A Real Financial Bottom

If you invested in any of the Merrill Lynch (MER - commentary - Cramer's Take) financings, you are sitting on top of the world. Which means, alas, you can now buy more financings from Merrill!

I don't know if Merrill needs any more capital -- if you are a bank or a broker, it is hard to think you don't. I don't even care about the stock -- I own Goldman for Action Alerts PLUS.

But do not be oblivious to the fact that investors now have big gains if they participated in the Lehman (LEH - commentary - Cramer's Take), Merrill, Washington Mutual (WM - commentary - Cramer's Take), or Wachovia (WB - commentary - Cramer's Take) financings. Bank of America's (BAC - commentary - Cramer's Take) been a push. That makes the Citigroup (C - commentary - Cramer's Take) and Ambac (ABK - commentary - Cramer's Take) financings the outliers. That's incredible; it will make others want to do more deals, and it will make investors feel they are getting great deals.

Your takeaway from this should be simple: BULLISH. If you put money in a bank stock and you are up, you are inclined to put money in the next bank stock.

Mind you, I am more concerned about dilution and earnings power. These financings dilute that.

Nonetheless you are up now regardless of dilution, and A WIN IS A WIN.

That's another reason the rotation seems so real. There's an appetite for this.

Now, here's the billion-dollar question, or, more accurately, about a ten-billion-dollar question. Will Fannie Mae (FNM - commentary - Cramer's Take) and Freddie Mac (FRE - commentary - Cramer's Take) issue equity? If they do, they can be out of the woods for the rest of 2008, and by then, maybe housing will stop going down and FRE/FNM shareholders will be winners.

Keep it in mind: Put FNM and FRE on your screens.

Those are the ones that should be next. That will rid us of the last of about a dozen of Achilles' heels.

Talk about a bottom. Sweet.

At the time of publication, Cramer was long Goldman Sachs.

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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. Outside contributing columnists for TheStreet.com and RealMoney.com, including Cramer, may, from time to time, write about stocks in which they have a position. In such cases, appropriate disclosure is made. To see his personal portfolio and find out what trades Cramer will make before he makes them, sign up for Action Alerts PLUS. Watch Cramer on "Mad Money" weeknights on CNBC. To order Cramer's newest book -- "Jim Cramer's Stay Mad for Life: Get Rich, Stay Rich (Make Your Kids Even Richer)," click here. Click here to order "Mad Money: Watch TV, Get Rich," click here to order "Real Money: Sane Investing in an Insane World," click here to get "You Got Screwed!" and click here for Cramer's autobiography, "Confessions of a Street Addict." While he cannot provide personalized investment advice or recommendations, he appreciates your feedback and invites you to send comments by clicking here.

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