Financial Institutions

Folks in Washington tell me there is a general sense of “foreclosure fatigue” in our nation’s capital. It’s just so boring to keep thinking about all the people losing their homes year after year. Can’t we move on to something new? This attitude goes along with a failure to do anything meaningful to get out of the five-year-old mortgage crisis, still very much with us. More charitably, the people who would like to do something see no political opening in an election year.

The wheels of litigation move slowly, but there are a couple of recent securitization fail litigation decisions that are worthy of note. First, in the Congress case, a wrongful foreclosure action in Alabama (see my previous blogging on it here), the Alabama appellate court reversed and remanded, a victory for the homeowner.

Bloomberg has an editorial arguing that making banks boring won't prevent a crisis; only increasing bank capital will do so.  

A few quick thoughts and suggested readings on Chase's ever expanding losses from the Whale Trade.

First, if you have not been reading Lisa Pollack's Alphaville posts on this topic you really must.

Here's a plug for a conference on mobile payments that the FTC is hosting next week.  It will be webcast live.  The agenda is here.  I'm one of the speakers.