My sentiment should be clear in the title alone.  Lets flesh it out a bit.  I just heard a few hours ago, probably on television, about a Chase Bank promotion.  It had to do with credit cards, purchases on them, and rewards, as they call them, for making those purchases.  That 15 second promo becomes the catalyst for what follows.

My purpose:   From a cursory search using Google one can find numerous articles that describe  the Mega Banks and various aspects of their evolution.

I have chosen to show a somewhat different perspective that is still one of condemnation.    In particular,  Wall Street and the stock market are instrumental in the creation of these pernicious monsters.

There are six banks, as I understand it, who have become known, appropriately, as Mega Banks.   They are:  Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Chase, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley, and Goldman Sachs.   Now the purpose of these big banks, as it would be for any business, bank or otherwise, is to make money and moreover to make as much money as fast as they can.  That's capitalism.   We cannot quibble about that fundamental aspect.

Every business, and it would be rare for that not to be true, wants to grow and expand.  That's just human nature at work.   But between these motivations  and that entity described as the 'Mega Bank' there's a perversion which comes into full bloom when we descend into their domain.   For these banks, growth becomes a cancerous obsession.   In short, and in their mind, conquering the banking world ( and that means worldwide ) is the goal and the only goal.   And you, Mr. Customer, become the focus of their dreams and aspirations.   With you, they can succeed and conversely, without you, they cannot.   Its really that simple.

Fundamental to the Mega Bank's pursuit of preponderant size is to not only gain customers, but to engage them in a process in which they take money out your pocket and put it into theirs.  There are good words to describe this activity which I leave to your imagination.   We have arrived at the heart of how these Mega Banks differ from other businesses.   When you buy a television, furniture, or an expensive meal at a fine restaurant, its very discernible on what you got for your money.   You can take pleasure in that transaction.   For the human senses of sight, sound, taste, and touch, I challenge you to find pleasure in those bank statements that details charges for their so-called products and services.

Digressing for a moment, many years ago I had an account at a regional bank.  One day I discovered that [they] had been acquired by Bank of America.  At the time it didn't really matter to me -- a bank was a bank.   After a number of years in which BofA became increasingly larger through acquisitions, I began to take note of new charges and those charges became larger over time.   On occasion, I would talk with someone at the bank ( not a teller ) and quietly express my discontent.   I could have been talking to a stone statue.  It took about a year for me to tire of this nonsense. Then I found another bank, not small, but smaller and better.

I found a solution to my problem.   I found another bank.

The Mega Bank is not something that could spring forth were it not for some facilitating environment.   In that regard, we can thank the federal government, and specifically, members of the House and Senate who have dutifully provided aid and comfort in the form of legislation, or better yet, the lack of it.   Its just too hard to resist the banking industry lobbyists and their endless millions.  Its smacks of bribery but it is all perfectly legal.  The point is that it shouldn't be.   Money buys influence.  Again, its just that simple.

One final comment regarding government in creating bad outcomes.  Whenever I hear these politicians  profess how noble and honorable public service is, I really want to puke.   Nearly always, they're in it for three things - adulation, money, and power.

The last member of this unholy triumvirate is Wall Street.  Yes, even they have a part to play.   Their influence takes form significantly different than the government.  All of these Mega Banks are publicly traded companies and that means they have stock holders which in turn implies investments.  This fact alone becomes a driver for how the Mega Bank conducts its business.   Because a discussion of this area is both convoluted and voluminous I will keep it brief and still try to convey important facets.

Down on Wall Street (and other places as well) there are analysts who follow a select number of companies in a specific category.  Here, of course it would be banking.   Every fiscal quarter, these analysts issue estimates on what a bank should make per share.   This is a fundamental measure of the profitability though in practice it becomes subsumed within many other numbers which are part of the quarterly report of a company.  For any company, including the Mega Bank, which has significant investor interest, it must sometimes follow a delicate line, in dealing with Wall Street and the investment community as a whole.

The circle of this argument for busting the Mega Banks is a rather large one and we're now past the half way point.

Continuing, when a company falls short of these estimates, it typically would draw the attention of money managers who own the stock.   These managers are the heads of various types of investment firms -- mutual funds, capital management, pension funds and other institutional firms.  Quite naturally, they examine the prospects of that company for continued growth.  If they decide to exit their positions and those positions could be very large indeed, it could signal a general decline in the stock.  That's always a palpable fear for a CEO and its Chief Financial Officer (CFO).  Needless to say, in any given quarter, 'making the numbers' is foremost in their mind.

Next, it is useful to characterize a company in some way as a means of illustration.  I like the word, beast.   When a beast is born, it doesn't need much to fill its belly.  As it grows, its demand for food becomes ever greater.   For our hypothetical bank beast, it grows to a size such that its demand for money, in the form of profit, becomes inordinately large.  After all, a bigger business mean more employees, more bank branches, and more overhead and expense in a bewildering number of ways.   You might say, feeding the beast becomes a very big problem.

Continuing, once banks get big they're on a never ending treadmill of finding new customers.   Of course, advertising is instrumental in this process and for Bank of America and Chase it calls for big bucks.   Here, note that money out the door must be followed by money in the door.  Accordingly,  they must use any creative and deceptive means to extract money from those new customers.   For these Mega Banks, ruthless is the best way to describe them.  Standing in the wings. so to speak, is Wall Street.   They are taking notes and making projections derived from financial models and the like.   For those at the top of the Mega Banks,  it can and usually does mean countless millions in their pocket through stock options.   For them this merry go round of separate but interrelated actions is focused on becoming supremely powerful, subjugating government to their whim, and as mentioned, becoming supremely wealthy through these efforts.

A century ago, John D. Rockefeller, sought and succeeded in creating control over the oil industry.  From the wellhead to the pump and everything in between he was a near dictator in the oil business.   He became the first billionaire and that fortune in today's terms would dwarf any other of the present billionaires.   That said, when the government decided to take down his monopoly it had no worries in that process.   But the Mega Bank poses special problems completely different from Standard Oil.   Their size in financial terms coupled with intertwining links with other financial entities around the world makes them, figuratively and literally, the ultimate time bomb.   Bank failure for any of them now,  more so as they become larger, presents the real possibility of a catastrophe on a scale that it is all but unimaginable.

If you think that all of this is a bit farfetched, think again.  Plug in the following link to history regarding a prominent hedge fund of the 1990's which was minuscule in size to any of the Mega Banks and read about the calamity it caused on a worldwide basis.   I remember it clearly due to my general trading activity in the stock market during that decade  ---  http://www.erisk.com/learning/CaseStudies/Long-TermCapitalManagemen.asp

There's one very easy solution to the Mega Banks.   If you have an account with any of them, simply withdraw it, close your account, and go to another bank.   When you examine the differences between a Mega Bank and a smaller bank, there aren't any, it doesn't exist.   Do what the government won't do.   They're gutless.    As with the Nike expression -- Just Do It.