Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility - TALF

Following the financial crisis of 2007-2008, the government issued a massive bailout to prevent the economy from slipping into another Great Depression (which seemed very possible at the time). This effort often seemed like a big blob of government money (known collectively as "the bailout"). The sense that everything fit into a big undifferentiated clump wasn't helped by the fact that all the programs seemed to have similar acronyms...TARP, TALF, TAF, etc.

However, the bailout actually consisted of a number of separate programs, each with a particular target or reason for existence. For instance, the Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility (known as TALF) targeted holders of asset-backed securities...the type of securities that became absolutely unsellable in the wake of the financial crisis. The Fed loaned out up to $200 billion to holders of these investments as a way to keep credit markets going. The loans were made between March 2009 and June 2010. By October 2014, all the money loaned out under the deal had been paid back.