Then, the government should go after the bonuses paid to all these bank managers. They were paid bonuses when their firm had to be paid TENS OF BILLION DOLLARS by US TAXPAYERS.

In Merrill Lynch’s case, their bonuses were down 6% from last year. Hard to believe.

All these bonuses should be left as CAPITAL in the banks and ANY UPSIDE, if any, should belong to TAXPAYERS. Anything less is a GIFT to them.

I’d like to see some sword falling on (literally) myself.

In the 80′s when Continental Bank got crushed during the energy crisis aftermath collapse I bought in super cheap believing the Continental was too big, too important, to well connected to be allowed to fail.

Guess what. A loud flushing noise.

The big boys are going to push things where they want them. And they love sucking other people in first.

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2009/01/merrill-execs-pay-selves-bonuses-ahead.html

They of course knew how much trash they had on the books.

11 year lows ftw.. Couldn’t happen to a nicer dancing monkey…

I am buy and hold. If the banks spike upward by some unreasonable amount, I will become a trader. Otherwise, I will buy lower unless fundamentals change.

Glad to see Thain go. A true asshole. I see his breed as the real problem, not the Lewis-types.

@Broken: I owned BAC and WFC a while back for a quick trade/profit. Owned WAMU too for a couple of days and sold for a quick profit but I don’t like to own these financials for too long. Might be OK for a trade but they’re certainly not “investments” in my book.

I also started positions with WFC and JPM. I wager all three banks will drop still lower, at which point I will increase my positions. Current valuations are so low, two out of three banks could be nationalized and I still win.

“Nobody trusts these cretins anymore”

Yes, but the question is, does Obama trust them, i.e., is he going to throw hundreds of billions of dollars at them like Paulson did?

We shall see.