Measured by overall assets, Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) still retains its status as the largest bank in America, but unfortunately it does so because of the use of taxpayer funds to bail them out, which they still owe us.
The data confirming this comes from the research firm SNL Financial, which culled the information from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.’s filings.
According to the filing based on the 2nd quarter, Bank of America has assets worth over $2.3 trillion and overall deposits of $971 billion.
With the acquisition of Colonial Bank, BB&T was the only newcomer to the top ten, holding assets worth $174 billion, and ranking in the No. 10 slot.
Another bank moving up when extending it out to the top 25 banks in America was BBVA USA Bancshares Inc., which bought out Guaranty Bank to bring its total assets to $71.5 billion, and its deposits to $48 billion. It’s now the 23rd largest bank in America.
The problem with all of this is rather than truly dealing with the “too big to fail” issue and the resultant moral hazard, the Federal Reserve and the U.S. government have made things worse by essentially creating even bigger banks than before, making it an even bigger problem when the “too big to fail” mantra is asserted again when the next banking crisis comes along.
We’re not even out of this one and have already seeded a disaster in the future when the banking system again comes under pressure, and the government is there to give handouts it has no way to fund without devastating the country even further with downward pressure on the U.S. dollar and out of control inflation. We still have to pay the piper for that with these bailouts, and the fallout is yet to come.
