Do You Expect More Banks to Go South?

You can expect more bad times on the horizon if you take acue from respondents to last week's Quick Poll, with 84% answering"Yes" to the question, overwhelming the mere 16% who answered witha hopeful "No." Polina Chapiro, a partner with Green Hasson &Janks LLP, sees more bad news coming down for banks.

I think that the poll reflects accurately what we are going tosee. Based on past experience—including the savings and loansituation in the '80s—we are just seeing the tip of the iceberg,although this might not be as bad as in the past. Some of thesmaller banks who got into the fray—and now that they are snared inthe credit crunch—they just don't have the pockets that are deepenough to survive this crisis. On the other hand, most biggerbanks, I don't think they are at risk at all. I would say that weare probably looking at a year before the turnaround, may be alittle bit shorter than that.