Volcker: Choice is prop trading or bank charter

REUTERS
Reuters US Online Report Business News

Feb 12, 2010 09:03 EST

NEW YORK (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's economic adviser, Paul Volcker, said his proposed banking rules would force Goldman Sachs and other banks to give up their bank charters if they want to continue proprietary trading.

"The implications for Goldman Sachs or any other institution is, do you want to be a bank?" Volcker, a former chairman of the Federal Reserve, told the Financial Times. "If you don't want to follow those (banking) rules, you want to go out and do a lot of proprietary stuff, fine, but don't do it with a banking license."