Ok! Now read the bold text below and the gist of this story… Now exactly who are these 5 regulators back in October and did they have anything to do with the settlement discussion? Maybe the media should have put this puzzle together for us and explained it in a better report.
Bloomberg-
To make their case in Washington, banks and trade associations have been pressing a coordinated campaign to get regulators from five federal agencies to scale back the draft of the proprietary-trading rule issued in October, according to public and internal documents and interviews. They recruited money managers, industrial companies, municipal officials and foreign governments to their side.
“The regulators are under a lot of pressure,” said Marcus Stanley, policy director of Americans for Financial Reform, an advocacy coalition that filed a comment letter urging that the draft rule be strengthened rather than watered down.
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.
(Reuters) – U.S. regulators could file civil fraud charges against some credit-rating agencies for their role in developing mortgage-bond deals that helped bring about the financial crisis, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter.
The Journal said the Securities and Exchange Commission was reviewing the conduct of companies including McGraw Hill’s Standard and Poor’s and Moody’s Investors Service owned by Moody’s Corp on at least two mortgage-bond deals.
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
09:30 AM – 12:00 PM
538 Dirksen Senate Office Building
The witnesses will be: Professor Steven L. Schwarcz, Stanley A. Star Professor of Law and Business, Duke University School of Law; Mr. Tom Deutsch, Executive Director, American Securitization Forum; Mr. Martin S. Hughes, President and Chief Executive Officer, Redwood Trust; Ms. Lisa Pendergast, President, Commercial Real Estate Finance Council; Ms. Ann Elaine Rutledge, Founding Principal, R&R Consulting; and Mr. Chris J. Katopis, Executive Director, Association of Mortgage Investors.
All hearings are webcasted live and Individuals with disabilities who require an auxiliary aid or service, including closed captioning service for webcast hearings, should contact the committee clerk at 202-224-7391 at least three business days in advance of the hearing date.
Witnesses
Panel 1
Professor Steven L. Schwarcz
Stanley A. Star Professor of Law and Business
Duke University School of Law
Mr. Tom Deutsch
Executive Director
American Securitization Forum
Mr. Martin S. Hughes
President and Chief Executive Officer
Redwood Trust
Ms. Lisa Pendergast
President
Commercial Real Estate Finance Council
Ms. Ann Elaine Rutledge
Founding Principal
R&R Consulting
Mr. Chris J. Katopis
Executive Director
Association of Mortgage Investors
Certainly everyone knows to read the fine print by now…
ProPUBLICA-
A few months ago, Bank of America offered Sergio Cortez of Staten Island, N.Y., the help he desperately needed to stay in his home: a break on his mortgage. Like millions of others, he was facing foreclosure. But there was a catch buried in the fine print. Cortez had to waive any possibility of ever suing the bank for anything relating to the loan.
Cortez isn’t alone. While regulators have banned the practice, some banks and others who handle mortgages have still been forcing homeowners into a corner: You want a chance at saving your home? Then you’ll have to waive your rights.
I asked Eliot Spitzer what he would do with the regulatory system if he were king. He said he did not consider it probable that he would soon be king, but then he offered this simple fix:
O. Max Gardner III, a lawyer and expert on foreclosure cases handled in bankruptcy courts, said that the OCC must have used an unfairly narrow definition of a wrongful sale.
He said that in most of the hundreds of cases he has handled, banks misstated the amounts homeowners actually owed, failed to record or properly allocate mortgage payments, and tacked on thousands of dollars in unauthorized and excessive fees.
“We see a problem with the dollars and cents in almost every single bankruptcy case that I file,” Gardner said.
The remarks by Warren and Dimon will generate headlines, although analysts said other financial regulation news this week will have more impact on banks and the markets.
“The big event next week in Washington is the long-anticipated release of the rules implementing the Dodd-Frank risk retention requirement,” said Brian Gardner, a senior policy analyst at investment firm Keefe Bruyette & Woods.
In the crazy days of 2005 and 2006, when home prices were soaring and mortgage underwriting standards were crumbling, it took foresight and judgment to see that it was all a bubble.
As it happens, there was a bank chief executive whose internal forecasts now seem prescient. “I have never seen such a high-risk housing market,” he wrote to the bank’s chief risk officer in 2005. A year later he forecast the housing market would be “weak for quite some time as we unwind the speculative bubble.”
We give up…you dead beats really caught us this time. We can’t take any more punishment. You’re destroying our BONUSES!! We just want you ouuut…ouuut…OUT!
Us EMPERORS really don’t have any clothes.
Does any of this make sense? NO. Why don’t we just help you stay in your home? Why not give a principal reduction or anything else other but… like the price we would sell your home for at short sale?? Usually 50% or more of the amount owed.
According to secret spies (joke this has not been confirmed) rumor has it that the five largest US mortgage servicers were told this week at a confidential meeting with regulators to consider paying delinquent borrowers up to $21,000 each as part of a broader settlement of the foreclosure quandary.
The main regulator for the largest U.S. banks is preparing to break from state authorities and settle with lenders over their foreclosure practices, according to a source familiar with the process, dashing hopes for a comprehensive settlement
[SNIP]
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, impatient with infighting over the structure and shape of a coordinated settlement, is preparing to move on its own set of fines and business-practice fixes for banks, according to a source, who was not authorized to speak publicly.
The OCC’s settlement could come in the next couple weeks, the source said.
TESTIMONY OF
JOHN WALSH
ACTING COMPTROLLER OF THE CURRENCY
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON HOUSING AND COMMUNITY OPPORTUNITY
of the
COMMITTEE ON FINANCIAL SERVICES
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
November 18, 2010
Statement
Introduction
Chairwoman Waters, Ranking Member Capito, and members of the Subcommittee, I appreciate this opportunity to discuss recently reported improprieties in the foreclosure processes used by several large mortgage servicers and actions that the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) is taking to address these issues where they involve national banks. The occurrences of improperly executed documents and attestations raise concerns about the overall integrity of the foreclosure process and whether foreclosures may be inappropriately taking homes from their owners. These are serious matters that warrant the thorough investigation that is now underway by the OCC, other federal bank regulators, and other agencies.
<SNIP>
A key objective of theMERS examination is to assess MERS corporate governance, control systems,
and accuracy and timeliness of information maintained in the MERS system. Examiners assigned to MERS
will also visit on-site foreclosure examinations in process at the largest mortgage servicers to
determine how servicers are fulfilling their roles and responsibilities relative to MERS.
We are also participating in an examination being led by the FRB of Lender
Processing Services, Inc., which provides third-party foreclosure services to banks.
We expect to have most of our on-site examination work completed by mid to late
December. We then plan to aggregate and analyze the data and information from each of
these examinations to determine whether or what additional supervisory and regulatory
actions may be needed. We are targeting to have our analysis completed by the end of
January.
We recognize that the problems associated with foreclosure processes and
documentation have raised broader questions about the potential effect on the mortgage
market in general and the financial impact on individual institutions that may result from
litigation or other actions by borrowers and investors.
US Regulators Examining Two Mortgage Processing Firms
By Alan Zibel, Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- Federal bank regulators are conducting examinations of two companies that banks use to process foreclosures, amid concerns that banks cut corners on thousands of foreclosure documents, Acting Comptroller of the Currency John Walsh said Wednesday.
Walsh, in remarks prepared for delivery Thursday, said his agency is examining Reston, Va.-based Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems in conjunction with the Federal Reserve, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the Federal Housing Finance Agency.
That company, known as MERS, lets lenders package and sell mortgages without recording each transaction with county property offices.
It has come under fire from critics, who say MERS doesn’t have the right to act as the legal representative of the mortgage owner in foreclosure cases.
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