Goldman's Earnings and Real Estate
Goldman Sach's record earnings are all over CNBC and Bloomberg TV this morning. Goldman earned $3.44 billion in the second quarter. This paragraph from the Bloomberg article caught my eye:

Goldman’s earnings included $1.4 billion of writedowns related to commercial real estate, including $700 million of fixed-income writedowns, $500 million lost on equity investments and $170 million of impairment charges, Chief Financial Officer David Viniar said in an interview with Bloomberg.

The large banks are going to be grappling with commercial real estate for the near term. The Commercial Mortgage Backed Security (CMBS) market and how the large volume of loans in these securities are going to be dealt with will dictate the recovery or prolonged slump in commercial real estate.