On October 3, 2008, Congress gave the U.S. Department of the Treasury authority to spend $700 billion to stabilize the economy. Treasury, in turn, created the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, out of which spun an alphabet soup of loan programs and special funding vehicles to support struggling U.S. financial institutions, the auto industry, and markets where liquidity was frozen.
Many law firms salivated at the prospect of helping Treasury negotiate and draw up all the complicated loan documents needed to prop up defaulting banks, insurers, and auto companies. The money! The bragging rights! The client contacts!
