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Hidden Gems in the Mortgage Deal
Hidden Gems in the Mortgage Deal
Harold Meyerson
<...>
But the deal should be looked at as much for what it doesn’t do—for if it doesn’t even begin to provide adequate compensation for America’s beleaguered homeowners or former homeowners, neither does it preclude those homeowners from lawsuits of their own, or, more important, does it put an end to the civil and criminal liability of the banks for all they did to misrepresent mortgages both to homebuyers and investors in mortgage-backed securities.
Initially, the banks sought a release from all liability as a condition of signing on to the deal, and the administration did not push back against them. Several state attorneys general did—chiefly New York’s Schneiderman and Delaware’s Beau Biden, who had jurisdiction over the country’s biggest banks and insurance trusts, and California’s Harris and Nevada’s Catherine Masto, who represented the states with the highest incidence of foreclosures and the greatest drop in home values....During the two weeks that followed, negotiations on the settlement continued, and Schneiderman made it very clear he would continue new lines of investigation when he filed late last week against Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo, and MERS—the Mortgage Electronic Registration System, which the banks established to expedite mortgage securitization and into which the legal title to properties were fed, often never to be seen again. Coming on the eve of the deadline for a settlement, the lawsuit drove the banks to paroxysms of fury—but facing the prospect that the deal would not include New York’s attorney general, the banks blinked. Schneiderman’s suit can proceed unimpeded by the settlement, and the joint task force’s work continues apace.
California’s Harris, too, won an agreement that enables her office’s sizable investigative unit to go after misdeeds in mortgage origination and packaging—including, under the terms of the California Fair Housing Act, the provision of subprime mortgages and other forms of predatory lending to particular classes of homebuyers. But with vastly more homes underwater than in any other state, her other chief concern was the size of the settlement. Last September, she withdrew from the negotiations because the banks' offer—at that time, roughly $20 billion—was too low...For months, Harris declined to negotiate with the banks. About ten days ago, with the deadline for a settlement looming and in the wake of the administration’s commitment to set up the joint task force and to hold the banks liable for pre-crash offenses, her talks with the banks and the administration resumed. Roughly 300,000 of the million underwater homeowners who’ll be compensated by the banks live in California, and Harris secured roughly $12 billion for those California homeowners in principle write-downs, with the stipulation that the banks would be penalized if the process took longer than one year, and the further stipulation that the money would go first to the 12 California communities with the highest foreclosure rates—chiefly, Inland Empire cities like Riverside and San Bernardino, and Central Valley cities like Stockton and Merced, which have among the highest incidence of foreclosures in the nation.
In the division of labor on the coming investigation of bank abuses, Harris and Masto will likely take the lead on fraudulent and lax origination—more of which took place in their states than anywhere else—while Schneiderman, Biden, and the Feds focus more on the misrepresentation and fraudulent marketing of mortgage-backed securities and derivatives. The mansion of financial fraud has many rooms, and since Thursday’s deal did not seal them off, Harris, Schneiderman, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, and Company will be looking into them in the months to come.
http://prospect.org/article/hidden-gems-mortgage-deal
Harold Meyerson
<...>
But the deal should be looked at as much for what it doesn’t do—for if it doesn’t even begin to provide adequate compensation for America’s beleaguered homeowners or former homeowners, neither does it preclude those homeowners from lawsuits of their own, or, more important, does it put an end to the civil and criminal liability of the banks for all they did to misrepresent mortgages both to homebuyers and investors in mortgage-backed securities.
Initially, the banks sought a release from all liability as a condition of signing on to the deal, and the administration did not push back against them. Several state attorneys general did—chiefly New York’s Schneiderman and Delaware’s Beau Biden, who had jurisdiction over the country’s biggest banks and insurance trusts, and California’s Harris and Nevada’s Catherine Masto, who represented the states with the highest incidence of foreclosures and the greatest drop in home values....During the two weeks that followed, negotiations on the settlement continued, and Schneiderman made it very clear he would continue new lines of investigation when he filed late last week against Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo, and MERS—the Mortgage Electronic Registration System, which the banks established to expedite mortgage securitization and into which the legal title to properties were fed, often never to be seen again. Coming on the eve of the deadline for a settlement, the lawsuit drove the banks to paroxysms of fury—but facing the prospect that the deal would not include New York’s attorney general, the banks blinked. Schneiderman’s suit can proceed unimpeded by the settlement, and the joint task force’s work continues apace.
California’s Harris, too, won an agreement that enables her office’s sizable investigative unit to go after misdeeds in mortgage origination and packaging—including, under the terms of the California Fair Housing Act, the provision of subprime mortgages and other forms of predatory lending to particular classes of homebuyers. But with vastly more homes underwater than in any other state, her other chief concern was the size of the settlement. Last September, she withdrew from the negotiations because the banks' offer—at that time, roughly $20 billion—was too low...For months, Harris declined to negotiate with the banks. About ten days ago, with the deadline for a settlement looming and in the wake of the administration’s commitment to set up the joint task force and to hold the banks liable for pre-crash offenses, her talks with the banks and the administration resumed. Roughly 300,000 of the million underwater homeowners who’ll be compensated by the banks live in California, and Harris secured roughly $12 billion for those California homeowners in principle write-downs, with the stipulation that the banks would be penalized if the process took longer than one year, and the further stipulation that the money would go first to the 12 California communities with the highest foreclosure rates—chiefly, Inland Empire cities like Riverside and San Bernardino, and Central Valley cities like Stockton and Merced, which have among the highest incidence of foreclosures in the nation.
In the division of labor on the coming investigation of bank abuses, Harris and Masto will likely take the lead on fraudulent and lax origination—more of which took place in their states than anywhere else—while Schneiderman, Biden, and the Feds focus more on the misrepresentation and fraudulent marketing of mortgage-backed securities and derivatives. The mansion of financial fraud has many rooms, and since Thursday’s deal did not seal them off, Harris, Schneiderman, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, and Company will be looking into them in the months to come.
http://prospect.org/article/hidden-gems-mortgage-deal
More information:
Schneiderman: deal with banks a 'down payment'
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/ns/msnbc_tv-rachel_maddow_show/#46335427
After mortgage settlement, MERS left out in the cold
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002290415
Fact Sheet: Mortgage Servicing Settlement
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002289132
Company Faces Forgery Charges in Mo. Foreclosures
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002279081
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