The troubled asset relief programme (Tarp) asset purchase plan has gone the way of the so-called "superSIV". Twice, now, the US government has tried to tackle the credit crisis by creating vehicles to acquire toxic assets - first using a private sector entity, then a government vehicle. Both efforts have been abandoned.

Instead, Hank Paulson, the Treasury secretary, proposes using the remaining $410bn of the $700bn bail-out fund for an expanded recapitalisation scheme and to capitalise a joint Treasury-Federal Reserve facility that would prop up the asset-backed commercial paper market - a crucial source of funding for consumer credit - by making non-recourse loans to ABCP investors.