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Source:
Lending Drops at Big U.S. Banks
DAVID ENRICH
WSJ, JANUARY 26, 2009
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123293041915314113.html
In any great organization it is far, far safer to be wrong with the majority than to be right alone. —John Kenneth Galbraith
Asian currencies continue to sell off vs the $ on the heels of the news yesterday that South Korea said they will look into hot money inflows stemming from the $ carry trade and the Bank of Indonesia said they are looking into the foreign buying of bills. This follows the news a few weeks ago that Taiwan was limiting foreign deposit holdings and Brazil was taxing foreign inflow transactions. As I mentioned yesterday, we may have reached a short term pain threshold in terms of $ weakness and foreign countries are fighting back as they certainly won't wait for...
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January 26th, 2009 at 9:07 am
and why wouldn’t a prudent banker just be biding his time here? Things are unstable..
http://money.cnn.com/2009/01/26/news/companies/caterpillar/index.htm?postversion=2009012608
Caterpillar to cut 5,000 more workers
Conventional wisdom says that unemployment is a lagging indicator..ok…but if you were a banker who was involved with CAT, what do you think today? They’ve already promised 15k layoffs in December, and now just one MONTH later, they add another 5k??
If you are a banker, what are your thoughts about whether CAT has any reasonable vision for this year’s business environment?
Pfizer will cut Wyeth staff, Sprint announces another 8k, (the job cuts announced today were brutal, by the way)…
The economic environment hasn’t stabilized, and if it hasn’t, why should bankers become more aggressive lending? Which players are the best financial risks? Why has Rod Serling taken over the US?
January 27th, 2009 at 12:30 am
I would not lend, you would not lend. They will not lend. Talking Investment Banks.
Reserves, deposits and big pay is all they want today. How many articles quoting Japanese economists saying that Cash gifts and Quant easing do not stimulate the economy and do not cause banks to lend. Years of such, as evidenced, won’t work.
So what’s to talk about? What perturbs me is to listen to simians explain that their are no solid loan opportunities. Or for that matter my Banking Geithner, Jamie Dimon explain the extensiveness or as I like to say to give the word some fiduciary feeling, extensivity of ole JP’s loan action.