The greed of Wall St and the derivative mess is what has caused this. The greed of the big boys to borrow money from the Bank of Japan at cheap interest rates and repackage these loans onto people that should of never been given a loan in the first place has caused the Yen carry trade. This is the backbone of the US credit ills. The sleazy greed of Wall St is legendary, top it off with a derivative and hedge fund lack of rules and we sit where we are at today. I think Warren Buffet said it best when he said the derivative schemes of the US bankers is a ticking time bomb. One should expect a few major banks to fail in the US before this is over. Perhaps we will even see some consolidation in the Canadian banking industry as this mess sorts itself out.

One thing you can be sure of, the current mess of the world banking system will come to pass. There is just too much riding on it. JMHO

When all around you expect the worse, the opposite will happen. It's the law of human nature. I often tell people, when I hear nothing but bearish comments from the news media and investors in general, a bottom in the market is near. I think that time is very, very close.

Al