If you were to believe the banks, the concern over foreclosure “improprieties” is way overdone. They claim that the robo signers really weren’t doing anything seriously wrong, the banks just need to redo some paperwork, and everything else about foreclosures is just fine. Yet Bank of America, having made the implausible claim that it had […]
Read more...Hope you enjoy the second part of our discussion on Real News Network. Part 1 is here. More at The Real News
Read more...The latest idea out of the G20, that of creating an international regulatory structure for the biggest international banks, sounds like progress but I doubt it will prove to be. Some regulators took note of the dangers posed by globe-spanning financial behemoths prior to the crisis. The Bank of England, in its April 2007 Financial […]
Read more...I was tight on time for this interview, and as a result I spoke at an even more rapid clip than usual. Hope you enjoy it nevertheless! More at The Real News
Read more...Tom Adams pointed to an article in American Banker by Kate Berry which discusses how mortgage securitization trustees are increasingly coming under scrutiny in the foreclosure crisis. By way of background, the trustee is the party responsible for securing the assets (the borrower promissory IOUs, liens, and various other documents related to the securitization). The […]
Read more...By Marshall Auerback, a portfolio strategist and Roosevelt Institute Fellow As any student of Economics 101 realises, you can control the price of something, or the quantity, but not both simultaneously. In announcing its decision to purchase an additional $600bn of treasuries last week, the Federal Reserve presumably intended to create additional stimulus to an […]
Read more...Yves here. This post by Linda Beale, who was involved in the tax angles of securitizations in her prior life on Wall Street, first appeared on Angry Bear and on her blog, A Taxing Matter. It’s a very helpful addition to the discussion of the foreclosure crisis. Because it is also a bit technical at […]
Read more...John Hussman is always worth reading, and his current missive is a hum-dinger. I’m extracting some key bits below, and urge you to read it in full. Note that Hussman is far from alone in chiding the Fed for encroaching on Constitutionally-mandated budget processes, including former central bankers. From Willem Buiter: As regards democratic accountability […]
Read more...We’ve been astonished at the continued poor reporting on the overhyped mortgage putback possible future action by Pimco, the Fed, Blackrock and others against Bank of America. Everyone seems so mesmerized by the names and the incorrect dollar size attached (the possible action relates to $47 billion of bonds, but the potential liability is much […]
Read more...Terry Guy Hands has lost his lawsuit against Citigroup, wherein he accused Citigroup of defrauding his private equity group, Terra Firma Capital Partners, by lying about the number of competing bidders during the auction of the record company EMI, for which Terra Firma paid $6.8 Billion. This was one of those top-of the market deals […]
Read more...The domestic politics of Ireland are still on a tightrope. Their coalition government, which had has been studiously ignoring three empty parliamentary seats, has now been told by the Supreme Court to get on with it and hold by-elections for one of them, which has been unoccupied for a scandalous 18 months. The by-election is […]
Read more...Not only did the Fed announce its controversial $600 billion QE2 program today, but Ben Bernanke felt compelled to defend it in a Washington Post op-ed tonight. For the normally oracular Fed to feel it has to sell its program in a non-financial media outlet says Bernanke must recognize that he is staking on thin […]
Read more...The Fed seems to have decided to split a loaf on the conservative side, coming in with less QE than the market’s hopes, at $600 billion, but one might cynically surmise above the low end expectation of $500 billion. Side by side comparison of this FOMC statement with the next most recent courtesy Andrew Horowitz […]
Read more...By Mike Konczal, a Fellow at the Roosevelt Institute who writes at New Deal 2.0. You may not be a lobbyist, but you can still make a difference in FinReg. Just a reminder: this Friday, November 5th, 2010, is the last day to submit comments on the Volcker Rule. Here is the website for this, […]
Read more...ProPublica reports that the SEC has taken interest in Magnetar’s role in a JP Morgan underwritten CDO. We discussed Magntar at length in our book ECONNED, which broke that story six weeks before ProPublica launched its report, and remains the definitive account of how those transactions were structured. (Our continuing beef with the ProPublica account […]
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