For review, the nine institutions receiving direct investment: Bank of America (BAC), J.P. Morgan Chase (JPM), Goldman Sachs (GS), Morgan Stanley (MS), Citigroup (C), Bank of New York Mellon (BK),  State Street, Wells Fargo (WFC) and Merrill Lynch (MER).

Hank, what do you see? Is it a bird? A plane? Maybe, you hope, a helicopter?

No.

Hank, there is an armada on the horizon. An armada of FAILBOATS with your name on them.

(img w/ thx to Erik Skiles)

The banks are admitting they’re not going to loan out this government money. They’re going to sit on it:

So much for that story. A few days ago, when Hank Paulson called the heads of the nine families to Washington and shoved cash down their throats, he announced that the banks would use this new taxpayer cash to lend. They won’t, of course. They’ll hoard it like a starving family who has just been given a grocery cart full of food.

From the NYT:

John Thain, the chief executive of Merrill Lynch, said on Thursday that banks were unlikely to act swiftly. Executives at other banks privately expressed a similar view.

“We will have the opportunity to redeploy that,” Mr. Thain said of the new capital on a telephone call with analysts. “But at least for the next quarter, it’s just going to be a cushion.”…

“I don’t think that the market wants to see that capital being put to work to leverage the business up again,” said Roger Freeman, an analyst at Barclays Capital, which acquired parts of the now-bankrupt Lehman Brothers last month. “My expectation is it’s quarters off, not months off, before you see that capital being put to work.”…

Jamie Dimon, the chairman and chief executive of JPMorgan, said his bank was in a stronger position to use the money than some of its competitors.

“It’s clear that the government would like us to use the capital,” Mr. Dimon said on a conference call with analysts on Wednesday. “If you are a bank that is filling a hole, you obviously can’t do that.”

So who plans to deploy the money? Thain, maybe, next quarter… and JPM? Jamie Dimon – that’s who I’d bet on as last man standing. No one else. And don’t count on getting that bank loan.