If you were to take Bear Stearns and put it on the autopsy table and make a diagnosis for cause of death, clearly it would be GREED and with greed running so deep in the carcass, there would be no hope to revive it. Like a cancer that proliferates and usurps the body uncontrollably, when greed is unrestrained, it yields a terrible price. And so we have it, even the Fed with it's monetary defibrillators couldn't save the 5th largest bank in the U.S.
Any system that is built on deceit and greed is destined to fail........it's only a matter of time. Just like the Ancient Roman Empire that eventually collapsed, the systemic credit problems run so deep its only a matter of time before it collapses beneath its own weight. Every tax payer will foot the bill to bail out these large investment banks. And now the price of commodities will go up even more and everyone will be paying more for the already high prices of gas, food, wheat, etc. It's just a revelation of how overextended credit is. More banks are just hoping they have enough liquidity on had to cover the losses because if not they too are going under, oh but wait........I forgot, the Fed will just go to their printing press room and print up several billion US bank notes and pump that liquidity into the system. And the Fed has got it made.........for they will make millions of dollars on interest alone from those over night loans at the discount window where those large firms averaged $13.4 billion in daily borrowing. Clearly the only people who benefit from the interest rate cuts are those large Wall Street banks who collect millions of dollars off the little guys. And yeah, it's those little guys like you and me who really hold the economy together. If it weren't for our spending and borrowing, this economy would be in the toilet if it isn't already.