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Ooops! I stand corrected on CIT vs. C.

So I just looked up stress test results and I don’t see anywhere that CIT even participated in the stress tests.

Maybe that’s because they are primarily a commercial lender?

I recall a couple of months ago predictions by a couple of market gurus and billionaire investors that commercial real estate collapse would be the second leg down of the recession.

Does the collapse of CIT represent the first casualty of this second leg down?

Wall street doesn’t seem to even notice today, stocks are flat. But I have seem time lags before after what seemed to be obvious signals that should have tanked the market.

I’m putting on some put options today while they’re still cheap.

Small business loans can be for several purposes, including real estate, inventory, capital equipment, etc. IMO, CIT's problems are more due to the general decline of economic activity. Small businesses are seeing profits dry up or disappear, and can't pay back their loans.

I think this precedes (or parallels) the commercial real estate collapse, which is effected by businesses folding and therefore not paying rent to the (over)developed shopping malls, strip malls, business parks, office buildings, etc. I don't think those larger real estate developments were CITs bread and butter, but I could be wrong.