By 2002, when WaMu became the sixth largest bank in America, Killinger had acquired a new wife, a taste for corporate jets, and a vision that he was creating the Walmart of banking. To drive the mortgage business, he launched a “Power of yes!” advertising campaign targeted at risky borrowers; according to The New York Times, when a mariachi singer applied for a mortgage claiming a six-figure income that couldn’t be verified, they took a picture of the guy in front of his house dressed in the mariachi outfit, put it in his application file, and approved the loan. From here, the ending went pretty much by the numbers: Between 2001 and 2007, Killinger earned an ego-boosting $88 million. As defaults grew, losses mounted, and the stock price tumbled, Killinger told irate shareholders that the problems were cyclical, advising them to “calm down, have a little faith.

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And we know how that ends…

100 to Blame: Infectious Greed, The International Monetary Fund, and More: Bruce Feirstein | Vanity Fair