IMF: US Losses Will Hit $1.4T

The International Monetary Fund has estimated declared losses on U.S. originated loans and securitized assets will reach $1.4 trillion, up from an earlier $945 billion estimate it made this spring. "The U.S. remains the epicenter of the financial crisis, with its housing market continuing to decline and a wider economic slowdown contributing to a further deterioration in the quality of existing loans," the IMF said in a report. "Authorities in the U.S. and a number of countries have taken measures to bolster confidence in financial institutions and markets, including injecting capital in financial institutions or proposing to buy troubled assets," the fund acknowledged. But the report's author and director of the IMF's Monetary and Capital Markets Department, Jaime Caruana, said he believes that "the ultimate success of these measures is difficult to gauge."