Washington - Wall Street's top executives on Wednesday defended the hundreds of billions of dollars their struggling firms have received in government bail-out funds, insisting the money has helped improve lending to consumers.

Many also recognized the sharp degree of public outrage at the slow recovery process and accepted some responsibility for the near- collapse of the US and global financial system.

"It is abundantly clear that we are here amidst broad public anger at our industry," said Lloyd Blankfein, chief executive of Goldman Sachs Group Inc, one of eight executives who testified before the Financial Services Committee of the US House of Representatives.

"Wall Street lost sight of its larger public obligations and allowed certain trends and practices to undermine the financial system's stability," he said.

But the executives insisted Wall Street remained at the core of the US economy, which could not come out of its year-long recession without stabilizing the financial industry.

They insisted that hundreds of billions of dollars already given to the industry had helped them improve lending despite the economic crisis.

"You will look back on (the bail-out) and know it was the right decision for our nation's economy and for American taxpayers," said Vikram Pandit, chief executive of Citigroup, which has received 45 billion dollars from the government.

The executives also defended millions of dollars in bonuses handed out over the course of last year, insisting the compensation packages were in line with the effort of their employees and were given out before they received government funds.

"I couldn't agree more that compensation should be more closely tied to performance," said John Mack, chief executive of Morgan Stanley.

Executive bonuses and purchases like corporate jets was derided as "shameful" by President Barack Obama. The president last week said any executives receiving future bail-out funds will be limited to 500,000-dollar annual salaries. (dpa)