IRVINE, Calif. , April 4, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — ATTOM , a leading curator of land, property, and real estate data , today released its 2023 property tax analysis for 89.4 million U.S. single family homes, which shows that $363.3 billion in property taxes were levied on single-family homes in 2023, up 6.9 percent from $339.8 billion in 2022. The increase was almost double the 3.6 percent growth rate in 2022 – and the largest in the past five years.

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WASHINGTON, July 7 (Reuters) – The U.S. Treasury Department said on Friday that state programs using its COVID-19 Homeowner Assistance Fund distributed $1.2 billion in aid to homeowners in the first quarter of this year, bringing the program’s total payments to $3.7 billion so far.

Payments from the $10 billion program, launched as part of President Joe Biden’s pandemic-related 2021 American Rescue Plan Act, have reached more than 318,000 households at risk of foreclosure, the department said.

The program has benefited a higher proportion of economically vulnerable and traditionally underserved homeowners than previous federal mortgage aid efforts, it added. Nearly half of the assistance has reached “very low-income homeowners” earning less than 50% of their area’s median income, according to the Treasury data.

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https://finance.yahoo.com/news/1-us-treasury-says-covid-191301016.html

WASHINGTON —  Just a small percentage of the at least $60 billion in unemployment payments estimated to be lost to fraud during the pandemic has been recovered, and time is running out to prosecute those who committed the crime.

The statute of limitations for many pandemic-related unemployment insurance fraud investigations is set to expire in 2025. Government watchdogs are pleading with Congress to act, asking House lawmakers in two public hearings held this year to give prosecutors an additional five years to pursue fraudsters who took money that should have gone to unemployed Americans during the pandemic.

“This is a once-in-a-century fraud scheme,” said McGregor Scott, who was appointed California’s fraud special counsel by Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2021. “This is the largest fraud scheme ever perpetrated on the taxpayers in the history of the United States. And so in the context of that, why not give law enforcement and prosecutors that extra time.”

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https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2023-02-24/congress-statute-of-limitations-prosecuting-pandemic-era-unemployment-fraud

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https://africa.businessinsider.com/markets/the-sec-just-charged-a-us-subsidiary-of-investment-giant-allianz-in-a-multibillion/tx7pg8r

Billions of dollars in federal rental assistance is still available to struggling renters, though some states are running out of funds.

As a result, tenants who are behind should apply for the aid as soon as possible, experts say.

Congress allocated more than $45 billion during the pandemic to cover households’ back rent and to help families avoid eviction.

By the end of March, more than $15 billion had not been spent yet, according to the U.S. Department of Treasury.

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https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/13/struggling-renters-can-still-apply-for-up-to-18-months-of-federal-aid-.html

The Justice Department obtained more than $5.6 billion in settlements and judgments from civil cases involving fraud and false claims against the government in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2021, Acting Assistant Attorney General Brian M. Boynton of the Justice Department’s Civil Division announced today. This is the second largest annual total in False Claims Act history, and the largest since 2014. Settlement and judgments since 1986, when Congress substantially strengthened the civil False Claims Act, now total more than $70 billion.

“Ensuring that citizens’ tax dollars are protected from fraud and abuse is among the department’s top priorities,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Boynton. “The False Claims Act is one of the most important tools available to the department both to deter and to hold accountable those who seek to misuse public funds.”

Of the more than $5.6 billion in settlements and judgments reported by the Department of Justice this past fiscal year, over $5 billion relates to matters that involved the health care industry, including drug and medical device manufacturers, managed care providers, hospitals, pharmacies, hospice organizations, laboratories and physicians. The amounts included in the $5 billion reflect recoveries arising from only federal losses, and, in many of these cases, the department was instrumental in recovering additional amounts for state Medicaid programs.

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https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-s-false-claims-act-settlements-and-judgments-exceed-56-billion-fiscal-year

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California has given away at least $20 billion to criminals in the form of fraudulent unemployment benefits, state officials said Monday, confirming a number smaller than originally feared but one that still accounts for more than 11% of all benefits paid since the start of the pandemic.

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https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/california/articles/2021-10-25/californias-unemployment-fraud-reaches-at-least-20-billion

There was a time when Black farms prospered.

Just two generations out of slavery, by 1910 Black farmers had amassed more than 16 million acres of land and made up about 14 percent of farmers. The fruit of their labors fed much of America.

Now, they have fewer than 4.7 million acres. Black farms in the U.S. plummeted from 925,000 to fewer than 36,000, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s latest farm census. And only about one in 100 farmers is Black.

What happened?

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https://www.voanews.com/usa/black-us-farmers-awaiting-billions-promised-debt-relief

With a federal ban on evictions scheduled to expire at the end of the month, the Treasury Department is set to announce Wednesday $1.5 billion in rental assistance has been distributed across the country in the last month — more than in the last five months combined, according to an administration official. States and cities have struggled to distribute funds to tenants and landlords, and the news comes as the White House is slated to hold its second eviction prevention summit later on Wednesday.

More than 11 million Americans — 16% of renters — are still behind on their rent payments, according to analysis by the Center on Budget Policy and Priorities. In the early days of the pandemic, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention implemented an eviction moratorium, but it’s scheduled to expire on July 31, adding a sense of urgency for those who are eligible for assistance but have yet to receive it.

Congress approved more than $46 billion in rental assistance between December and March for both tenants and landlords, but getting it into their hands has proved challenging. Exact amounts renters and landlords can receive depend on their income and where they live, but renters could get enough to cover rent from as far back as March 13, 2020, unpaid utilities and even, in some cases, future rent.

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https://www.cbsnews.com/news/eviction-moratorium-ending-rental-assistance-treasury/

HUFFPO-

Image: Carolyn Kaster/AP

• At the heart of the dispute is the purge of 1.88 billion records. Bank of America, in a court filing, insists the records were copied, returned to the bank and still exist in its system.
• Miami attorney Bruce Jacobs, a former prosecutor, says the bank got rid of loan records that he claims may have contained evidence of fraud.
• Bank of America said he has it all wrong.

CNBC-

The nation’s second-largest bank is squaring off in a contentious court battle against a Miami real estate attorney who is accusing it of purging 1.88 billion records to conceal alleged fraud.

Bank of America, in a court filing, insists the records were copied, returned to the bank and still exist in its system.

But Bruce Jacobs, a former Miami-Dade County prosecutor, says the bank got rid of loan records he was seeking that he says may be evidence of fraud because the original records may have been altered by the bank.

“Bank of America thinks they’re untouchable,” Jacobs told CNBC. “They think they have so many zeroes in their bank accounts that they’re above the law.”

[CNBC]

Reuters-

Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS.L) has agreed to pay a smaller-than-expected $4.9 billion to resolve a U.S. investigation into its sale of mortgage-backed securities, paving the way for a long-awaited return of cash to UK taxpayers who bankrolled its post-crisis survival.

RBS said that $3.46 billion of the proposed civil settlement would be covered by existing provisions and that the bank would take a $1.44 billion charge in the second quarter to cover the rest.

Analysts had estimated the U.S. Department of Justice could impose a fine of up to $12 billion on RBS for mis-selling mortgage-backed securities in the run-up to the 2007-2008 financial crisis.

[REUTERS]

Reuters-

Wells Fargo & Co (WFC.N) is close to settling a record fine of $1 billion imposed by two U.S. regulators for its risk management business, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters on Thursday.

Last week, the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) proposed Wells Fargo to pay the penalty to resolve probes into auto insurance and mortgage lending abuses at the third largest U.S. bank.

Wells Fargo declined to comment.

[REUTERS]

Pittsburgh-Post Gazette-

Wells Fargo said Friday that it faces a potential $1 billion in fines to resolve government investigations into the megabank’s behavior in the auto and mortgage markets.

The bank has acknowledged that it charged thousands of customers for auto insurance they didn’t need, driving some to default on their loans and lose their cars through repossession. The bank has also said it will refund customers who were charged improper fees to lock in an interest rate for a Wells Fargo mortgage.

Both matters have been under investigation for months by two federal regulators, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. Those regulators are offering to resolve the matter for a combined $1 billion, the bank said. Such a large civil penalty would be the latest hit to Wells Fargo’s effort to rebuild its image after more than a year of scandal.

[PITTSBURGH POST GAZETTE]

Barclays Agrees to Pay $2 Billion in Civil Penalties to Resolve Claims for Fraud in the Sale of Residential Mortgage-Backed Securities

Raw Story-

Forbes says that it first started having suspicions about Ross’s net worth after it examined the financial-disclosure forms he filed after being nominated by Trump to lead the Department of Commerce. In all, the forms showed he had assets with a net worth of just $700 million, which was far below the $3.7 billion he had claimed to be worth, and below the $2.9 billion that Forbes had believed he was worth.

Ross initially told Forbes that he had shifted $2 billion into family trusts prior to being nominated for commerce secretary by Trump, which meant that he did not have to disclose it.

However, Forbes investigated the matter further and concluded that the $2 billion “never existed.”

[RAW STORY]

Market Watch-

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross stashed roughly $2 billion of assets in trust funds for his family members before he was confirmed — which allowed him to keep the cash off of his financial disclosure reports, according to a report Monday.

The hidden assets raise questions about whether the 79-year-old billionaire violated federal rules and whether his family owns billions in holdings that could create the appearance of conflicts of interest, Forbes magazine reported.

Ross only disclosed the trusts and the timing of the transfer after Forbes questioned why his financial disclosure form listed fewer assets than he had previously told the magazine he owned.

[MARKET WATCH]

Bloomberg-

JPMorgan Chase & Co. was ordered by a Dallas jury to pay more than $4 billion in damages for mishandling the estate of a former American Airlines executive, but the verdict will probably be knocked down on appeal.

Jo Hopper and two stepchildren won the probate court verdict over claims that JPMorgan mismanaged the administration of the estate of Max Hopper, who was described as an airline technology innovator in a statement issued by the family’s law firm.

Large punitive damages verdicts like the one in the Hopper case are often scaled back because the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled they can’t be disproportionate to actual damages. In this case, the jury awarded less than $5 million in actual damages.

[BLOOMBERG]

Four years ago, JPMorgan Chase reached a then-record settlement with the Department of Justice after, among other things, the bank received a copy of a U.S. attorney’s draft complaint documenting its alleged role in underwriting fraudulent securities in the years leading up to the 2008 financial crisis. Following the bank’s $13 billion financial agreement, the draft complaint was never filed. Then the bank paid another settlement to prevent a separate legal case from potentially unearthing it. The contents of the draft complaint have long been a financial-crisis mystery, a Great White Whale of a document. At least until now.

Vanity Fair-

In November 2013, JPMorgan Chase, the nation’s largest bank, agreed to pay a then-record $13 billion fine to federal and state authorities in order to settle claims that it had misled investors in the years leading up to the financial crisis. JPMorgan Chase’s settlement raised many eyebrows on Wall Street. The huge settlement appeared inconsistent with the oft-repeated narrative of the bank’s heroism during the crisis. JPMorgan Chase and its C.E.O., Jamie Dimon, after all, were appropriately lauded for swooping in to save both Bear Stearns and Washington Mutual, acts of financial patriotism that certainly helped prevent the U.S. economy from further doubling over upon itself.

But people wondered why one of Wall Street’s ostensible white knights would pay $13 billion—$9 billion of its shareholders’ cash, plus another $4 billion in mortgage relief—in a government case. During a conference call on the morning that the settlement was announced, Mike Mayo, a veteran Wall Street analyst, asked Dimon and bank C.F.O. Marianne Lake the question that appeared to be on the minds of everyone in the financial-services industry: “How is it that JPMorgan got front and center with this issue? That it’s the Department of Justice working out an agreement with JPMorgan when JPMorgan performed so well during the crisis, yet here’s the one bank that’s paying a $13 billion fine?” Without missing a beat, Dimon retorted, “Mike, you’ve got to ask them, O.K.?” In other words, Dimon seemed to be saying to Mayo, as he later put it in Davos, that the whole thing was “unfair.”

[VANITY FAIR]

Market Watch-

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac could need a taxpayer bailout of as much as $99.6 billion if a severe economic downturn gripped the U.S., their regulator said Monday.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency released the results of a stress test that examined how the mortgage finance companies would perform in what’s called a “severely adverse scenario.” The stress test was mandated by the post-financial-crisis Dodd-Frank Act and the specifics of the scenario were devised by the Federal Reserve.

The test found that Fannie FNMA, +2.61%   and Freddie FMCC, +3.16%   together would require between $34.8 and $99.6 billion, FHFA said. That’s an improvement from last year, when FHFA said the enterprises would need $125.8 billion.

[MARKET WATCH]