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BROOKINGS PAPER: Efficient Credit Policies in a Housing Debt Crisis – Janice Eberly and Arvind Krishnamurthy

BROOKINGS PAPER: Efficient Credit Policies in a Housing Debt Crisis – Janice Eberly and Arvind Krishnamurthy


Brookings-

Summary

Should another housing market crash occur, the government’s highest priority should be helping cash-short homeowners maintain spending in a weak economy and avoid foreclosure by temporarily reducing or deferring mortgage payments.

In “Efficient Credit Policies in a Housing Debt Crisis,” Janice Eberly of Northwestern University and Arvind Krishnamurthy of Stanford University build a theoretical framework to guide policymakers ahead of a housing collapse and in the aftermath, finding that reducing the loan principal spreads the benefits of government funds over a long period of time, rather than focusing on the crisis period. The housing bust of the late 2000s was at the heart of the worst recession since the Great Depression, and resulted in a set of government programs to help beleaguered homeowners and cushion the blow to the overall economy. The authors focus on the importance of liquidity constraints and consumer spending in the overall economy, especially during a financial crisis when there is a need to support household consumption.

[BROOKINGS]

Down Load PDF of This Case

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Abigail C. Field: Assessing Schneiderman’s Task Force Gamble

Abigail C. Field: Assessing Schneiderman’s Task Force Gamble


Abigail Field-

My latest for FireDogLake. For even more confirmation that the Feds aren’t interested in bank accountability, regardless of the State half of the task force’s intentions, see Congressman Brad Miller on why he’s not the task force Executive Director and Richard Eskow on the obviousness of the problem. 

As people increasingly realize that the mortgage settlement was an enforcement fraud, attention’s turned to the “new“ joint Federal/State task force that’s supposed to make the settlement into a “down payment,” by delivering much more. And so far people don’t like what they see, and are saying so. What’s striking about the resulting PR push back, however, is that it just highlights how banker-fraud-friendly our federal government is.

For example, Attorney General Eric Schneiderman penned a Daily News Op-Ed in which he pitches “More than 50 attorneys, investigators and analysts have already been deployed to support our investigations, with many more on the way” as somehow adequate to deliver on that “down payment” promise when the Savings and Loan crisis took over 1,000 and Enron alone took over 100. Not only hasn’t the federal government corroborated AG Schneiderman’s claim of “many more on the way”; “many more” than 50+ doesn’t sound like anywhere near the 1,000+ needed to approach the ballpark of accountability.

[REALITY CHECK]

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The Bankers’ Subversion of the Rule of Law, Notary and Land Records edition

The Bankers’ Subversion of the Rule of Law, Notary and Land Records edition


Abigail C. Filed-

Hi

For the next couple of weeks, I’m one of the David Dayen subs at FireDogLake–no one person could fill his shoes–and this post ran there earlier today. This version is slightly updated but essentially the same.

One way to see the double standard at the heart of the foreclosure fraud—one set of laws for the bailed out banks, one for the rest of us—is to focus on the role of notaries public, and then consider that role in light of what our Supreme Court said about notaries in 1984, in a case called Bernal v. Fainter, Secretary of State of Texas.

First, let’s recap the role of notaries in the foreclosure fraud crisis: Notaries are the people who verify that someone actually is who they say they are when that person signs a document. Because banks and their agents industrialized “Document Execution” as part of their foreclosure business model, notaries did not do their jobs. Notaries’ failure to verify identities has been so complete that many people will sign as one person, say, “Linda Green.” Notaries have also been told to sign documents using one name, and then notarize their own “surrogate” signature. “Well, what’s the big deal?” bank defenders say. Beyond the fact that there’s no “business convenience” exception to following the rule of law, consider Bernal.

Bernal involved Texas’s requirement that all notaries be citizens; lawful permanent resident aliens need not apply. Bernal challenged the Constitutionality for the citizenship requirement. To rule on the question, the Court had to consider what notaries did, and whether or not what notaries did was so political, so central to representative democracy, that limiting being a notary to citizens was rational. In finding that notaries were important but not political officers of the state, the Court made some observations of note.

[REALITY CHECK]

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Richard (RJ) Eskow: The White House And Mortgage Fraud: So Far It’s All Talk, No Action

Richard (RJ) Eskow: The White House And Mortgage Fraud: So Far It’s All Talk, No Action


HuffPO-

The Obama Administration worked for months on a deal that would have let America’s biggest banks off the hook for a crime wave of runaway mortgage fraud. All they had to do in return was pledge a negligible sum of money, to be paid by their shareholders and not themselves, and which they would dispense themselves. In return, crooked bankers received immunity from prosecution – and even from investigation.

After the deal came under attack from a number of its allies, the Administration settled with the banks anyway. But it promised millions of wronged homeowners – and the nation as a whole – that it would move “aggressively” to investigate criminal misdeeds and prosecute bankers and anyone else who broke the law.

That was then, this is now. Two and half months later the Administration hasn’t even started to take the inadequate steps it promised it would take. The clock is running out on the statute of limitations and there’s no sign that the Administration has lifted a finger to investigate criminal bankers.

Talk vs. Action …

[HUFFINGTON POST]

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Obama’s mortgage unit is AWOL … NY AG Eric Schneiderman should quit this fraud

Obama’s mortgage unit is AWOL … NY AG Eric Schneiderman should quit this fraud


What we have learned so far: Whenever dealing with the banks and or with the government, they are from the same mold. We cannot tell any difference.

This “mortgage task force group” thing is also NO Different than that MERS system…There are no employees!

NY Daily News-

On March 9 — 45 days after the speech and 30 days after the announcement — we met with Schneiderman in New York City and asked him for an update. He had just returned from Washington, where he had been personally looking for office space. As of that date, he had no office, no phones, no staff and no executive director. None of the 55 staff members promised by Holder had materialized. On April 2, we bumped into Schneiderman on a train leaving Washington for New York and learned that the situation was the same.

Tuesday, calls to the Justice Department’s switchboard requesting to be connected with the working group produced the answer, “I really don’t know where to send you.” After being transferred to the attorney general’s office and asking for a phone number for the working group, the answer was, “I’m not aware of one.”

The promises of the President have led to little or no concrete action.

Read more:  [NY DAILY NEWS]

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Abigail Field: Hiding the Enforcement Fraud At the Heart of the Mortgage Settlement

Abigail Field: Hiding the Enforcement Fraud At the Heart of the Mortgage Settlement


Abigail C. Field-

On Thursday, April 5th U.S. District Court Judge Rosemary M. Collyer announced she had decided to sign off on the ”$25 billion” Mortgage Settlement. By “announced”, I mean she signed the consent orders all our major law enforcers and the biggest bankers had agreed to, and entered them into the record. Judge Collyer didn’t actually say anything about the deal. She didn’t let anyone else say anything, either: she didn’t hold a public hearing on the deal.

In acting silently, Judge Collyer not only okayed the deal’s lousy terms, which institutionalize servicer theft and foreclosure fraud, she reinforced the incredibly poor public process that’s kept the enforcement fraud at the heart of the deal hidden. Deliberately hidden.

Magical Misdirection

To understand just how deceptive “our” government and “our” law enforcers have been with us

[REALITY CHECK]

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CREDO: Tell President Obama: 55 investigators aren’t enough to investigate Wall Street criminals.

CREDO: Tell President Obama: 55 investigators aren’t enough to investigate Wall Street criminals.


Via CREDO

Back in January, President Obama announced during the State of the Union speech the creation of a new financial crimes task force to investigate the crimes and misdeeds that led to the economic collapse and “hold accountable those who broke the law.”

Yet, despite the enormity of the issue, its direct impact on millions of Americans and the widespread nature of crimes and wrongdoing, the new financial crime unit has been allocated a paltry 55 staff members to undertake this enormous task.1

And now we’re hearing from insiders in Washington DC, that the full complement of 55 promised investigators — which is already not nearly enough — haven’t even been deployed to the task force.

Election year promises aren’t nearly enough. President Obama needs to prove his commitment to the financial crimes task force is real and provide the task force with the resources it needs to investigate Wall Street criminals.

Tell President Obama: 55 investigators are not enough. We need 20 times more staffing to launch a real investigation into Wall Street’s crimes.

After the much smaller savings and loan scandal of the ’80s approximately 1,000 FBI agents and dozens of federal prosecutors were assigned to prosecute related cases2. And 100 FBI agents were tasked with investigating the Enron scandal3, which involved just one company and caused none of the economy-wide damage we’ve seen since the collapse of the housing bubble.

The 55 investigators promised to the financial crimes task force is not nearly enough. And to find out that President Obama hasn’t delivered on those investigators, let alone resourced the effort at the levels appropriate to the biggest financial fraud in U.S. history, is shocking.

President Obama’s record on Wall Street accountability is abysmal. But because of enormous grassroots pressure from activists like you and polling that suggests he needs to take on Wall Street as a part of his election campaign, we have a real opportunity to move President Obama to meaningful action on Wall Street accountability. Time, however, is running out.

President Obama’s first task force at the Department of Justice did little if anything to prosecute Wall Street for crimes that led to the financial crisis. But because of your activism, he announced a new task force and named progressive champion and New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman one of its five co-chairs.

Now we need to pressure the White House to give that task force the resources it needs to pursue justice. Without sufficient staff to conduct thorough investigations, it’s hard to see how this task force could bring indictments quickly or even beforesStatutes of limitations run out.

Tell President Obama: 55 investigators are not enough. We need 20 times more staffing to launch a real investigation into Wall Street’s crimes.

The economic crisis we’re in demands a response commensurate with the damage done by Wall Street crooks. But the 55 promised investigators don’t even come close to being adequate. If the White House hasn’t even followed through on its promise of a paltry 55 investigators, it’s clear that massive pushback is needed to get the level of staffing we truly need to bring Wall Street criminals to justice.

Aside from the appointment of Attorney General Schneiderman, none of the other co-chairs of the new task force has done literally anything that achieves our goal of holding banks accountable or prosecuting bankers for criminal activity.

In fact, three of his co-chairs served on the earlier failed Department of Justice task force that the new investigation was created to supersede.

In an election year when we know the Obama reelection campaign wants to frame his race as opposing the candidate of the one percent, President Obama will be particularly sensitive to public perception of whether his efforts to hold Wall Street accountable are meaningful and represent the full force of his office.

Tell President Obama: 55 investigators are not enough. We need 20 times more staffing to launch a real investigation into Wall Street’s crimes.

We want, and our country needs, indictments. The collapse of the housing bubble led directly to the economic crisis we’re in. But not one of the Wall Street crooks who drove our economy off a cliff has gone to jail. And without aggressive investigations and prosecution for misconduct, none of them will.

President Obama needs to give the Department of Justice task force the resources required to launch a serious investigation that will bring about real accountability before the statutes of limitations run out for Wall Street’s crimes.

It’s been months already. We can’t waste any more time. We must act now before we lose our opportunity to do anything significant at all.

1. “Details Emerge of New Financial Fraud Unit ,” Huffington Post, 01-26-12.
2. FBI Deputy Director John S. Pistole’s statement before the Senate Judiciary Committee, 02-11-09
3. “In Past Financial Crises, Fewer Pursued In Courts,” NPR, 08-14-11.

http://act.credoaction.com/campaign/fraud_task_force/?rc=tw1

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[VIDEO] Shaun Donovan on the Foreclosure Fraud Settlement & Wish Wash

[VIDEO] Shaun Donovan on the Foreclosure Fraud Settlement & Wish Wash


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BREAKING: The $25B Foreclosure Fraud settlement has been approved by U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer.

BREAKING: The $25B Foreclosure Fraud settlement has been approved by U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer.


Via

Nothing from the consent judgment entered into court in the $25B foreclosure settlement may constitute “evidence against Defendant.”

WSJ-

The settlement was announced in February and filed in court as a consent judgment last month. Judge Rosemary Collyer approved the landmark settlement on Wednesday. The signed order was filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

The pact will offer reductions in loan principal and other assistance to qualifying homeowners. The largest portion of the aid, valued at $17 billion, goes to borrowers at risk of foreclosure. Banks will pay $5 billion in fines, including nearly $1 billion to the Federal Housing Administration.

[WALL STREET JOURNAL]

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Review Finds Possible Flaws in More Than 138,000 Bank Foreclosures

Review Finds Possible Flaws in More Than 138,000 Bank Foreclosures


Not this word again “Flaw”…it’s FULL   B L O W N   FRAUD!

Why wasn’t this review done prior to any settlement? Because they never began any investigation.

DealBook-

The nation’s biggest banks may have put the huge $25 billion settlement over bad foreclosure practices behind them, but that doesn’t mean their mortgage troubles are over.

A separate review — this time by independent consultants on behalf of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency — flagged more than 138,000 cases for possible flaws in the foreclosure process at the nation’s largest mortgage servicers. Those include foreclosures involved with the so-called robo-signing scandal, in which bank representatives churned through hundreds of documents a day in foreclosure proceedings without reviewing them for accuracy.

[DEALBOOK]

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Joe Nocera: Why People Hate the Banks

Joe Nocera: Why People Hate the Banks


NYT-

A few months ago, I was standing in a crowded elevator when Jamie Dimon, the chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, stepped in. When he saw me, he said in a voice loud enough for everyone to hear: “Why does The New York Times hate the banks?”

It’s not The New York Times, Mr. Dimon. It really isn’t. It’s the country that hates the banks these days. If you want to understand why, I would direct your attention to the bible of your industry, The American Banker. On Monday, it published the third part in its depressing — and infuriating — series on credit card debt collection practices.

You can’t read the series without wondering whether banks have learned anything from the foreclosure crisis, which

[NEW YORK TIMES]

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Alison Frankel | Securities lawyers beware: The SEC may be coming after you

Alison Frankel | Securities lawyers beware: The SEC may be coming after you


Alison Frankel-

If you’re a lawyer who advises securities issuers, there was an ominous confluence of events Friday. Kenneth Lench of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Enforcement Division said publicly, according to Bloomberg, that the SEC is considering enforcement actions against lawyers who helped put together dubious transactions involving complex securities. And quicker than you could say Janus Capital v. First Derivative, the full Commission issued a notice that it’s reviewing the scope of protection the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2011 ruling offers secondary-player defendants in enforcement actions. (Hat tip: Securities Law Prof Blog.)

The Janus decision, you’ll recall, held that Janus Capital wasn’t liable for the alleged misstatements its mutual funds made in an offering prospectuses. The Supreme Court said that only the funds “made” the offending statements, no matter how much of a behind-the-scenes role the parent company played. Janus hasn’t turned out to be an absolute bar on claims against financial advisers — National Century bondholders won a summary judgment ruling last month that permits them to proceed with their securities fraud case against Credit Suisse — but continued the line of Supreme Court rulings that has made it increasingly difficult for investors to tag secondary players with liability.

[ON THE CASE -REUTERS]

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Abigail C. Field: Our Government Blessed Foreclosure Fraud

Abigail C. Field: Our Government Blessed Foreclosure Fraud


Abigail C. Field-

The mortgage settlement signed by 49 states and every Federal law enforcer allows the rampant foreclosure fraud currently choking our courts to continue unabated. Yes, I realize the pretty language of Exhibit A promises the banks will completely overhaul their standard operating procedures and totally clean up their acts. Promises are empty if they’re not honored, and worthless if not enforceable.

We know Bailed-Out Bankers’ promises are empty, so what matters is if the agreement is enforceable. And when it comes to all things foreclosure fraud, the enforcement provisions are laughable. But before I detail why, let’s be clear: I’m not being hyperbolic. The bankers running and profiting most from our bailed-out banks are totally dishonest when dealing with the public, and their promises are meaningless.

To see their dishonesty in the mortgage context, read the complaint filed in the mortgage deal, or my take on it here. But the bankers don’t limit their lying, cheating and stealing to homeowners. They abuse their clients the same way. Most broadly damaging, the bankers steal from taxpayers on a federal, state and local level and practically everybody else too. Fraud is just how they do business. When dealing with bankers, you can’t do business on a handshake.

[REALITY CHECK]

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The Wall Street multibillion-dollar scandal no one is talking about

The Wall Street multibillion-dollar scandal no one is talking about


The LIBOR trading scandal could turn out to be far worse for Wall Street than its mortgage troubles.

CNN Money-

FORTUNE — Much of the talk about bad behavior on Wall Street since the financial crisis has been about mortgages with a little bit of insider trading sprinkled in. And that makes sense. Everyone immediately understands what a mortgage is. And the housing bust that resulted from all those bad home loans affected us all. And Hollywood has taught us to ooh and ah over insider trading.

But there is another scandal that has come out of the financial crisis that at least to me makes the mortgage underwriting scandal look like small peanuts, and it has been heating up lately. Two weeks ago, the government disclosed that it is looking into bringing criminal cases against traders and banks that manipulated a key bank lending rate, called LIBOR. A source close to the case says the government’s “may” will be dropped soon. Both Barclays and Deutsche Bank have disclosed that they have been the focus of investigations. Banks have suspended dozens of traders. Today, Credit Suisse announced that it was cooperating with regulators on the case. Traders at UBS reportedly are already working with the government on its investigation. Looking for instances in which Wall Streeters go to jail, unlike mortgages, this may be the one.

[CNN MONEY]

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John Walsh: Foreclosure settlement, consent orders do not conflict

John Walsh: Foreclosure settlement, consent orders do not conflict


Lets not confuse the word “Flaw” with “Fraud”…There is a major difference!

HW-

John Walsh, acting Comptroller of the Currency, said the recent $25 billion mortgage servicing settlement reached between the big banks and state attorneys general does not conflict or double-up on requirements servicers have to follow in consent agreements banks signed with the OCC and other regulators last year. 

In 2010, regulators, including the OCC, examined 14 large federally regulated mortgage servicers and thrifts.

Last year, the agencies issued enforcement orders against all 14 institutions forcing them to take steps to review their foreclosure review processes and to offer aid to borrowers who suffered from flawed foreclosure practices.

[HOUSING WIRE]

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Gretchen Morgenson: Wall Street Really Does Enjoy A Different Set of Rules Than The Rest of Us

Gretchen Morgenson: Wall Street Really Does Enjoy A Different Set of Rules Than The Rest of Us


Chris Martenson-

On The Two Sets of Rules

Honestly, the transfer of wealth that has been created, that has been taken from the saver — and from the taxpayer, do not forget — to “mend the financial system” or to keep it from falling off the cliff, is extraordinary.

When you talked about savers, these are the people as you point out that really had nothing to do with the crisis. They were in fact, doing the right thing, not buying more house than they could afford, putting away money for college education, etc. They are the ones who are really paying the price now.

I think that has led to a very angry populace but also a sense that there are two sets of rules in the country. That one set applies to big and powerful institutions that when they go awry are rescued quickly. Then there is another set of rules for the rest of us who do what we are asked to do, do what we are supposed to do, and really then become victims of the situation. It is very unfortunate and I think it is, as you say, corrosive. 

On The Lack Of Accountability

The idea that forging signatures, that notarizing very important legal documents really improperly in thousands of cases — maybe millions — the idea that that is somehow is going to be allowed to go on with just sort of a penalty of some kind or a fine and not prosecuted in the criminal courts, I think it is amazing. It is really counter to what we have all been led to believe was the course of action in such a case.

You have many small people, small fry mortgage fraudsters who are in jail. I mean we are talking about the people who were straw buyers for homes who defrauded banks. They are in jail for a reason: because they perpetrated a fraud. These banks whose employees were forging signatures should also have been prosecuted with vigor and they were not. They were simply allowed to negotiate their way out of trouble and negotiate their way with shareholders money. They are not paying it out of their own executives’ pockets; they are paying it out of the shareholders’ pockets. There really is no accountability here whatsoever.

There were 1,100 criminal referrals in the S&L crisis and there were 839 convictions. That is a sizable number and far, far, far more than we have seen. I mean I think I can name one senior level person at a mortgage company who is in jail at the moment

[CHRIS MARTENSON]

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AGs to consider investor protections in foreclosure settlement

AGs to consider investor protections in foreclosure settlement


LOL…according to Tom Miller.

Good Luck!

HW-

If the top five mortgage servicers begin to abuse bond investors under the foreclosure settlement write-downs, the attorneys general would consider some protections, according to Iowa AG Tom Miller.

Miller faced down banking executives and analysts during a panel at the REthink Symposium Thursday. The $25 billion settlement signed in March forces servicers to meet roughly $10 billion in principal reductions, which could swell higher because in some instances the full dollar written down will not be credited.

Servicers will get full credit for reducing principal on loans they hold on their own portfolio but receive 45 cents for every dollar written down on mortgages held in private securities.

“To try principal reduction in a targeted way and find out if it works is good for the housing market,” Miller said. “We know what (the banks’) plans are. Two have said they wouldn’t do write-downs on private securities. But we could have some discussions about something to reassure investors.”

[HOUSING WIRE]

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Yes, Wall Street banks pay off top financial journalists. Why do you ask?

Yes, Wall Street banks pay off top financial journalists. Why do you ask?


H/T Matt Stoller

cjr.org-

In this toxic climate, many financial journalists are on edge, worried that any misstep could make them the target of criticism for being too cozy with Wall Street. Back in October, New York Times op-ed columnist Joe Nocera, who often writes about finance, was taken to task by media critic Erik Wemple of The Washington Post for speaking at a securities conference in Miami sponsored by Wall Street firms including Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan, and Morgan Stanley. The gig appeared to breach the paper’s own rule for not permitting staff journalists to take speaking fees from any for-profit sources. Nocera “declined to address the speaking fee,” Wemple wrote, and he also declined to talk to me.

But while some news organizations don’t permit their staffers to take speaking fees from any sources, including Wall Street, there is still plenty of action out there.

[CJR.ORG]

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Where are the Indictments?

Where are the Indictments?


Abigail C. Field-

Let’s be clear why there’s a mortgage deal: the banks broke the law. Several laws in fact, in ways that appear criminal as well as civil. Limiting their liability is the only reason the banks did a deal.

In this post I’m going to look at what the banks could be held liable for; how much liability “their” money persuaded law enforcers to ignore will be the next post. But one important kind of peace has not been bought: criminal. So as I detail the wrong doing exposed by the deal, I highlight the crimes our law enforcers seem to allege the bankers committed. After all, a liability release isn’t simply what it says, it’s what law enforcers do with their remaining freedom to act. If crimes were committed, and indictments don’t follow, the release is much broader than its text.

A close read of the complaint and the related language that precedes the releases (see Exhibits F and G) reveals:

continue reading [REALITY CHECK]

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Abigail Caplovitz Field: The Mortgage Settlement Allows Banks to Steal Without Penalty

Abigail Caplovitz Field: The Mortgage Settlement Allows Banks to Steal Without Penalty


HuffPO-

The consent agreements the bailed-out bankers (B.O.B.s), the feds and the states are largely as had been promised. One big surprise, however, is that the B.O.B.s would now be allowed to systematically overcharge borrowers and steal their homes. Seriously. Who cares about $1 million or $5 million penalties if horrible damage can be inflicted without punishment?

To see what I’m talking about, you need to look at Exhibit E-1. (It’s in all the consent agreements; here’s Chase‘s.) Exhibit E-1 is a 14 page table titled “Servicing Standards Quarterly Compliance Metrics.” That is, it’s a table that details what, precisely, law enforcers will check to make sure that the B.O.B.s are meeting the very pretty servicing standards in the deal. (See Exhibit A)

(Note: You may want to print out table E-1 while reading this, or at least keep it open in another browser window; what I have to say may be hard to believe and you’ll want to be able to double check that I’m telling you the truth.)

Now, the table doesn’t come right out and say, ‘we, the federal and state governments of the United States of America do hereby bless the institutionalization of servicer abuse,’ but it should. To understand why, you need to keep your eye on how the table’s columns are defined. For most issues, the critical columns are C “Loan Level Tolerance for Error” and D “Threshold Error Rate.” Later I’ll talk about the problems in Column F, the “Test Questions.”

When Error Isn’t Error…

[HUFFINGTON POST]

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Alison Frankel: Can MBS investors block national mortgage deal via litigation?

Alison Frankel: Can MBS investors block national mortgage deal via litigation?


The never ending settlement… because those in DC are doing their best to make sure their bankers are A-OK.

Reuters-

Mortgage-backed securities investors who are convinced that banks intend to shift the cost of the $25 billion national mortgage settlement onto their shoulders are “evaluating their legal options,” according to Chris Katopis, executive director of the Association of Mortgage Investors (and a former clerk on the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals). The private investors, as I’ve reported, are outraged at the terms of the settlement, which sets no limit on the percentage of securitized mortgages the settling banks — Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, and Ally Financial — are permitted to modify to reach their $17 billion target for reducing the principal balance owed by struggling borrowers. Mortgage-backed noteholders believe the deal terms encourage banks to write down investor-owned first liens, rather than second lien mortgages in bank-owned portfolios. That incentive, they say, shifts the cost of the deal from the banks to mortgage-backed bondholders.

Their argument is gaining traction. The New York Times editorialized Sunday on the bank-friendly details of …

[REUTERS LEGAL]

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MUST READ: Who is REALLY paying in the $25bil TBTF mortgage settlement

MUST READ: Who is REALLY paying in the $25bil TBTF mortgage settlement


Economic Musings-

The surprising tale that I will attempt to pen in this blog entry has a very familiar cast of characters; the Obama Administration, the Housing Bubble, “Toxic Mortgages”, and Too Big To Fail “TBTF” Banks among others.  While the headline of TBTF banks in a $25bil mortgage settlement is known to many, the underlying details of the settlement are less known and quite appalling when you pull back the covers.

 The wounds on past and present homeowners are still fresh from the housing crisis.  As Jonathan Laing points out in this weekend’s Barron’s cover story, “five million of the country’s 76million mortgage holders have lost their homes to foreclosure or lender ordered short sales since 2006, and an estimated 14million more own more on their homes than their properties are currently worth.  In all, some $7.4 trillion in homeowners’ equity has been destroyed according to Mark Zandi…”  

 Cries for Accountability

While blame deserves to be cast upon numerous parties for the housing bubble, Americans have rightly called for accountability on the TBTF banks.  Accountability for what? Among other faults, robo-signing became prevalent among TBTF banks as they forged mortgage documents in order to ensure proper paperwork was done to foreclose on properties. 

 Details of the $25bil Settlement (in the words of HUD) & Public Lauding

“On February 9, the Department of Justice …

[ECONOMIC MUSINGS]

© 2010-19 FORECLOSURE FRAUD | by DinSFLA. All rights reserved.



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