Banks again

Michael Levy, the financial adviser, was on the radio this morning. He had this lilt to his voice. Like he had just gotten the nicest birthday present ever. He was obviously very happy. What about?
He announced that banks had revealed their latest quarterly profits, way up over last year!
The major banks showed their profits for the second QUARTER of 2010:
TD showed a PROFIT for the three month period of 1.17 BILLION dollars! (deserves the exclamation mark, don't you agree?) for a per share value of $1.39.
RBC was up to 1.32 billion at .88 cents per share.

Notice they don't want to use even the word 'bank' anymore. Sort of brings to mind the same image as Darth Vader, or Dick Cheney or .... burglar.

CIBC made 660 million dollars or 1.59 per share.
BOM 745 million, their highest quarterly profit ever, for 1.26 a share.
We can be assured the trend of huge bank profits is going to continue into 2010. Great news huh? People like Michael Levy get positively giddy over this. Good news all around.

But I have a bit of trouble with this. If you can make a billion dollar profit for one quarter of the year, and can't show anything you produced, like a car, or a chair or a potato, I deduce that all that money came from people's bank accounts. Well?

Their Research and Development Department must be little brainy nerds in shadowy basements somewhere thinking up shrewd methods to pilfer your savings while inventing clever tag lines to tell you it will make YOU money .... while creating sly ways to distract you from the fact that they ARE a bank! That is stealth.
I think what they really produce is deception. Sort of like making fog.

This, of course, is wonderful for those who have shares in these (nefarious) businesses. I believe the only other enterprise that makes for this kind of cash is drug dealing. Exactly, this is sort of like meth for the investors. BOM underworld meaning = Barrels Of Meth.
Of course I am one of those millions of struggling workers trying to get a potato on my table, I don't even know people who have shares in banks, unless they are hiding it through embarrassment.
Meanwhile the privileged cadre of moneyed people like Levy get shaking like jelly at the thought of their shares rising again. That is good, isn't it?
Well isn't it?
Don't you feel vicariously rich now too. Aren't you filled with glee too like Michael Levy?
I'm not. I have to wait until payday to get my potato.