By Andy Goldberg Sep 27, 2008, 0:42 GMT
San Francisco - Whatever feelings you might expect to follow the worst bank failure in US history - trepidation, panic, anxiety, fear - there was barely a hint of concern among customers and staff Friday at a suburban California branch of Washington Mutual.
Sure, there were the usual lines of customers grinding their teeth in frustration as they waited for an available cashier at a WaMu branch in San Jose, California. But there was hardly any serious discussion among customers about the implications of the bank's failure, and certainly no apparent run on the bank.
That may be a tribute to the regulatory agency that late Thursday seized the bank and its 309 billion dollars in assets, and then promptly sold off the retail bank business to JP Morgan Chase for 1.9 billion dollars.
Perhaps that sense of success was the reason why a string of bright helium-filled balloons lined the row of vacant teller windows, and the tellers themselves idled around the back office area without attending to customers.
But one reporter was not so sanguine, and after waiting for 20 minutes in line finally asked the cashier whether his meager life savings were in any danger.
'Absolutely not,' said the cashier. 'For our customers nothing has changed. Plus, you have much less than 100,000 dollars in your account, and so your deposits are insured by the federal government.'
As is always the case at banks the world over, the woman next in line couldn't help overhearing the conversation.
'Oh my gosh!' she exclaimed. 'WaMu is so big. If they can fail anyone can fail.'
'Actually, the whole banking system is failing,' said another customer helpfully. 'But what I can't figure out is that everything seems to be the same as ever.'
The ongoing normality included a line of SUVs waiting with engines idling in a long line for the drive-through teller, that peculiarly American invention, which allows the gas-guzzling nation to attend to its financial affairs without leaving the comfort of its air- conditioned cars.
But there was no such intense activity in the loans department. Lushly carpeted, studded with imposing desks and lined with rich mahogany walls, it was the bank's prime profit centre until the implosion of the mortgage market: the reason for WaMu's spectacular rise and hasty demise.
Now there was just a single loan officer in the field of desks, talking to a surfer dude with dreadlocks and sandals who looked like he had popped in on his way to the beach.
'I just wanted to check what's going on. Like everyone else in this country I live on credit. I need to know that it's not going to dry up,' said James Harrington, 31. 'I'm not convinced. The president even said, 'This whole system could go down.''
Despite that gloomy prognosis, there was only one person in the bank who appeared to be taking any defensive actions. A swarthy guy, unshaven and with a dragon tattoo on his right biceps, walked into the vault for safety-deposit boxes and emerged a few minutes later with a big blue duffel bag. He walked out the bank quickly, looking around nervously as though he was scared of getting mugged.
'He doesn't have to worry,' quipped someone in line. 'The biggest ripoff is happening in Washington.'
page: 1
tonny from belgiumSep 27th, 2008 - 11:03:21
It need not be a ripoff,look at how Sweden solved a similar crisis oin 1992: www.nytimes.com/2008/09/23/business/worldbusiness/23krona.html?em
Report this comment
Your Talkback on this Story