"Cut" it out. Banking on the slide? (CONTENT ADDED)

June 17th the S&P decided to listen to TSM and cut its rating on 18 banks while also lowering its outlook on 4 others. We've said all along (despite bear market rallies up and gains of 100 or more percent - playing trends and recognizing overall macro-economic pictures for long-term investing are two different things) that banking is bad and staying bad and will get worse than where their stocks currently sit. We hope you made some fast money on them because they're going back down and may take your profits with them if you dont watch out! Here's the CNBC link:

http://www.cnbc.com/id/31406152

What more could you need than the TSM approval call to sell banks? How about Meredith Whitney - the bank-know-all, know-how woman - who said June 15th that toxic assets have yet to wreak their havoc on banking balance sheets, earnings reports and stock prices.

Bloomberg made some interesting comments recently and pointed out that during the 1Q of 2009:

1) Net Income of $7.6 Billion Is Less than Half Year-Earlier Level; 2) Noninterest Income Registers Strong Rebound at Large Banks; 3) Aggressive Reserve Building Trails Growth in Troubled Loans; 4) Industry Assets Contract by $302 Billion; 5) Total Equity Capital Increases by $82.1 Billion, mostly for TARP recipients. 6) Number of problem institutions: 305 with $220bn in assets--> insurance fund fell to $13bn from $17.3bn in Q4 2008. The FDIC imposed an emergency fee to raise $5.6 billion to rebuild the fund, with more assessments possible this year. The agency forecasts failures will cost $70 billion through 2013.

In considering mark-to-market accounting rule changes for banks... starting Q1--> Robert Willens (former Lehman): rule change could boost capital balances by 20 percent and earnings by as much as 15 percent. Edward Jones: Under the new rules banks will also be allowed to exclude from net income any losses they deem “temporary,” making it easier to provide a flattering earnings picture