“No one is going to trust the US banking, mortgage, or securities industries for decades.”
Indeed, and the collapse of the housing and financial sectors will provide the pretext to nationalize the banks and regulate the hell out of what is left of the financial markets. At that point you can kiss free enterprise and prosperity adios. And then all the screw-the-banks populists on this board will have a new (and very real) issue at which to shake their pitchforks.
Let's be honest here. The banks brought this on themselves by commiting tens of thousands of cases of fraud and perjury. I'm no populist, but I also have absolutely no sympathy for that bunch of thieves.
None. In fact I'm looking forward to the crash. From where I sit the west and south sides of Chicago will be a nice rosy glow in the evening sky.