I've been talking about the Super SIV bailout plan since the plans for the fund first became public October 14. Today The Wall Street Journal is questioning whether the Super SIV bailout fund can be funded in time [subscription required] to help struggling SIVs who need to find investors for $100 billion in debt coming due in the next six to nine months. The Journal reports some of the biggest SIV operators already are selling their assets, including Citigroup (NYSE: C), the Super SIV champion and the operator of the largest chunk of SIVs, and Rabobank of the Netherlands. Moody's Investor services continues to downgrade the types of assets held by the SIVs, especially assets based on subprime mortgages in the U.S.

Why should you care? You may be holding a money market fund or mutual fund that holds debt from these SIVs in trouble. If the bailout doesn't arrive in time, SIVs will have to restructure their debt, wind down, or in the worst-case scenario become unable to pay their debt investors. When the Journal first started talking about this mess, it reported SIVs held $400 billion in assets globally. Today, because of the write-downs and sale of assets, the Journal is estimating the total value of SIV assets at $350 billion.

If you hold money market funds or mutual funds with debt from one of the big 10 SIVs, consider seriously whether you really want that exposure. The top 10 SIVs include four from Citibank International (Centauri, Beta Finance, Sedna Finance and Five Finance), Sigma Finance from Gordian Knot, Cullinan Finance from HSBC Bank (NYSE: HBC), K2 from Dresdner, Links Finance from Bank of Montreal (NYSE: BMO), Tango Finance from Rabobank International and Victoria Finance from Ceres Capital Partners.

Remember, most money market funds are not insured by the FDIC, and you can lose part of your principal. While that's not happened in a very long time, there are no guarantees. There are good money market options with FDIC insurance using internet banking. Two you might want to take a look at are Capital One (NYSE: COF) and Citigroup. You don't have to change all your banking to internet banking, just your savings if you choose, because you can transfer electronically between your local bank and your internet banking accounts. Many internet banks offer electronic transfer without a charge as long as you can wait three days for the money to transfer.

Lita Epstein has written 20 books including Trading for Dummies and Reading Financial Reports for Dummies.