I’m so offended by the latest Obama canard, that the financial crisis of 2007-2008 cost less than 1% of GDP, that I barely know where to begin. Not only does this Administration lie on a routine basis, it doesn’t even bother to tell credible lies. .And this one came directly from the top, not via […]
Read more...Reader MBSGuy wrote to express his disgust with the mortgage industry’s efforts to pretend that nothing is rotten in Denmark. His object of contempt was an article in Bloomberg which dutifully recited the current talking points. The flacks have clearly been working full time: the headline, “Mortgage Industry Bristles at ‘Robin Hood’ Foreclosure Theories,” is […]
Read more...I suspect some readers will take issue with the US being ranked as high as it is, 22 out of 178 nations, in an annual survey of public sector corruption by Transparency International. However, it fell from 19 the year prior, so the trajectory at least is correct. The New York Times provided a brief […]
Read more...The latest SIGTARP (Special Inspector General of the Troubled Asset Relief Program) report is, if such a thing is possible, even more damning than its previous quarterly reports. It slams the Treasury for abject failure to meet the program’s own objectives, its lack of proper control and metrics, its “Mission Accomplished” declarations, its phony accounting, […]
Read more...In Rudy Giuliani’s second term as mayor, the famed backer of law n’ order had a great fondness for taking it into his own hands. Groups that wanted to assemble on the steps of City Hall were required to file a notice or petition of some sort. A peculiar ritual would then ensue. The mayor’s […]
Read more...After the dramatic multi-state foreclosure halts by three major servicers, GMAC, Bank of America, and JP Morgan, over the use of improper, “robo signed” affidavits, the new party line from these banks and others who also used robo signers, like Wells Fargo, is that this was a mere “technical” problem, that they had reviewed ten […]
Read more...I hope readers will forgive the overweight reporting on Florida, but it is serving as a test ground for how battles over foreclosures and mortgage fraud will play out around the US. Florida is not only one of the states with the highest level of foreclosures, but it also has the most cohesive group of […]
Read more...In all honesty, the news report out of the G20 strikes me as such a weird idea that I don’t know what to make of it. From the Financial Times: During an all-night meeting in South Korea of finance ministers from the G20 group of countries, the US called on nations to cap current account […]
Read more...The Obama Administration is entirely predictable. It ever and always sides with large corporate interests, while trying to create the impression that it is actually concerned for the welfare of the average citizen. Admittedly, the occasionally tough talk with little follow through feeds a perverse spectacle of plutocrats sulking, pouting, and claiming that they are […]
Read more...By Richard Alford, a former economist at the New York Fed. Since then, he has worked in the financial industry as a trading floor economist and strategist on both the sell side and the buy side. In the 1960s and 70s, an arm of the US government destroyed villages in Vietnam in order to save […]
Read more...As much as state attorneys general could be an effective force in acting for consumers and investors against banks, the fact that an attorney general has saddled up does not necessarily mean the effort is serious. At a minimum, it might just be a gambit to garner some good PR without seriously inconveniencing the perps; […]
Read more...It take a fair degree of skill to pen a journalistic story that hews to the appearance of objectivity yet is out to sell a point of view. The lead article in the Journal tonight, “Niche Lawyers Spawned Housing Fracas” telegraphs its bias in its headline: the foreclosure crisis is merely the creation of two […]
Read more...From Bloomberg: New York state courts will require lawyers in residential foreclosure actions to certify they have taken “reasonable” steps to verify the accuracy of documents submitted to the court. The new rule, released in a statement by the New York state Unified Court System, is effective immediately. Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman introduced the requirement […]
Read more...At least some legislators are taking the foreclosure crisis seriously. Representative John Conyers, Marcy Kaptur, Raúl Grijalva, and Alan Grayson wrote to Neil Barofsky, Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, to ask that he investigate foreclosure fraud and conduct an audit of GMAC, Fannie, and Freddie. SIGTARP is a full fledged prosecutor, […]
Read more...New fronts are opening in the foreclosure mess. A lot of people have wondered why no one has gone to jail over what by commonsense standards is fraudulent activity. The possibility that the violations were indeed criminal is finally being investigated. From the Washington Post: Federal law enforcement officials are investigating possible criminal violations in […]
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