MR. FRATTO: No, no, no. Well, let's be clear. The proposal that Secretary Paulson made, that the administration made, is an important part of the solution. That core idea of taking these assets that are not trading in markets today, that is what is essentially a frozen market, that needs to be part of a solution. We need to address those assets and to get a market restarted so that banks and businesses are able to operate in their normal way, where banks are able to lend to each other overnight, and businesses are able to borrow from banks for overnight lending.

We're seeing lots of strains throughout the country, especially from small businesses who are searching for overnight lending. Banks are having a very difficult time lending. We saw that again in overnight credit rates last night where the spreads on those rates increased again.

So there's real stress in the market, and that is a solution to fix it. But to get to your point, there's no single silver bullet here. There are lots of good ideas that can help the financial services industry and our financial markets, and we're going to look at all of those ideas.

seen at 09:00, 30 September in Whitehouse Press Briefings. Email this to a friend.
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