FeedPosted Sep 14th 2009 10:00AM by Jim Cramer (RSS feed)
Filed under: Market matters, Citigroup Inc. (C), Regions Financial (RF), Bank of America (BAC), Federal Natl Mtge (FNM), Goldman Sachs Group (GS), Morgan Stanley (MS), Amer Intl Group (AIG), Wells Fargo (WFC), Cramer on BloggingStocks, Financial Crisis
TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says everyone in the trenches knows we're better off now -- only the academics disagree. Am I nuts, or am I missing something? One year after the financial system was brought to its knees, we are back in the mid-9000s and we have taken off the table massive bank risk and are well on our way to recovery.
I keep listening to people like Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz say the banking system is worse off now and I say to myself, "That's just stupid and wrong and anti-empirical and actually just silly." Anyone who knows what's really going on has to feel this way. And where was Stiglitz when some of us were running around trying to save things?
Continue reading Cramer on BloggingStocks: Worse after Lehman? Are you kidding me?
Posted Aug 21st 2009 10:00AM by Jim Cramer (RSS feed)
Filed under: Market matters, Regions Financial (RF), Cramer on BloggingStocks, Financial Crisis
The Street.com's Jim Cramer says that now it is all about who is going to take advantage of the opportunities. Did anyone listen to Bill Isaac yesterday? Did anyone listen to the man that was instrumental in solving the banking crisis of 1987-1991 when he was on "Squawk Box?"
I don't think they did. If they did, they wouldn't be nearly as fretful about housing or the bank stocks or the mortgage problem or the toxic bonds as they seem to be, because Isaac talked about 1,600 banks that had to be closed and about how there simply was no place to put the bad assets at all. He talked about major banks collapsing day after day after day, the largest banks in the most important regions in the country. He talked about how hardly a day went by when a bank that they were not prepared to deal with went under because of mortgage loans.
Continue reading Cramer on BloggingStocks: Mortgage meltdown is history
Posted Aug 14th 2009 2:20PM by Steven Halpern (RSS feed)
Filed under: Newsletters, Regions Financial (RF), Wells Fargo (WFC), Stocks to Buy, Recession, U.S. Bancorp (USB), Financial Crisis
"While I continue to avoid bank stocks and bank ETFs , I very much continue to recommend that you buy and own plenty of nicely high-yielding bank preferreds and bank minibonds for your retirement investing," says Neil George.
In his income-focused Stocks that Pay You, the advisors reviews his favorites among these lesser-known investment vehicles.
"Why invest in banks at all? Because -- as they continue to clean up and bolster their balance sheets -- banks are getting even better credit risks, which means that you'll be even more likely to get paid your high-yield dividends and interest payments.
Continue reading Bank bets for income investors
Posted Aug 11th 2009 10:10AM by Jim Cramer (RSS feed)
Filed under: Market matters, Regions Financial (RF), CIT Group (CIT), Federal Natl Mtge (FNM), Amer Intl Group (AIG), Stocks to Buy, Cramer on BloggingStocks, E*TRADE (ETFC)
TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says many stocks, considered frothy at one time, have turned into good turnaround stories. Here's still one more version of a short-seller's nightmare. What happens when froth turns to investible? What happens when you see behavior that clearly indicates froth and then, somehow, the fundamentals change, and the stock takes off?
We have seen that recently in so many situations that it is pretty dazzling. It was one thing to see
Genworth (NYSE:
GNW) (
Cramer's Take) back from the dead on its own.
Continue reading Cramer on BloggingStocks: From froth to investible
Posted Aug 7th 2009 1:00PM by Steven Halpern (RSS feed)
Filed under: Newsletters, Regions Financial (RF), Stocks to Buy, Housing, Recession
"Even among the broad-based market carnage of the past year, regional banks with heavy real estate exposure have been notably poor performers," notes turnaround expert George Putnam.
In The Turnaround Letter, he explains, "While investors are still wary of this group, there are cases where the market has overreacted and the stocks will eventually rebound dramatically." Here, he looks at four favorite regionals.
"Many regional banking stocks are now trading at a small fraction of their 'book value.' In more normal times, most banks will trade for two to three times book value and sometimes more.
Continue reading Four bank turnarounds: Rebound in regionals?
Posted Jun 30th 2009 10:00AM by Jim Cramer (RSS feed)
Filed under: Market matters, Regions Financial (RF), SLM Corp (SLM), Cramer on BloggingStocks, MBIA Inc (MBI)
TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says you'll miss some great opportunities if you blindly believe all the bad news. You want a rebuke to the "never-ending woes of commercial and residential real estate mortgage bonds"? You get one every day in this market, and today is no different. Look at what is up big today:
Genworth (NYSE:
GNW) (
Cramer's Take),
Lincoln National (NYSE:
LNC) (
Cramer's Take),
Wyndham (NYSE:
WYN) (
Cramer's Take),
Regions Financial (NYSE:
RF) (
Cramer's Take) and
Zions (NASDAQ:
ZION) (
Cramer's Take). Each in its own way needs the residential or commercial real estate markets to be robust to thrive, and if the myriad articles I read about the horrible state of the mortgage bond market and the dim commercial real estate prospects were true, why would you be making money in Wyndham, a gigantic timeshare company? How could Regions and Zions be rallying? They are among the worst of the worst; unless you consider Genworth and Lincoln National, which are supposed to be roadkill because of all of their mortgage bonds.
Continue reading Cramer on BloggingStocks: Warning: The financial media can be hazardous to your portfolio
Posted May 21st 2009 4:00PM by Jon Ogg (RSS feed)
Filed under: Regions Financial (RF), QUALCOMM Inc (QCOM), Suntech Power Hldgs ADS (STP)

Today was a day marked by selling, partly on economic news and partly on a call from S&P. S&P put the credit bias of the United Kingdom
at "negative" from "stable" giving the notion that the nation's Triple-A ranking is possibly at risk to be cut. Then came the
implications from Bill Gross and others that the U.S. could ultimately see the same fate. To show how bad the trend and bias was, long-dated Treasuries saw their yields rise as much as 15 basis points today.
A slightly
less-bad jobs report failed to catch any attention today. In short, if you are a market bear you are getting more feathers in your cap now that earnings are basically finished. Here are today's unofficial closing bell levels:
Dow 8,291.82 -130.22 (-1.55%)
S&P 500 888.23 -15.24 (-1.69%)
Nasdaq 1,695.25 -32.59 (-1.89%)
Top Analyst CallsContinue reading Closing Bell: Bears getting braver (OPEN, LDK, STP, QCOM, RF, PETM)
Posted Apr 18th 2009 12:10PM by Trey Thoelcke (RSS feed)
Filed under: Earnings reports, Google (GOOG), General Electric (GE), Intel (INTC), Nokia Corp. (NOK), Citigroup Inc. (C), Johnson and Johnson (JNJ), JPMorgan Chase (JPM), Abbott Laboratories (ABT), Regions Financial (RF), Baxter Intl (BAX), Charles Schwab Corp (SCHW), Chevron Corp (CVX), ConocoPhillips (COP), Goldman Sachs Group (GS), Mattel, Inc (MAT), BP p.l.c. ADS (BP), AMR Corp (AMR), Harley-Davidson (HOG)
Here are some highlights from this past week's earnings coverage from BloggingStocks:
Continue reading Earnings highlights: Goldman Sachs, Google, Citigroup, GE, Intel, Nokia and more
Posted Apr 16th 2009 4:20PM by Jon Ogg (RSS feed)
Filed under: Starbucks (SBUX), JPMorgan Chase (JPM), Regions Financial (RF), Southwest Airlines (LUV)

The sages say to sell the news and have started calling the market grossly overbought on the near-term, yet stock enthusiasm is at the exact opposite of how negative things were 6 weeks ago. We have 6 million on the jobless claims now, although this week showed a real
decline in new claims. The rally came on late in the day after the market was down triple-digits at one point. Here are the unofficial closing bell levels:
Dow 8,125.43 +95.81 (1.19%)
S&P 500 865.29 +13.23 (1.55%)
Nasdaq 1,670.44 +43.64 (2.68%)
Top Analyst CallsContinue reading Closing Bell: An IPO, Banks & Tech, all killing the bears (JPM, RST, SBUX, LUV, RF)
Posted Apr 16th 2009 4:00PM by Elizabeth Harrow (RSS feed)
Filed under: Major movement, Earnings reports, SEC filings, Forecasts, Good news, Regions Financial (RF), Options, Financial Crisis
The shares of Regions Financial Corporation (NYSE: RF) surged this afternoon after the regional bank said it expects to report a first-quarter profit. In a regulatory filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Chairman and CEO Dowd Ritter attributed the unexpectedly profitable quarter to recent strength in new account openings and customer deposit growth.
If Wall Street seems shocked by the news, it's because analysts were predicting Regions to swallow a quarterly loss of about $290 million, or 42 cents per share, according to Thomson Reuters. Plus, with nearly 5% of the equity's float sold short, it seems that many investors were also betting on the bank to report gloomy earnings.
Continue reading Regions Financial draws heavy call volume after 1Q profit forecast
Posted Jan 20th 2009 2:10PM by Elizabeth Harrow (RSS feed)
Filed under: Earnings reports, Bad news, Regions Financial (RF), Housing, Financial Crisis
It's a dismal day on Wall Street for financial stocks, and Regions Financial Corp. (NYSE: RF) is no exception. The Alabama-based bank today reported an eye-popping quarterly loss of $6.22 billion, or $9.01 per share, as results were pressured by a $6 billion writedown in its banking and Treasury operations.
On an operating basis, Regions' loss of 35 cents per share exceeded the consensus estimate for a loss of 20 cents per share. Net charge-offs for the quarter soared to $796 million, compared to $107.5 million in the year-ago period. Additionally, the company confessed to "emerging stress" in its Florida-based real estate and mortgage businesses.
"Although we're encouraged by steps the government has taken to stabilize the housing market and revitalize the economy, there is no quick fix for credit quality issues currently plaguing the financial services industry," commented Dowd Ritter, RF's chairman, president and chief executive officer.
Ritter added that he doesn't expect unemployment to peak or real estate values to bottom in 2009, and he warned that bank earnings won't improve until such a trough is reached. He doesn't foresee the need to seek new capital from the government, though Regions will look for opportunities to shore up its capital position as market conditions allow.
Continue reading Regions Financial swallows huge quarterly loss, hits 24-year low
Posted Sep 23rd 2008 11:00AM by Eric Buscemi (RSS feed)
Filed under: Analyst upgrades and downgrades, General Electric (GE), Novartis AG ADS (NVS), Regions Financial (RF), Newell Rubbermaid (NWL), Analyst initiations, Anadarko Petroleum (APC)
Analyst upgrades:
- Credit Suisse upgraded shares of Novartis (NYSE: NVS) to Neutral from Underperform as they believe the stock's defensive characteristics justify a premium valuation.
- Merrill raised Dreamworks (NYSE: DWA) to Buy from Neutral and has increased confidence in DWA's sustainable success following the performance of Kung Fu Panda and new revenue streams.
- Anadarko Petroleum (NYSE: APC) was raised to Buy from Hold at Stanford on valuation.
- Goldman upgraded Smurfit-Stone (NASDAQ: SSCC) and Canadian National (NYSE: CNI) to Buy from Neutral and added International Paper (NYSE: IP) to the Conviction Buy List.
- Northern Trust (NASDAQ: NTRS) was upgraded to Buy from Neutral at Merrill.
Analyst downgrades:
- Jefferies downgraded shares of Savvis (NASDAQ: SVVS) to Hold from Buy and lowered the target to $17 from $20 to reflect decreasing visibility from economic headwinds and expectations for increased capex.
- Citigroup downgraded Regions Financial (NYSE: RF) to Sell from Hold as they believe fundamentals are not in-line with the current valuation following the recent rally.
- Merrill lowered their General Electric (NYSE: GE) estimates below consensus and downgraded shares to Neutral from Buy citing increased fundamental pressures on the company's GE Capital unit. GE's target was cut to $28 from $37.50.
Continue reading Analyst calls: NVS, DWA, APC, RF, GE, MTB, BYD, NWL ...
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