There were few surprises contained in the anxiously awaited results of the bank stress tests released by the government on Thursday -- and that’s probably just how they wanted it.

Ten of the 19 big financial institutions tested -- notably Bank of America (BAC), Wells Fargo (WFC), GMAC (GM) and Citigroup (C) -- are being asked to add billions of dollars to their balance sheets in the event the recession gets worse.

According to the results: Bank of America needs to raise $33.9 billion; Wells Fargo $13.7 billion; GMAC $11.5 billion; Citigroup $5.5 billion; Regions Financial (RF) $2.5 billion; SunTrust (STI) $2.2 billion; KeyCorp (KEY) $1.8 billion; Morgan Stanley (MS) $1.8 billion; Fifth Third Bancorp (FITB) $1.1 billion; and PNC Financial Services Group (PNC) $600 million.

In response apparently to the impending release of the results, Wells Fargo announced just after the close of markets Thursday that it intended to raise $6 billion in a public offering, and Morgan Stanley will raise $2 billion in stock and another $3 billion in non-federally insured senior notes.

• READ Citi to Expand Public Exchange Offers by $5.5B
• READ Geithner's Comments on the Stress Tests

Meanwhile, the remaining nine institutions -- Goldman Sachs (GS), JPMorgan Chase (JPM), Bank of New York Mellon (BK), MetLife (MET), American Express (AXP), U.S. Bancorp (USB), BB&T (BBT), State Street (STT) and Capital One (COF) will not need to raise additional capital.

The 19 banks tested are those U.S. institutions with more than $100 billion in assets. The government announced in February it would do the stress tests, which were designed to measure each institution’s ability to withstand a prolonged economic downturn. The government even made the conditions more severe in the middle of the tests, FOX Business learned, hoping to ensure this capital-raising exercise would be done only once.

Many of the results had already been reported in the media prior to the release of the government’s results at 5 p.m. ET. Indeed, the results have been leaking out all week.

There is widespread sentiment that the results were leaked early so that the information could be absorbed as gently as possible by financial markets, and that’s essentially been the case.

In fact, market response has been largely positive. Even though leaked results have shown significant shortfalls for several banks like Bank of America and Wells Fargo, the markets have cheered the fact the tests have shed light on a previously murky area of the economy.

“The markets hate uncertainty. Any time uncertainty is eliminated, investors get a warm and fuzzy feeling,” said Greg McBride, senior financial analyst at Bankrate.com. 

To back up their assertion that the banks would need more capital in the event the economy continues to sour, administration officials said the results “suggest that if the economy were to track the more adverse scenario, losses at the 19 firms during 2009 and 2010 could be $600 billion.”

The bulk of those losses, according to the Treasury Department’s statement -- approximately $455 billion -- would result from losses on the bank’s accrual loan portfolios, particularly in the areas of residential mortgages and other consumer-related loans.

The estimated two-year cumulative losses on total loans under the more adverse scenario would be 9.1% at the 19 participating banks, according to the statement, or worse than during the heart of the Depression.

“If the economy were to follow the more adverse scenario,” the government estimated, total losses could reach $950 billion by the end of 2010.

--Jason Racki and Joanna Ossinger contributed to this article.