Bank of America drops

Profits down 32 percent for quarter

CHARLOTTE, N.C. Bank of America Corp.’s plunging profits shocked Wall Street yesterday and prompted a clearly frustrated Chief Executive Kenneth Lewis to hint that an exit from investment banking was possible at the nation’s second largest bank.

As the last of the nation’s top three banks to report results this week, Bank of America’s news suggests that the problems in the credit market may yet be closer to the beginning than an end. But while Lewis blamed some of his bank’s problems on those market conditions, he admitted his traders also made plenty of mistakes.

“What I can’t say is that we’ll stay the course,” Lewis said on a call with analysts, after his company posted a 32 percent profit drop in the third quarter. “The probability of changes and eliminations of some businesses and infrastructure ... is very high.”

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