Steve Eisman of the "The Big Short" fame said Thursday that one investment mantra he swears by is telling him that buying beaten-up bank stocks won't be fruitful. "One thing I've learned in my career over the years is that buying something just because it's cheap is a value trap and shorting something because it's very expensive is a death wish," Eisman said on CNBC's " Squawk Box ." "So, yes, the banks are cheap by any metric.
"The thing that bothers me the most is that returns are going to go down just because of the increase in capital requirements," the senior portfolio manager at Neuberger Berman said. Regulators have unveiled plans to force American banks with at least $100 billion in assets to issue debt and bolster so-called living wills in a move to protect the public in the event of more failures.