Professor Edward Kane:

I do not. I always like to draw the distinction between information and disinformation. There is a lot of disinformation, no matter what one tries to say to clarify the matter. Some say it was all just bad luck, some ask who could have guessed that all this building in Ireland would turn out to be so shoddy or how could we guess the people who were borrowing 120% of the value of their homes would not be able to pay back the debt. Of course we can guess that.

We see ourselves moving more and more back to high-leverage loans on real estate. Real estate values fluctuate a great deal. Sure, there will be periods when they go up, and then they will collapse. Banks have to make loans prudently in terms of whether the people who are borrowing have the money to be able to support the loan. People bought more houses than they could afford and borrowed more money than the house was worth. The value of the house went down and they were lost.