"And so the system broke down, the empire collapsed, and a long, sullen silence settled over the galaxy, disturbed only by the pen-scratchings of scholars as they laboured into the night over smug little treatises on the value of a planned political economy." - The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy

The latest totals of subprime writedowns and capital raising provide food for thought: writedowns now total $592 billion and new capital raised (whether through shares, bonds or other means) $443 billion.

If some forecasts are right, that first figure has some distance still to climb. Funny - the Fed predicted that we'd only see mark-to-market losses of $475 billion...

Lars Toomre notes the head of BaFin, Jochen Sanio, saying that Lehmans' collapse caused $300 billion of damage outside the US. (No details on how that total was reached, unfortunately.)

And radical calls to ban off-balance sheet accounting, restrict bank investments, cut leverage to under 50%, level the CME and Nymex and ban derivative trading - from Felix Rohatyn and Charlie Munger.