Lehman cuts Investment banks estimates

They cut MER, BSC, GS, and MS citing dislocation in the credit and mortgage markets. So we had cuts on them yesterday, and now today. These stocks should be your tells. Will the downgrades stick? It's not like they are giving us any new information. It's already known. And the stocks have been hammered. But you need these stocks to trade down, and then trade up on these estimate cuts. That will tell you this old information is already in the price of these stocks, along with the emotional response.

HR Block said that mortgage lending today was the worst since the 30's. Is that a factual or an emotional statement? Or a factual statement (morgtage lending is down) mixed with an emotional assessment? (worst since the 30's)

The point is, without an emotional response, most won't sell stock at these prices, unless they are panicked into it. The FT had an article this morning about a possible fire sale of $43 billion in "conduit" assets, because these financial companies need short term money.

So why hasn't the Fed cut the funds rate?