Twenty minutes ago, the FDIC announced its plans to take over the assets of Alabama’s Colonial Bank.  The FDIC will arrange a sale of those assets to BB&T.

Right away, people are asking if there are more “Colonials” out there.  I would suggest that a mid-sized community bank on the Central Coast of California might want to pay attention to this situation.

Pacific Capital Bancorp (PCBC) had a very bad quarter, with losses of $7.77 per share (including one-time items).  PCBC, the parent bank of Santa Barbara Bancorp, has been struggling.  They are putting off making payments on (more…)

In spite of what the government is saying, it might be too early to say that the economy is finally getting back on its feet.

Yesterday, Ben Bernanke and his associates articulated a view that stimulus has taken the economy out of “defcon 1,” and that future policy will focus on weaning the US off of government help.  Bernanke, who says that he sees those famous “green shoots,”  indicated that the Treasury will continue to buy securities, but that this should slow or cease by as soon as November.

That is in spite of all kinds of evidence of persistent trouble on Main Street.  How can regulators see light at the end (more…)

Willy Loman wanted his sons to be well-liked.  Not merely “liked.”  Willy struggled to grasp how things were changing in the economy back in the 1950s.  He believed that personal relationships and popularity could overcome a lack of math skills or even a lack of moral integrity.  Willy didn’t understand the world back then.  Maybe he would understand it even less, now.

The sudden development of “boomerang employees” marks the abandonment by companies of even the merely “liked” and the competent.

Yesterday, I attended a workshop on the campus of a local technical community college.  During breaks, I (more…)

Employee thwarts bank robbery on Tuesday.

Fired on Thursday.

Hmm…

The dollar drives our new economy, says one informal “economist” scouting properties in Southern California’s suburbs.  Single dollars.

Jim the Realtor, who narrates his own tour of foreclosed commercial residential and retail properties in Encinitas, Carlsbad, and a few other suburbs in San Diego County, California, says there is opportunity, as long as prices drop like a rock. It is an expression of creative destruction, expressed in the uniquely Southern California elocution of a drive-by.

It is an interesting tour.  These are not broken down, falling apart buildings reticent of images in places like Cleveland’s  Slavic Village.  Just the opposite, in fact: these are beach side condos, strip malls off the interstate, and (more…)