I remember very well reading about shady business tactics among banks like Wells Fargo and Bank of America as early as mid-2006 (specifically, minorities being steered into bad loans with higher interest rates).
I worked an atypical analyst job at the time that provided services to banks - but no influence at all, gaining business during boom periods, and losing business during lean times. Having seen the writing on the wall, I was discussing it with my manager - basically stating that soulless behavior like this would lead to some lean times - and that I was going to take some time off before I was laid off. My interest in the scandal was purely human interest, I had no business acumen whatsoever.
A year later, 80% of my floor was laid off. My manager got out before the crash, too, but for some reason decided to get into real estate.
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