Moody’s Downgrades Entire U.S. Banking System; Credit Suisse Plummets. Welcome to Banking Crisis 3.0

On July 29 of last year we wrote that Wall Street Megabanks’ Multi-Billion Dollar Blunders Suggest Money Controls as Good as George Bailey’s Uncle Billy and summed up our analysis with: “This is the stuff of banana republics – not a financial system befitting a superpower.”

On a regular basis, we emailed these articles to key staff of the Senators and House Reps who sit on the Senate Banking and House Financial Services Committees.

Late Monday, the credit rating agency, Moody’s, downgraded the entire U.S. banking system outlook to negative from stable. (Let that sink in for a moment – a downgrade of the entire U.S. banking system.) The news of the Moody’s downgrade did not hit the wires until yesterday, which should have cratered the most vulnerable bank stocks. Instead, there was a highly suspicious short squeeze that fueled a big rally in the prices of publicly-traded banks.

That unwarranted optimism has now been reversed this morning with Dow futures down more than 600 points just after 8:00 a.m. in New York; major banks in Europe temporarily halted from trading after steep selloffs; and troubled Swiss behemoth bank, Credit Suisse, down 24 percent to a new all time low of $1.74 in morning trade in Europe following multiple trading halts. For the systemic contagion posed by Credit Suisse, see our February 10 article: Credit Suisse Tanks Yesterday to $3.02; It’s Lost Over 90 Percent of Its Market Value Since 2007; It’s Not Alone.

The rest is at the link. Trump always wants access to banks, and wants to have an unlevel playing field. He borrows from banks, he doesn't invest in them - that I know of - so his diddling the rules regarding banks would have been to benefit himself. One wonders if any banks (Deutsche Bank comes to mind) will throw him under the clown car.