TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer explains why this poor earnings report is such a crushing blow.

Yep, Merrill Lynch (NYSE: MER) (Cramer's Take) messed up, for certain. We had no idea how bad things were. They just gave us no signal. Devastating.

Citigroup (NYSE: C) (Cramer's Take)? We all knew that Prince was a pathetic risk manager. Check that, Bob Rubin and the Crown Prince don't think so, but the rest of the world does. So the fact that Citigroup needs to talk to Bob Steele at Treasury to save itself isn't all that shocking.

Wachovia (NYSE: WB) (Cramer's Take)? I thought it was more conservative than this. Then again, it bought Golden West at the top and even that great lender succumbs in this horrid environment.

But the one that really hurts, the big surprise, is Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) (Cramer's Take). To me this bank had been doing everything right, tight standards, good national growth rollout, fantastic research, good solid banking.

Suddenly, I feel that everything's on the table after that quarter. It just really blew it in lending and trading and investment banking, in mortgages, you name it.

Fortunately, of these four, Band of America could come back the fastest. Ken Lewis is no-nonsense. Anyone who disappointed will be forced out. He will review and slice and crush, as we see already. But it is the one bank that I know I had been telling people had the real growth you want out of a bank. The one that would not be a value trap. And given the fact that there were no more banks it could buy, I figured now would be when it would just return dollar after dollar to shareholders in buybacks and dividends.

I think it still will.

But after this quarter, sadly, there will be fewer dollars to give back and I just don't know how they are going to grow as fast as everyone else any more.

To me it looks like, right now, we may have lost the best bank ATM out there.


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Jim Cramer is a director and co-founder of TheStreet.com. He contributes daily market commentary for TheStreet.com's sites and serves as an adviser to the company's CEO. At the time of publication, Cramer was long Citigroup.