Southern Landscapes of the Financial Services Crisis

The late 20th century has seen unprecedented numbers of commercial and savings bank (S&L) failures throughout the United States, which may severely disrupt local supplies of investment credit. This paper opens with a review of the causes of this financial crisis, including deregulation, the glutted commercial real estate market, and depressed local economies, as well as the state response to this crisis, including the formation of the Resolution Trust Corporation and the infamous S&L " bailout." It also comments briefly on the complex role of the South in national financial systems. Second, it examines the spatial distribution of failed commercial banks and S&Ls in the South and their assets and liabilities, including out-of-state purchases of failed S&L assets for the years 1980-1992. The contrasting geographies of these two types of financial institutions are made explicit. Finally, it returns to the ways in which the traditional growth trajectories of Southern states, particularly their relative integration in national financial circles, have become articulated with the spatial structure of the current crisis in finance.