If there is one piece of data that should make you scrap all optimistic forecasts for 2012 year end S&P price targets and EPS forecasts, it is the following chart from Morgan Stanley which shows the relative contribution of financial stocks to the change in full S&P earnings (combined they account for 26.3% of the change from the actual $883.5 billion to $970.6 billion). Specifically we are looking at Bank of America, which with a forecast surge in Earnings from ($2.5) billion to $10 billion accounts for 14.1% of the entire change in S&P earnings forecasts. And since the S&P is simply the Earnings number multiplied by some multiple, all consensus views that have 1400 as their 2012 year end forecast rely on bank of America to account for nearly 20 S&P points! The US market has now devolved to such a sad state when the most insolvent of all US banks has to carry nearly the bulk of earnings growth in 2012. At least with Apple they produce something - unfortunately in BAC's case it is only legal fees for the avalanche of endless litigation against them.
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