Comments on: Bank Stock Outlook: Will First-Half Gains Give Way to Second-Half Pain?

By: Why Ben Bernanke's Incomplete 'Exit Strategy' Could Lead to a Decade-Long Downturn

Tue, 26 Jan 2010 16:15:51 +0000

[...] Propping up teetering banks may serve to shore up near-term public confidence in the financial system. But it also destroys the same system by dislocating any meaningful capital-allocation strategy by extending the life of sick institutions that suck up scarce resources. What’s happening at Fannie and Freddie is no different – except that it’s happening on an exponentially more debilitating scale. [...]

By: Why Ben Bernanke's Incomplete 'Exit Strategy' Could Lead to a Decade-Long Downturn

Fri, 31 Jul 2009 20:35:58 +0000

By: William Patalon III

William Patalon III — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 01:54:59 +0000

Kelliann and Gerald: Thanks for taking the time to comment. Insights such as these continue to underscore that Money Morning’s readers remain extremely well-informed, and virtually always have substantive insights to add to a discussion.
Great comments, both of you.
William Patalon III
Executive Editor
Money Morning

By: BillHisted

BillHisted — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 01:36:51 +0000

I woud be interested to see a similar analysis on Canadian and major international banks

By: Gerald Friedman

Gerald Friedman — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 14:42:18 +0000

Zions Bancorporation is another bank that could be included, in this list but is probably too small to have been.

By: kelliann

kelliann — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 14:02:32 +0000

I predict PNC is going to lose a LOT of Florida customers when they start trying to pull them into the PNC system. The Florida National City customers prefer strong regional banks. The ones who stayed with National City only did so because they changed their policies to allow Floridians to bank exactly the same as they did prior to being National City customers. In most cases, they never even changed account numbers. National City would never have done this if they weren’t aware that if they made big changes, the customers would jump to the type of regional bank they preferred that offered the same conveniences they had been used to.
PNC, on the other hand, is using the old technique of drag ‘em into our system and our website and we’re going to do nothing to preserve the conveniences they are used to. PNC believes this “because that’s how it’s always been” in Pittsburgh. That attitude iconically represents Pittsburgh.

PNC exhibits no knowledge of the things that National City found it had to do to keep the Florida customers.

I will guess that PNC is going to end up with a lot of empty branches when their customers leave. Floridians have a totally different attitude about being forced to make changes than Pittsburgh people do. Floridians attempt to get what they want and if they can’t, they leave or they force companies and government to accommodate their needs.

A majority of Floridians moved to the state because they wanted a better life. That being so, they won’t up up with anything that isn’t better. Just the fact that they were willing to move to Florida from elsewhere demonstrates they have little tolerance for being pushed into things by corporations or governments.

Not so in Pittsburgh, where the culture is to accept what you’re given and not protest.

PNC hasn’t figured that out yet – they think they can count on inertia. Not so. Their smartest move would be to sell the Florida holdings to strong regional banks and stay in Pittsburgh where they and the culture match.