Banks brace for more pain

Most banks did better than expected in the second quarter. But concerns about capital, credit and housing are likely to weigh on the sector for the rest of the year. Paste this link into your favorite RSS desktop reader NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- With the latest earnings season in the rearview mirror for most of the nation's banks, investors can breathe a little easier. At least for now. As the final numbers continue to trickle in, financials, as a group, managed to fare a bit better than most analysts were anticipating. In fact, over half of the financial services firms in the S&P 500, which include everything from regional banks to securities firms, managed to beat earnings expectations during the second quarter, according to Thomson Reuters. Of course, several banks merely reported smaller losses than forecast. "If they... [read full story]