The bad news wasn't a huge surprise, as analysts had predicted the bank would lose money in the third quarter. But it's probably not what departing chief executive Ken Lewis wanted for his last earnings report at the bank. The $2.2 billion figure includes the payments the bank must make on its government loans.

Despite the loss, Lewis offered two main points of comfort: He said consumer losses were likely to peak by year end, though he expects they will remain high in 2010. He also noted that the quarterly loss was partly caused by "non-core" expenses, such as a $402 million government fee, that didn't affect the bank's fundamentals.

"There are several things this quarter that indicate that there are better days ahead," Lewis said.

Executives didn't provide a specific timeframe for repaying the $45 billion it holds in federal aid, but they're eager to get out from under the government's thumb. As long as the bank holds the taxpayer money, the government will have broad authority over its operations and will charge hefty interest rates on the loans.

Also overhanging Friday's earnings report was the uncertainty about who will succeed Lewis, who announced Sept. 30 that he would retire at year's end. Lewis, 62, is under fire for his Jan. 1 purchase of Merrill Lynch.

But Merrill has fueled the bank's revenue all year, including this latest quarter. As consumer banking remains weak, Merrill's investment banking, trading and brokerage have performed well and provided the bank with alternative paths for making money. The bank said that its integration of Merrill is on track, and that cost savings should be higher than first predicted.

Some analysts expressed concern about being overly reliant on investment banking, an area where returns are highly volatile. The bank's shares fell 4.6 percent to $17.26, on a down day for the markets.

In consumer banking, the defaults leveled off but still remained high. The bank lost more than $1 billion in global card services, which includes credit and debit cards. That's an improvement over the previous two quarters, but still much higher than a year ago. The bank lost another $1.6 billion on home loans and insurance.

Charge-offs, or loans the bank doesn't expect to collect on, rose over the year and over the previous quarter in almost all consumer units. Credit cards were an especially ugly spot, with the bank charging off more than 14 percent of its domestic credit card loans.