Banks themselves have generally ceased their role as gatekeepers. They're now in the shipping business, not the storage business. They parcel out to other investors the big loan packages they cut, typically as much as 95% of the loans they originally underwrite. These are sliced and packaged into products and gobbled up by hedge funds, insurance companies and institutional investors hungry for anything with a sizable yield.
Structural changes in the way people buy and sell debt adds to the appetite. The Street's soothsayers say this has fundamentally changed markets, by spreading risk far and wide, like a rake shaping a deep sand trap into a large, shallow one.
In other words, don't worry about how these times will end. Just know that everyone will be getting paid until the day arrives. And no one will have to give it back.
No worries, indeed.
