(Adds detail from filings)
By Douwe Miedema
WASHINGTON, July 6 (Reuters) - The largest Wall Street bankson Monday published detailed manuals of how to shut down theirbusiness during a crisis without the help of taxpayer money, acrucial step to prevent being broken up by regulators.
After the 2007-09 financial crisis, the banks were requiredto submit the so-called "living wills" each year to show howthey would proceed though an ordinary bankruptcy during a crisiswithout quietly relying on government support.
But the Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit InsuranceCorporation last year said they were unhappy about the qualityof the plans, urging the banks to improve them, or face toughsanctions including being broken up.
The 2010 Dodd-Frank Act gave the regulators the power tocarve up the banks if they deem the living wills "not credible,"though that is only the starting point of a lengthy proceduregiving banks several chances to improve.
Last year there was no such joint determination, becausewhile the FDIC did use the term, the Fed did not. It is notclear when the regulators will issue their verdict on thisyear's round of submissions, the fourth.
Banks say they have massively improved their resilience towithstand shocks, bulking up on shareholder capital to shieldcreditors, and earmarking certain bonds as susceptible to lossesin return for a higher yield.
"Our (plan) would effectively resolve the firm within areasonable timeframe, without systemic disruption, withoutextraordinary governmental support and without exposingtaxpayers to risk of loss," a JPMorgan spokesman said.
The plans contained far more detail than those of last year.Citigroup, for instance, submitted a 102-page document,more than three times as much as the 2014 plan.
What is published on the regulators' websites, is only thepublic portion of the plans. The actual documents are thousandsof pages, and contain detailed instruction including mundanefacts such as how to access computer systems.
The banks are Bank of America, Bank of New YorkMellon, Barclays, Citigroup, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs,JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, State Street, UBS and Wells Fargo. (Reporting by Douwe Miedema, additional reporting by DavidHenry in New York; Editing by Alan Crosby)
Barclays (BARC)
