Banks have made a major effort to clean up accounts that held risky toxic real estate assets, covering 10.5 billion euros in losses through Q1 2012.
By way of comparison, the banks made 4.8 billion in profits last year, but now they are much closer to the real state of the sector that one year ago was hesitant to admit what was really happening.
In addition, defaults on mortgages have reached an historic high of 9.5%. The prediction is that defaults will increase beyond 10%. Nobody knows where the ceiling is. The government should speed the bank bailout process, because nothing is certain and time is is running out.
