Charles, the problem with the monomaniacal focus on interest is that it naturalizes the structures of domination that exist in surplus value itself. Financial institutions may play a role in organizing that domination, but it's role is imeshed in the system of domination. There isn't a one to one correspondence to these theories, but they are analogous in their mystifying function. It is also important to note that anti-semitic argumentation tends to draw on the unnatural nature of interest and anti-interest advocates frequently fall into anti-semitism. Let me turn to Horkheimer and Adorno for the anti-semiticism side.
"Bourgeois anti-Semitism has a specific economic reason: the concealment of domination in production. In earlier ages the rulers were directly repressive and not only left all work to the lower classes but declared work to be a disgrace, as it always was under domination; and in a mercantile age, the industrial boss is absolute monarch. Production attracts its own courtiers. The new rulers simply took off the bright garb of the nobility and donned civilian clothing. They declared that work was not degrading, so as to control the others more rationally. They claimed to be creative workers, but in reality they were still the overlords of former times. The manufacturer calculated, arranged, bought and sold. On the market he competedfor the profit corresponding to his own capital. He seized all he could, not only on the market but at the very source: as a representative of his class he made sure that his workers did not sell him short with their labor. The workers had to supply the maximum amount of goods. Like Shylock, the bosses demand their pound of flesh. They owned the machines and materials, and therefore compelled others to produce for them. They called themselves producers, but secretly everyone knew the truth. The productive work of the capitalist, whether he justifies his profit by means of gross returns as under liberalism, or by his director's salary as today, is an ideology cloaking the real nature of the labor contract and the grasping character of the economic system.
And so the people shout: Stop thief!--but point at the Jews. They are scapegoats not only for individual maneuvers and machinations but in a broader sense, inasmuch as the economic injustice of the whole class is attributed to them.... The merchant presents them with the bill which they have signed away to the manufacturer. The merchant is the bailiff of the whole system and takes the hatred of others upon himself. The responsibility of the circulation sector for exploitation is a socially necessary pretense." (Horkheimer and Adorno 174)
robert wood