the question of how much of Texas’ “business” is proper is a valid one, but not part of this argument). Citibank chose to discriminate against certain “politically incorrect” businesses; Texas chose to discriminate against them . . . I’m not seeing the problem here. Unless, of course, you have a problem with intellectual consistency.

      • Sorry, first sentence should have read “absolute right NOT to do business with”. My bad (and this site SERIOUSLY needs better edit features!!!!).

        • Of course Lamp is an insufferable cock. But keep in mind that every minute he spends here is a minute he’s not slapping his poor (soon to be ex) wife around. That will make reading his nonsense more palatable.

        • Hi, brainless, nameless troll!!! What’s the matter, Geoff not ignoring you enough, today? I’m impressed you could take the time away from engaging in onanism with your little microp**is to actually type out your stupid “comment” which totally had nothing to do with the subject of the thread.

          I’d call you a clown, but that’s an insult to clowns.

      • Wow – you so don’t get it. I don’t know (or care) if you’re truly a “libertarian” or not, it’s called discrimination and it’s illegal.

        Also, you’re apparently not aware that banks, insurance companies and asset mgt companies have formed an alliance – GFANZ, Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero – and are meeting right now in Glasgow to ensure crippling restrictions are put into place on EVERY company and private citizen to ensure our compliance with THEIR desired goals… Look it up – GFANZ, ESG scores, also NZBA (Net Zero Banking Alliance), NZIA (Net Zero Insurance Alliance), and NZAOA (Net Zero Asset Owner Alliance).

        AS A “LIBERTARIAN”, DO YOU SUPPORT US ALL BEING FORCED TO USE OUR OWN MONEY & SAVINGS & INVESTMENTS (AND LIVE AND WORK AND TRAVEL) THE WAY THE BANKS, INSURANCE COMPANIES, AND ASSET MGT COMPANIES WANT???

        When all this is set up, and we’re all well & truly trapped – will YOU just bend over & take it happily???

        • Well, rocks (in your head), you clearly know f***-all about finance, that’s for certain. These banks have been dictating rules to people and institutions for years. And, no, financial “discrimination” is not per se illegal (concerted or collaborative refusal to deal may be). But, yes, you have other options for your financial needs. Certainly not as many as there used to be, but there are still lots of local banks, credit unions, etc. out there. Lots of payment systems, too. Although I do find it amusing that banks CAN be prosecuted for not making loans in a certain area, but can’t be for discriminating against an entirely legal business. But Texas chose to fight back, apparently successfully, and I’m fine with that. I hope others do, as well. Most libertarians (small “l”) I know believe businesses SHOULD be allowed to discriminate, and then have to deal with the consequences. Nice chatting with you.

  18. Don’t need to be a customer of any of those banks, jusy a Member of My credit union(s). Huge difference and many advantages.

  21. i say let them bleed out for a while
    the idea behind it being not only to make them rethink what they did
    but all the other banks also

  22. Texas should tell Citigroup to get bent. “We only require them to follow best practices”? BS. Citigroup can serve all legal businesses equally or it can serve nobody at all.

  24. Unless that letter contains an oath under penalty of perjury, I don’t believe a word they say. (It’s called “lip service” and has no real significance.They will say anything because of the billions they will make.)

  27. So the banks want the big business, but don’t care about the small business customers. I’m pretty sure the Bank’s policy is to maximize profit and get along with government. But they pretended to have “scruples” about business with gun dealers. Perhaps it’s time for Texas to conduct a public conversation with banks about their “scruples.” Are they merely to stay on the good side of the law? Regardless of how the bank behaves or how the DoJ behaves or wants? If the bank actually felt the way they claimed about gun dealers, why or why don’t those same attitudes apply towards drug launderers, human traffickers, companies large and small that don’t care about whether their products are made with forced labor, or even doing any business at all with China or doing business with companies that the Chinese government has even partial ownership of?
    If bankers answer “we just want to make money and avoid prosecution, that’s all” then they’re beginning to be honest. You may not like where they stand, but knowing where they stand is better than not knowing.

  28. In the yahoo article, citizens says it doesn’t allow retailers to sell bumpstocks (they dont), sell guns to people who don’t pass background checks (they dont) or sell guns to people under 21.

    In Texas 18 year olds can buy rifles and shotguns from retailers, so unless citizens shows that it doesn’t violate this, their standing letter needs to go to file 13.

  29. Just as other commenters commented – what about other States???
    Also, what does “mending their ways re. fire arms” (if true) really mean when they’ve joined over 100 other banks, insurance companies, and asset management companies in the GFANZ (Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero) – which is meeting in Glasgow right now to set up “climate change” and “green” technology restrictions & requirements that’ll strangle us all (companies and private persons) into compliance with whatever they want us to do?!?!?!?!?!? Don’t believe me? Look it up. ESG scores (Environmental, Social Justice, and Governance), and GFANZ. Also NZBA (Net Zero Banking Alliance), NZIA (Net Zero Insurance Alliance), and NZAOA (Net Zero Asset Owner Alliance).
    Whether or not the “Reconciliation” bill passes, with all it’s similar and other restrictions, constrictions, and unconstitutional provisions, the Big Banks are ensuring their own chokepoints are going to be in place to get what they want.

    • Yes, ugly things are on the way.

      I’d really like to know why no money-men (people?) on our side haven’t yet set up their own financial services companies, as an alternative to the actual fascists…

      • I’m wondering the exact same thing!!! It’s the perfect opportunity, and money’s to be made…

        Two other ugly things on the way…
        1) The death of the $US – experts think it’ll be w/in the next 6 month, perhaps as soon as the end of this year or beginning of next. Just like w/ Venezuela, the $US will be “reset” again & again, w/ jumps downward in valuation each time. Those w/ little to no savings or investments, and/or on public assistance like Social Security or welfare, will suffer unbelievably. Like the poor Venezuelans, who long ago ate all their pets, and all the zoo animals.
        2) The soon-to-be-pushed-hard digital currency – if it’s “issued” by a Central Bank (including Federal Reserve) or the IMF, it’ll be the end of freedoms… They’ll use it as another stranglehold on us, to ensure our compliance w/ our own enslavement.

        I HATE THESE “PEOPLE” IN THIS REGIME!!! They are evil, truly evil. I don’t say that lightly. If I could make them disappear into a cornfield (reference to an old Twilight Zone episode), I wouldn’t bat an eye.

  31. What exactly are the “best practices” that these banks refer to, strange to note, without necessary clarification.

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