Update on Fed/Bloomberg Case

The case, which the Federal Reserve appealed, is about whether or not the central bank should release the names of non-banks that have borrowed from it.

The Fed wants the names kept secret, and lost in the lower court, and now Bloomberg wants the names released pending appeal:

Details about the borrowers and their collateral are “central to understanding and assessing the government’s response to the most cataclysmic financial crisis in America since the Great Depression,” attorneys for Bloomberg said in the suit.

The Freedom of Information Act obliges federal agencies to make government documents available to the public. The Bloomberg suit didn’t seek money damages.

The interesting bit here is that the Fed is appealing on the basis of damage, which means that they appear to be ceding their prior claim that they aren't really a part of the government, and hence are subject to FOIA requests.