This is fascinating: the NYTimes.com has a great animated timeline showing the meltdown of the U.S. Financial institutions between end of 2007 until now. Watching the banks shrink (and in some cases, disappear) like this gives you a sense of just how dramatic the decline was. The banks went from a capitalization of $1.54 trillion ($1540 billion) all the way down to $290 billion in March of 2009, essentially losing 80% of their capital. Anyone who thinks the intervention of the governments didn’t matter is dreaming in technicolour.
Now their capitalization is growing back up to a trillion again. Check this out to see who disappeared and who dominates now: How the Giants of Finance Shrank, Then Grew, Under the Financial Crisis – Interactive – NYTimes.com
(Thanks to the Contrarian blog for this tip, too).
Smart People I Know 