>>>>>Royal Bank of Scotland
>>>>>
>>>>>down 25% this morning
>>>>
>>>>I read an article sometime over the last couple of days (I looked for a link but can't find it - I think it was in the National Post) that pointed out that the assets of even the largest failed banks in the US are a relatively small percentage of US GDP. It also pointed out that RBS's assets are considerably larger than the UK GDP.
>>>>
>>>>An even more severe example of this (although much smaller in absolute size) is the current crisis in Iceland: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/banksandfinance/3153061/Financial-crisis-Iceland-PM-warns-its-every-country-for-itself.html
>>>
>>>All these articles constantly confuse assets and liabilities. It is ballooning liability size that bring banks down.
>>
>>And most of these banks can't actually tell you how big their liabilities are.
>
>I see two ways out of that particular conundrum:
>
>1) they are so sloppy that they really don't know what they have and what they owe and what are they owed. Their stockholders (i.e. anyone whose funny papers the bank holds) get a chance to shoot at the directors' gallery when they're lined up the wall.
>
>2) they know everything but they don't dare go public with it. Their stockholders (i.e. anyone whose funny papers the bank holds) get a chance to shoot at the directors' gallery when they're lined up the wall.

It's good to have choices..