The international banking crisis has caused trouble for many German banks, but the German state banks (Landesbanken = LB) may be hit particularly hard. SachsenLB had to write off €1.8 billion; the State of Saxony prevented its bankruptcy only by providing a guaranty of €2.75 billion. The bank was taken over by Landesbank Baden-Württemberg (LBBW). WestLB may have to write off €2.0 billion and BayernLB reported a write-off of € 4.3 billion. For all regional state banks, a total write-off of at least €12 billion is expected, corresponding to 19 percent of their aggregate equity capital of €63 billion. Comparable figures for private banks are not available, but if the percentage share were of a similar magnitude, their losses would amount to about €45 billion. The figures estimated to date are not nearly that high, however.