The next meeting of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission is set for June 30th - Julyl 1st. The meeting is titled "The Role of Derivatives in the Financial Crisis."

Witnesses giving testimony include representatives from American International Group (AIG), Goldman Sachs, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the Office of Thrift Supervision, and the New York State Insurance Department.

These manipulation of so-called 'complex financial instruments' certainly played a role in bringing about the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. We welcome the hearings.

A must read editorial in today's New York Times argues that the FCIC needs to push harder:

Congress created the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission last year to investigate the causes of the meltdown. Many banks, financial firms and other witnesses have cooperated. But not Goldman Sachs.

On Monday, Mr. Angelides announced that the panel had finally subpoenaed Goldman. He told reporters that Goldman’s performance had been “abysmal, unacceptable and won’t be countenanced.” He added that it is his job to ensure that the American people are not “played for chumps.”

We couldn’t agree more. We also have to ask what took the commission so long — and hope this new toughness will carry through to a smart and tough report. The commission’s final product is due on Dec. 15. If Goldman’s lawyers think they can play out the clock, Congress had better disabuse them of that notion right now.

If Goldman doesn’t comply, the commission can — and should — ask a court to enforce the subpoena. If Goldman still balks, the court could find Goldman in contempt.

We still don’t know in detail what the crisis panel is hoping to learn from Goldman. In its own disturbing lack of transparency, the panel has not made the subpoena public. A summary on its Web site, posted late Monday, says that it is looking for information on Goldman’s derivatives’ deals and wants to interview Goldman’s top executives and other employees with knowledge of specific transactions. The public clearly has the right to know those details and how they may have contributed to the financial crisis.

The Goldman subpoena is only the latest of many black eyes for the bank, including a civil suit for securities fraud brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission earlier this year.

In the conference call on Monday, the panel’s vice chairman, Bill Thomas, a former chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, suggested that Goldman’s failure to cooperate indicated that the bank had something to hide. “They may have more to cover up than either we thought or than they told us,” he said. At the least, it suggests that Goldman is still trying to control the narrative of the financial crisis.

That is a prerogative it and all of the banks forfeited when they nearly brought down the financial system and then were bailed out by American taxpayers.

The country needs a full accounting of what went wrong. To do their job, Mr. Angelides, Mr. Thomas and the commission are going to have push a lot harder.

This is a positive step, but, as the New York Times notes, the FCIC needs to push harder.

More encouraging news from the FCIC:

Today, Chairman Phil Angelides and Vice Chairman Bill Thomas announce that the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission has issued a subpoena to Goldman Sachs & Co. for failing to comply with a request for documents and interviews in a timely manner.

In seeking documents and testimony from public agencies and companies, the Commission has made it clear that it is committed to using its subpoena power if there is a lack of, or delay in, compliance. Failure to comply with a Commission request is viewed with the utmost seriousness, as the Commission will not be deterred from getting desired information.

In creating the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission under the Fraud Enforcement and Recovery Act of 2009, Congress granted the Commission the power to “require, by subpoena or otherwise, the attendance and testimony of witnesses and the production of books, records, correspondence, memoranda, papers, and documents.”

The Huffington Post has more on the subpoena:

Goldman Sachs refuses to comply with federal investigators probing the roots of the financial crisis, a government panel said Monday.

The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission slapped Goldman with a subpoena compelling the most profitable firm on Wall Street and the nation's fifth-largest bank by assets to turn over documents and produce employees for interviews.

Thus far, most of the firms at the heart of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression have voluntarily turned over documents and allowed crisis investigators to interview their employees.

This is at least the panel's third subpoena pushing financial industry exes to comply with its request. The FCIC's first such subpoena was issued to Moody's Corporation in April for the firm's delay in producing documents and allowing investigators to interview Moody's Investors Service personnel. Its second subpoena was issued last month to famed investor Warren Buffett, compelling his June 2 testimony before the FCIC. Both parties complied.

In a statement, the FCIC said it issued its subpoena to Goldman for "failing to comply with a request for documents and interviews in a timely manner."

More, please, FCIC.

Sorry isn't good enough for the millions of Americans suffering from job losses, underemployment and plummeting house values. But, in testimony before the FCIC yesterday, Moody's CEO won't even off an apology! The Huffington Post:

The chairman and chief executive of Moody's Corporation joined the long list of top Wall Street executives who have refused to apologize for their role in causing the worst financial crisis and resulting economic collapse since the Great Depression.

Appearing on Wednesday before the panel created by Congress to investigate the roots of the financial crisis, Raymond W. McDaniel, the head of the corporate parent of Moody's Investors Service, said that while the credit rating agency's disastrous performance has been "deeply disappointing" and that the firm is "certainly not satisfied" with it, after more than two hours of testimony he didn't say the one thing much of America may have been looking for: I'm sorry.

They're unrepentant. And, they'll do it again - unless, we reform the credit ratings agencies. The Senate must act.

Today, Warren Buffett testified before the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission (FCIC). His widely panned performance may just be the catalyst that keeps credit agency reform in the Wall Street Reform bill. The Guardian:

There was an excruciating moment when Buffett argued that the rating agencies "made the same mistake as 300 million other Americans" in believing that house prices would never fall. Come on, most of those 300 million people didn't have the same access to the sponsors of mortgage-backed securities as did Moody's and Standard & Poor's.

When the storm broke in 2007, the agencies were taken wholly by surprise. The most revealing comment on the affair came in a well-documented memo sent by a Moody's employee to his bosses in the same year. The company's errors, he wrote, made it look "either incompetent at credit analysis, or look like we sold our sold to the devil for revenue".

Why would Buffett want to be associated with such an industry? That's easy – he liked the business model. Who wouldn't? Two firms sit at the top and many institutional investors are forbidden from buying financial products that don't carry a rating.

It is not obvious how the industry should be reformed. The fee structure – whereby issuers pay for a rating from the agencies – creates conflicts of interest. But it's not clear that an "investor pays" formula would be viable. On that score, Buffett was correct. But his woolly defence of past mistakes merely underlined the madness of taking these agencies so seriously. That, at least, was a public service of sorts.

It's no surprise that in response to Buffett's performance, Senator Al Franken and others renewed their fight to keep a credit-rating amendment in the Wall Street Reform bill. Reform is moving forward.