The Treasury Department announced Friday that it had reached a deal to sell its remaining shares in Ally Financial, ending the auto portion of the 2008-2009 bailouts and exiting the “last major Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) investment.”
The Treasury said that it will sell all of its 54.9 million shares in Ally stock at $23.25 per share, recovering $1.3 billion for taxpayers.
Ally was previously known as GMAC Inc., the arm of General Motors that provided financing to auto dealers. After failing in 2008, it was bailed out by the government, eventually receiving more than $17 billion in taxpayer funds. It converted to a bank-holding company and was renamed.
In a statement announcing the sale of Ally shares, Treasury Secretary Jack Lew said the auto bailouts “helped save the auto industry, more than one million jobs, and prevent a second Great Depression.”
Lew also added that “as we exit the last major financial investment, it’s important to take stock of the progress we have made and the critical role TARP and the Auto Industry Financing Program played in getting us to this point.”
Altogether, the Treasury said, taxpayers recovered $19.6 billion on their bailout of Ally.
With Friday’s news, according to the Treasury, the government has received $441.7 billion on TARP bailout repayments. The government disbursed $426.4 over the course of the bailouts that began over six years ago, including disbursements to banks, the insurer AIG, and other entities in addition to auto companies.
The government still owns some shares in small banks through TARP, but the big banks and auto companies have exited the bailout.
