Gen-

You may be right. As long as .GOV doesn't disallow litigation, or limit awards to something silly like 100 million.

And throw the unions under the bus? Ain't gonna happen.

Quote:

The bond insurer, backed by billionaire Wilbur Ross, is also seeking reimbursement for the claims paid and for future losses.

Crook vs Crook

Quote:

Assured was today stripped of its AAA credit grade from Standard & Poor’s, after the New York-based ranking company said investors and issuers are weaning themselves from the guarantees the company offers.

S&P cut its financial strength and counterparty credit rating on Assured Guaranty Corp. and Assured Guaranty Municipal Corp. one level to AA+, according to a statement from the ranking company.

Seems like a battle is brewing..............

So if a government were taken over by an industry group, what would it look like exactly? Self enriching activities with government backstopping, breaching of the law without consequence, industry chosen cabinet officials, unearned wealth transfers.

Something like that, Blurt....something like that

Blurtman, that would never happen....


Two-hundred-and-thirty-seven members of Congress are millionaires. That’s 44 percent of the body – compared to about 1 percent of Americans overall.

CRP says California Republican Rep. Darrell Issa is the richest lawmaker on Capitol Hill, with a net worth estimated at about $251 million. Next in line: Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.), worth about $244.7 million; Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.), worth about $214.5 million; Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), worth about $209.7 million; and Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), worth about $208.8 million.

All told, at least seven lawmakers have net worths greater than $100 million, according to the Center’s 2008 figures.

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The CRP numbers are somewhat rough estimates – lawmakers are required to report their financial information in broad ranges of figures, so it’s impossible to pin down their dollars with precision. The CRP uses the mid-point in the ranges to build its estimates.

Senators’ estimated median reportable worth sunk to about $1.79 million from $2.27 million in 2007. The House’s median income was significantly lower and also sank, bottoming out at $622,254 from $724,258 in 2007.

But CRP’s analysis suggests that some lawmakers did well for themselves between 2007 and 2008, even as many Americans lost jobs and saw their savings and their home values plummet.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) gained about $9.2 million. Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) gained about $3 million, Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) had an estimated $2.6 million gain, and Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) gained about $2.8 million.

Some lawmakers have profited from investments in companies that have received federal bailouts; dozens of lawmakers are invested in Wells Fargo, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs and Bank of America.

Among executive branch officials, CRP says the richest is Securities and Exchange Commission Chairwoman Mary L. Schapiro, with a net worth estimated at $26 million.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is next, worth an estimated $21 million. President Barack Obama is the sixth-wealthiest, worth about an estimated $4 million.

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A number of lawmakers are estimated to have suffered double-digit percentage lossed in their net worth from 2007 to 2008. The biggest losers include Kerry, who lost a whopping $127.4 million; Warner lost about $28.1 million; Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) lost about $11.8 million; and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) lost about $10.1 million.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/110....

Absolutely vomit-inducing.

Things are heating up-Texas AG issues subpoenas, and class action lawsuits! If the AGs in other states won't act then the people will. Cracks are staring to appear everywhere. Karl you have been at this for so long and now people are starting to get it.

http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.c....

BofA, JPM get Texas Subpoenas; Class Action Suit Against BofA; "Pit Bull" vs. BofA in Mortgage BuyBack Battle


The mortgage mess gets more complicated every day. Here are a sampling of stories that shows how.

Bank of America, JPMorgan Get Texas Subpoenas on Foreclosures

Bloomberg reports Bank of America, JPMorgan Get Texas Subpoenas on Foreclosures

Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and seven other banks or loan servicers were subpoenaed by Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott for information about their foreclosure practices, a spokesman said.

“The state is subpoenaing information and documents,” Jerry Strickland, the spokesman, said yesterday in an interview. He didn’t elaborate. The state also subpoenaed Ally Financial Inc., CitiMortgage Inc. and Wells Fargo & Co

The Texas subpoenas followed letters sent by Abbott’s office to 30 loan servicers on Oct. 4, asking them to halt foreclosures in the state pending a review of their practices.

Abbott asked banks then to identify employees who filed faulty affidavits or other documents in the state and identify foreclosures that used such documents. He also asked lenders and servicers to halt all sales of properties previously foreclosed upon and stop all evictions.

Twenty-six of those companies responded to the letters, according to a spreadsheet of answers sent yesterday by Strickland.
Class Action Filed Against Bank of America For Foreclosure Fraud

Law.Com reports Bank of America Sued in Class Action Over Flouting of Foreclosure Rules
Bank of America has been hit with a class action on behalf of homeowners seeking damages for alleged disregard of foreclosure process rules.

The suit, filed Wednesday in federal court in Newark, N.J., accuses Bank of America and two subsidiaries, LaSalle Bank and BAC Home Loans Servicing, of "an undisciplined rush to seize homes" through "pervasive and willful disregard of knowledge, facts and statutes."

Bank of America has filed foreclosure proceedings on many mortgages in New Jersey without holding the necessary rights as the mortgagee or assignee at the time of foreclosure, the suit says.

"Many thousands of foreclosures are plainly void under statute and settled New Jersey case law. Many borrowers never obtain statutorily required notices, and many foreclosure suits are filed entirely based in inaccurate recitations concerning ownership of the mortgage, the note, or the assignment," the suit says.

The suit was brought by Lawrence Friscia, head of a Newark firm that counsels distressed homeowners, and his associate, Jonathan Minkove, who say they’ve found that Bank of America regularly negotiates binding agreements to modify mortgage terms and then fails to honor the terms.
Fed’s ‘Pit Bull’ Takes on Bank of America in BuyBack Battle

Bloomberg reports Fed’s ‘Pit Bull’ Takes on Bank of America in BuyBack Battle

Kathy D. Patrick is a Houston lawyer who spends her Sundays teaching children about God. The rest of the week, according to one attorney who knows her, she can be “as frightening as a pit bull on steroids.”

Her law firm, Gibbs & Bruns LLP, is a 30-lawyer outfit that says it specializes in “bet the company” litigation. This month, it reached a settlement with JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Bank of Montreal stemming from an alleged fraud at a Canadian gold company. Earlier this year, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and UBS AG settled with the firm over the sale of $550 million in mortgage-backed securities. Patrick reached that settlement on behalf of her clients just two months after filing suit.

Patrick, 50, is “fearless and tenacious,” said Dan Cogdell, a Houston criminal-defense lawyer who said she is capable of pit bull-like aggressiveness “if the need be.” If she succeeds in getting Bank of America to settle, it may trigger more calls for buybacks in the $1.4 trillion market for so-called non-agency mortgage securities, which lack government backing.

Bank costs from repurchasing mortgages in such securities may total as much as $179.2 billion, including expenses related to suits against bond underwriters, Chris Gamaitoni, a Compass Point Research and Trading LLC analyst, estimated in August.

I knew they were exaggerating at GS. These things are only 83% vomit.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-21....
Strangely, I haven’t seen this piece before, I found it linked to LPS yahoo site, which is strangely up today…but it has so many good bits and pieces on the whole situation, nice write up on LPS operations...

“In 2002, an accountant in Boca Raton, Florida, named Joseph Lents was accused of securities-law violations by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Lents, who was chief executive officer of a now-defunct voice- recognition software company, had sold shares in the public company without filing the proper forms. Facing a little over $100,000 in fines and fees, and with his assets frozen by the SEC, Lents stopped making payments on his $1.5 million mortgage…”

No original note, no payments for 6 years (so far)!!!

It means 1 in 8 loans was done correctly Karl. Don't be a permabear.

And the other 7 need to be rammed up Blankfein's, Pandit's and the other's asses.

I'd like to believe what Gen is saying, but the only way I can is to believe this is being orchestrated. Why? I don't believe many of these investors are just now getting wise to what happened. We knew stuff was garbage. We knew enough to assume violation of reps and warranties. We knew of intentional misrepresentation. If we knew, many of the purchasers/insurers knew. So why do they sue know? How could BofA buy Countrywide b/c they surely knew?

I may be giving them more credit than they deserve, but I still believe they are a step ahead because they've always had inside information. Maybe a crash is imminent, but they're prepared. I don't think anything since 2004 has been an accident except some of the timing.

Thetruth, probably because the cash flow is drying up and it's moving up the tranches.

Quote:

And throw the unions under the bus? Ain't gonna happen.

I wouldn't be so sure, Karl...

So I was doing some digging on something else when i ran into this from 2009:

Original Plan

Paulson, with Bernanke’s support, originally sold the concept of the TARP to Congress as an asset-purchase program. The Treasury then switched to capital injections, investing $192 billion so far. Officials said it was faster to buy stakes in firms than design a process for buying investments at a time when confidence in the industry was collapsing.

I am almost to the conclusion that the reason they didn't buy these assets is because they knew back then that they were empty boxes. The liabilities to taxpayers would have been limitless if they purchased the assets. Leave the empty boxes at the banks and see if our fraud can fix the situation and if not....then worse case is the bank fails and we do damage control.

The mortgage disaster is a field of landmines. I can't understand why none of them have gone of yet? Are our capital markets so manipulated and controlled at this point that nothing can sink them? I can't fathom/ understand how the markets have continued their northward journey knowing what we know and whats been reported.

For God sakes we had a Citi whistle blower state 80% of the loan production that came across his desk in 2007 were fraudulent and nothing happens. The next day an analyst upgrades Citi. What planet am I living on? The guy admits fraud and no one gets arrested?

At this point there is nothing that will take these markets lower. Nothing matters. Fraud, crime, the law, stealing.....nothing matters anymore. I don't understand why and how these mortgage fraud revelations were swept under the rug. These banks and criminal bankers are getting away scot free and the markets will continue to grind higher.

Lawyers contribute a lot of money to the political establishment, they will get their turn to******and pillage off the stupidity in the system now. Pandit is going to permanently wear depends after the lawyers are done (sans Vaseline).

Deutsche Bank stock will probably go up tomorrow.

All these loans are going to bust, it is only a matter of time. That means 25% of each investor pool is assured in forcing putbacks. These deals are only a speed bump from default. When the 401k is exhausted from making house payments it goes boom. When the car craps out it goes boom. When taxes go up it goes boom. Food prices can be another boom. The high DTI's are certain fails going forward, incomes will not increase to bail this out.

We are probably 3 years out from 40% of all mortgages being underwater and still there will be a huge backlog of foreclosures.

The banks will not have the cash flow to withstand the onslaught of putbacks without huge capital raises. Maybe Bernanke can create enough money to fund the cash flow shortage that is on the horizon... I think the banks are going to need another trillion.

The reason all investor pools will be put back is because people like Bill Gross (and others) will be able to buy up the crap, turn around and sue for full money. This will probably be the new game for hedge funds, buying the cheap crap and forcing it down the throat of the banksters.

Hey, anyone know what judgement interest currently is? It used to be around 6% I think..

The fed or some unknown government entity has to be in full control of our capital markets. I'm convinced. I'm not a tin foil hat guy, but come on, how else can you explain this? I'm talking above and beyond our weekly POMO's. Something is very wrong here. I cannot believe this is unfolding and the markets are moving up on it. This is surreal. It's like we're dreaming. Total financial Twilight Zone.

No worries, it'll all be retroactively legal next month.