#WikiLeaks- PAULSON DISCUSSES FINANCIAL MARKETS, IRAN WITH SARKOZY, LAGARDE
Alexander Higgins-
In 2007 top US and France officials knew rampant fraud being committed by regulators, rating agencies and Wall Street Banks would soon cause a global financial collapse.
While investors and nations around the world were happily giving trillions of dollars away to crooked Wall Street bankers top officials in the United States and France knew the market would soon collapse and people would be robbed of millions.
While raising the issue that the role of government regulators and rating agencies needed to be reviewed in the wake of the upcoming crisis, US officials ignored calls from the French government to enact necessary regulation to stop the rampant fraud that would soon result in investors losing tens of trillions of dollars they had invested into the markets.
The cable reveals that while discussing the ability of the French banks to survive the crisis, French President Sarkozy was pushing the US to enact regulations to forestall the crisis. Instead, Henry Paulson responded by telling Sarkozy not to overreacted because the” it would take months, not weeks, for credit to be re-priced” telling France this is “not a major crisis.”
Paulson went on to warn that the major problem was with the German banks and which would require a bailout from the taxpayer while warning that the assets held by banks but covered up from investors by being held off-balance sheet presented systematic risk to banks and to sovereign wealth.
The cable clearly reveals that taxpayer bailouts would be needed. Paulson further up sticks up for the Wall Street hedge fund saying they were not to blame for the crisis while acknowledging there were major Wall Street transparency issues.
To summarize, the cable reveals that top government officials in France and the US knew Wall street banks were committing fraud in the origination and packaging of sub-prime mortgage and lying to investors about the resulting securities they were creating and selling. Officials knew banks were also lying about their own liabilities and hiding them from investors by keeping the assets off their balance sheets. The government also knew that both regulators and ratings agencies were participating in the scheme.
Remember as you read this cable, these conversations all took place over a year before the 2008 financial collapse when taxpayers around the world were forced into giving up trillions of dollars for banker bailouts. Also keep in mind that while the cable discusses “systemic risk”, “bailouts” and “market turbulence”, none of these had happened yet. They were discussing what would soon happen in the future.
The discussion of “systemic risk”, “market turbulence” and “taxpayer bailouts” over a year before the markets actually collapsed and those events actually occurred, show they knew a global financial collapse. Not only did they know it would occur but knew what the consequences would be for the investors and the governments who were fleeced by Wall Street. As the cable reveals, Paulson chose to deal with the crisis by letting it continue and urging France to keep the issue underwaps by urging Sarkozy not to “over react”, hence allowing the scandal to the continue which just postponed the inevitable.
Also remember when we were forced into these bailouts, it was under the guise that our governments had no idea the banks were doing this and this was a sudden and unforeseeable crisis. Finally, remember that – while there have been plenty of accusations from “conspiracy theorists”, “fringe economists” and “wing nut” politicians such as Ron Paul – there still has been no admission from our government that financial regulators or the ratings agencies played a role in the crisis.
They did such a good job depressing the housing market and sending the economy into a tailspin, why not trust the banking cabal with keeping track of all property titles?
John O’Brien, the Essex County register of deeds, isn’t buying it, and neither should you.
O’Brien, of Lynn, is in the forefront of a national effort to challenge the policies and practices of the Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems Inc. (MERS). The agency was established in 1995 by a group of banking conglomerates including Bank of America, Countrywide Home Loans and Wells Fargo, to keep track of loans issued against property titles — a task previously performed by the public registries of deeds.
In a Nov. 18 letter to Attorney General Martha Coakley, O’Brien alleged that MERS “has failed to pay the proper recording fees required under Massachusetts statute when a lender assigns a mortgage to another entity.” And this week Coakley announced that she will join her colleagues in several other states in an investigation to see whether MERS is skirting laws regarding such transactions.
In response to questions regarding the letter from Essex Co. (Mass.) Register of Deeds John O’Brien to the Hon. Martha Coakley, Attorney General for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, MERS has not seen the letter nor have we been contacted by the Massachusetts attorney general. We will fully cooperate with any inquiries from appropriate authorities.
It is not the case that recording fees are somehow owed or outstanding. MERS pays recording fees when the mortgage is recorded. Fees are paid for a service performed, and if a document is eliminated because it is no longer necessary, no fee is due because there is nothing to record. In fact, MERS greatly reduces the workload of county recorders, resulting in lower operating expenses for the county recorder’s office. Moreover, it would be the borrower, and not the lender, who ultimately pays the costs of recording assignments, either directly or indirectly.
When servicing rights or promissory notes are sold for loans where MERS is not the mortgagee, the usual practice is for the seller to execute and record an instrument assigning the mortgage lien to the purchaser (commonly referred to as an “assignment”). In general, the primary reason assignments are recorded (in cases where MERS is not the mortgagee), stems from the need of servicers to be in the land records to fully administer the loan on behalf of the mortgage loan owner. In which case, the servicer will be assigned the mortgage lien (thus becoming the mortgagee) in order to receive the service of process related to that mortgage loan. When Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc. is the mortgagee (i.e., holds the legal title to the mortgage lien), there is no need for an assignment of the mortgage lien between its members because MERS remains the mortgagee holding legal title to the mortgage as the common agent for them. It is not the case that the assignments are now being done electronically through the MERS® System instead of being recorded in the land records. The need for an assignment is eliminated because title to the mortgage lien has been grounded in MERS. Moreover, transfers of mortgage notes and servicing rights are not recordable transactions (and have never been reflected in the land records) because they are not a conveyance of an interest in real property that is entitled to be recorded; only the transfer of the lien is a conveyance. The only reason servicers needed to appear in the county land records before MERS was so they could receive legal notices pertaining to the property. Now, MERS as their common agent receives the legal notices. The chain of title starts and stops with Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc. as the mortgagee. MERS, as the agent for the note-owner, holds legal title for the note-owner in the land records.
The use of MERS is in compliance with the statutory intent of the state recording acts. When MERS is the mortgagee, the mortgage is recorded at the county land records, thereby putting the public on notice that there is a lien on the property. The MERS® System also complements the county land records by providing additional information that was never intended to be recorded at the county level, namely the information about the mortgage loan servicer, and now, with the addition of MERS® InvestorID, the name of the investor.
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