what is going on with mbia?k to last week, brian, when mbia launched a con sense solicitation. essentially what they are trying to do is remove mbia insurance, which has a cross default to mbia's holding company bonds and replace it with national, which is more stable. >> mark do me a favor, i am not a very bright guy, speak english for me here what is going on with mbia what is the core story here? >> the core story here is that mbia and b of a have been locked in litigation now for several years over country wide and the fact that mbia suffered losses associated with countrywide a few years ago. mbia is trying to recover those losses. b of a, the suckers is to countrywide is trying to stop them from doing that. now, if mbia can achieve a settlement with b of a, for 2 to 3 billion dollars, then it will be in much better stead. we believe in the end of the day it is in b of a's best interest to achieve a settlement. if mbia wins in court over issues such as successor liability or if all of the information that t

essentially, bank of america is offering to buy a bunch of mbia debt, which of course, mbia being a mortgage immunity bond insurer. this is to wall off a troubled unit and improve the finances of its parent company. if this goes through, mbia may not make good on a number of policies, including those owned by bank of america. so its stock taking a hit on that news. again, b of a buying the debt in order to block a change in the structure that could prevent it from paying off some of those policies. back to you, bill. >> all right, mary. thank you very much. heading toward the close here. prices for stocks are coming down. so are bridge prices. >> don't go anywhere. we have a huge show ahead on the "closing bell." stay with us. >>> coming up, bucket list. remember this? >> in terms of bringing down deductions, one way of doing that would be to say everybody gets -- i'll pick a number -- $25,000 in credits. >> the idea for a bucket to limit tax deductions may now be gaining momentum with democrats. is this a better idea than raising anyone's rate? we crunch the numbers and tell you who will pa

a big win for mbia in that war with bank of america.hat later. >> let's go over stocks in the dow in the last couple years that have done poorly. alcoa. hewlett packard. bank of america. it's done nothing. it's done absolutely nothing. even when all of the banks had a resurgence, they gave that up and a lot is endless lawsuits that they tell you they have it together. a tremendous number of lawsuits involved in the banking business. these bills are actually adding up. it's actually hitting the bottom line. >> it is. after a few billion you are talking real money. we talk a lot last week about the autonomy acquisition for hp and how terrible it was but nothing will compare to what countrywide did to that company, to bank of america. >> all of these little things that might have been great in order to be able to just deal with what happened. >> liabilities they took on. incredible. they are dealing with it. investors believe they have moved through it to a large extent. >> the stock is up from 5.6 where warren buffett got involved. if you