After a few days without food, humans become delusional. Global banks, starved of capital for almost a year, seem to be losing perspective too. How else to explain Brady Dougan’s comments during Credit Suisse’s second quarter results on Thursday? “Our business model is remarkably resilient”, the Swiss bank’s chief executive said. Resilient? Compared with the same period last year, total revenues are almost 40 per cent lower and earnings per share have more than halved.

Credit Suisse deserves praise for pulling out a better second quarter than the first. Certainly the market was impressed, pushing the share price 5 per cent higher. But investors need to be very clear-headed about the post-credit crunch world for banks. Versus twelve months ago, current trading conditions are almost unrecognisable. In investment banking, debt underwriting revenues, which includes high-yield and leveraged lending, are down by two-thirds. Equity underwriting is 40 per cent lower, as is advisory. Revenues in fixed income, after adjusting for valuation moves, are about half that of last year.