A year ago, the fortunes of the world and its banks were in horrible alignment. A banking crisis drove the worst and most sudden shock to economic activity since the second world war. The banks must be saved, virtually everyone agreed, or the economy would tip into a second Great Depression.

Are they still in such alignment? The presiding emotion holds that they are not. While the banks' losses last year took the economy down, the belief now is that their profits are keeping the economy from recovering.