By LOUISE STORY and GRETCHEN MORGENSON

In the whodunit of the financial crisis, Wall Street executives have pointed the blame at all kinds of parties — consumers who lied on their mortgage applications, investors who demanded access to risky mortgage bonds, and policy makers who kept interest rates low and failed to predict a housing market collapse.

But a new defense has been mounted by a bank executive: my regulator told me to do it.

[NEW YORK TIMES]