RJ and Makay

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Banks around the world may slash an additional 100,000 jobs this year, according to Meredith Whitney, chief executive officer of Meredith Whitney Advisory Group LLC.  Whitney shared her views yesterday with radio hosts Tom Keene and Ken Prewitt on the Bloomberg Surveillance show.  Worldwide, banks lost well over 200,000 jobs in 2011, and this year “stands more of a chance to be a repeat” of 2011, she said.

Meredith Whitney, the bank analyst who jumped to celebrity by correctly predicting Citigroup Inc.’s dividend cut, is having less success divining stock market winners and losers according to Bloomberg.

As reported on Bloomberg.com, two-thirds of her picks fared worse than market indexes. Missed calls include Visa Inc., which fell 14 percent after Whitney called it her “single best buy,” and Capital One Financial Corp., which tripled after she urged clients to sell.

Whitney’s recommendation to sell bank stocks propelled her to fame during the financial crisis. Time magazine labeled her one of the world’s most influential people and Fortune put her on its list of the 50 Most Powerful Women. Michael Lewis’s best- seller “The Big Short” chronicled how Whitney’s prediction on Oct. 31, 2007, that Citigroup would lower its dividend helped erase $390 billion of value from U.S. stocks.

Meredith Whitney, of the Meredith Whitney Advisory Group LLC in New York, recently rated 15 largest states according to financial conditions and only two received passing grades. California's financial condition is rated the worst, as reported on investmentnews.com.

The report categorized the states by four criteria: economy, fiscal health, housing and taxes. Texas and Virginia are the only two states to receive overall positive ratings.