Research, Mortgage Banking, Legislation, Law & the Government, Investment Banks, Heard on the Street, Global Macro, Financial Shenanigans, Current Affairs, Commercial Banks, Capital Markets, Banking	21 Nov 2008 12:00 AM
I told you so, from Doo Doo to TARP and back to Doo Doo by Reggie Middleton	Comment (0)

First, read the "Doo Doo 32" post, then the "Anatomy of a Sick Bank", then reference the TARP list (corporate welfare) below (source:US Treasury Emergency Economic DEstabilization Act). Ya' see anybody familiar??? It's almost like having a crystal ball - filled with doo doo! I actually believe this particular move was necessary on behalf of the Treasury, and was what I recommended when Paulson originally released his 3 page tome of economic domination (see WARNING: the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 may significantly DESTABILIZE the economy!, Shock & Awe: redux and Reggie Middleton asks, "Do you guys know who you're messin' with?"). After reading Doo Doo 32 and the Sick Bank articles, no one can honestly say that they didn't know who was to end up on this list.

Date	Seller	Transaction Type	Description	Price Paid	Pricing Mechanism
Name of Institution	City	State
10/28/2008	Bank of America Corporation	Charlotte	NC	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$15,000,000,000	Par
10/28/2008	Bank of New York Mellon Corporation	New York	NY	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$3,000,000,000	Par
10/28/2008	Citigroup Inc.	New York	NY	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$25,000,000,000	Par
10/28/2008	The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.	New York	NY	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$10,000,000,000	Par
10/28/2008	JPMorgan Chase & Co.	New York	NY	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$25,000,000,000	Par
10/28/2008	Morgan Stanley	New York	NY	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$10,000,000,000	Par
10/28/2008	State Street Corporation	Boston	MA	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$2,000,000,000	Par
10/28/2008	Wells Fargo & Company	San Francisco	CA	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$25,000,000,000	Par
10/28/2008	Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc.	New York	NY	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$10,000,000,000	Par
11/14/2008	Bank of Commerce Holdings	Redding	CA	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$17,000,000	Par
11/14/2008	1st FS Corporation	Hendersonville	NC	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$16,369,000	Par
11/14/2008	UCBH Holdings, Inc.	San Francisco	CA	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$298,737,000	Par
11/14/2008	Northern Trust Corporation	Chicago	IL	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$1,576,000,000	Par
11/14/2008	SunTrust Banks, Inc.	Atlanta	GA	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$3,500,000,000	Par
11/14/2008	Broadway Financial Corporation	Los Angeles	CA	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$9,000,000	Par
11/14/2008	Washington Federal Inc.	Seattle	WA	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$200,000,000	Par
11/14/2008	BB&T Corp.	Winston-Salem	NC	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$3,133,640,000	Par
11/14/2008	Provident Bancshares Corp.	Baltimore	MD	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$151,500,000	Par
11/14/2008	Umpqua Holdings Corp.	Portland	OR	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$214,181,000	Par
11/14/2008	Comerica Inc.	Dallas	TX	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$2,250,000,000	Par
11/14/2008	Regions Financial Corp.	Birmingham	AL	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$3,500,000,000	Par
11/14/2008	Capital One Financial Corporation	McLean	VA	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$3,555,199,000	Par
11/14/2008	First Horizon National Corporation	Memphis	TN	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$866,540,000	Par
11/14/2008	Huntington Bancshares	Columbus	OH	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$1,398,071,000	Par
11/14/2008	KeyCorp	Cleveland	OH	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$2,500,000,000	Par
11/14/2008	Valley National Bancorp	Wayne	NJ	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$300,000,000	Par
11/14/2008	Zions Bancorporation	Salt Lake City	UT	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$1,400,000,000	Par
11/14/2008	Marshall & Ilsley Corporation	Milwaukee	WI	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$1,715,000,000	Par
11/14/2008	U.S. Bancorp	Minneapolis	MN	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$6,599,000,000	Par
11/14/2008	TCF Financial Corporation	Wayzata	MN	Purchase	Preferred Stock w/Warrants	$361,172,000	Par

UK and Eurozone, Legislation, Law & the Government, Global Macro, Financial Shenanigans, Current Affairs, Consumer Finance, Commercial Banks, Capital Markets, Banking	3 Nov 2008 12:00 AM
Corporate welfare by Reggie Middleton	Comment (7)

I was very clear in warning about the "everyman for himself" phenomenon back when the first US bailout package was announced in the US. All of the money given banks are going straight to the bank's coffers and nowhere else. It is a farce to believe that banks will act against their own self interest when given money. PNC took the money and bought a bank with a risky loan portfolio to boost deposits, AIG is paying margin calls with its taxpayer money, JP Morgan and Merrill chiefs flat out said, "No, I will not lend the new money out", and the Euro banks are also designing special textual diagrams to display their views on handling the new low interest rates they are benifititing from by way of the UK government. See what I just pulled off of the memorandum of understanding between HSBC and the government:

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………………./…./
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………./’/…/…./……./¨¯\
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…………..\………….\

HSBC Defies Brown, Signals It Won't Pass On All of Rate Cuts to Customers

From Bloomberg:

Research, Current Affairs, Commercial Real Estate, Asset Securitization Crisis	28 Oct 2008 12:00 AM
GGP: Requiem by Reggie Middleton	Comment (15)

Las Vegas Review Journal :

General Growth borrowed to create a massive portfolio of more than 200 properties in 44 states, including a $14 billion deal in 2004 to purchase the Rouse Co., which owned Fashion Show mall, Summerlin Centre and several other Las Vegas properties.

Company stock started slipping several months ago as prospects for consumer spending waned.

Shares went into freefall more recently when investors realized the confluence of the credit crunch with an emerging recession would make it difficult, if not impossible, for General Growth to make good on its debts.

Financial blogger Reggie Middleton, whose detailed criticisms of General Growth were posted online at www.boombustblog.com in January, months before management acknowledged serious problems, said the news Monday wasn't a surprise.

"Of course it could have," been prevented, said Middleton. "They didn't take care of the problems."

He criticized management not only for over-leveraging the company long ago but for compounding the problem through mismanagement.

Middleton said General Growth officials heaped blame on short sellers for forecasting a demise, got the company added to the list of firms protected from short sellers that was created in September to protect banks, then dumped millions of their own shares to meet margin calls.

"The latter part of the share price compression was the management's own making," Middleton said. "They owned a lot (of stock) on margin. They sold more shares than speculators like me ever would."...

... Wally Brewster, General Growth Properties senior vice president of marketing and communications, said the malls are healthy on an operational level...

... As for the notion that General Growth officials would seek a buyer for the entire company, "We always look at all the options."
Brewster also responded to the idea that company officials could have averted the problem by taking action earlier.

"I think we stand on our success of the past 50 years," Brewster said. "We are now dealing with an environment I don't think the U.S. has seen since the Great Depression."...

... Moore agreed with Middleton that the moves on Monday aren't likely to preserve General Growth as a complete entity. He added that current problems could have been averted had management girded the balance sheet before the credit markets went south.
The moral of the story?

"Leverage is very, very dangerous," Moore said.

In November and December of 2007, I plainly forecasted this turn of events in painfully explicit detail Don't tell me this could not have been seen coming. Greed and avarice vs. ignorance - the battle of the vices...