Category Archives: Regulations and regulators

Bill Black: Yglesias Mimics “Mankiw Morality” and Bashes Bastiat

Yves here. Remind me never to get on Bill Black’s bad side.

IRS Anticipates Cheapest ObamaCare Family Plan Will be $20,000 in 2016

Aiee! CNS News found this tidbit (hat tip furzy mouse), contained in IRS final regulations published on January 31. Now admittedly these are examples for the purposes of illustrating how to make various calculations under the new regulations, but the assumptions are pretty clear.

Bill Black: Yglesias Pours the Geithner, Holder, Breuer (GHB) Banksters Immunity Doctrine in our Drinks

By Bill Black, the author of The Best Way to Rob a Bank is to Own One and an associate professor of economics and law at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.

It’s early, but Salon has published on January 30, 2013 either the funniest or saddest column of the year to date: “Are Banks Too Big To Prosecute?”

Mirabile Dictu! Finally, Someone (Amar Bhide) Questions Benefits of Mortgage Securitization

A major intellectual blind spot in academia and among policy makers is the belief that making markets more liquid is always and ever a good thing.

Marcy Wheeler: Lanny Breuer Now Blames 94 US Attorneys for Immunizing Banksters

By Marcy Wheeler. Cross posted from emptywheel

Remarkably, on the same day two Senators (one of them named in the article) reminded Eric Holder that Lanny Breuer said this….

I think I and prosecutors around the country, being responsible, should speak to regulators, should speak to experts, because if I bring a case against institution, and as a result of bringing that case, there’s some huge economic effect — if it creates a ripple effect so that suddenly, counterparties and other financial institutions or other companies that had nothing to do with this are affected badly — it’s a factor we need to know and understand.

Bank of America Foreclosure Reviews: How the Cover-Up Happened (Part IV)

In this post in our Bank of America foreclosure review series, whistleblowers describe how the bank and its independent consultant Promontory Financial Group designed and managed the tests so as to minimize findings of harm to borrowers.

Bank of America Foreclosure Reviews: Why the Cover-Up Happened (Part IIIB)

This post is the second half of Part III in our Bank of America foreclosure review whistleblower series. Part III focuses on how the confusion and high cost of the foreclosure reviews weren’t simply the result of overly ambitious targets and poor design, oversight, and implementation of the reviews. These reviews never could have been done properly due to significant gaps and inaccuracies in the borrower records at Bank of America. That meant the only possible course of action was a cover-up.

Bank of America Foreclosure Reviews: Why the Cover-Up Happened (Part IIIA)

Past whistleblower leaks from Bank of America and other reviews have pointed out how frequent changes to the review process, both from the OCC and from the independent reviewers, made the process disorderly. This confusion is likely to serve as a convenient excuse for why the costs of the reviews exploded, which was one of the two major rationales offered for shutting them down.

At Bank of America, the disorderliness of the project is only part of the story. Focusing on that aspect serves to exculpate OCC, the bank and Promontory. The dirty secret of these reviews is they could never have been done properly.

Geithner Finally Leaves Treasury, Blurts a Whole Series of Lies on His Way Out

By Nathan Tankus, a student and research assistant at the University of Ottawa. You can follow him on Twitter at @NathanTankus

I can’t emphasize enough how satisfying it is to see Timothy Geithner finally leave government. True, it would have been more enjoyable to see him leave in handcuffs, but I take my satisfaction where I can get it.

Iceland’s Lessons on How to Fix a Bank Crisis

By Delusional Economics, who is determined to cleanse the daily flow of vested interests propaganda to produce a balanced counterpoint. Cross posted from MacroBusiness.

I’m slowly working my way through the material that’s coming out of World Economic Forum in Davos. I tend not to take too much attention of what is said at this particular conference as, in my opinion, it tends to be full of self-serving tripe in the most part.

I did, however, notice a small interview with Icelandic President, Olafur Ragnar Grimsson, which was quite interesting.

Appeals Court Ruling May Nullify Consumer Finance Protection Bureau Rulemakings

A ruling by the Washington, DC federal appeals court in Noel Canning v. NLRB pretty much ends the ability of presidents to make recess appointments, a measure that has been used since 1867. The suit successfully challenged a NLRB rulemaking on the grounds that three of the five directors were recess appointments which meant the NLRB lacked a quorum to give it authority to act.

Ian Fraser: Something Sinister About the Lack of Prosecutions at Lehman Brothers

By Ian Fraser, a financial journalist who blogs at his web site and at qfinance. .

This is the first interview that Chicago lawyer Anton Valukas has given since the publication of his 2,292 page report into the bankrutpcy of Lehman Brothers on March 11th, 2010. At that time, Valukas found strong evidence of financial and accounting fraud designed to deceive investors at the defunct New York-based investment bank. Valukas is surprised, especially given Lehman Brothers’ rampant abuse of Repo 105 to disguise its precarious financial position in the quarters ahead of its September 2008 collapse, that the former Lehman Brothers’ chief executive Dick Fuld or any other Lehman Brothers’ director has been charged with fraud or related offences.

The Persistent Power of Finance, Um, JP Morgan

By C.P. Chandrasekhar, Professor of Economics, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Cross posted from Triple Crisis

In a move that went contrary to what is expected of regulators, the Securities and Exchange Commission of the US approved in mid-December a controversial JP Morgan-created exchange-traded fund (ETF) backed by physical supplies of copper.