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The New York Times reports that the Treasury’s stress test has determined that Bank of America needs $33.9 billion in new capital.  That’s nearly half the current value of the entire company, which has a market cap of about $70 billion.

If BofA can’t raise this money itself, it means either (a) more TARP money or (b) conversion of the Treasury’s current $45 billion in preferred shares into common shares.  I continue to think that (b) is little more than a shell game, but better minds than mine have suggested that it would have some genuine value.  If that’s what happens, conversion at Tuesday’s closing price would give the government a one-third stake in BofA.  But if their stock plummets and conversion happens at a lower price, Treasury could end up with a majority stake.

On the other hand, BofA’s chief administrative officer bravely says they have plenty of options for raising the money themselves before they have to strike a deal with the feds.  For example, BofA could decide to quickly sell a third of its stake in China Construction Bank, which would bring in about $8 billion.  The sale of First Republic and Columbia Management could generate about $4 billion.

Maybe.  It’s hard to say at this point.  But $33.9 billion is a lot higher than anyone’s been talking about so far.  Any way you slice it, it’s bad news for Ken Lewis.

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WE'LL BE BLUNT.

We have a considerable $390,000 gap in our online fundraising budget that we have to close by June 30. There is no wiggle room, we've already cut everything we can, and we urgently need more readers to pitch in—especially from this specific blurb you're reading right now.

We'll also be quite transparent and level-headed with you about this.

In "News Never Pays," our fearless CEO, Monika Bauerlein, connects the dots on several concerning media trends that, taken together, expose the fallacy behind the tragic state of journalism right now: That the marketplace will take care of providing the free and independent press citizens in a democracy need, and the Next New Thing to invest millions in will fix the problem. Bottom line: Journalism that serves the people needs the support of the people. That's the Next New Thing.

And it's what MoJo and our community of readers have been doing for 47 years now.

But staying afloat is harder than ever.

In "This Is Not a Crisis. It's The New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, why this moment is particularly urgent, and how we can best communicate that without screaming OMG PLEASE HELP over and over. We also touch on our history and how our nonprofit model makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there: Letting us go deep, focus on underreported beats, and bring unique perspectives to the day's news.

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