Great news and greater news: global banks have come clean about 80 percent of losses on subprime-related assets, which means further admissions of fuck ups will be a relative drop in the bucket. “As a significant proportion of the losses have been disclosed, further ratings action arising from ABS-CDO and subprime RMBS exposures is likely to be minimal,” said Fitch Ratings in a report today. Seriously—you won’t feel a thing. Even more exciting are the bragging rights earned by the four hardest working firms in the field of risk management. Fitch notes that Citigroup, Merrill Lynch, UBS, and IKB have accounted for 60 percent of all disclosed losses to date.

Banks Disclosed 80% of Subprime-Related Losses
[Reuters]

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Comments (7)

  1. Posted by guest | May 14, 2008 at 12:51 PM

    Its reassuring to know Fitch, one of the agencies responsible for assessing the credit worthiness of a lot of this paper to begin with is so confident we’re 80% of the way through this debacle. I will finally be able to sleep at night!

  2. Posted by ab | May 14, 2008 at 12:54 PM

    props to IKB for making it into this illustrious group. who said the germans can’t still play a role in some major world fuck ups.

  3. Posted by guest | May 14, 2008 at 12:57 PM

    Given the state of things (oil, stagflation, etc.) I just can’t help but think this is like Schwarzman’s noodle salesman sounding the all clear on August 7th ’45.

  4. Posted by Anal_yst | May 14, 2008 at 1:00 PM

    @ 12:57
    ha ouch!
    But, I agree. Human nature (human idiocy? human blind hope?) appears to be leading the markets to think the worst is over and we’ve weathered the storm. I, for one, tend to disagree, but thats another story for another time.

  5. Posted by NomadTrader | May 14, 2008 at 1:03 PM

    Throw in UBS with IKB, and you got half of the fuck-ups sitting in German accounts. Sargent Schultz to the rescue though – ” I know nothing.” Don’t look now, but we are so sorry you got squat in your account.

  6. Posted by guest | May 14, 2008 at 1:22 PM

    @NomadTrader: wait, did you just count UBS as a German institution? That kind of talk will get you killed if you’re not careful.

  7. Posted by NomadTrader | May 14, 2008 at 2:06 PM

    No, they only wish they were German. The “financially responsible” Swiss suckered their German accounts into all that LBO,CMO, and CDO shit. Put that with IKB and you got a hell of a lot of pissed Germans. But, like I said, ” I know nothing!!” will be the response from the Swiss.
    Oh, by the way, we know we totally fucked up your equity accounts, but we are Swiss, and we are here help. You know, “UBS – you and us.”
    What a fucking joke these Swiss are – hell, they aren’t even smart enough to keep German Gov’t snoops knee-deep in hookers. What does anybody expect from these clowns?

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