Money in the Vault

摘要

You've heard how IndyMac and Washington Mutual set aside paltry amounts for nonperforming assets. But there are a handful of healthy-looking banks out there with ample rainy-day reserves. Eric Fitzwater, a senior analyst at SNL Financial, a Charlottesville, Va. research firm, provided us with the raw data for this listing. These banks have no more than 0.6% of their assets classified as nonperforming (industry average is 1.2%)and have reserves equal to at least 168% of nonperformers. In line with the whole financial sector, share prices for these banks have mostly been weak of late. Result: yields from 1.5% to 8.4%, price/earnings ratios (against 2008 forecasts) in line with the market's 17.