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None of the banks wanted to touch Lehman and even if they did, their own balance sheets are almost as bad.

... so instead they go and buy Merrill? Not sure I agree with you a hundred percent on your police work there, Lou.

Well, I don't know the internals but Merrill might have a better balance sheet than Lehman. Also, BOA might be trying the whole "get too big to fail" thing - riding the wave of moral hazard and hoping for a government bail out if they ever hit the rocks hard.

So they're trying to replicate Bear? If they were, then paying $25-$30/share for Merill would be teh FAIL. Merrill most definitely has a better balance sheet (given the stockholder's equity section) than Lehman, and also less exposure to the types of risky securities that are failing.

I for one wouldn't want to be in ownership of any financial in this market.

On a side note, money seems to be going through almost a daily rotation of sectors. One day tech's up while everything else is down, the next day its biotech, commodities etc.. Tomorrow is going to be a down day for financials, which has meant an up day for techs in recent days. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

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