Mortgage Document Fabrication is Alive and Well…
Sadly, mortgage servicers are still very much in the document fabrication and forgery business.
Read more...Category Archives: Regulations and regulators
New Zealand: Kea Street Cred and US$1Bn Promise Lures Kiwi to Front Very Peculiar Financial Service Providers
Another duo of wildly offbeat New Zealand Financial Services Providers
Read more...Cyber Risk as Systemic Risk
The threat to the financial system posed by cyber risk is often claimed to be systemic. This column argues against this, pointing out that almost all cyber risk is microprudential. For a cyber attack to lead to a systemic crisis, it would need to be timed impeccably to coincide with other non-cyber events that undermine confidence in the financial system and the authorities. The only actors with enough resources to affect such an event are large sovereign states, and they could likely create the required uncertainty through simpler, financial means.
Read more...Hensarling’s “Market Regulation” Replacement to Dodd Frank Proves He Does Not Understand Banking
Yves here. Steve Waldman wrote a definitive post in 2009, Capital can’t be measured, on a core issue that Black discusses here. A key section: So, for large complex financials, capital cannot be measured precisely enough to distinguish conservatively solvent from insolvent banks, and capital positions are always optimistically padded. Given these facts, and I […]
Read more...Transparency International Reports on Massive Corruption in the Pharmaceutical Sector – Media Hardly Notices
Health care corruption is pervasive, yet remains a taboo topic.
Read more...Can Philosophy Stop Bankers From Stealing?
How can bankers be persuaded or coerced into behaving better?
Read more...CalPERS-TH Lee Row Over Private Equity Fee Abuses Demonstrates Failure of SEC Oversight
CalPERS’ inability to get TH Lee to disgorge ill-gotten fees shows how hopelessly one-sided private equity investing really is.
Read more...New Zealand: Icon Sachs (Whatever That is), Fennas Finance, a Bank Account at an ANZ Napier Branch, a Conspiracy Theorist And a Ponzi Scheme
Yet more strange sightings in the New Zealand Register of Companies
Read more...The SEC Fines a Private Equity Firm for Broker-Dealer Fee Violations. Are KKR, Apollo, Blackstone, TPG, Carlyle and Lots of Others on Its Hit List?
The SEC finally fined a private equity firm for broker-dealer abuses. Is this just a shot across the bow or will bigger firms pony up too?
Read more...Hoisted from E-Mail: “New York Times Article Promotes Price-Fixing in the Drug Market”
A well-argued reader rant on an article arguing that drug makers need higher prices to preserve their profits.
Read more...Wall Street Journal Tallies DoJ and SEC’s Pathetic Record in Tackling Wall Street Crime
The officialdom continues to defend the half-hearted effort by the DoJ and SEC to pursue financial services industry misconduct.
Read more...New Zealand: the World’s Tiniest Stock Exchange, ‘a Big Ponzi Scheme’, and Other Crazy Tales From John Key’s Financial Services Hub
New Zealand’s Offshore Financial Services Providers: a new sampling of strange creatures
Read more...Scenes From Paris Protests (and an Update from Alison)
A sighting from the protests in Paris over proposed anti-labor regulations.
Read more...Clinton Chasing Votes With Fracking U-Turn
Clinton’s fracking reversal will alienate the energy industry without appeasing environmentalists, since fracking produces methane and earthquakes.
Read more...Purdue Pharma’s OxyContin: Corporate Fraud With a Body Count
Yves here. Some of the facts in this article are stunning. For instance, more Americans die from opoid overdose than from car accidents. And this article gives only a partial tally of Purdue Pharma’s predatory conduct. The drugmaker targeted overly-busy, not very well trained general practitioners in communities which were likely to have high incidence […]
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