President Barack Obama's latest meeting with some of the nation's leading Wall Street and banking executives — folks he referred to on CBS-TV's 60 Minutes last night as "fat cats" — has gotten underway at the White House.
Obama is due to make a statement about the session around 12:10 p.m. ET. We'll update this post with what he says. And the White House will stream the event here.
In the meantime, the Associated Press tops its latest story about the get-together with this:
President Barack Obama is asking bank executives to support his efforts to tighten the financial industry, while bankers are prepared to tell the president he should stop oversimplifying their concerns if he wants good-faith collaboration.
According to the White House, these are the financial executives at the meeting:
— Ken Chenault, President and CEO, American Express.
— Richard Davis, Chairman, President, and CEO, US Bancorp.
— Jamie Dimon, Chairman and CEO, JP Morgan Chase.
— Richard Fairbank, Chairman and CEO, Capital One.
— Bob Kelly, Chairman and CEO, Bank of New York Mellon.
— Ken Lewis, President and CEO, Bank of America.
— Ron Logue, Chairman and CEO, State Street Bank.
— Gregory Palm, Executive Vice President and Chief Counsel, Goldman Sachs.
— Jim Rohr, Chairman and CEO, PNC.
— John Stumpf, President and CEO, Wells Fargo.
Bad weather (there's been fog in parts of the East Coast this morning) prevented some execs from getting there, the White House says. The invitees who couldn't make it:
— Lloyd Blankfein, Chairman and CEO, Goldman Sachs.
— John Mack, Chairman and CEO, Morgan Stanley.
— Dick Parsons, Chairman, Citigroup.
Along with the president, the administration officials there are:
— White House chief of staff Rahm Emmanuel.
— Senior adviser Valerie Jarrett.
— Council of Economic Advisers Chair Christina Romer.
— National Economic Council Director Lawrence Summers.
— Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner
Update at 12:40 p.m. ET: Saying he expects an "extraordinary commitment" from the bankers "to help rebuild our economy," the president just told reporters that he told the bankers to "go back and take a third and fourth look about how they are operating (when it comes to lending to small- and medium-sized businesses)."
He also said he has no interest in "letting (bank) lobbyists thwart reforms."
The bankers, Obama said, expressed support for financial reform. But, there is a "big gap between what I'm hearing here in the White House" and what the banks' lobbyists are saying on Capitol Hill, the president added. "I urged them to close that gap."
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