Bank of America Corp hasn’t completed any first-mortgage modifications that reduce loan balances for borrowers so far under a $25 billion settlement reached this year, the official monitoring the agreement said Wednesday.
Five financial institutions that are part of the settlement have provided $10.6 billion in consumer relief from March 1 to June 30, with $8.7 billion in the form of short sales in which customers sell their homes for less than the mortgage’s value. Bank of America produced $4.8 billion in short sales, the most of the five banks, according to the first report by settlement monitor Joseph Smith.
JPMorgan Chase & Co completed $367 million in first lien modifications in which borrowers had their loan balances reduced, about half of all modifications.
It has come to our attention that you have been offered a role in a porn film for $10 million. We urge you to reject it.
Princely Pay and Elite Status
Goldman Sachs is prepared to pay you much better than porn, and as a partner, your position will be much more prestigious than the Duke of York’s role as a representative for international trade and investment. We twist country treasurers and central bankers around our little fingers. Politicians are at our beck and call. We even pay a lower tax rate than your grandmother.
As a royal, you’ll regain your rightful status. We’ve managed to pervert capitalism and have even infiltrated our own regulators and government. If you join us, your elite status will be assured in perpetuity.
Department of Jesters
Our mortgage unit, Goldman Sachs Alternative Mortgage Products (GSAMP) was nicknamed “Garbage Sold at Mythical Prices” by financial professionals.
Occupy Sets Wall Street Tie-Up as Protesters Face Burnout
Bloomberg-
Occupy Wall Street, the global movement against inequality that ignited in Manhattan last year, will mark its first anniversary by trying to block traffic in the financial district and encircle the New York Stock Exchange.
Planning for the Sept. 17 protest, dubbed S17, follows months of internal debate and flagging interest, according to interviews with organizers. The morning action may include attempts to make citizens’ arrests of bankers, and some activists intend to bring handcuffs, they said.
Mortgage-backed securities were rotten at their very core!
Alison Frankel-
We’ve known since last February that the Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating the securitization process in which tens of thousands of sometimes dubious mortgage loans were bundled into highly rated securities. But aside from some boilerplate disclosures by the banks that received SEC subpoenas in February and a complaint the SEC filed in April against the relatively fringe MBS player Sand Canyon, there have been precious few public hints about the commission’s investigation of mortgage-backed securities.
With that background, a show-cause motion the SEC filed Monday in federal court in Los Angeles against R.R. Donnelly is worth paying attention to. Donnelly, which prepared due diligence reports for the investment bank underwriters on at least 17 securitizations by Residential Capital (the now bankrupt mortgage arm of Ally Financial), doesn’t appear to be a direct target of the SEC investigation. But the show-cause filing discloses that the SEC is digging into the loan-by-loan nitty-gritty of ResCap’s securitizations. If the commission is doing the same deep investigation of other mortgage-backed offerings, I have to credit the SEC: It took too long for the regulators to jump into the MBS mess, but the Donnelly filing suggests that they’re engaged in a thorough probe. (And I’m not just saying that because I’m in the SEC’s dog house.)
This putative class action concerns mortgage pass-through certificates (the “Certificates”) issued by IndyMac MBS, Inc. (“IndyMac MBS”) in ten offerings pursuant to two registration statements and related prospectuses and prospectus supplements (the “Offering Documents”).1 Lead Plaintiffs Wyoming State Treasurer and Wyoming Retirement System allege that the Certificates were issued pursuant to materially misleading Offering Documents in violation of Sections 11, 12(a)(2), and 15 of the Securities Act of 1933 (the “Securities Act”).2 The matter is before the Court on Lead Plaintiffs’ motion for class certification, appointment as class representatives, and appointment of class counsel.3
TAMPA — The Republican National Convention, which got into full swing here Tuesday, and next week’s Democratic version in Charlotte, will be the two most expensive, extravagant pairs of political conventions in U.S. history.
And most of the fun is paid for by the big corporations, lobbyists and superrich “superdonors” who began arriving in Tampa on their private jets this weekend.
“This is a system where there’s no shame,” said Harvard Law professor Lawrence Lessig, an expert on the role of money in politics. Instead, said Lessig, “There’s pride.“
THOSE MORTGAGES *ARE* EXACTLY THE ONES THAT SHOULD BE *INVESTIGATED*, particularly *property records* of Assignments (or *not*).
Are investors aware of these reductions?
Cleveland-
CLEVELAND, Ohio — Thousands of homeowners nationwide are getting jaw-dropping offers from five of the largest mortgage lenders.
The unsolicited letters and phone calls from Chase, Ally/GMAC Mortgage, Citibank, Wells Fargo and Bank of America are the mortgage equivalent of winning the lottery even when you weren’t playing.
The banks are offering customers no-strings-attached deals to drastically reduce their interest rates and, in some cases, slice tens of thousands from their principal. Customers don’t have to apply, sign tons of paperwork or pay any closing costs or any fees.
A “stupid stunt” that took place nearly 50 years ago has cost one Iowa man his job at Wells Fargo.
The bank fired Richard Eggers from his job of seven years as a customer service representative after the company found out about a decades-old run-in with the law, the Des Moines Register reports. In 1963 Eggers got caught putting a cardboard cut-out of a dime in a washing machine at a laundromat.
“It was a stupid stunt and I’m not real proud of it, but to fire somebody for something like this after seven good years of employment is a dirty trick when you come right down to it,” Eggers told the Register. “And they’re doing this kind of thing all across the country.”
You mean to tell me these execs were getting rewards of millions of dollars just for staying at work? Seriously, what the hell is wrong with this picture?
Tell this to hundreds of thousands that are taking a pay cut just for simply saving their job!
REUTERS-
A federal bankruptcy judge on Tuesday rejected Residential Capital LLC’s proposal to pay as much as $7 million of bonuses to 17 senior executives, saying the payout was primarily a reward for staying in their jobs.
* SEC examining mortgage loans bundled into securities
* SEC seeking due diligence documents
* Disclosure shows SEC still pursuing financial crisis cases
WASHINGTON, Aug 28 (Reuters) – The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating Ally Financial mortgage unit Residential Capital for possible misconduct in its loan origination and underwriting practices.
The SEC disclosed in court documents that it had issued a formal order of investigation on Feb. 22 to probe possible fraud in the offer and sale of mortgage-backed securities by ResCap.
Homeowners with mortgages serviced by Residential Capital LLC want to form an official committee in the company’s bankruptcy case, which would give them a louder voice in the company’s complicated Chapter 11 proceedings.
In a Friday filing with U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan, a lawyer for the group of homeowners said they’re concerned that state and federal settlements this year with mortgage servicers including ResCap’s government-owned parent Ally Financial might not be enforced properly now that ResCap is in bankruptcy. A ResCap spokeswoman declined to comment.
The settlement, over borrower claims of improper foreclosure practices, offers billions of dollars in relief to many homeowners who either owe more than their homes are worth or were forced to sell their homes and move. While the homeowners do have one representative on ResCap’s official committee of unsecured creditors–a plaintiff in a Pennsylvania class-action lawsuit brought by the same lawyer asking for a committee–the group said it needs more say to protect its interests.
Perhaps not now but maybe a future President will want to know who knew what and when.
Special thanks to the Wall Street Journal for killing the story when Harry tried to get a reporter who wanted to write an article about the $30-50 Billion Ponzi Scheme in 2005. (see part 2 below @ 2:20)
His life was in jeopardy but by who? If you ever have some time, these are an absolute must watch.
The last financial crisis can be blamed in large part on runaway securitization. Wall Street giants sliced and diced mortgage loans into bonds that they sold around the world. They claimed that they diversified the mortgage pools so that even a few defaults would not undermine the value of the securities, and they offered tranches of the bonds at a decent yield. As global demand increased for the securities, Wall Street pressured originators to close more and more loans, regardless of creditworthiness. This caused a bubble in prices. Moreover, financial innovators took the lower-tranche loans and cut them up into once-removed securities, making bets on bets on the housing market that were allegedly “safe”. We all know how this ended, and how the securitization bubble took a crash in housing prices and made it exponentially worse.
So now we’re poised to do that all over again.
As I’ve been chronicling, the housing market has been boosted by two events over the past several months, both of which have brought down supply and subsequently nudged up prices. First, banks and REO (real estate owned) holders have deliberately kept their properties off the market, restricting supply. Second and more important for the purposes of this post, institutional investors, including private equity firms and hedge funds, have begun to buy up foreclosed properties in large quantities at a discount. Over 40% of the foreclosed properties in Oakland have been purchased by investors of this type. In the near term, they plan to rent them out, creating what they believe is a fool-proof profit stream of rental payments. Eventually, I believe the plan is to flip the houses once prices rise more.
When the Justice Department recently closed its criminal investigation of Goldman Sachs, it became all but certain that no major American banks or their top executives would ever face criminal charges for their role in the financial crisis.
Justice officials and even President Obama have defended the lack of prosecutions, saying that even though greed and other moral lapses were evident in the run-up to the crisis, the conduct was not necessarily illegal.
But that characterization of the financial industry’s actions has always defied common sense — and all the more so now that a fuller picture is emerging of the range of banks’ reckless and lawless activities, including interest-rate rigging, money laundering, securities fraud and excessive speculation.
In the boom years, conspicuous consumption in the bars was investment bankers’ natural release from long hours in the office. Now the office sits on their shoulders while they sup.
After a series of banking scandals, banks’ compliance teams are ramping up their checks on every aspect of office life, such that even social outings are under scrutiny, with training sessions on what you can and can’t say over a beer with colleagues.
“Everyone is more paranoid, that’s for sure,” said one department head at a European investment bank, where the trading floor is festooned with posters reminding staff to report any suspicious behavior.
There’s no doubt … Brian Mulligan — an international banking honcho — was beaten to a pulp by the LAPD — based on photos obtained by TMZ.
Mulligan — the Managing Director and Vice Chairman of Media for Deutsche Bank — is unrecognizable in the pics — with severe nasal fractures and lacerations, a concussion, a fractured right scapula, and numerous contusions and abrasions.
Although the LAPD claims officers beat and arrested Mulligan after he became violent and threatening … prosecutors declined to file charges. Our sources say prosecutors believe the photos are “clear evidence of excessive force.” Indeed, Mulligan already filed a $50 million claim against the City of L.A.
TMZ first reported, Mulligan claims two LAPD cops beat him senseless after wrongfully detaining him … claiming he resembled a person suspected of attempted car theft. Mulligan claims the officers took him to a hotel against his will and when he tried to leave officers brutally attacked him.
The crony connections just keep on coming over at Eric Holder’s Department of Justice.
BreitBart-
Last week, the Justice Department announced that it will not prosecute Goldman Sachs or any of its employees in a financial probe.
Could that be because the attorney for Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein was none other than Attorney General Eric Holder’s “best friend” and former personal attorney, Reid Weingarten?
Or because in 2008, Goldman Sachs employees donated $1,013,091 to Barack Obama?
Or because Goldman Sachs is the former client of Eric Holder’s and Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer’s law firm, Covington & Burling?
But also take a good look at the MERS trademark documents below, especially the very top of page 3 where it names Covington & Burling the sender of what appears to be a fax allegedly in 1998 for “MERSCORP Inc.”. The documents were signed in 2003, 3-4 years after MERS’ 1999?s date via Fmr. V.P. W. Hultman’s secretary Kathy McKnight [PDF link to depo pages 29-39].
On Thursday, the 16thof August, 2012, the entire western banking system experienced a 9.2 on the Richter Scale event. On that day, for the first time in the history of the United States, the Washington State Supreme Court ruled that MERS, the Mortgage Electronic Registry Service, is not, and cannot be a beneficiary under the statutes of Washington State. In a well reasoned opinion, the Justices saw through the charade that is MERS and said “no” to the lie.
Who knows what the ultimate fallout of all this will be. MERS® put out their puff piece commenting on their loss trying to spin it as a win. I read it and thought to myself, really? That’s not what I read when I read the Bain decision. I read about a trip to the woodshed. Not to worry though. They will be back. They are like the Borg from Star Trek, or at least they think they are. For them, this is a temporary setback and they are, no doubt , even now, adapting and thinking of ways to overcome. Already rumour control has it that they are planning to lobby the state legislature to change the rules so MERS is suddenly legal again.
One of the things we have learned from dealing with these characters is that we can take certain, seemingly disparate pieces of information, almost make up conclusions, and son of gun, no matter how outrageous, they turn out to be true~!
Remember when the first person said all the REMICS are empty? Everyone scoffed in disbelief. Now it is taken as an article of faith.
Remember when we laughed at the concept of the banks offering the really nice pads to their employees as part of their compensation plan? That one turned out to be true too.
Remember when we were comparing their front line phone/cubicle warriors to trained monkeys with a wire up their wazoo? Turns out that one was true too. There is even a patent!
So here is my current set of outrageous predictions.
I predict we shall soon learn that the loan agreement the homeowner made with their “pretender lender” is a total sham.
I predict that the real borrower shall be revealed to be Countrywide, Ownit, New Century and all of their ilk and that there is some sort of “Super Loan Agreement” which lays out the real terms and conditions which we are all subject to but that we never had, nor were ever supposed to have, awareness.
I predict that what we shall find out is that the homeowner is one of two things. We are either sureties in a very complex securities deal, or, more likely, the business partner of the true borrower whom we currently are calling the “pretender lender”.
I predict that we shall learn that the banks, using deceptive business practices, if not outright RICO practices, induced the homeowners into their schemes while failing to disclose all of the players and agreements which they were buying into.
I predict that someone, somewhere will unearth a document proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that the homeowner is merely part of a “borrowing base” and that MERS is the lie which allows the true lender, someone like Merrill Lynch or Morgan Stanley or some fall guy with a bizzarro name like “Continental Soldier Minute Man Express Mortgage Lender” to have a first lien position on the security.
I predict that the true damage Bain is going to inflict on the banking side is that MERS’s loss of “Beneficiary” status will no longer provide the “pretender lender”, who is the real borrower, the ability to provide first lien position to these strange creatures from the Delaware Secretary of State’s office.
I also predict that because of all of this, the whole house of cards will fall down.
In Washington anyway.
Outrageous? Of course. I’m making this stuff up. But if history is to be any guide, these outrageous claims will turn out to be dead nuts on, the absolute truth. Just like JP Morgan and WaMu.
On Tuesday, in a little-noticed filing, Bank of New York Mellon sued WMC Mortgage and GE Mortgage Holding in federal court in Manhattan. BNY Mellon oversees a $680 million trust whose notes are securitized by WMC and GE Mortgage loans. Its new complaint explains that BNY Mellon, as the mortgage-backed securities trustee, is suing at the direction of a certificate holder for breaches of representations and warranties about those underlying mortgages. I left a message with BNY Mellon counsel at Boies, Schiller & Flexner, asking about the identity of the certificate holder, but didn’t hear back. Nevertheless, the filing is the latest indication that MBS trustees are very slowly beginning to bring breach of contract, or put-back, claims on behalf of MBS investors.
As my Reuters colleague Rick Rothaker reported earlier this month (and as I predicted last year), banks that issued mortgage-backed securities are facing mounting put-back claims, not just by the government-sponsored mortgage guarantors Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac but also by private MBS investors. By contract, those investors have to jump through a series of procedural hoops to assert claims of breach of reps and warranties: They must amass 25 percent of the voting rights within the trust, demand an investigation of potential breaches by the MBS trustee, and then, if the trustee does not act to their satisfaction, wait a specified amount of time — typically, between 60 and 120 days — before filing suit on their own. The burst of trustee complaints we’ve seen in the last few months indicates that some MBS trustees are beginning to take seriously their duty to act at the direction of certificate holders.
The Hennepin County attorney’s office has filed a federal lawsuit against mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, claiming the companies illegally failed to pay required taxes on home sales.
The class-action suit, filed on behalf of all 87 Minnesota counties, is the latest in a string of similar lawsuits filed by other states against federal government-sponsored Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in recent weeks.
Hennepin County Attorney Michael Freeman said at a news conference Friday, Aug. 24, that there are “tens of thousands” of transactions in question, going back six years, and that the lost tax dollars number in the millions.
“This is solely a question of law,” Freeman said after the conference, regarding the companies’ claim of tax exemption. “The question is: ‘Are Fannie and Freddie exempt from this law?’ We know Fannie and Freddie sold houses and we know they didn’t pay the tax.”
Retired Navy SEAL and Plymouth County Commissioner Anthony T. O’Brien Sr., a Republican from Pembroke, has announced he is running for Plymouth County Register of Deeds against incumbent Register John R. Buckley Jr., a Democrat from Brockton.
[…]
He said, “The top issue in re-election campaigns is the incumbent’s record. Many people asked me to run because Register Buckley’s leadership problems include that, like too many elite ‘no-show’ career politicians, his long-time reputation is that he is rarely in the office despite being in a full-time position receiving full-time pay ($110,000) from the taxpayers. You can’t solve problems if you’re not in the office. Last year Mr. Buckley reported that $20 million was lost in the past eight years to a private company called MERS or Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems. A lot of that money should have come to the Registry of Deeds and Plymouth County. Why was this money lost? Is $20 million an accurate amount or is it more? Why did it take eight years for the Register to report this problem? MERS is being investigated by the Attorney General as is possible improper robo-signing of Registry documents. (An Internet search can easily confirm these investigations.) Our citizens want answers and a full investigation into Register Buckley’s handling of these serious problems should also be conducted. I will be a full-time Register and solve these problems. Unfortunately, the only accountability and term limit for entrenched, no-show politicians is elections.”
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