At perhaps the final results presentation of his banking career, would Ken Lewis have liked Friday’s hotchpotch of one-offs to add up to a positive number? Of course he would. Rivals JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs posted frankly eye-watering profits this week. But although the reputation of the outgoing chief executive of Bank of America is in the mud, his true legacy will not be clear for years.

Leave aside that BofA paid too much for Merrill Lynch. No one will ever know the political pressures at work during those frightening moments of last year. But which bank today wouldn’t rather have Merrill in its fold, than, say, Wachovia or Washington Mutual? The irony is that not long ago everyone thought investment banking was going to implode or be regulated to death. As the west deleverages, though, it is consumer banking that faces years of misery ahead. Meanwhile, BofA’s core global banking and global markets divisions account for about 40 per cent of pre-tax, pre-provision earnings, according to Citigroup.