The American subprime mortgage crisis was a multinational financial crisis that occurred between 2007 and 2010 that contributed to the 2007–2008 global financial crisis. The crisis led to a severe economic recession, with millions of people losing their jobs and many businesses going bankrupt. The U.S. government intervened with a series of measures to stabilize the financial system, including the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).
A continuous buildup of toxic assets in the form of subprime mortgages purchased by Lehman Brothers ultimately led to the firm's bankruptcy in September 2008. The collapse of Lehman Brothers is often cited as both the culmination of the subprime mortgage crisis, and the catalyst for the Great Recession in the United States.
President George W. Bush discusses education, entrepreneurship and home ownership at the Indiana Black Expo in 2005.
Federal funds rate history and recessions
A mortgage brokerage in the US advertising subprime mortgages in July 2008
A financial crisis is any of a broad variety of situations in which some financial assets suddenly lose a large part of their nominal value. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, many financial crises were associated with banking panics, and many recessions coincided with these panics. Other situations that are often called financial crises include stock market crashes and the bursting of other financial bubbles, currency crises, and sovereign defaults. Financial crises directly result in a loss of paper wealth but do not necessarily result in significant changes in the real economy.
Black Friday, 9 May 1873, Vienna Stock Exchange. The Panic of 1873 and Long Depression followed.
Declining consumer spending
The Roman denarius was debased over time.
Philip II of Spain defaulted four times on Spain's debt.