Washington Mutual Inc., the biggest U.S. savings and loan, said third-quarter net income fell about 75 percent because of ``a weakening housing market and disruptions in the secondary market.'' Loan loss provisions total about $975 million and losses and writedowns on mortgage loans and securities amount to $410 million, the Seattle-based company said in a statement today. Chief Executive Officer Kerry Killinger, 58, said he expects results to improve in the fourth quarter. The profit decline would bring net income to $187 million, the worst performance since the fourth quarter of 1998, according to Bloomberg data. Citigroup Inc., the biggest U.S. bank, said earlier this week that profit for the quarter fell 60 percent after $5.9 billion of credit and trading losses on loans and mortgage-backed securities. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aj5itx3XsvP0&refer=home
Once it hits between 23 to 25..... time to move in for shorting...... This assumes all else being held equal whereby the Fed doesn't make some dumb move like lowering interest rates again. If it does all it will do is temporary alleviate things and we then have to worry about inflation risks. What needs to be done is for these damn banks to rework and modify their loans with these lower income folks who doesn't know a damn thing about money and finances who got suckered into this "American Dream."
Ya but "it doesn't matter if people can't pay their mortgage because so many people will buy houses they will appreciate so much it won't matter"!!!
Have no fear, they will soak existing customers to make up for it. Case in point: I had 2 wamu credit cards for the past 3 years at 7.99% percent. The deal was this fixed rate, for an indefinite period of time. In August notification of interest rate increases. 15.99%. Accept new terms or close accounts. Haha, balances paid, accounts closed! They thought they could recoup for the last 3 years with one line of fine print.
Hmmm... like many financial institutions, they are making their good and worthy clients to pay for/cover up the bad clients and bad decisions they made. What's the point of throwing good money to cover up the bad. Suicidal. Absolutely suicidal.