Credit crunch losses

Looks like the losses on the recent 'credit crunch' have topped US$18 billion, according to a report in the Financial Times section of The Australian (link). Most of the major banks in the U.S. are reporting write-downs in the value of their loans. It will be interesting to have a look at the reports of these companies to see how they have gone about the valuation of their loans.

I wonder if things would have been different if the U.S banks had to file half-yearly (as in Australia) rather than quarterly. In particular, I wonder if the banks would have disclosed to the ASX the extent of their write-downs under the Continuous Disclosure obligations.