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11/08/2011 | Bank withdrawals

The Economist Staff

AS STOCKMARKETS tanked again on Monday and investors flocked to the relative safety of Treasury debt despite Friday’s downgrade of America’s credit rating by S&P, punch-drunk moneymen were left asking if it was 2008 all over again. One ominous echo of those dark days was the stomach-churning performance of financial firms, which reportedly prompted the agencies that make up the Financial Stability Oversight Council, America’s systemic-risk regulator, to hold an emergency call.

 

America’s banks are generally reckoned to be in better shape than their European peers, having gone through their own near-apocalypse in the months after Lehman Brothers’ demise. That bleeding was stemmed by some vigorous capital-raising combined with the stress tests of May 2009 which, though far from perfect, were a lot more robust than the flaky checks done on European lenders this year.

This confidence gap is narrowing, and not because of any improvement in Europe. For reasons that were not altogether clear—though worries about the unseen consequences of the downgrade on banks’ books clearly played a part—the KBW index of bank shares tumbled by 11% on a day when the S&P 500 fell by an ugly-enough 6.7%. Worst hit was Bank of America, which lost a staggering 23% of its value, bringing its decline since the beginning of the year to a little over 50%. The cost of insuring the bank against default increased by half.

BofA now trades at a mere one-third of its book value, suggesting that investors don’t trust the stated value of its assets relative to its liabilities. A cloud of uncertainty still hangs over its potential losses from duff mortgages inherited through the acquisitions of Countrywide, a big lender, and Merrill Lynch, one-time packager of the most egregious structured securities on Wall Street. A group of investors and New York’s attorney-general have challenged a $8.5 billion settlement the bank struck in June with buyers of mortgage-backed securities that had soured. AIG joined the fun on Monday, suing BofA for $10 billion for mortgage fraud, which the bank denies. The bank admitted recently it will have to pay more than previously expected to compensate Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac for dodgy loans that Countrywide had palmed off onto the housing-finance agencies.

Tank of America
On paper, BofA's financial health looks reasonable. It has more than $400m of liquid assets, $18 billion of reserves squirrelled away to cover mortgage losses and a “tier one” common equity ratio of 8.2%, slightly above the toughened-up minimum requirements of the latest Basel bank-capital standards. And it has relatively little short-term market funding.

Nevertheless, talk that it might need more equity is growing louder, and once the market starts to suspect that such a move is necessary, sentiment can be hard to shift and the capital shortfall hard to plug. Tellingly, Mike Mayo, a well-respected bank analyst with CLSA, on Monday slapped a sell rating on BofA because of creeping uncertainty over its capital adequacy. He thinks it might even be forced to sell Merrill to raise cash if things get much worse.

The bank’s beleaguered boss, Brian Moynihan, must be wondering why he agreed to take the reins from Ken Lewis 18 months ago. He has agreed to take part in a call with investors organised by Fairholme Funds, a big shareholder, on Wednesday. They have been told that sceptical questions will be welcomed. It promises to be a lively exchange.

The Economist (Reino Unido)

 



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22/03/2009|
22/03/2009|
27/01/2009|
27/01/2009|
27/01/2009|
17/01/2009|
17/01/2009|
17/01/2009|
17/01/2009|
17/01/2009|
17/01/2009|
11/01/2009|
06/12/2008|
06/12/2008|
06/12/2008|
06/12/2008|
23/11/2008|
23/11/2008|
16/11/2008|
16/11/2008|
04/11/2008|
04/11/2008|
03/11/2008|
03/11/2008|
24/10/2008|
24/10/2008|
24/10/2008|
24/10/2008|
15/09/2008|
15/09/2008|
15/09/2008|
15/09/2008|
15/09/2008|
15/09/2008|
06/09/2008|
06/09/2008|
05/09/2008|
05/09/2008|
05/09/2008|
05/09/2008|
01/09/2008|
01/09/2008|
01/09/2008|
01/09/2008|
22/08/2008|
22/08/2008|
17/08/2008|
17/08/2008|
16/08/2008|
16/08/2008|
28/07/2008|
28/07/2008|
28/07/2008|
28/07/2008|
28/07/2008|
28/07/2008|
19/07/2008|
19/07/2008|
24/05/2008|
24/05/2008|
03/05/2008|
03/05/2008|
29/04/2008|
11/02/2008|
05/01/2008|
09/12/2007|
18/11/2007|
10/11/2007|
10/11/2007|
06/11/2007|
06/11/2007|
06/09/2007|
26/08/2007|
25/08/2007|
11/07/2007|
16/06/2007|
16/06/2007|
10/06/2007|
10/06/2007|
19/05/2007|
19/05/2007|
19/05/2007|
19/05/2007|
24/04/2007|
24/04/2007|
14/04/2007|
14/04/2007|
05/04/2007|
05/04/2007|
05/04/2007|
28/02/2007|
28/02/2007|
05/02/2007|
05/02/2007|
04/02/2007|
04/02/2007|
04/02/2007|
04/02/2007|
04/02/2007|
04/02/2007|
29/01/2007|
29/01/2007|
29/01/2007|
29/01/2007|
11/01/2007|
11/01/2007|
11/01/2007|
11/01/2007|
27/12/2006|
27/12/2006|
27/12/2006|
27/12/2006|
27/12/2006|
27/12/2006|
20/12/2006|
20/12/2006|
17/11/2006|
30/09/2006|
28/07/2006|
12/04/2006|
12/04/2006|
12/04/2006|
06/03/2006|
21/02/2006|
17/02/2006|
31/01/2006|
10/01/2006|
28/12/2005|
31/10/2005|
26/09/2005|
29/08/2005|
11/08/2005|
08/08/2005|
24/06/2005|
24/06/2005|
24/06/2005|
03/04/2005|
03/04/2005|
03/04/2005|
03/04/2005|

ver + notas
 
Center for the Study of the Presidency
Freedom House