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Obama’s Bank Tax Seeks $90 Billion to Repay Bailout

WASHINGTON—President Obama plans to call on Thursday for taxing about 50 big banks and major financial institutions for at least the next decade to recoup all taxpayer losses from the bailout of Wall Street.

The tax on banks, insurance companies and brokerages with more than $50 billion in assets would start after June 30 and seek to collect $90 billion over 10 years, according to a senior administration official who briefed reporters late Wednesday.

But the levy but would remain in force longer if all losses to the bailout fund, the Troubled Asset Relief Program, are not recovered after a decade. Administration officials now say that the losses from the $700 billion loan program created in October 2008 are likely to be about $117 billion, which is about a third of the losses that the government projected last summer — an improved forecast that reflects the strength of the recovery on Wall Street, even as Main Street struggles.

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