The Option Arm Triplets: Dead Banks Walking

I am continually surprised that people are willing to hold, at any price, the common stock of regional Option-ARM mortgage disasters Downey Financial (DSL), BankUnited Financial Corporation (BKUNA), and FirstFed Financial (FED).  They are dead banks walking. The big investment banks, money center banks, insurance companies, and even the GSEs have been drastically writing down the value of their toxic mortgage portfolios. Some might argue they have not written them down enough, but clearly management is at least trying to estimate the value of their portfolio. These big institutions, like AIG (AIG), Citibank (C), and Lehman Bros (LEH), also may benefit from government bailouts and foreign fund white knights who want to buy their name brand to break into the US market.

None of these long-shot saviors exist for the three small banks that I like to call the Option Arm T