It looks like Wall Street has picked the President at the end of this year, and it won't be Barack Obama. CNN Money reports that no other candidate came close to the $12 million Romney's campaign raised in 2011. The money came financial firms banks, insurance and real estate companies. By comparison, Obama's campaign raised $5 million from people who worked on Wall Street last year.
As reported here, the top four contributors to a political action committee (PAC) allied to Romney were hedge fund managers.
The Telegraph reports that all this comes on top of the usual suspects in Republican funding drives, all of them backing Restore our Future, the pro-Romney group that funded the most vicious attacks against Newt Gingrich in Florida. "Also on the list of corporate millionaires contributing to Restore Our Future, was William Koch, the brother of David and Charles Koch, whose millions have helped fund the Tea Party movement as well as a constellation of conservative think thanks and advocacy groups. Mr Koch contributed $250,000, while Oxbow Carbon, the energy firm he runs, put in a further $750,000. Mr Romney also received $1 million in two donations from Bob Perry, a Texan property mogul who bankrolled the 'Swift Boat' attacks against John Kerry, the 2004 Democratic nominee. The repeated assaults and distortions on Mr Kerry's record in the Vietnam War were credited with helping George W. Bush win re-election. As well as contributions from donors at Wall Street firms like Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch, Mr Romney racked up nearly $1.4 million from five former colleagues at Bain Capital, the private equity company he ran in the 1990s. The firm's managing director, Steven Barnes donated $125,000, a sum matched by his wife, Deborah."
It's actually strange because Wall Street has thrived under Barack Obama. While family incomes around America went backwards, the bankers have had massive pay rises during his time in office. Also, Obama extended the Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003, As a result, Wall Street executives' salaries have been taxed at 35 percent and their capital gains income, which is where most of their take home pay comes from, is only taxed at 15 percent. And of course, many big banks are only there because Obama provide billions in taxpayer dollars to bail them out and prop them up during the financial crisis that their industry created.
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